Need advice on transatlantic cruising

[hollyanne]

We'd like to do a transatlantic cruise in 2010 to celebrate our 30th
wedding anniversary. Any thoughts on the best time of year to do this
in terms of weather, etc? Eastbound vs Westbound? We'd like to embark/
disembark in Florida but the rest is up in the air. We're also
wondering how far ahead we need to book. Thanks

[Mike M]

Originally Posted by hollyanne

We'd like to do a transatlantic cruise in 2010 to celebrate our 30th
wedding anniversary. Any thoughts on the best time of year to do this
in terms of weather, etc? Eastbound vs Westbound? We'd like to embark/
disembark in Florida but the rest is up in the air. We're also
wondering how far ahead we need to book. Thanks

If you want to disembark in Florida your options are a bit limited. Ships will be repositioning from Europe to the U.S. (Westbound) in the Fall and will do trans-Atlantic cruises at that time. They usually start repositioning in September and finish up in December. The nice thing is that many ships now include a number of European ports as part of the trans-Atlantic and many of the cruises are ten to fourteen, or more, days.

If you want to start in the U.S. you can look at Spring cruises when ships are repositioned from the Caribbean to Europe.

Take care,
Mike

[katlady]

We just took a cruise April 26-May 10 it went from Miami to Civitavecchia (Rome). We took the train to Venice Italy. The weather was very nice spring weather not to hot not to cold. I had hear Venice can be smelly in summer because of the heat it didn't smells at all when we where there on May 12-14.

I suggest you go in Spring, the weather is good and the sailing is smooth. If you end in Civitavecchia (Rome), I also suggest you hop on a train to Venice it's only about 55 euros per person for a standard 2nd class ticket and well worth the trip on a Eurostar train it's about 4 hours.

[Marc]

Transatlantics are wonderful! I strongly recommend sailing in the fall as you get an extra hour on six days. Going eastbound you lose an hour on six days; thus the westbount cruise is 12 hours longer for the same price.

As Mike said, start in Europe where you should get four to eight days in various ports before hitting the Atlantic. Our trip was 15 nights but I have seen them between 14 and 19 nights. We sailed in late November although some do seem to leave earlier and I have seen trips as late as December.