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Top 11 Mediterranean Cruise Tips
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Jan 29, 2025
Discover the 11 secrets and tips on having an incredible Mediterranean Cruise. Drawing on my experiences from cruising the Mediterranean, these are the 11 essential and important things you need to know before you book and go. I explore topics like best time to go, main itineraries, best ports to sail in and out of, cruises lines and ships to consider, excursions, currency and getting the most of your time in the Mediterranean region. It is a gorgeous and interesting part of the world and the second biggest cruising destination in the world (after the Caribbean). Book your Mediterranean cruise and support Tips For Travellers with Cruise Direct, who offer all the best deals for the region across all cruise lines: http://www.tipsfortravellers.com/cruisedirect I would love you to give the video a "thumbs up" and if you subscribed to the channel. Every week Gary Bembridge's Tips For Travellers Channel posts a video to help you make the most of your precious travel time and money on both land and at sea. First-hand travel inspiration, advice and tips based on the over 20 years I have been travelling every month. Follow me on these social media platforms: - YouTube: http://bit.ly/TFT_YouTube2 - Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/tipsfortravellers - Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/tipsfortravellers - Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/garybembridge
View Video Transcript
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I'm Gary Bembridge of Tips for Travelers. I'm going to give you 11 things that you absolutely need to know to make sure you have an incredible Mediterranean cruise
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First of all, when to go. Now the peak season for Mediterranean cruises is from April to October. And of course, the big, big season is July and August
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That's when it gets really hot and really expensive. So a really good time if you can, if you can avoid the school holidays, is to go at the beginning of the season. So May, June time
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and that's sort of September time, that's when you normally have great weather and it's much
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less crowded. There are six key ports where most Mediterranean cruises depart from
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Barcelona, Venice, Genoa, Chiviche, which is near Rome, Southampton and Athens. Mostly Mediterranean cruisers will leave from those big six embarkation and disembarkation ports
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Now one key tip that I have is focus on the ports that actually are within the Mediterranean
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because that means that from the day that you start your cruise, you're in the Mediterranean
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and there's no transit time and no lost time. Now you have five broad Mediterranean cruises to choose from
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First of all, you have the central Mediterranean cruises. They tend to be about a week long and they largely do a circular route within the heart of the Mediterranean
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So I visit places like southern France, parts of Italy, the Balearic Islands, Sicily, Malta
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and of course parts of Spain like Barcelona. The second itinerary and a very popular itinery is the Eastern Mediterranean
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These tend to go from the beautiful city of Venice and then go down the coasts
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So they include places like Croatia, Montenegro, Crete, Greece. The third very popular Mediterranean cruise is the Greek islands
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This tends to be operated by cruise lines with smaller ships, which are more nifty for getting around the Greek islands
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You then have the much longer Mediterranean cruises, which can be up to two weeks long. And these are ones that particularly tend to go from more northern Europe
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They might come in the UK or parts of Northern Europe. And they will then include stops in places like France, Portugal, Gibraltar
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because they need to travel through that area before they actually get into the Mediterranean
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through the Straits of Gibraltar. They'll tend to be slightly longer. It means that you do get to see a much more diverse amount of culture
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so you'll see the Mediterranean, but you also get to see parts of northern France Portugal and also Gibraltar Now the last of the Mediterranean cruise types are the repositioning cruises These happen at the beginning and the end of the season
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when the ships are normally redeploying to or from the Caribbean. So you normally see a little
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bit of the Mediterranean and then you will head across the Atlantic and spend a little
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time in the Caribbean. So that's quite a nice mix of the two regions. Now my fourth trip is a very
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very important one is make sure that if you're going on a Mediterranean cruise, you choose the right
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cruise line. There are at least 20 different cruise lines that will offer Mediterranean cruises
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during the season. So there's a huge amount of choice. And so you need to make sure that you
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choose a cruise line that suits your travel type, your budget and your interests because they
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are very, very diverse. So for example, the cruise lines that travel to the Mediterranean
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include the following. Princess, Fred Olson, Celebrity, Aida, Costa, Hapagloid, Silversi, region 70s, saga, Koonard, Royal Caribbean, the Ouichael
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cruise line, Seaborne, MSEC cruises, Pino cruises, Saga, Holland American, Morella cruises
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Now broadly speaking, they will do the same itineries. So it's not so much about the
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itinerary. Once you decide which part of the Mediterranean you want to go and make sure that
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you get on the right cruise line because if you're on the wrong cruise line, you will not enjoy your Mediterranean experience because the passengers won't be right for you
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The onboard experience won't be right for you. And it's also possible the excursions won't meet your interests and needs. So very importantly do your research. Now link to that
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my next tip is also when you're looking at which cruise line to go look at the size of ship
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The size of the ship is important because the itineries will differ slightly
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You'll find most bigger ships are limited on the ports they can go to in the Mediterranean
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These are ports that can really cater for big ships. On some of the smaller ships, they have much more flexibility about the ports that go into
