This was our first cruise on Azamara and my wife and I were not exactly sure what to expect. We booked the cruise on our Celebrity Baltic cruise a year earlier because of the great itinerary. Having cruised eleven times before, we liked a smaller ship which the Journey was (33,000 tons and 700 passengers). Besides the itinerary, we liked the fact that the entire trip was casual dress and open seating. The fourteen day Holy Land cruise visited many of the Mediterranean ports and countries we had always wanted to see: Spain, Italy, Egypt, Israel, Cyprus, and Greece.

We opted to plan our own air transportation rather than go through Azamara (Celebrity). When you do your own air, it can be a little nerve racking, but once you take the plunge it is fun and in most cases it will save you several dollars. After some research, we opted for the business class on Iberia (Spain's national airline). Flying from Phoenix Arizona to Madrid was smooth. A great advantage of flying business class was the use of Iberia's Madrid lounge on the layover from Madrid to Barcelona (our ship's port). We were able to rest and refresh ourselves at Madrid before our final hour flight to Barcelona. One word of advice is to try to avoid in-country flights with Iberia. There were no first or business class seats, and as one fellow traveler put it "it's a cattle call". No reserved seats on our one hour flight, but you can put up with anything for one hour. The airport at Barcelona was difficult to traverse. Somehow we got in the wrong arrival line, and after going through customs we found that our airlines' luggage was not anywhere to be found. After finding an English speaking official, we discovered that we would have to exit the airport arrival area, and then re-enter the airport before we could then find our way back to the Iberia's arrival carousal. This took over thirty minutes to go back through security and find our way to the Iberia's carousal. My little Spanish helped us to communicate our situation and to find the right exit doors. This experience was 180 degrees different from the well marked airport at Madrid. From what the officials said, we were not the only ones that have had this experience. The only good thing was we didn't have to wait for our luggage at the carousal. Our bags were one of the few left.

We did decide to go through Azamara (Celebrity) to book a hotel, and I had emailed the hotel Casa Furster ahead of time to arrange for the hotel to meet us at the airport with transportation. We should stop here to say that one of the improvements that Azamara could make would be to include your airport to hotel transportation if you book one of their rooms. Not only don't they do this (as some other high end lines do), but they don't even give you a chance to pay for the service. If you are paying premium dollars for a cruise, this is one area that should be included. Now for the hotel! The Hotel Casa Furster was outstanding. We opted to pay a few more dollars for this hotel after reading the reviews from fellow travelers. From the personal greeting by name at the hotel entrance, to the personal escort to our room where wine and strawberries greeted us, to the unbelievable breakfast buffet we were not disappointed. Read more