We have never had a bad cruise and this one on the Equinox was no exception there were lots of things we thoroughly enjoyed and some things not so much. I suppose a Trans Atlantic cruise always seems like an adventure but this, our fourth, more so as it was the first Trans Atlantic of a new ship, the Equinox, only the second in her class. To add to this sense of adventure an excellent lecture series on the voyage by marine historian David Perry focused around the Titanic, a ship lost on her first Trans Atlantic crossing. Till these lectures we never knew so many movies had been made about the Titanic, something like fourteen, I think, including "A Night To Remember", "The Unsinkable Molly Brown" and most recently "Titanic". Happily, there was no such drama on this voyage on a very southerly crossing far away from any possibility of icebergs; to the contrary it was smooth sailing, calm sea and fair weather all the way. However it made some of us pause, when on the last day of the cruise, the Captain in his noon announcement from "the ships navigational bridge" wished us "A Night To Remember"!

We arrived in Rome by air the day before the cruise and had arranged for Rome Cabs to pick us up and take us to the port of Civitavecchia, this was our second time using this company and again the service was faultless. Our hotel, the Traiano was full with people sailing on the Equinox and one of our Cruise Critic group had arranged for them to provide a cocktail party for us which they did free of charge even though there were a number of fellow cruisers there who were staying at other local hotels. We were greatly impressed by the Traiano especially when, after the ship sailed, I realized I was missing some important documents. After searching everything again and again I e-mailed the hotel and they responded immediately that they had found my stuff and would mail it to our home. I thanked them profusely and offered to pay any cost but they wouldn't hear of it, the documents got home before we did. Hotel Traiano stands very high in our estimation and we would recommend it to anyone sailing from Civitavecchia.

The hotel's free shuttle got us to the ship just on noon and we were on board with a glass of Champagne in hand before we knew it, our most efficient embarkation ever! By the time we had some lunch our cabin was ready and our luggage arrived shortly thereafter a good start and very efficient for such a big ship. Read more