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So they might actually go into slightly more unusual and smaller ports. So not only choose the right cruise line, but within that cruise line also focus on the size of the ship
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and look very specifically at the ports that they go to. Now my next tip is about pre and post cruise stays
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because if you're, for example, sailing out of Barcelona or you're sailing out of Venice
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or even you're sailing out of Chivetsia, which is the closest port to Rome
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you're not going to get a chance to see those cities. You need to think about a pre-stay or a post-stay
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based on where your cruise is embarking or disembarking Otherwise you not actually going to see those incredible cities Now my next step is around excursion Obviously if you coming on a Mediterranean cruise you want to see the incredible sites
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There's a couple of things that you do need to be aware of. First of all, some of the ports that you go to are actually nowhere near where it says on an itinerary
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So, for example, Rome is actually a good hour and a half, two hours away from the port
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You might be thinking you're going to Florence or Pisa. Again, it's going to be an hour and a half or two hours away from the port where you actually dock
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dock in Laverna. If you're actually going on one of those cruises that come from Northern Europe
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you might be thinking you're to Paris, but actually La Havra can be two or three hours away from
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Paris. So very importantly, as you look at the itinerary, understand how close the actual
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place that it's built on your itinery is to the port. You may actually want to book excursions
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with the cruise line because there's obviously lots of risk that you might find a difficult
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to getting back in time before the ship departs. And if you're on a cruise line excursion
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the ship will wait for you if it's running late. If you're doing, independently travel and you get confused with the trains coming back or you miss your taxi or whatever
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there's a chance that ship will leave without you the other thing to understand is if you are docking
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as you will often do in many of the ports in europe you might be in a more working shipyard often
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the cruise line will put on a shuttle bus service which runs you into the closest town so if it's
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doing that you may want to consider actually self-touring in those particular ports because
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many of them will have hop-on-off of buses or you'll be talks on board or you'll be talks on board or
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or there'll be materials not given on board or the tourist board will either be on the key side
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or come on the ship to let you know how you can self-explore. So you may notice what's
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want to consider doing some self-exploring. Very important you want to understand in each of the
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destinations and port you're calling out is just how close the sites or place you want to see is
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to where the ship is going to be and then plan your excursions once you understand that
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Now my next tip is also linked to that is if you're on a European cruise there is a lot to see a lot
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to do so don't over schedule. One of the things I recommend is as you look at the
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itinery because you probably going to be in a port every single day is perhaps think about having a mix of self and excursions because it could be very timely every single day you up early you out touring all day because some of these will be all tours all excursions Pick a day or two where you going to be quite close to the town and do a bit of self have some time just to sit in a cafe watch the world go by meander around perhaps sit on the beach The other thing you might want to think about is your dining time
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So if you're going on one of those cruises which has fixed dining times, you have an early sitting and a late sitting
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Now, if you go on a Mediterranean cruise, you're likely to find that many of the excursions will be quite long, so you'll be out all day
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So one of the things you might want to think about is actually, if you do have to choose a first or a second sitting, is consider the second sitting
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because it's going to give you time to unwind, get ready, chatted about the day, and then go to the later sitting
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It may give you a less frantic overall Mediterranean trip. The other thing to think about is currency
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Now, on a Mediterranean cruise, most of the places you're going to go to are going to either be Euro countries
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or you're going to find most of the tourist places that you interact with will accept the Euro
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So probably the currency you need for when you're on land is the Euro
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You'll find pretty much every place. Certainly the cruise line will take you
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they're used to taking euros. I wouldn't worry too much about taking different currencies if you're going to places that are not euro countries. Now when you
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go on a Mediterranean cruise one of the things I recommend you do is see it as a taster for understanding Europe, understanding the places you may want to go back
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and explore. Clearly in a Seminary cruise you're going to visit lots of places you're going to see lots of different countries, lots of
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different sites. You're not really going to understand and see Europe in a huge amount of detail but it's going to give you a feel and a
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flavour for that place. Go with your eyes open and think about but perhaps your plan is to come back and explore much more on land and get a little bit deeper
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Mediterranean cruise is fantastic. There are five different types of ways of seeing the Mediterranean, as I've explained, the different itineries
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But you're going to get a chance to immerse, feel, and get a real taste for Europe
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It's great a Mediterranean cruise because in the space of a week or two weeks, you're going to see lots of different countries
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lots of different cultures, experience lots of different sites. A cruise is really a great way of seeing the Mediterranean
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