We enjoyed a wonderful 12 night trip on Century in September 2010. We sailed from Barcelona and the busy schedule took us to Villefrance, Livorno, Rome, Messina, Mykonos, Kusadasi, Athens and finally Salerno for the Amalfi coast. We have cruised four times with Celebrity in the Med, each time starting the cruise either from Barcelona or Venice. This time we flew out to Barcelona a couple of days in advance and stayed at the B Hotel. The B Hotel is situated reasonably centrally and was an excellent base, the rooms were a good size and the very modern. The best feature for us was the roof top swimming pool and bar. We booked room only and found an excellent coffee shop - called Ben's I think - just across the road from the hotel. Breakfast for two was very reasonable around 6 euros.
We had previously cruised on slightly larger ships than Century and although we did miss certain features the larger ship have, for example, the thalassotherapy pool, we had an excellent time on Century and were particularly impressed by the efficient and friendly crew. Our room was an outside cabin and suited us fine. The cabin was clean and in immaculate condition and we were well served by our steward and his assistant. The ship does in places look a little dated, but this did not spoil our experience at all. We chose Select Dining for the first time and it worked really well. After a couple of dinners we found a spot in the Main Dining Room that we liked and we were able to sit at more or less the same table every evening despite varying our arrival time. Some nights we choose to eat early, i.e. in Mykonos when we had an evening in port and other nights we did not arrive until getting on till 9 pm. The food was very enjoyable and I particularly liked dining off the Everyday Menu which meant I could enjoy Celebrity's lovely french onion soup and creme brulee nearly every day.
Our chief reason for selecting this cruise was the ports of call. We have cruised 6 times and have always, bar a visit to St. Petersburg, toured on our own and avoided the cruise lines' tours. In our first port of call, the beautiful Villefranche, we took the train into Nice and spent 3 hours visiting the market and seafront before taking a local bus to the mountain village of Eze. Eze is spectacular and well worth the climb. We took the local bus back down to the coast and then a train back to Villefranche. The cost of the day was probably less than 10 euros each.