As Floridians who primarily sail the Caribbean with Carnival, Royal Caribbean, Princess and Celebrity we were initially a bit wary to book with Costa. In addition to the "issues" that Costa has had this year with two of their ships, we were wondering if we would be fish out of water on a ship where the primary language and culture is Italian. On both accounts we were very pleased that our worries were without merit. With some small improvements in a couple of areas, especially the boarding process in Venice, this cruise would rate as one of the best we have taken throughout the years.

When discussing our interests with our local travel agent we had several options when selecting our European cruise. We selected the Favolosa for a couple of reasons - the itinerary is both unusual and exciting (Bari, Olympia, Izmir / Ephesus, Istanbul and Dubrovnik), the ship itself is less than a year old and finally the pricing was very tempting. Having sailed on Carnival's Liberty in January we basically knew what to expect with the ship itself as the Favolosa is, for all intents and purposes, a carbon copy of the Liberty with only some cosmetic changes. The biggest differences between the two are around the main swimming pool (Favolosa has a retractable roof) and the Favolosa's balcony cabin seems to be laid out better leaving more room.

Our adventure started with an early morning flight from London's Stansted Airport to Venice's Treviso Airport aboard the infamous Ryanair. As a highly experienced flier I can honestly say that this was the worst airline "adventure" that I have EVER experienced (and that is saying something with the current state of airlines today). The ONLY positive thing that I can say is that they got us to Italy in one piece!!!! Obviously not Costa's fault but clearly an experience to be highly avoided in the future. Read more