We checked out of the hotel and were driven over to the port.  As we saw Crystal Serenity through our own eyes for the first time since November of 2021 we had joys of happiness as smiles came to each of our faces.

Words cannot adequately describe the emotions we experienced as we walked up the gangway to return back home to Crystal Serenity.  When we boarded Serenity on July 3 of 2021 for the restart of cruising which had been placed on-hold due to COVID-19, it was an emotional day.  Given the uncertainty of Crystal when operations ceased in March of 2022, if you can believe it this was an ever more emotional day.  When operations first came to a halt, we thought to ourselves, would we ever step on-board Serenity again or see the beloved crew or so many guests we have come to know so well over the year of sailing with Crystal.  Our tears swelled as we were greeted by crew members with the words welcome home. These words ring very true.

Thank you Pat and Patricia for your comments.

Keith went back out on his own before dinner, and the streets were very busy with people walking, on bicycles, watching a show, dining, taking one of several ferries and other boats. The area was truly vibrant.

People were having a good time.  Each time the person jumped through the hoop they raised it further from the ground.  

Back a the hotel we enjoyed dinner. Afterwards, Keith stopped by the Crystal Hospitality Desk and spoke to a very nice representative. We are not using the Crystal Hotel Program but she had an informational sheet for us. She said the majority of guests were arriving on Sunday.

We enjoyed breakfast in our room.

We enjoyed a nice day today.  It is Sunday so many places were closed as it used to be in the United States in our younger years.  

Keith went out first as he did yesterday while Anne Marie freshened up.  It was cooler which was nice.

The two of us walked for a couple of hours. We ran into a friend Marv who we have sailed with many times and at the hotel we saw friends Carole, Stanley and Linda so it truly is a Crystal reunion.


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We enjoyed a leisurely lunch and then a nice afternoon as we look forward with great anticipation to boarding Crystal Serenity tomorrow. Keith started to go on a walk and met a friend from Cruising Leon and his lovely wife and Keith & Leon went out on a walk for about an hour. Leon enjoys playing Paddle Tennis as Keith does.

We wanted to close with some personal thoughts as we get ready to board Crystal Serenity tomorrow.
 
When the Pandemic hit in 2020 and the Cruise Industry came to a screeching halt, as this went on and the former parent company stopped refunding money within 90 days of cancellation for a moment we wondered would they return. Would those first segments of World Cruise 2020 when we left about ten days before the World Cruise ended be our last time sailing Crystal? Thankfully, not.
 
When Crystal restarted in 2021, we sailed three different times on Serenity on seven different voyages plus one on Crystal Endeavor. When we left Serenity in November of 2021 we were thinking ahead to our next voyages on Serenity, Symphony, Endeavor and Mozart for 2022. When the World Cruisers boarded in 2022 and the next day it was announced the parent company had gone insolvent and Crystal was ending, we wondered was November the last time we would sail with Crystal again? Thankfully not.

Even before these two items, we realized many years ago due to a loss of Anne Marie's sister at a relatively young age and eventually some health issues closer to home the importance positivity, enjoying the time we have and not putting off those things you can do today to another time. We enjoy each cruise, focus on the things we like, and do our best not to sweat the little things that don’t go our way. After all, we love sailing Crystal and adore the members of team Crystal.  When people ask what is your favorite cruise?  Answer simple.  The one we’re currently on. When people ask what is your favorite cruise ship, Symphony, or Serenity? Answer simple.  The one we’re on now.  
 
So as we write this and get ready to board Crystal Serenity all we can say is we are tinkled pink, thrilled to be here, and words cannot adequately describe our happiness.  

Cheers,

Anne Marie & Keith
 
 

After being awake for 36 or so hours other than a short sleep on the flight and in the lounge it was great to get some good sleep.  Keith is known to wake up early and he woke up 10 minutes before the alarm was set to go off at 5:50 am.  Then again that would be 10:50 pm if we were at home.  LOL.

We enjoyed breakfast from room service. We asked for coffee, bananas and cereal but this is France where croissants, pastries and rolls/bread are part of breakfast and they brought those along with some mango.  

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After breakfast and freshening up Keith went out on a walk by himself to explore the area near the Hotel.  Eventually, he made his way to the promenade area by the water.  On the side with the water people out walking and jogging and lots of boats and on the other side of the street lots of cafes.

Weather is nice.  We were told only a few weeks ago it was triple digit (Fahrenheit) whereas it's been low to mid 80's of late.
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After Keith returned to the hotel and Anne Marie freshened herself we both went out on a long walk of a couple of hours. The weather was delightful.  We visited a church and took in all that was around us.  

We had a lovely lunch at a restaurant recommended by the concierge which feature fish. It was terrific.  The waiter was exceptional. We learned he is from Ukraine. His mother moved to France many years ago. The waiter brought over his younger sister after the war broke out. He said the people of Ukraine are strong people and was very appreciative to all the United States and the rest of Nato is doing. He speaks English, French, Ukrainian, Russian and Polish. We even discussed various words. Growing up Keith's Mom would call a suitcase a valise and Keith used that word for several years. At the end of the meal do you ask for the bill or the cheque. It is always interesting the words we all use.  

We would have gladly returned tomorrow but they are closed as we know many places in France are on Sundays.

As this is also the pre-cruise hotel for Crystal they will have representatives at the hotel and a Crystal sign is in the lobby which is a nice reminder that Crystal is back.  

Will post more tomorrow.

Cheers

​Anne Marie & Keith 
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Our Flight arrived on-time from our home airport to London Heathrow. The fight was uneventful.  We each nodded off from time-to-time so we got some sleep. The time passed fairly quickly.  

