Another port of call - Santorini

So having made Santorini, some 30 years after I originally should have gone, I thought I'd write a port review.

Santorini Panorama - 12th September 2011

You can just see the donkeys in the bottom left corner starting their perilous journey back down to sea level!

Why read my review of the Queen Victoria cruise, with some more photo's of Santorini

Now the touristy bits...

SANTORINI, also called Thera or Thira, lies to the south of the central Cyclades group of Greek islands. It is considered the hottest holiday spot in the Cyclades in more ways than one. Born in a massive volcanic eruption, fumes still rise offshore.

Santorini satisfies the up-market end of the Greek island holidays market with many luxury hotels, and cruise ships bring holiday visitors ready to gasp at the romantic sunset skies, and turn on to the island's hot nightclubs.

Spectacular is a word that applies more to Santorini than most. Visitors sailing into the flooded caldera are greeted by dizzying cliffs with dazzling white villages plastered like dollops of cream on the sky-hugging rim. An island of extraordinary contrasts, Santorini can be both breathtakingly beautiful and deeply unattractive. The sheer cliffs of red and black can feel intimidating and the black volcanic sands hold the heat. White cube houses and blue dome churches tumble attractively down the cliffsides but streets are full of expensive cafes, trendy shops and near nightmare swarms of tourists.

There are a couple of ways to get to the village, either walk or take the donkey - not my idea of a good time; use the chair lift, queues permitting or take a cruise line excursion which take you to a low lying port and so missing out on the queues or hike!

As you can see from my photo, it is a tender from the ship to the land and these are run by the locals, so no need to lower the lifeboats. Later on that day an MSC ship also came into the bay, a very busy time!

Its a lovely place, and certainly lived up to my expectations but it does get very busy and smelly with all the donkeys going up or down the paths!

My Cruise on Queen Victoria to the Greek Isles and Aegean Treasures - part 2 the Ship

I recently wrote about the itinerary in my last blog, please read, so I thought I'd now talk about the ship and experience on board.

I have been lucky enough to sail on Queen Mary 2 and saw Queen Elizabeth when she was launched in Southampton, so I was really looking forward to spending a pleasant cruise on QV.

My first view was that she is intrinsically the same ship as the Queen Elizabeth, far smaller than QM2 and more of a cruise ship than an Ocean liner but this does not comprise on space and I never felt as though she was full to overflowing even though she had been fully sold out.

The public spaces are well appointed and maintained, and throughout the cruise I did not find it difficult to find a seat in any of the bars, lounges or the nightclub, Hemispheres when I went to them. In fact the staff were scrambling to serve you to have something to do in the Golden Lion, great for a traditional pub lunch though, and with draft Guinness!

Grand Lobby

Golden Lion

Champagne Bar

Food and service on board was I thought excellent, I heard of people saying the service was not up to scratch, but it does depend on the waiter and I found that everything was at a standard that I was very happy with. In fact we had a bonus on the table front, Table 396 deck 2, right at the back with an excellent view through the windows, perfect.

There is speciality dining in Todd English, and they do an alternative dinning in the Lido and it is disappointing that since my last Cunard cruise they have started to charge a supplement for the alternative dining. However, they have just moved the 'Taste of India' from the Lido to the Todd English - charge has doubled for this from $10 to $20pp - but I have to say the food and service was excellent.

I don't usually take pictures of food, but this is the starter.

The cabisn are no different in size to those on Queen Elizabeth, but how much time do you really spend in the cabin. So for 12 nights it was just perfect, one day I will go for a Grills just to see how the other half live!

Overall, this was an excellent cruise. The itinerary was just perfect and went to the places we wanted, the weather which was in the late 20's everyday, except the rain in Dubrovnik, added to an excellent experience onboard - all in all the perfect atmosphere to book another cruise especially as we are now Gold Cunard World Club Members.

Rain in Dubrovnik, but it went in 20 minutes

But the offers on board this time were not as good as last year, my credit card bill last week was just £3 after the on board spend we had for the cruise, so I think I'm going to sit and wait and see what happens to the price of the Queen Elizabeth cruise we want to do.

As I say, its the overall cost when you get off that you have to look at.

My Cruise on Queen Victoria to the Greek Isles and Aegean Treasures - part 1 the itinerary

I thought that for this cruise I'd do my review of this Queen Victoria sailing in 2 parts, firstly the destinations and then the ship - partly because for me the decision to go was based on the itinerary, places I've always wanted to go to or been to and wanted to go back.

So, we started on 9th September in Rome not that you see anything just the hour drive from the airport to Civitavecchia and departed that evening for Naples.

Naples has a reputation, and I was a little concerned but we took a taxi to part of the Old Town and then walked along the narrow streets back to the ship. Now we Italy, so this was an excellent day but you do get to see some strange groups of people!

From Naples we headed after a day at sea to Santorini, 30 years ago I had a holiday booked for this beautiful island, but for 1 reason or another we could not go so we were really looking forward to this stop, and it did not disappoint.

The island of Santorini is the rim of an old volcano, and the ships anchor in the caldera and you are tendered to the port. There are 3 ways to the town, cable car, donkey or by foot, for me you need to take the cable car but watch for the queues, on the day we were there there were 6 cruise ships in and the queues were long and it was very hot so walking was a really bad choice!

From here we headed to Izmir for Ephesus, a historic ancient city although the day we visited I think everybody in Turkey was also there! At least I can say I've been to Asia, as this site is in the Asian side of Turkey.

Then for me one of the highlights, the sailing into Istanbul where we had an overnight stay, and it was great to get off ship in the evening and walk around the restaurants and some shops taking in the sounds and smells.

The picture below is taken from the balcony of the cabin and has the minaret's of the Blue Mosque and St Sophia's on the headland as well as Topkapi Palace.

Then there is the Grand Bazaar, don't forget your credit card! They say that there are 5 miles of passageways and thousands of stalls, I did not try to check but this is an amazing place.

After this stop in Istanbul, the ship sailed for Samos, Athens and Zakynthos- typically Greek with gorgeous weather in fact on 1 day the mid afternoon temperature was over 100 and the pool was a welcome cooling point.

From there we headed to Dubrovnik, a new place for us and one were looking forward to, especially as for a couple of years in was regularly in the news in the 1990's about the conflicts in the area.

It is a walled city and there was a courtesy coach from the ship to the town, this was the only day that the weather was inclement and we got caught in a storm on the wall, but found shelter and then a bar, well I have to get refreshments!

I have to say that we loved this port, and it is somewhere that I will go back to and may even do a land holiday here.

This was towards the end of the cruise and the last port of call was Venice, a city we visited about 6 years ago but only for a day. I had spent ages making sure we had a cabin on the correct side of the ship for the sail in especially as we had 2 full days in the port, however Cunard changed the itinerary and the sail into Venice was mid morning - I was not disappointed.

OK, if you stop on St Marks Square to get a drink or something to eat it is expensive a tea and coffee with the music was 30 Euros, but head off down the side streets and alleyways and you will stumble across so little cafes and bars which make a place like this.

After 12 nights we had to come home you can read my thoughts on the flights at A Tale of 2 Airlines, if I could have stowed away to do it again I would have done! This to me was one of the best itineraries that I have seen and I would happily do this trip again.

Part 2 about the ship will follow in due course.