May 26, 2010--5/26/2010 10 Night Mediterranean

[jocjarmom]

Yes but can we all DIY's meet up to walk together? I am particularly keen on the Cinque de terre one especially, perhaps we meet somewhere on day?
Tracey

This is why I set up all of the events for each day on the FB page. I hope everybody who is planning to do DIY in each of the ports will sign up.

There is also a wall on these pages, so people can say, "okay, let's all plan to meet at 8:00 a.m. at the Registration desk, and then we'll all go and do this..." or something like that.

My family is only doing DIY in Ajaccio. Ironically, as the admin for the FB page, I had to set up the events, even though I'm only attending one of them.

 

[Kiss-im-mee2]

Yes but can we all DIY's meet up to walk together? I am particularly keen on the Cinque de terre one especially, perhaps we meet somewhere on day?
Tracey

For Cinque Terre We can all meet at sidewalk outside the tender dock at 9:15 and walk to the train station. There is a pretty long tender ride so I would plan to leave the ship at 8:30. The train leaves at 10 and everyone needs to purchase a CT card from the National park office along track one. DH and I are planning to walk the last trail which we haven't done yet. It is the most difficult and can be very narrow. We will check at the park office to make sure it is open and in good shape. For those of you that have never been I would recomend the first two trails unless you are avid hikers. We should all get together before we get to La Spezia so I can give you some tips.

Even though we do most of the ports on our own we will be doing a ship excurision in Tunis. There is very little info on this port and I have read that most of the people don't speak English. It is also a shorter port time so it would be very difficult to do what we want and be back at the ship early. The excurisions are a reasonable price at this port.

 

[ingreece]

Eileen,
Thanks! I wrote this all down. I'm looking forward to joining you.
Jennifer

 

[NHdisneylover]

I just thought I would throw out this idea: I ordered the Magic Treeehouse Reseach GUide to Anceint Rome and Pompeii to give us all a quick and easy overview of the history of the area. It is a nonfiction guide written by the same people who do the Maric Treehouse books and it is aimed at about a 2nd to 4th grade reading level. even though my kids are past that level, I thought jsut something simple to make sure we all have a good basic understanding of the history of hte area nad what we are seeing would be fun. I honestly have not read it yet--we plan to read it aloud on the train going to Salzburg in two weeks, but flipping through it it looks worthwhile. It might make good flight readinging material for some of you crossing the Atlantic with kids.

BTW--Tracey, I tried to respond to your PM and got a message that you cannot accept PMs We are taking the Medina&Carthage half day tour in Tunis. It would be fun to have you along. Rio owuld love having Luke there. He really liked talking to luke on Skype and wanted to do it again the next day I'm sorry Rio kept monopolizing the conversation though.

 

[Dgentrysim]

jennifer (ingreece)....thanks for the information on Tom Ogg's eportreviews! I just read all his DIY reports on each one of the ports we are going on. My husband and I are rethinking some of the excursions we've signed up for and thinking about taking some of the DIY tours they are trying to get together on the DIS. The reports were great! I especially liked the one on Rome...made me feel like we could see all the things we wanted especially with the extra hours we'd have if we take the DIY tours that jocjarmom has written about. We are the type that like to explore on our own...so these tours may be right up our alley!

I look forward to meeting you and others who I've seen here on the disboards! Should be loads of fun!

Have a magical day!

DisneyDeb

 

[ingreece]

Hi DisneyDeb,
You're welcome! I felt terrible after telling you that the Vatican Museum was closed on Mondays. Well, it happens to be closed the Monday after Easter (Pasquetta) and that is the day we will be there next. We're taking a RCCL cruise April 3-10 before the Disney cruise. So, anyway- sorry for that wrong info but I'm glad you liked the site. I also bought a book called European Ports of Call by Fodor's with helpful info for DIY tours.
Looking forward to meeting you too.
Oh, and today I found half of my Fish Extender gifts in Athens! I'm so excited to give them out.
Jennifer

 

[Dgentrysim]

jennifer......you are lucky you have found a lot of your fish extender gifts! I'm picking some of here and there....we're in the group that isn't quite full....last I heard was all adults, no children yet. I'm making some of my gifts, cute ideas on disboards! I'm so excited about this....never done the FE....almost like Tinker Bell is visiting you each day! lol

I've learned about the DIY reports by Tom Coggs (not sure if this is exactly his name) and really enjoyed reading them. I'll have to check out the one you are talking about....I do like Fodors and I like Frommers.....they give good advice & suggestions.

