After enjoying our Canary Island cruise last year we decided to venue further. Our favourite Tui cruise ship, Marella Explorer, sails around the Canary Islands during our winter months then moves to the Eastern Mediterranean for the summer. We wanted to do a longer cruise but not being quite ready to travel across the Atlantic Ocean, we chose the Olives and Old Town repositioning cruise, perfect for us to try a few more sea days.
We joined this great ship in Gran Canaria although some of our fellow 'Explorers' had joined the previous day in Tenerife. Captain Voytek and his crew are amazing, working so hard to look after everyone on board, guests and crew. He's a lovely chap, very funny and very proud of his team who we met the second night before one of the Broadway Shows.
It was so lovely to be back on board and quite reassuring as we knew where everywhere was ... or so we thought.
The cabins are located along the sides of the ship, lowest number at the front (forward) increasing as you move towards the back (aft). The left side (port) are the odd numbers and starboard (right) are the even numbers. Easy... yet we still went down the wrong side looking for our cabin, long before any partying!
It was with relief and delight to finally finding our aft odd deck 9 home for the next 13 nights. A balcony cabin is a must for us, it is an added expense but we love having our own outside space and having fresh air. The cabin was very spacious with plenty of wardrobe space, an en-suite bathroom with walk in shower, a sofa and dressing table. The tea and coffee facilities were replenished everyday and although we had a mini fridge we didn't use it. The balcony had plenty of room for the two chairs and table, perfect for a quite coffee, or wine from the bar upstairs, when back from a day on shore.
The cabin crew were brilliant, our room was always clean and tidy with our bed made each day and turned down each night. During the cruise a few towel animals hitched a ride, plenty of Marella chocolates waited for our evening return and, to our delight, Cruise News was also waiting each evening with our following days' information. Marella were going to be digital only with this much loved part of cruising but due to passenger pressure the paper Cruise News survives.
Cabin location sorted (we still got lost now and then) the other important locations to find and remember were the bars and restaurants which are mainly aft or in the centre of the ship. There is plenty of choice of restaurants:
Market Place - buffet style restaurant open from breakfast until the early hours (included)
Snack Shack - grab and go pool side (included)
Latitude 53 - waiter service breakfast, lunch and dinner (included)
Vista - Italian waiter service dinner only (included)
Italian in the Mediterranean - lunch and dinner (included, book for dinner)
Tapas in the Mediterranean - lunch and dinner (included, book for dinner)
The Dining Club - fine dining (additional charge, book for dinner)
Umi Sushi - traditional sushi (additional charge, book for dinner)
Kora-La - pan-Asian cuisine (additional charge, book for dinner)
Surf and Turf - steakhouse (additional charge, book for dinner)
Most evenings we ate in Latitude 53, a beautiful balconied dining room with double height aft windows. The food is amazing with great wines including Prosecco and port with our cheese and biscuits. We had so many lovely starters, mains and desserts, I don't think there was any meal we didn't clear our plates.
We enjoyed the company and service of our waiters so much on our first evening that we requested their area each visit, they were a big part of our holiday and have our huge thanks and appreciation.
We did dine in two other restaurants, Vista and Tapas in the Mediterranean. Vista is a Italian style restaurant where they prepare carbonara at your table in the whole parmesan cheese; our reason for dining here, I was looking forward to this non-tomato dish. It was absolutely delicious, as was my trio of tiramisu dessert.
Tapas was a great meal too, I'm always surprised that eating small dishes can make you feel fuller than a large meal. We had a sharing platter, although I'm not sure why everything was in threes. There was a good selection of tapas including garlic prawns and chicken in white wine.
Olives and Old Towns was an all inclusive cruise but as with the variety of dining options you can add on extras. There is a wide variety of alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks available on the All Inclusive package but it is possible to upgrade to Premium Inclusive which includes the Coffee Port and Whisky & Gin bar with its speciality malts and gins. There are many bars to choose from it really depends on the time of day all serving AI and PI drinks.. The Marella Explorer bars are:
Mediterranean including outer deck - open 8am until midnight
The Lounge - from 5pm to midnight with a variety of live music
Bar 53 - a quiet bar perfect for pre-dinner drinks, open from 5 until 11pm
Aperitif - serving drinks mainly for the speciality restaurants from 5 until midnight
Squid and Anchor - the pub, always plenty happening from quizzes to silent discos, 11am until late
Pool bar - including waiter service 10am through until 11pm
Indigo Bar and Casino - opens 3pm until late
The Shack - a small bar above the pool deck open from 11am until 6pm
On our first cruise we did upgrade to PI but last year and this cruise we chose not to. I think the only difference we noticed was canned mixers are on Premuim Inclusive but our gin and Jim Beam with pump mixers was fine. To upgrade or not is always a big discussion with fellow cruisers; some say it's a must, some don't and some just pay the extra per drink as and when.
The variety of dining and bar choices, including AI or PI, is why I feel Marella have cruising just right, everyone can choose what they want, be that upgraded cabins, upgraded drinks, speciality restaurants and even to dress up or not. Everyone can enjoy their holiday in their own way with everyone having fun together especially in The Lounge with the entertaining bar staff.
There is always something happening on board; quizzes, talks, learning new skills and the 'must have' bingo! We did play a couple of times and definitely played the last night ... usually in the Squid and Anchor there were so many players on the last day it was in the Broadway Show Lounge. The reason for the popularity... a £4400 jackpot! well done to the lucky winner, it wasn't us.
Every evening the Broadway Show Lounge comes alive, the show cast are amazing and perform a different show every night with such variety there is something for everyone. During our cruise there were also two shows by The man they call G. He was superb and very funny, especially the late night show; a brilliant vocal impressionist with an amazing singing voice.
The show part of our evening is something we look forward to every night. After diner it was a pleasure to stroll along to forward of the ship where on entering the theatre we were always greeted with a choice of drinks, so nice to watch a show with a glass of bubbly. Every show was amazing, we especially enjoyed Revive and Le Caberet. Thank you cast and backstage crew, you were superb every night.
Sadly there was a need for an emergency medical evacuation on one of our sea days. This happened on our previous cruise too. The Captain and Bridge manoeuvre our ship to be in the correct direction for the helicopter and from our balcony we watched in awe and admiration as the Italian Navy flew along side in very windy weather. After a few loops round the pilot held the helicopter steady whilst the casualties (two) were winched off the ship. It must be so worrying for their families and friends, we hope they are well. The skills shown by the Italian seals and Marella crew were outstanding 👏
We have had a superb cruise on board Marella Explorer as she changed her location ready for the summer season, every day was full of fun be that on board or ashore. Thank you Captain Voytek and all the crew on Marella Explorer. Thank you too to all our fellow 'Explorers' we certainly know how to party - we had an amazing time and will be on board again sometime soon for more cruising adventures.
