cruising
Time for Cruising
Welcome to Cruising Italian Style, a holiday at sea offering you an endless choice of opportunities, both on board ship and ashore. You can have as much freedom as you want on a Costa Cruise, because you can tailor your cruise to suit you. Choose from a dazzling array of itineraries and discover the experience they call Cruising Italian Style across the oceans.
So many pleasures await you onboard that you can indulge in the vacation of a lifetime without ever setting foot on land. Will you join in the dozens of shipboard activities like art auctions, horse racing, bridge games, Italian lessons and trivia contests? Or learn to prepare perfect pesto in an Italian cooking class? Explore all the possibilities available to you when you’re Cruising Italian Style. Families, friends, couples, singles and honeymooners alike are sailing away for the vacation of their dreams and eliminating the hassles of planning a vacation. A cruise is one convenient vacation where you won’t have to worry about catching your next flight as you travel from one destination to another, packing and unpacking your bags. You’ll find that a Costa Cruise ship is a floating resort offering every comfort, convenience and amenity that one could imagine. You can lie back and be completely pampered. Or you can go non-stop enjoying one great show after another – dine like never before – try your luck in the lively casino, or dance the night away to pulsating beats in the disco. It’s no wonder that more people are taking a cruise vacation than ever before. And once you get a taste of cruising, you’ll also want to come back for more again.
In fact, cruises have the highest customer satisfaction over any other vacation experience!
ENTERTAINMENT AND ACTIVITIES ON BOARD
Dance classes – Get in step with everything from fox-trot to hip-hop! Deck and pool games – A great way to meet other guests and win some cool prizes. Cooking demonstrations – Learn the secrets of Italian cooking from the masters! Italian language classes – Pick up useful phrases in conversational Italian. Fitness – For the casual fitness enthusiast to the fitness devotee, Costa ships offer state-of-the-art fitness facilities and a wide range of conditioning activities including fitness walks, aerobics, stretch and relaxation.
Spa – Select from a la carte treatments or personalised packages for massages, facials and herbal wraps.
Port and shopping lectures – Everything you ever wanted to know about your next port of call.
Night-time at sea – At night, you’ll find a variety of entertainment – watch a Broadway style show in the theatre, wander into the piano bar, try your luck in the casino or step out to a dance band out on the deck. Then you can head to the disco where the DJ spins hits all night long.
DINING OPTIONS
Costa offers all kinds of dining options, so you can eat formally or casually in open air, in a restaurant or in your stateroom – any time of day or night! Dining choices abound from poolside dining to midnight buffets. Each day, you may choose to dine casual at the buffet, traditional in the main restaurant or in one of our world-class specialty restaurants. Cozy bistros serve pizza, gelato, cappuccino and espresso and room service awaits your call 24 hours a day.
SHORE EXCURSIONS
When visiting one of our ports of call, the easiest and most enjoyable way to familiarise yourself with the territory is to take one of the cruise’s shore excursions. Costa’s cruise shore excursions are an exciting facet of Cruising Italian Style and offer unique insights of the fascinating ports and historic sites which you’ll be visiting. And each excursion is carefully researched by our shore excursions staff to ensure your experience onshore is as enriching and enjoyable as your stay onboard.
SPECIAL OFFERS
Kids travel for free when sharing a cabin with 2 adults paying the full fare*.
PRONTO PRICES
Changing the way you book your cruise – Whoever books first pays less.
ABOUT COSTA
Costa Crociere S.p.A. is an Italian company operating in the Mediterranean, North Europe, the Caribbean, Central and South America, the Arabian Gulf and the Far East.
Top cruise company in Europe, where it is a leader in Italy, France, Spain and Switzerland, and in South America.
Most advanced fleet on the continent with 11 ships that have a capacity of approx. 20,200 guests
70 per cent of its employees are under 40 and they come from 80 different countries.
In 2006, the ship occupancy rate was 107 per cent, with a customer satisfaction level of 98 per cent.
River Cruising in Spain, Portugal, and Italy
Going on a river cruise in Spain, Portugal, or Italy is slightly outside the mainstream of cruising. However, the landscape in all three countries is renowned for its beauty; unfortunately there’s a dearth of navigable rivers in all three countries.
There’s the Douro, which runs from Spain into Portugal, the Guadiana in Portugal, the Guadalquivir in Spain, and the Po in Italy. That’s about it. However, these countries make up for the lack of river cruises with an enormous selection of ocean-going vessels that prowl the Atlantic and Mediterranean.
River cruising in Spain means starting in Seville, cruising down the Guadalquivir, traversing a bit of the Mediterranean to Portugal, up the Guadiana back into Spain and then returning to Seville. These CroisiEurope cruises usually include a coach ride and guided tour of Cordoba.
In Portugal, AMA Waterways, Uniworld, and CroisiEurope operate on the Douro River, which flows from Spain through Portugal to the Atlantic. Most of these cruises begin in Porto, Portugal, cruise into Spain and then return. Several tours may begin with a few days in Lisbon, then bus to Porto and thence to the riverboat. Conversely, one may cruise from Porto into Spain and take a bus tour of Salamanca. The reason for combining river with road is related to the relatively short length of the river. There’s no way to cruise on the Douro for 10 days or 2 weeks; you would probably go up and down the entire river several times.
For a list of possible cruise tours, see Affordable Tours or the above-mentioned three cruise companies.
The scenery and ambiance of a Douro cruise is without equal. Basically the Douro River Valley is an unspoiled area of small villages, vineyards, and just plain nature. The Douro is a “hidden gem for those seeking an unspoiled river valley with lovely vistas and lively cities.”
Unfortunately, river cruises in Italy are basically limited to Venice and the Po River which is too shallow for most typical riverboats. However on a shallow-draft boat, CroisiEurope runs a cruise from Venice to Cremona. The attraction is in the small towns along the river that can be explored. Word has it that if you like to shop, bring lot of cash, as great bargains can be had.
The other riverboat cruise in Italy is throughout the Venetian lagoon on Go Barging’s refurbished luxury Dutch barge.
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