Tianni
Tianni Rowley,
- Joined
- Jun 16, 2013
- Messages
- 68
Hello all!
I thought I'd start this now to share the plans for our cruise next year. To say that I am excited is the understatement of the century! I am as excited as I was when the Saints won the Super Bowl! Who DAT!!!
So, we booked on our last cruise on the Fantasy this past May. We were torn between Alaska and the Mediterranean but opted for Europe because DH and DS probably couldn't do 3 days at sea in a row. That and it was about the same price and the airfare was actually more expensive to get on the boat to Alaska then to get to Barcelona.
So.... We started planning... In July...
We began by canceling our cruise we had planned on CC out of NOLA where we are from because we couldn't stop focusing on Europe! So, we started pricing airfare and decided to book as soon as we could and boy am I glad we did. We priced and priced and finally came up with Delta is just as stupid as they have always been and booked through United with it being about 300$ cheaper per person on United!
We also discovered that it was actually cheaper to make an extra stop in Dublin for a night and pay for a hotel (with Hilton Honors points) than it was to fly in directly to Barca.... And we are staying in Barcelona 2 extra days, flying home on Monday because again, it was cheaper to pay for a hotel than to fly back Sunday. By... Get this. $400 a person! So we are stopping in Dublin for a night to check out this little village called Malahide village And we will be staying in Barcelona Saturday and Sunday. Flying into Dublin on the 29th and we will have all day as our flight gets in at 7ish.
So, the Friday before the cruise (the 30th) we will fly into Barca and stay at the Hilton Barcelona hotel (not the one connected with DCL. They wanted about 400$ a room and since we have 4 people we need 2 rooms).
So, finally we have that situated and we can start looking at excursions. We have been following all do the trip reports and found a REALLY good one, "bringing the magic to Venice". It's written by a high school junior and it is wonderful! She gives tons of tricks and tons of information.
We decided to book a private tour of Rome, it's expensive $480 a person for 4 people, through a friend of ours who is a travel agent. (Boats 2 beaches) and Walt is wonderful! We also found out this week that the pope WILL be in Rome that say so the Vatican and st Petersburg basilica will be closed in the morning, and having the private tour will allow us to do the coliseum first and the Vatican afterwards. This tour is 10 hours so we have opted for shorter tours is Villefranche, Naples and Florence. DS will be 11 and I'm afraid he'll just get too tired. So we will make sure to so the car museum and we will not hike!
So we will continue the planning from here! Can't wait!
I thought I'd start this now to share the plans for our cruise next year. To say that I am excited is the understatement of the century! I am as excited as I was when the Saints won the Super Bowl! Who DAT!!!
So, we booked on our last cruise on the Fantasy this past May. We were torn between Alaska and the Mediterranean but opted for Europe because DH and DS probably couldn't do 3 days at sea in a row. That and it was about the same price and the airfare was actually more expensive to get on the boat to Alaska then to get to Barcelona.
So.... We started planning... In July...
We began by canceling our cruise we had planned on CC out of NOLA where we are from because we couldn't stop focusing on Europe! So, we started pricing airfare and decided to book as soon as we could and boy am I glad we did. We priced and priced and finally came up with Delta is just as stupid as they have always been and booked through United with it being about 300$ cheaper per person on United!
We also discovered that it was actually cheaper to make an extra stop in Dublin for a night and pay for a hotel (with Hilton Honors points) than it was to fly in directly to Barca.... And we are staying in Barcelona 2 extra days, flying home on Monday because again, it was cheaper to pay for a hotel than to fly back Sunday. By... Get this. $400 a person! So we are stopping in Dublin for a night to check out this little village called Malahide village And we will be staying in Barcelona Saturday and Sunday. Flying into Dublin on the 29th and we will have all day as our flight gets in at 7ish.
So, the Friday before the cruise (the 30th) we will fly into Barca and stay at the Hilton Barcelona hotel (not the one connected with DCL. They wanted about 400$ a room and since we have 4 people we need 2 rooms).
So, finally we have that situated and we can start looking at excursions. We have been following all do the trip reports and found a REALLY good one, "bringing the magic to Venice". It's written by a high school junior and it is wonderful! She gives tons of tricks and tons of information.
We decided to book a private tour of Rome, it's expensive $480 a person for 4 people, through a friend of ours who is a travel agent. (Boats 2 beaches) and Walt is wonderful! We also found out this week that the pope WILL be in Rome that say so the Vatican and st Petersburg basilica will be closed in the morning, and having the private tour will allow us to do the coliseum first and the Vatican afterwards. This tour is 10 hours so we have opted for shorter tours is Villefranche, Naples and Florence. DS will be 11 and I'm afraid he'll just get too tired. So we will make sure to so the car museum and we will not hike!
So we will continue the planning from here! Can't wait!