We transited from Terminal 5 over to Terminal 3.  Major form of transportation other than our legs and the lift was a bus.  

Once at Terminal 3 we made our way to the British Airways Club Lounge where we rested until boarding our flight five hours later.

By comparison the flight to Marseille was short.  After going through passport control, collecting luggage and going through customs control we were taken to the Intercontinental Hotel in Marseille by a driver who Gabby arranged with the Hotel Concierge to have waiting for us.  Many of our fellow Crystal Cruisers will be staying here. In fact, we met one couple who recognized us from the interview Crystal did about us.

The room is beautiful with excellent views.

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Cheers,

​Anne Marie & Keith
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Thank you Deborah for your comments and glad to hear you have a cruise booked for 2024.

Today, we begin our adventure as we travel by aircraft from our home airport to Marseille, France.  This will involve a flight to London Heathrow followed a few hours later by a flight from Heathrow to Marseille.  

We were driven from home to our local airport by a driver from a company we have used for many years  The drive is a little under an hour.  We had lunch at the airport before it was time to check in for the flight.  The good news is the ticket counter opened earlier than expected and getting through TSA pre-check was a breeze.

​After check-in we made our way through security and visited the airline lounge to relax before we will board.

We will post again from Marseille.  

We are thrilled to start this adventure. It will be many hours to get to Marseille but we are just happy to be here.

Cheers,

​Anne Marie & Keith

Yesterday, we received luggage tags from Crystal with a cover letter from Cristina Levis - CEO, Crystal Cruises & Abercrombie & Kent.

We also received a call from the Hotel in France asking if there is anything special we need. This was quite unexpected and very nice.

We've been waiting for tomorrow to begin for quite sometime. 

We are excited to begin a new travel adventure.

Our bags are packed other than a few last minute items to add. We are ready to go. We can't wait.

We love to travel and are fortunate to have traveled all over the world visiting 300+ ports-of-call by cruise ship and additional countries, cities, towns and villages on land.  

There are many places we enjoy visiting and Europe is a region we enjoy immensely between its beauty, history, people, cuisine, and because there is so much to do.

We want to thank the many people who have helped us prepare for this adventure.

This includes our Travel Specialist, Gerri, her very capable assistant Gabby, and the management team at the agency.  

There are many people and organizations to thank at Crystal including members of on-board guest services, documentation, land programs, reservations, and sales, marketing and public relations.  We also thank members of the crew from Crystal Serenity.

We will do our best to blog each day but if we miss a day it is most likely due to internet challenges or we are so busy having a great time, we were unable to blog.

There are many things we love about travel by cruise vessel and being at sea.  Former President John Fitzgerald Kennedy said: "I really don't know what is that all of us are committed to the sea, except I think in addition to the fact that the sea changes, and the light changes, and the ships change, it's because we all came from the sea. And it is an interesting biological fact that all of us have in our veins the exact percentage of salt in our blood that exists in the ocean, and therefore, we have salt in our blood, in our sweat, in our tears. We are tied to the ocean.  And when we go back to the sea - whether it is to sail or to watch it - we are going back whence we came.

September 14, 1962

We close by thanking those of you for your very nice comments and most recently this includes Andrea and Carol.  
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We look forward to making new memories which will last a lifetime.

​Cheers,

Anne Marie & Keith 

Many thanks to those of you who have commented on our Blog. This includes:  Greg, Emily, Jo, Jim, Gill, Gail, Muriel Dave, Lynn & Buddy, and Candy along with so many of you who have sent us similar well wishes via e-mail, texts and messages. We so appreciate all of you.

We have been asked by more than one of you how could there possibly be seven first time ports of call for us when we have sailed to much of the world. We found the same to be the case when sailing the Mediterranean on three seven day back-to-back cruises on Crystal Serenity in September/October of 2018 right before Serenity went into dry-dock. While we have sailed the Mediterranean and the British Isles numerous times, this itinerary offers stops as did the on in 2018 to not only ports that are often on itineraries of this region but to some other ports of call.

While we keep a listing of ports of call previously visited we created the listing several years after we started cruising. While the information from previous blogs and cruise programs helped us create this listing, we may have overlooked some ports or might not have identified each one.  These are the ports we believe are first time ports for us even though we may have driven past some of them or even stopped at some on previous tours. They are: Cannes, Cali, Ibiza, Cartagena, Portomao and Ferrol.

We wanted to take this opportunity to mention that we do not have time to reread what we write for this blog so you will notice spelling and grammar mistakes and other mistakes.  

Thank you to those of you who will be traveling along with us virtually along with those of you who will be on one or both of these sailings with us.

Bags are packed. Ready to go. Can't wait.

Cheers,

​Anne Marie & Keith

To quote the name of a song written by Paul McCartney and performed by The Beatles, our return to Crystal Serenity feels like a "Long and Winding Road".  

It's been 20 months since we last sailed Crystal Serenity.
At the time we debarked, we did not know Crystal Cruises would cease operations in February 2022 due to the bankruptcy of its parent company.

Thankfully, the Crystal brand and its two ocean vessels were purchased in June, 2022 by A&K owned by Manfredi Lefebvre d"Ovido and Geoffrey Kent.

The new cruise line is called Crystal.

We are excited to be on the July 31 inaugural sailing of Crystal Serenity from Marseille to Lisbon and the second sailing from Lisbon to Southampton.

As much as we have cruised this area of the world, we will visit seven ports-of-call for the first time bringing to 311 the number of ports we have visited around the world.

We will Blog before, during, and following this adventure.  We expect to make new memories which will last a lifetime.

We love to read your comments so please feel free to provide comments whenever you like.  

In the meantime, please enjoy this trailer video.

Cheers,

Anne Marie & Keith