Who knew that the biggest saga to board the Azamara Pursuit would be getting to the ship from Venice.. We needed to get to Chioggia to board the ship, a distance of around 45kms by road.
The original plan was for us to take a water taxi, would have cost us Eur350 if the taxi boat skipper had said yes, and taken about 1 hour. Unfortunately our taxi boat skipper did not accept the fare to Chioggia, as he would have lost an hour of fares due to the time it would take to get back to Venice. We think he was a bit shocked when we agreed to his Eur350 price tag. The reason we wanted to do the by water as it would have been a great way to start the cruise. Thankfully we didn’t as the walk from the taxi drop off point to the cruise terminal was probably around 1 to 1.5kms and it was HOT!
Venetian Porters – Glad that they are there!
A lesson for new players is to make sure that you get dropped off at the correct side of the canal. On one side of the canal is the train station and the land taxis are on the other side. To get to the land based taxis from the train station you need to cross this bridge which has 284 steps.
Thankfully there was a porter who was waiting just for fools like us. Though I am not sure we were exactly the sort of customers he was waiting for. Between the two of us there were 4 large pieces of luggage, including my wine suitcase, 4 smaller cabin luggage size bags.
He earned his Eur60! There is less baggage in the above pic!
Transfer Costs
When you include the water taxi fare, porter charge and land taxi fare, it was around Eur300 and took about an hour. Thankfully the plan is for all Venice Cruise departures to use the Fusina Terminal in the future. The challenge with this is that you will need to use a cruise line provided transfer from Venice as there is no taxi drop off point anywhere near where the ships dock.
Azamara Pursuit
After the saga of the taxis we arrived at the embarkation point for the Azamara Pursuit, our home for the next 16 nights. Boarding was thankfully fairly straightforward with our cabins / suites ready for us to occupy.
My Suite
I upgraded to a Ocean Suite to see how the other 10% live and I am glad that I did. Lots of space and I am able to dine in the specialty restaurants each night. Plus a couple of other benefits that I will cover later, as well as a butler and a cabin attendant.
Interior
Balcony
Not a bad view…
I think I will survive for the next few nights. The place is bigger than my apartment. Not sure how I am going to handle a butler though..
Next up Night 1 and the sail away.
