Tammy Trip Reports | Day 2

15 Oct

Posted at 10:29h in Uncategorized by Tammy 2 Comments

0 Likes

Day 2 – Hello, Apex!

I was there! I had been to Athens before, <link> and was stunned by the size! I wish I had more time to explore, but we were sailing today!

Or I was. I was still waiting for updates on Audrey’s location!

My friend Jo Anne had sailed the week prior to us, and she sent me this picture:

They were ready for us!

I made it through customs and grabbed my bag. I was originally going to wait for Audrey, but those plans were out the window! I found the Celebrity transfers and went to an ATM for euros while I waited.

They told us to put our luggage tags on, because our bags were going right to our rooms. We waited about 30 minutes for a few more people, and then walked out to the bus.

Let’s gooooo! The ride to Piraeus was about 45 minutes.

I got to the port and Covid tested by about 1:30.

Then I settled in for the slightly nerve wracking wait for results!

While I waited, I got the bad news from Audrey. She was stuck in Amsterdam!

She wasn’t going to make it! Oh noeses!

Well, this is why we bought air through celebrity! Hopefully they could get her to Mykonos tomorrow.

I’m Covid free! Woohoo!

I boarded and ran by our room. Here it is!

I filmed, of course.

And here’s my view. This is a deluxe porthole view.

I also met our stateroom hostess, who was lovely!

Then I went in search of food!

Look at the solarium!

And here is the Magic Carpet bar!

This ship is very pretty!

Lunch with a view.

Coke Zero in cans. This was a good sign.

I was getting updates from Audrey, and things were not good. She missed her connecting in Amsterdam, and now she was routing through Munich! She wasn’t going to make it to Athens until 7:55!

Wuh oh.

I got on the phone with Celebrity air to see what our options were. They said the ship couldn’t wait. Dang it, Joan!

And then she couldn’t meet us in Mykonos because of covid restrictions! DANG IT, JOAN!!

So now she is meeting us in Rhodes on day 3! Welp. Better than not making it at all!

I sent her a message that I knew she wouldn’t get for a while, and wandered around!

Here’s the buffet. Not all of the food stations are open.

It felt like I was the only one onboard in several places!

There were about 400 guests onboard this week! On a ship with a capacity of 3500! That’s like 11 percent occupancy. Wowsers!

The Apex was completed in 2020, but didn’t start sailing until June of 2021 for obvious reasons. She’s practically brand new!

I did stop by guest services to see if they could speed anything along, and they said she may not be allowed to board in Rhodes!

Wut.

They said they would call me, so I went back to the room to work. They called about an hour later, and confirmed she could board in Rhodes! Phew!

Poor Audrey. She had gone from Dallas to NYC to Amsterdam to Munich to Athens! Two extra stops, and they didn’t help!

Here is where I would like to interject some (more?) commentary. We know full well you should never come in the day of the cruise. We tell all our clients to come a day early. Never ever the day of. But we did it! Only because it was the only way we could make it work. I would never ever do it on a family vacation where I had spent thousands of dollars. We were taking a risk, and we knew it! But we were okay with it. And we bought air through Celebrity for this very reason. And thank goodness we did!

I decided I wasn’t terribly hungry, so I had M&M’s for dinner! And I sat down in the solarium.