MapSkraps

I just received a note about Alla Tours. It may be information that everyone here already knows but it is new news to me: Alla Tours recently experienced a DoS attack (denial-of service) on their website. This was a hacking attack whereby one of their more unscrupulous competitors flooded their website with requests thus making it unavailable to legitimate clients.

Maybe that is why the website address was being requested. Possibly there was trouble accessing it?

Seems to be working now: http://www.alla-tour.com/

We had great luck with Alla during our Oceania Nordic Exploration cruise in June of this year. We enjoyed 5 of their tours, including 3-days with them in St. Petersburg. It makes me sad to think that their company would be hurt in any way because of a dirty trick -- hence, this quick post.

My husband is tall. He is 6 feet 5 in bare feet. His shoes add another inch. When others look at him they see a clean-shaven 74 year-old man with short, thinning, graying blonde hair, wearing wire-frame eyeglasses over his very blue eyes, a freshly pressed oxford-cloth button-down collar shirt, nicely ironed Dockers, white socks and light-colored, leather, Hush Puppies with laces. They see a hygienic, neat, trim, 6'6", 200 pound man.

We have been married for 47 years. Possibly I am so used to him that I do not find his height unusual. (At 5'8" I have always felt grateful to have a fella that makes me feel petite -- something unfamiliar to women of my height.) It seems that much of the world's population does not feel this way about a person of 6'6".

On our recent Oceania cruise to the Baltic Sea/Nordic Areas, my husband's height seemed to be a source of wonder to many of the other passengers. Feeling perfectly free to express their amazement at seeing someone of his height, shipmates continued to tell him he was tall, question just how tall he might be, and ask him about his former basketball playing expertise — over and over again during the entire 2-weeks we cruised with them. "You...are...tall!" "How tall are you?" "Did you play basketball?"

Often during our married life, people who are normally sensitive to the feelings of others, polite, and politically correct, have made thoughtless remarks about height to my guy. However, the concentration of such rudeness during our cruise reached an all time peak.

This subject matter was wearing thin for both of us but I didn't realize it was taking such a toll on my husband until he mentioned it about 9 days into the voyage. "You know, if I don't get at least five questions about my height, every time I leave the cabin, I feel like a failure." Upon discussing his statement I realized it could be translated to, "Am I actually THAT much of a freak?" This from a successful man who has lived a productive, healthy, family oriented life and is now on a trip meant to celebrate his final full-retirement.

Upon consideration of the matter, it is surprising that this would occur on a rather high-end (not to mention high-priced) cruise, designed for adults who we found, almost exclusively, to be mature, accomplished, and, seemingly, intelligent people.

I am sharing this on Cruise Critic and will post it on a few other websites. It is not my objective to be critical of those who are insensitive to people blessed with height but to simply encourage all of us to be mindfully kind to each person we come in contact with.

I agree.....always there too late, with my face pressed up against the window pane.....(Sounds like a good lyric for a song.):rolleyes:

:):):)

Hi.

The Artist Loft program sounds like fun. We're leaving June 3, 2015 on Marina's Nordic Exploration voyage. I'd love to know:

1.)... if a pre-cruise schedule of activities is available.

2.)... how the registration is handled.

3.)... a ballpark idea of the costs involved.

4.)... or where I can find Marina's Artist Loft info for myself.

Thanks in advance to any fellow cruiser who answers.

--pam