Cruise Ship: Noordam
Cruise Destination: Eastern Mediterranean
Cruise Dates: July 8 - July 18, 2009
Guest Contributor: Ray Niacaris
This was our second cruise; the first was with the Carnival Elation to the Mexican Riviera.
Time in Rome - Prior to Boarding the Noordam
We decided to spend a few days in Rome prior to our cruise, which left from Civitavecchia. We stayed at the Michelangelo Hotel, which is right behind St. Peter's Basilica. The first thing you will notice is how much ground you can cover on foot. When you look at maps it appears the city is very spread out, but this is not the case. The streets are very narrow and the city itself is quite compact. You do not want to drive a rental car in Rome. Just walking is suicide, and parking and/or driving would be a nightmare. Instead, use the metro. It is very convenient to all the sites and the purchase of a 3 day Roma Pass is well worth the cost. We used the Rick Steve's guide book and maps and found them extremely helpful with great maps. There are very few street signs to find your bearings. When they are marked, look for them cast into the side of a building on a corner.
Michelangelo Hotel--Bring a multi-tap or outlet strip with you. Hotels and for that matter the ship do not have enough outlets for all the chargers, laptop, etc. that you will need. Both our hotel rooms had one usable outlet. Make sure you bring the in- line 3 pin euro adapter as well. We were worried about this hotel as it seemed very cheap and there were very mixed reviews on the Internet. However, this turned out to be a great hotel. Maybe it is dependent on what room you get. Ours was great, very clean, with a great view and a superb bathroom. For reference our room number was 118.
Favorite restaurant--We had a great meal at Alfredo's. This was the famous place where Fettuccine Alfredo was supposedly invented, and we ordered it. It was fantastic tasting. The place is not easy to find. Again, we were on foot and the lack of street signs got us going in circles. Also, by the U.S. standards, streets are more like sidewalks or alleys and Alfredo's was tucked away in one of these "alley" streets. However, it was well worth the effort to find it once we got there.
Roman Sites--The guide books do not lie about crowds and lines. However, we accidently got to St. Peters at just the right time, about 3:00 PM on a Sunday afternoon. We literally walked into the church without any lines and were amazed the next day when we saw a line that stretched around the square. We used the free MP3 recordings from Rick Steve's web site for the major Roman attractions. They were great and very informative. I especially like the way he made each topic at the site like a song (track). That way you could create a play list for, say the Sistine Chapel, and change the order if you wanted to. Can't say enough about how well these worked for us.
Time to go to the Noordam
The port of Civitavecchia is about 35 miles from the heart of Rome. Airport transfers cost a fortune, and you are stuck on a bus for an hour or more. We took a taxi to the Termini train station, and took the train to the port. The fare for the train was 9 Euros each, which is considerably cheaper. The stop is at the port, and there are handy taxis to take you to the ship. (You can usually share these with other cruisers and split the cost).
Boarding and Disembarking
This is handled very efficiently by Holland America, especially if you pre-register online ahead of schedule. They really know what they are doing, and if you just follow their lead, you and your luggage will arrive on the ship with very little stress.
Staterooms
We had a Veranda suite. We had actually booked a Veranda balcony, and a week before the cruise, we were asked if we wanted to upgrade to a suite for $200. each. This was well worth the cost. The cabin and bath are very spacious and well appointed. We spent most of the time in the room on the balcony, and I doubt if we would ever cruise again without having one. They are very private and furnished with wicker chairs and tables. We were on the upper Veranda deck, and we often went to the Lido restaurant to bring food and drinks to the room. You could use room service for this, but we never did. We could get what we wanted when we wanted it and it was very little effort.
(Major tip) Pack a length of sturdy line or rope, (not string) about 15 feet or so. This sounds useless, but we used quite a bit. First, it was a clothes line to dry out the sweaty clothes from the day. We also wanted to hear the waves at night and the narration on the TV as we passed various sites. There is no way to do this with the self-closing balcony door. With the rope, you can tie the balcony door open and hear the narration and the waves at night. We could never just shut off the air conditioning. Either it was on or the heat was on. This way we could keep the cabin very comfortable.
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