I'm in the process of getting my FE made. Can't wait to get it! One of the ladies (that makes the FE's) everyone has been talking about that they found on ebay actually lives not too far away from me. She is making mine.
The ones I've seen that she does are beautiful!

Enjoy the rest of your day!

DisneyDeb

 

[jocjarmom]

For Cinque Terre We can all meet at sidewalk outside the tender dock at 9:15 and walk to the train station. There is a pretty long tender ride so I would plan to leave the ship at 8:30. The train leaves at 10 and everyone needs to purchase a CT card from the National park office along track one. DH and I are planning to walk the last trail which we haven't done yet. It is the most difficult and can be very narrow. We will check at the park office to make sure it is open and in good shape. For those of you that have never been I would recomend the first two trails unless you are avid hikers. We should all get together before we get to La Spezia so I can give you some tips.

Even though we do most of the ports on our own we will be doing a ship excurision in Tunis. There is very little info on this port and I have read that most of the people don't speak English. It is also a shorter port time so it would be very difficult to do what we want and be back at the ship early. The excurisions are a reasonable price at this port.

Eileen, you should (a) sign up for the FB LaSpezia event, and (b) put this info on the wall for LaSpezia. That will be VERY helpful!

 

[Kiss-im-mee2]

Eileen, you should (a) sign up for the FB LaSpezia event, and (b) put this info on the wall for LaSpezia. That will be VERY helpful!

I put our plan on the event wall and also posted a very good link for a discription of the villages. This is the info we used our first time to CT. The person who wrote this report left from Livorno and had to take the train to La Spezia. Our first time to CT we also left from Livorno and I would have never been brave enough to attempt this trip except for the great instructions in this report.

http://www.ftroute.com/ITCR/livorno1.cfm

 

[threebritts]

I just got an e-mail telling me the cafe press link wasn't working I checked it and the site seems to be working fine here is the link http://www.cafepress.com/medcruise

 

[jocjarmom]

jennifer......you are lucky you have found a lot of your fish extender gifts! I'm picking some of here and there....we're in the group that isn't quite full....last I heard was all adults, no children yet. I'm making some of my gifts, cute ideas on disboards! I'm so excited about this....never done the FE....almost like Tinker Bell is visiting you each day! lol

I'm in the process of getting my FE made. Can't wait to get it! One of the ladies (that makes the FE's) everyone has been talking about that they found on ebay actually lives not too far away from me. She is making mine.
The ones I've seen that she does are beautiful!

Enjoy the rest of your day!

DisneyDeb

Hi Deb,

Just wanted to tell you that you're no longer a "just adults" group. So far, we've got 2 families with kids, and room for 3 more families. Once they are full, I can send out the info.

Karen

 

[Dgentrysim]

Karen....thanks so much for the update! I'm glad we have kids in our group! They are so much fun to shop around for. Thank you for all your hard work in putting this together. Should be lots of fun!

Have a wonderful week-end!

DisneyDeb

 

[KLS Georgia]

I just thought I would throw out this idea: I ordered the Magic Treeehouse Reseach GUide to Anceint Rome and Pompeii to give us all a quick and easy overview of the history of the area. It is a nonfiction guide written by the same people who do the Maric Treehouse books and it is aimed at about a 2nd to 4th grade reading level. even though my kids are past that level, I thought jsut something simple to make sure we all have a good basic understanding of the history of hte area nad what we are seeing would be fun. I honestly have not read it yet--we plan to read it aloud on the train going to Salzburg in two weeks, but flipping through it it looks worthwhile. It might make good flight readinging material for some of you crossing the Atlantic with kids.

