Cathy Wells

Age: 28
Occupation: Government
Number of Cruises: 1
Cruise Line: Festival / First European
Ship: Azur
Itinerary: Eastern Mediterranean

We traveled on the 10-day cruise aboard the Festival Cruise Line Ship the M/S Azur in July 2003. I had looked up as many reviews on the ship as I could find and didn’t manage to find very many. Those that I did find were not very complementary about the cruise ship or its facilities. But the determining reason that we chose this cruise was for its itinerary and we prepared ourselves for the worst. The clientele is very European, we were the only Australian’s on board and there were only about 35 people that spoke English. The majority of passengers were German and French, then Italian and Spanish.

Itinerary

10 nights 11 days from Venice, to Dubrovnik Croatia, Olympia Greece, day at sea, Alexandria Egypt (see the pyramids), Cyprus, Antayla Turkey, Rhodes Greece, Athens Greece, transit Corinth Canal and another day at sea. A brilliant itinerary!

Embarkation

We live in Australia and booked the cruise online through Vacations to go. We opted to pick up our tickets at the port of embarkation. This worked fine although it meant that we didn’t have baggage tags for our luggage like all the other passengers. Therefore we had to check in first to confirm our room number before we could leave the check in building and walk to the luggage garage to check through our bags. At boarded at about 2.30 and were escorted to our cabin. Our luggage was waiting for us outside our room. We were one of the last groups of people to check in and board so we missed out on the Welcome lunch Buffet.
Our cabin

We had an I/S cabin (2040) in the middle of the ship on the second lowest deck. It was a double room with two single beds with a desk with drawers between the two beds. There was a cupboard, which was plenty big enough to store our baggage. The bathroom took up one corner of the cabin. The water pressure was good and our towels were replaced usually twice a day. Once in the morning and once while you are at dinner. The rooms do not have ice buckets, but if you ask for one then they will deliver one, and then you just need to ring up the stewards’ office to get it filled whenever you want.

The engine noise was quite loud and continuous the whole night, but we were prepared for this and took earplugs and airline facial sleeping masks. Our room was hot just about all the time, but this was probably because it was so hot outside, between 35-40 degrees every day.

The ship

The ship is old, and you can see that it has had several coats of paint over the old ones. The ship generally appeared clean to us, although it was always overcrowded. There are 2 pools which are refilled each day with clean filtered sea water, but be careful of laying or leaning on the blue pool surface, as the finish was always soft (like unset paint) and would rub off onto your skin. The lounge chairs were good, if you managed to get up early enough to get one.

There are a few lounges and a small casino on board, a gym – which only contained a few pieces of equipment. A cinema showed up to 4 movies a night in various languages.
The food and bars

Generally we found the food to be pretty good, although fellow American passengers found the food very disappointing compared to the larger Caribbean cruises that they had been on.

Breakfast was either the buffet by the pool or buffet in the main restaurant, we preferred the main restaurant because you could also order a-la-carte, although not many people realized this.

For lunch you also always had the choice of either buffet by the pool or the set a-la-carte main restaurant. Generally we always chose the main restaurant as you were always assured of getting a seat. The buffet near the pool was so crowded that you never got a seat. The only times that we got the buffet outside was on the two full days that were at sea, as we did not want to leave our sun chairs. So we filled our plates and took them up to the sun deck, which was great.

The dinners were all in the main restaurant with two dinner sittings, 6.30 and 8.30. We were in the early sitting. The meals were pretty good, always quite small meals, so you did find that you would have to have at least 4 courses. The only time that there weren’t the two dinner seatings was after we returned from the shore trip into Egypt. As it was about 8.30 – 9pm there was two buffets set up, one by the pool and the other in the restaurant.

Our assigned table at dinner was in a table of eight, with other couples from the UK and the US. The service from our waiters was good; they showed us some magic tricks and folded paper napkins for us. The wine waiter was good and the wines were very good prices. As my husband doesn’t drink my bottle was often resealed and back on the table the following night.

