CHAPTER 11- WE HAVEN’T BEEN TO ITALY FOR 7 MONTHS! LET’S GO!

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Chapter 11

 

WE HAVEN’T BEEN TO ITALY FOR 7 MONTHS! LET’S GO!

 

July, 2025

 

Wednesday, July 9, 2025

 

We left home on Saturday, July 5 and arrived in Nice France on July 6 in time to remember what humidity feels like. But on July 7 when we boarded the Azamara Onward we were reminded of how beautiful the shoreline of Nice is, and when the day has nothing but blue sky without oppressive humidity, one knows that dreams of being on the French Riviera can come true. As we strolled on the Promenade it was impossible to not recognize the similarity to the Santa Monica/Malibu coastline, and to anticipate the shoreline beauty of Northern Italy where we will be on this cruise.

 

The first port on this cruise was Genoa. The highlight of this city of 600,000 was to honor the memory of Christopher Columbus, who was born here. We quickly realized that we’ve been to enough cities in Italy to recognize architectural similarities. For example, the porticos that grace the streets that we were awed by in Bologna are in Genoa too. Same as in Bologna, the retail experience still feels like pre-internet and wondering “why is everyone here in this store and not just shopping on Amazon?”

 

July 10 - 15, 2025 on the Azamara Onward

 

Having sailed on a few river cruises that total about 175 guests, and recently on a true mid-sized ship with a guest count of 1,100 we were sailing on the Azamara Onward to not only experience a ship with only 700 guests but to better know what they mean when they claim to offer an “immersive” experience.

 

Immersive means that because the physical ship is small it can access ports that larger ships can’t get into.

 

Immersive also means that Azamara designs the time in port to surpass the times available to other ships. While most cruise ships will typically arrive in a new port at 8:00 am they will usually require everyone to be back on board by 6:00pm. Azamara stays in some ports until 10:00pm; allowing guests to stay in-town longer and perhaps enjoy a local dinner.

 

On this trip the ship even docked in Livorno for 2 days, and in our case, we dashed by train to Florence and back for a day, and the next day dashed by train to Pisa and back. We even met a couple that stayed in Florence overnight. Not typical, but quite an option.

 

Which leads me to one of the queries that I pondered on this trip; “why do people travel?” And its corollary, “How do people make decisions about how to travel for vacation?”. Obviously, the reasons are beyond this blog but I keep thinking of the images I have in my head from years and years ago of cruising which had old people under a blanket on a wooden recliner sailing the ocean in apparent comfort to get across the Atlantic.

 

Fast forward to the 21st century and cruising became a way to see places; effectively making the cruise ship a “floating hotel” at whatever level of on-board hotel luxury you want.

 

In other words, ‘seeing places’ became a perceived consumer value at least as valuable as the shipboard experience itself.

 

It seems to me that the trend to smaller ships and their promise of an “immersive” experience that doesn’t require schlepping luggage from city to city, or hotel to hotel, makes immersive cruising a real competitor to land based vacations and is a sharply defined position for the cruise providers to take in the cruise marketplace.

 

Even as august a player as Silversea is racing to be seen as a player in the immersive sweepstakes.

 

In this new world, the ship is a starting point; not the end point. It needs to meet your requirements, but the time away from the ship, in places you want to see, apparently is the driver of the consumer purchase decision between different vacation options.

 

So now you’re wondering, how was our Azamara immersive cruise?

 

This is not the “Cruise Critic” app and I was brought up in my career to understand that there are “horses for courses” and a “bum for every seat” (as expressed by a British colleague at Weight Watchers) so all I will say is that the Onward is a mid-level ship that executed on the promise to sail the Italian Riviera and take us to places we hadn’t been to before. I didn’t expect a Ritz-Carlton experience and was not disappointed- which means I was satisfied with my experience.

 

Would I recommend an immersive cruise on Azamara to clients? Absolutely! Value for money is a perception, and if one doesn’t want/need “the best” of everything and is happy to have a clean, safe, shipboard experience with well trained and friendly staff, cuisine that has quality and quantity, taking them to places on a personal bucket list at a mid-level price point, then yes, I am happy to present this as an option to clients.

 

 

July 15-19, 2025 FLORENCE, PISA, VERONA, ROME

 

Aside from cruising the shoreline of Italy with Azamara we decided to leverage the cost of our airfare by staying in Italy beyond the end of the cruise. When it costs so much to fly, it makes sense to take advantage of being there to expand the experience and lower the cost of airfare on a per day or per trip basis.

For Jacqui and me, being in Italy meant going back yet again to Florence to re-experience our favorites places to see, eat and shop and to use it as homebase for a day trip.

Yes, the trains in Italy are terrific. They run on time, they are fast, the seats are comfortable, etc. Too bad you must schlep your luggage across a terminal and heave it up a set of stairs which is always an interesting test of one’s back muscles.

If you forgive a time shift in this narrative back to when we were on the cruise and the ship docked in Livorno, the gateway to Tuscany, we had booked train tickets to Florence and navigated the process of grabbing a bus or taxi from the ship to the train station and the same on the return. I’m time shifting back to the cruise because we finally got to see Pisa on day two of being docked in Livorno. Forget the Leaning Tower attraction; that’s a side show. The real appeal of Pisa is the complex of buildings that comprise the reason for Pisa’s appeal. What beautiful architecture! Like in Florence there is a baptistery, a cathedral and a bell tower (which happens to have been built on soft ground). Definitely worth the effort to get there.

Someday over a cold, adult beverage I will tell you the tale of disembarking the ship at Civitavecchia, Rome’s port and making our way back to Florence with all our luggage in the heat and humidity that makes Scottsdale seem not so bad. Suffice to say that it was a bit of an adventure where we were intercepted and rescued by a lady who appeared from nowhere in the mob at Roma Termini station to grab our luggage and take us to our departing train to Florence and then demanded 25 euros for the service she provided. I’ll buy the adult, cold beverage.

I will time shift again to mention our day trip to Vernona; another bucket list destination to see the Arena (aka the ancient Roman Coliseum) and Juliet’s balcony (right, straight out of your high school reading list). Actually, Verona is lovely. Like another day-trip city we visited previously, Parma, this is a smaller city that is a gateway to the Alps and that has beautiful, lush suburbs. I would go back for a longer trip.

So what’s the deal with Florence and its ability to draw us back so often?

For me it is the combination of its historical significance, magnificent architecture, art, fashion, style, food, etc. When I see a video like this (https://www.facebook.com/share/r/1EMhTFDrcd/) I am reminded that it is not the energy from the crowds who throng there but it is the aura still felt from the most important family in Florence; the Medici.

As busy as the streets are I see a small, not overpopulated city that was built for and around the Medici.

I think it is impossible to think of this level of “company town” being built today but that is what Florence is/was, a company town that retains its power to make us feel welcome and at home.

We are indeed blessed to enjoy this treasure from so long ago.

 

 

 

Alla prossima volta (Until next time).