BTW--Tracey, I tried to respond to your PM and got a message that you cannot accept PMs We are taking the Medina&Carthage half day tour in Tunis. It would be fun to have you along. Rio owuld love having Luke there. He really liked talking to luke on Skype and wanted to do it again the next day I'm sorry Rio kept monopolizing the conversation though.

We bought that book, along with a couple others for the kids over the winter holiday, with the same idea. I have to say I thought it was a pretty good book for them - plus I really didn't find many others like it to expose the kids to so much of what they were going to be seeing in Europe. The kids enjoyed it and my older son is now reading it to our youngest, and she is enjoying it too. It has definitely increased their interest.

 

[battricia]

Hi! I just booked this cruise for my SO and I! We are very excited!!!

Can anyone tell me a good hotel to stay in the night before and after the cruise? Hopefully something not too expensive, and maybe close to port, or easily accessible? Also, the best way to get from airport to hotel, hotel to port, port to hotel, hotel to airport Will it be hard to get around barcelona if we don't speak spanish?

Any other useful info would be great! This is only our 2nd cruise (last cruise was last may, dcl western caribbean). I will be checking out the library for books this week.

 

[KLS Georgia]

Hi! I just booked this cruise for my SO and I! We are very excited!!!

Can anyone tell me a good hotel to stay in the night before and after the cruise? Hopefully something not too expensive, and maybe close to port, or easily accessible? Also, the best way to get from airport to hotel, hotel to port, port to hotel, hotel to airport Will it be hard to get around barcelona if we don't speak spanish?

Any other useful info would be great! This is only our 2nd cruise (last cruise was last may, dcl western caribbean). I will be checking out the library for books this week.

Welcome aboard. A lot of folks are staying at the new Novatel in Barcelona. Join us on our facebook page http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=277870927901

and check out our website
http://muchomagico.weebly.com

for more info and meeting new cruise friends.
Karen

 

[Kiss-im-mee2]

Welcome battricia, glad to have you with us. We usually stay at the hotel Contental which is in the heart of everything close to Placa Catalunya and on La Rambles. The easiest way to get to hotel and port is a taxi. However DH and I don't care for taxis so we take the airport shuttle to placa Catalunya and walk to our hotel. We also walk down La Rambles with our luggage to the port shuttle and take it to the ship. You won't have any problem in Barcelona if you don't speak any Spanish.

Karen already gave you the two important links for our cruise but here is one more. This is a link to the Med ports of call board where you can learn all about cruising in the Med. My best advice is to start reading!!! Go back some pages on this roll call and and learn something about us.

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/forumdisplay.php?f=19

 

[battricia]

one other question, is it typical on med. cruises that second dining would book faster than 'main' dining? On our caribbean cruise it was the main dining that got filled up quickly, which worked well for us, we preferred second dining, but as per dcl website we seem to be 'stuck' with main dining. Do you think it will be possible to switch this? We're only 2 adults. Should I try to call them to see?

Thanks!

 

[sinnika]

one other question, is it typical on med. cruises that second dining would book faster than 'main' dining? On our caribbean cruise it was the main dining that got filled up quickly, which worked well for us, we preferred second dining, but as per dcl website we seem to be 'stuck' with main dining. Do you think it will be possible to switch this? We're only 2 adults. Should I try to call them to see?

Thanks!

Not sure if the 2nd dining filled before the 1st dining in 2007 Med cruises, but there are less children than you would find on the caribbean cruises and those with younger children especially often choose first. You can request to be wait listed now, and if you don't get assigned 2nd dining by cruise time, see if you can switch it as soon as you board. With the late ports, many are choosing late dining, although not everyone likes to eat that late.

And BTW, welcome!

 

[jocjarmom]

Hi all,

Just wanted to tell you, we only need one more family to complete our 4th Fish Extender group! Please let me know if there is anybody else who wants to sign up. Thank you!

Karen

 

[NHdisneylover]

We bought that book, along with a couple others for the kids over the winter holiday, with the same idea. I have to say I thought it was a pretty good book for them - plus I really didn't find many others like it to expose the kids to so much of what they were going to be seeing in Europe. The kids enjoyed it and my older son is now reading it to our youngest, and she is enjoying it too. It has definitely increased their interest.

I am glad to hear it is good. We have not read it yet.