We got an awesome deal on the MSC Preziosa and only have 19 days left until we get onboard. I’m so excited and just got my tickets delivered to my email yesterday. This is a budget cruise, no super expensive excursions, hoping for some lazy beach days, and no drink packages this go around.
Here’s our awesome itinerary over 15 nights (including an overnight in Rotterdam)!
Here’s a quick overview of my plans. In case you didn’t know, I’m incapable of at least making basic plans.
1. Southampton, England- Park, Sleep, Cruise deal at Holiday Inn next to to the port night prior. Maybe we will hit up IKEA and I saw there’s a Build a Bear for B.
2. St. Peter Port, Guernsey- £1 bus maybe or just wander the town.
3. Brest, France- Oceanopolis. This aquarium gets great reviews and I’m sure the kids will have a lot of fun.
4. Lisbon, Portugal- I booked a tour specifically for cruise ship passengers through We Hate Tourism. http://www.wehatetourismtours.com The tour is called ‘Pirates of the Cruise Ships’.
5. Cadiz, Spain- Hoping for warm weather and some beach time!
6. Malaga, Spain- Crossing fingers for two days in a row of warm weather and some beach time.
7. La Coruna, Spain- I booked a tour with Cruising Excursions to Santiago de Compostela, a famous church nearby. I honestly couldn’t find anything else I liked and have read lots of stories of MSC canceling their own excursions and didn’t want to take the risk. I am slightly worried because it says 6 hours and that would place us getting back right when the ship leaves. We’re the only ship in port so I’m sure they’ll adapt it though. http://www.cruisingexcursions.com
8. Rotterdam, Netherlands- I precooked tickets online to Keukenhof to see the famous tulips. Hopefully it won’t be too late. I’m planning to take the train to the airport and then use the shuttle and ticket combo I booked directly through Keukenhof. https://keukenhof.nl/en/
9. Hamburg, Germany- This is the one port that I don’t really have a solid idea of what I want to do. I saw that there’s an s-bahn station near the dock which I will probably take into the center. I’m also considering doing one of the free walking tours with Sandemans. https://www.neweuropetours.eu I really like wandering port towns so will probably do a lot of that.
10. Le Havre, France- This port is one that is often used to get into Paris, but since we have a week planned this summer and the kids have gone already for a day recently I’m not up for the long journey in. Also decided not to do Mont Saint-Michel because it would just be too long a day for the kids. Would rather just plan a week in Normandy. So I booked a bus tour to Honfleur with Bee Le Havre. They have great reviews on Trip Advisor and are about 1/3 of the price of everything else I found including private taxi to Honfleur. https://beelehavre.com/le-havre-honfleur-tour.html
I know that’s a lot but it sums up our trip. The kids are really looking forward to just hanging on the ship and at the pool. This ship again has an indoor pool for cooler days but also lots of outdoor water play areas including a huge water slide. Luckily our port days aren’t too packed for the most part so will have time while in port also to explore some of these areas!
Jaunting Around The World 