There was a midnight buffet every night on a different theme, however we didn’t make it to any of them. We did stay up to see the grand buffet, for which the first 15 mins is to just take photos, and it was quite spectacular with carved fruit animals and the like.
The ports of call

The prices for all the shore excursions were expensive. Some of the other passengers who were at our dinner table went and organized their own tours, but in my opinion, they didn’t get to see the range of things that we did together with the informative guides in our own language. For every port there were usually the choice of three shore excursions, understandably some had minimum numbers in each language and therefore some people had their chosen excursion cancelled.

Dubrovnik, Croatia, Arrives Noon, Departs 4:00pm – We chose not to go ashore in Dubrovnik, although the town and the area look beautiful.

Olympia (Katakolon), Greece, Arrives 1:30pm, Departs 7:00pm $39 Euro p/p– We went on the organised tour that took us to Olympia and Katakolon. Our tour was a join English/Italian tour so the guide had to repeat everything in both languages, which became tiresome. After about a 40-minute drive the bus first took us to a hotel at the very top of the hills over looking Olympia were there were refreshments. Next we went down to the ancient site of Olympia and then to the town of Olympia where we were able to do a quick walk around and a spot of shopping.

Cairo / Giza (Alexandria), Egypt, Arrives 7:00am, Departs 8:00pm $99 Euro p/p - Amazing shore excursion. Every single passenger on the ship went on the organised tour to Egypt. Those that had been planning to do it by themselves were warned not to and that it would be much safer to travel with the full group. The bus trip from Alexandria to Cairo took about 3 hours. We went straight to see the 3 main pyramids and also had the opportunity to go inside one of them. Next we went down to the sphinx. Then we went to a handicraft shop that showed us how the papyrus paper is made and were you can buy artwork on papyrus and tshirt with your name in hieroglyphics. Lunch was in a spectacular hotel right next to the pyramids, a truly 5 star place with a 5 star meal. After lunch we went to the Egyptian museum, then back by bus for 3 hours, a long day but worth every cent.

Limassol, Cyprus, Arrives 1:00pm, Departs 6:00pm – We chose to share a taxi into the old town with another couple from our dinner table. We walked around the shops and had a lovely time.

Antalya, Turkey, Arrives 8:00am, Departs 6:00pm $69 – We went the organised trip that took us to Perge, Side and Aspendos. Again lunch was at a great hotel, although it was very hot, but it was over 40 degrees outside. All the sites were very interesting and the tour guide was informative. The only down part of the tour was the end where they took us to a Turkish rug and jewellery shop where the sales people out numbered the clients two to one and the was very hard sales pressure put on you.

Rhodes, Greece, Arrives 8:00am, Departs 4:00pm – A beautiful island. The ship docks just outside the main entrance into the old town, which is behind a fortified wall. Very touristy with lots of shops. We walked back to the boat for lunch. After lunch we walked for about 10 minutes to the main beach, which was crowded but good fun, just watch the stones, there nothing like the sanding beaches we have in Australia.

Athens (Piraeus), Greece, Arrives 8:00am, Departs 1:00pm $49 Euro p/p – As we weren’t in port for very long we went on the organised tour. It took us around Piraeus up into Athens where we saw the old Olympic stadium, the changing of the guards and then up to the Acropolis.

Corinth Canal – the transit through the canal took place at around 2.30. It was a great atmosphere, but again was very crowded as everyone was out on the deck. There were lots of people of the roads that go over the top of the canal and even a bungee jumper that jumped off just as the ship was going through.

Overall conclusion

I think most of the reviews I have read about the Azur have been written by travelers that have experienced the true 5 star cruise liners that sail around the Caribbean. As this was our first ever cruise, we had nothing to compare it to, also having read a number of very poor reviews we were prepared for the worst. So overall we found it to be a very enjoyable experience.

Itinerary: excellent – 5 star, the pyramids are truly awesome and no other ships stops in Egypt
Food: good – 4 stars,
Ship: average – 2 stars, not the ship to go on if you want the cruise ship experience.
Service: good, 3 Stars, staff happy to do anything for you, but you have to ask first.

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