What's a European Cruise Like?!?

We had a good night sleep in our hotel across from the Hauptbaunhof (train station) in Bremen, Germany. We took the picture below from our hotel room window. But before we headed to the train, we  needed to buy some breakfast. We wanted to go to the REWE grocery store, but google maps led us astray. We walked by the place where google thought the grocery store was three times with no luck. We were looking for a sizable store and there certainly was no such thing as a big grocery store on that block! But we finally found the single door entrance that led straight down an escalator to the big grocery store in the basement. We needed to get used to grocery stores underground in Europe! We liked the prices we were finding here. We paid around $2 for a package of 20 fresh apricots, 50-cent greek yogurts, and $2 for an apple strudel at the local bakery. Paired with our bag of granola, we had a cheap breakfast, plus plenty of snacks for the two-hour train ride this morning.

As we waited for our train, we saw something new to us. They had a train-washing station. We watched as the soap and automated scrubber worked on that dirty train.

We could certainly see the difference between the just-cleaned car on the right, and the dirty train car on the left.

We got a message that our 9:17 ICE fast train was going to be very crowded. When the train arrived, we had to walk through three cars before we found a seat that wasn't already in use or reserved. We saw that most seats were reserved at our next stop in Hamburg, so it was a full train this morning to our destination on the northern coast at Kiel, Germany.

Kiel was the port city for the seven-day cruise that we had booked. But the train station was far from the cruise port, and we had to figure out how to connect the two. There was always the cruise transfer bus, but they wanted $20 per person for that service. We had read that the local bus #11 runs a route in that direction, and our bus ticket was just 2 euro. So we bought our bus ticket and walked to the bus stop to see if this really would work. We were glad to find some other cruise ship passengers doing the same. We would meet a group of 11 from Czechoslovakia, an older couple from France, and a young couple from Germany. We found that the passengers on this ship would be a vast mix of countries and languages. As Americans, we were definitely in the minority.

When asked where we were from, we were trying to decided how to answer. If we said, "The United States," the other person would pause for a moment before they figured out, "Oh, you're Americans!" They usually seemed glad and surprised to find a couple of Americans this far from home. In our travels, we have learned not to answer that we were from "America" because Canadians will say they are also from (North) America. Traveling this far from home brings some interesting insights.

We successfully made the bus trip to the coast and walked a kilometer from the bus stop to the port. Then it was a fast and easy process to drop off our little carry-on suitcases at the ship port. We noticed that everyone else on the bus had multiple pieces of over-sized luggage. We were obviously traveling light for a seven-day cruise. Mark had filled out all our forms for the fast track line. It took longer to walk the length of this huge ship than it did to go through the check-in process. With 6,000 passengers, this was the largest cruise ship we've ever sailed.

What's a European Cruise like? We had a lot of options for seven-day cruises from European ports. We finally decided on one that went north into the Scandinavian countries. Then we could choose between a pretty long list of cruise companies leaving from different ports heading north. We could have chosen Royal Caribbean or Norwegian Cruise lines, both of which we have sailed before for a more "Americanized" experience. We could have chosen a British company that would have been very English, but was more expensive. We narrowed it down to two different Italian companies, and we chose MSC for the good price and the new ship. Built in 2023, the MSC Euribia has the latest and greatest in technology, including their promenade that changes it's ceiling scene throughout the cruise.

The Euribia's atrium staircase was studded with crystals that make for a sparkling walkway. As usual, when we got on the ship, our room wasn't ready for us. So we were still wearing our backpacks until we could unload them in our room.

In the meantime, we were exploring the ship before the other 6,000 passengers found all the cool places. It was a beautiful ship!

Because everyone on the ship goes to the same destinations and the passengers eat the same food, we have always booked one of the cheapest rooms. The picture below shows what our inside room looked like. We felt like it was bigger than most inside rooms on the other ships we have sailed. After living out of a suitcase for more than two weeks, it felt good to unpack for these seven days.

Of course, one of our first stops was the buffet for some lunch. They had special cakes decorated for our first day on the Euribia.

We've been wearing jackets, and this ship was heading straight north. So the on-board pools were strangely vacant on this cruise.

Likewise, the water park at the top of the ship was closed. The waterslides look like they would be great fun on a warm day.

This water slide empties into a big basin before it drops to the next level. Our grandchildren play with a toy called marbleworks, where they build tubes that marbles race through on their way to the bottom. This looked like a giant marbleworks for humans.

While we liked the main dining room for formal meals, we enjoyed the views from the buffet dining at the back of the ship.

Much like other cruises, we found this Italian ship offered games and food demonstrations. They just had less narration because the passengers spoke so many different languages.

As the seven days passed, we watched the forum ceiling change many times.

We never realized how much we would miss hearing a good ole American voice. During our seven days floating around with 6,000 people, we only found those American voices twice. Both times they were from U.S. military people that were stationed in Europe. We think we got the award for traveling the farthest to get to this port.

So many different languages were spoken on board that we felt a little like we were at the Tower of Babel. We could be in a very loud area, and not be able to understand even a word around us. Important announcements were made in the following eight languages, and we were so impressed with the woman that could speak all of them so fluently.

On our first day we went in search of ice cream. Unlike ships sailing around the United States, European ships are a little stingy with their ice cream. While frozen desserts were available for an extra fee at one of the forum shops, the only free ice cream was one ordered as dessert in the formal dining room. One evening we ordered it in the form of baked Alaska.

This blog outlines our ship, the MSC Euribia, and tries to answer the question, "What's a European Cruise Like?" But the real reason we chose this voyage was to experience a little of Scandinavia. Hang on for more European adventures as we explore our ports in Denmark and Norway!