Riviera - Greek Isles & Adriatic

Where this cruise calls, day by day

7 ports and 4 sea days over 10 Nights.

1. Day 1

   Athens (Piraeus)

   GreeceDepart

   Piraeus is Europe's busiest passenger port, and it is a port first and a place second - ferry berths, cranes, and cruise quays spread along a long waterfront. Athens is 10km inland, 30-45 minutes by road in traffic or about 25 minutes on the Line 1 metro. Almost everything you came for sits in one dense square kilometre under the Acropolis, so the day works if you pick a route and commit to it.

   • The Acropolis - the Parthenon, Erechtheion and Propylaia - and the Acropolis Museum below it
   • The Ancient Agora and the Temple of Hephaestus, the best-preserved Doric temple in Greece
   • The National Archaeological Museum, and the marble Panathenaic Stadium
   • Cape Sounion and the Temple of Poseidon, about 70km down the coast

   Getting ashore

   Docked. Terminals sit along Akti Miaouli, and ships shuttle to the port gate; the Line 1 metro ride into Athens is about 25 minutes, but budget close to an hour door to door once the shuttle, the station walk and the queue are counted.

   Best months

   Apr-Jun and Sep-Oct (in Jul-Aug heatwaves the Acropolis and the Agora now close from midday until late afternoon)

2. Day 2

   Santorini

   GreecePort

   Santorini is a flooded volcanic caldera, and the towns sit on the rim some 300m above where your ship anchors - which is the whole logistical problem. There is no cruise berth, so you tender to Skala below Fira and then queue for a small cable car, walk up 588 steps, or ride a mule. Arrivals are now capped to thin the crush, but the cable car remains the bottleneck in both directions.

   • Oia on the northern tip, and the caldera-edge path that walks there from Fira
   • Akrotiri - a Bronze Age town buried by the eruption and excavated under a modern roof
   • Assyrtiko tasting at the caldera-facing wineries, Santo Wines and Venetsanos
   • A caldera boat to the crater of Nea Kameni and the warm springs at Palea Kameni

   Getting ashore

   Tender to Skala, the old port below Fira, then the cable car up the cliff - queues of an hour each way are normal on busy days, and the alternative is 588 steps. Excursion tenders often land at Athinios instead, where coaches wait.

   Best months

   May-Jun and Sep-Oct (Jul-Aug is hot, packed, and Oia at sunset is shoulder to shoulder)

3. Day 3

   Rhodes

   GreecePort

   Rhodes has the easiest arrival in the Greek islands for anyone who dislikes tenders: ships tie up in the commercial harbour with the medieval walls right there, and you walk in through a gate. The Old Town was built by the Knights of St John and has been lived in ever since, so it is a working town rather than a monument - though the main shopping street is given over almost entirely to cruise trade.

   • The Palace of the Grand Master and the cobbled Street of the Knights
   • The Archaeological Museum, housed in the Knights' Hospital
   • Lindos - the acropolis above the village, and St Paul's Bay below it
   • Mandraki harbour and the Acropolis of Rhodes on Monte Smith

   Getting ashore

   Docked in the commercial harbour; the Old Town gates are a 5-10 minute walk. Lindos is about 50km south, an hour each way by road.

   Best months

   Apr-Jun and Sep-Oct; Rhodes stays warm well into late October

4. Day 4

   Crete (Heraklion)

   GreecePort

   Heraklion is Crete's administrative capital and a working city - bombed in the war, rebuilt in concrete, and only patchily attractive. Two things justify the call. Knossos, the Minoan palace complex, is fifteen minutes out of town; and the Archaeological Museum holds everything found there, where the frescoes and the Phaistos Disc make more impression than the site's concrete reconstructions do.

   • Knossos - the Minoan palace, complete with Arthur Evans's contested reconstructions
   • The Heraklion Archaeological Museum: Minoan frescoes, the snake goddesses, the Phaistos Disc
   • The Koules sea fortress and the Morosini Fountain on Lions Square
   • The tomb of Nikos Kazantzakis on the Venetian walls above the city

   Getting ashore

   Docked in the commercial port about 1.5km from the centre - a 20-minute walk or a short taxi; Knossos is 5km inland.

   Best months

   Apr-Jun and Sep-Oct (Knossos has almost no shade and is punishing in Jul-Aug)

5. Day 5 · At sea

6. Day 6 · At sea

7. Day 7

   Corfu

   GreecePort

   Corfu was Venetian for four centuries and then British for fifty, and the Old Town shows it - tall shuttered Italianate terraces, a cricket ground on the main square, and an arcaded promenade the French put up. The island is green and wooded in a way the Cyclades are not. The cruise terminal is a couple of kilometres from the Old Town, an unremarkable walk or a short shuttle ride.

   • The Old Fortress and the Liston arcade on the Spianada, the largest square in Greece
   • The Achilleion, the palace Empress Elisabeth of Austria built above Gastouri
   • Paleokastritsa - the monastery on the headland and the coves beneath it
   • Kanoni, with the Vlacherna monastery and Mouse Island offshore

   Getting ashore

   Docked at the cruise terminal about 2km from the Old Town; a shuttle runs to the port gate, and it is a 20-25 minute walk from there along the waterfront.

   Best months

   May-Jun and Sep-Oct (Corfu gets far more rain than the Aegean islands, so shoulder season can be wet)

8. Day 8

   Dubrovnik

   CroatiaPort

   Dubrovnik's walled Old Town is small, hard-surfaced and steep, and on a two-ship day it does not cope - which is why the city capped cruise arrivals. Ships berth at Gruz, about 3km round the headland, so you arrive by bus or taxi rather than stepping out at the gate. The wall circuit is what people come for and it earns the ticket, but it is a 2km loop with almost no shade.

   • The city walls circuit - roughly 2km, stepped, shadeless, and about EUR40
   • The Stradun, the Rector's Palace, and the Franciscan monastery pharmacy of 1317
   • The cable car up Mount Srd for the view down onto the Old Town and Lokrum
   • A boat across to Lokrum island, or sea kayaking beneath the walls

   Getting ashore

   Docked at Gruz, about 2.5km from the Pile Gate; ship shuttles run to the gate, local buses 1A and 1B take ten minutes, and the walk is 35 minutes along a busy road.

   Best months

   May-Jun and Sep-Oct (Jul-Aug means heat on the walls and the worst of the crowding)

9. Day 9 · At sea

10. Day 10 · At sea

11. Day 11

    Venice

    ItalyArrive

    Since August 2021 ships above roughly 25,000 gross tons have been barred from the Giudecca Canal and St Mark's Basin, so the classic sail-past no longer happens. Large ships now berth at Porto Marghera, the industrial port on the mainland edge of the lagoon, and transfer passengers in; many lines moved turnarounds to Trieste or Ravenna. Only small vessels still use the Stazione Marittima.

    • The Basilica di San Marco and the Doge's Palace, both worth a pre-booked slot
    • The Gallerie dell'Accademia and the Peggy Guggenheim Collection on the Dorsoduro bank
    • The Rialto market early, before the day-trippers land
    • A vaporetto the length of the Grand Canal - the cheap version of the sail-in you no longer get

    Getting ashore

    Large ships berth at Porto Marghera on the mainland and transfer passengers by bus and boat; only ships under the tonnage limit still reach the Stazione Marittima in the lagoon.

    Best months

    Apr-May and Sep-Oct (summer is hot and packed, and Nov-Jan brings acqua alta)