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There is NO picture on the ship ID card.  The only picture is the one that appears on a computer screen as you check in/out to make sure no one else is using your card --a security concern and nothing else.  That picture is only seen by the person you hand your card to.

I've been on cruises where a person is transitioning or has and I did not hear of a single comment from staff or crew.   Fellow passengers pretty much are living/cruising in their own bubble and often have their own situations they're dealing with.

Go and enjoy the cruise with your sweetie.

wayne--saw it too.  We're there in April so here's hoping there's some rain coming!  Thanks!!

I second the advice of Andee.  We went all over Northern Europe, Greenland, Iceland, Russia for 2 months this summer on Nautica and I rarely had trouble connecting my GoogleFi. 

Jennie-- 

nothing like sitting on a tile floor (even on a small pillow) packing for 3 days to make me wonder just how agile and how much stamina I have!!!  However, I am ready to declare victory and now off to a cocktail party and then down the beach to watch the community countdown to turning Christmas lights on.

There's just something about white lights twining up palm trees to put us in the holiday spirit---and to see Santa in his board shorts!!!

palakika--wish you were going ATW with us.  Still doing some segments?  Or gave those up for the condo?  I'm thinking the condo wins this contest!!

Paul,

thanks for the affirmation this morning.  I worked for 2 days trying to get David and I from Lome to J'burg to Victoria Falls airport and back to J'burg then on to CTown--would have made for some very long days.

So I gave up and vowed...."another day another cruise" and lo and behold....O slipped in the Vic Falls Overland for us and I'm betting if we weren't the 1st to sign up we were in the top 5! 

So Iguazu and Vickie Falls all in one cruise!!!  Plus Bhutan and MPichu....and Patagonia Penguins...and.....and...

so as you can see I'm pretty excited. 

O books some amazing hotels for these Overlands and that's half the fun of them, ie, drinks at the top of a New Delhi Hotel at sunset,  our hotel and dinner in Luxor right on the Nile, and the sweep of the savannah seen out our floor-to-ceiling windows on a safari.  Whew! 

Jennie-  we're doing what i call the 5 "P"s --my way of attempting to remember them!  m Picchu, Patagonian Penguins & iguazu, Pandas, victoria falls & mana Pools, & nePal.  Convoluted yes, but i can repeat them easily! 

We did several of the others on ATW16 and there are many more opportunities for safaris this time.  Part of the fun of the Overlands with O, for us, are the amazing hotels we stay in.  We didn't anticipate that!

We have also received permission to leave the ship in Lome, Togo and are flying to Cape Town to stay for a week DIY.  We'll rejoin the ship there, spend the night, and then leave the next day for the Victoria Falls adventure. 

David and I keep telling people that we have to do these cruises and adventures while we still have the agility and stamina--we'll soon see if we still have both!!

thanks everybody!  Pinotlover it was so nice meeting you.

Palakika--your Dr Dave doing well?  2 years ago we traveled south along the Wash and Oregon Coast and fell in love with its beauty!  Well done getting a new condo there!

Jennie--hope this works for you to see what we're doing in the Himalayas:  https://www.oceaniacruises.com/around-the-world-cruises/miami-to-san-francisco-INS200108H/hotels/overland/3/?sr=%2fcruise-finder%2f%23sailDates%3d2020|01%23destinations%3d180dayworld#land-program-102

Jennie,

I had your vacation exactly the opposite from what you two did!  I thought you were up north first, then Bali....oops!!

Yes, we're very excited about our impending cruise.  We've done massive research for each port that we haven't been to, signed up as quickly as we could for the Overlands, and this week we've begun packing. 

We're not celebrating Christmas with family this year as they are using the Munchkin's school holiday break to do their own travels out of the country...so I'm excited for them. 

Merry Christmas Down Under and a Happy New Year!  David and I celebrate New Year's when we see the video of the fireworks over the Sydney Opera House!  Hugs to you both!!

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Thanks Jennie!  Are you home from Bali?

We're packing for ATW20 and Luggage Forward comes Dec 23 to ship 4 bags (2 each) to the ship.  Can't wait!!!

We hope to maintain the blog on our cruise.  I won't be writing on CC.

Thanks again.  Hope it is useful Roothy 123.  We love Australia!

Don't like the O ships so elevators facing aft not a problem for us on the R ships...but point taken!

Roothy123--

hope this helps--it does for me!

"port", "left", "even" all have same letter count (same can't be said for 'starboard', 'right' and 'odd') so....

when i am first on the ship and exit the elevator i hold out my left hand-turn that way for my even # cabin--works every time!   (we request the same cabin # every time.  Of course i mostly use the stairs, which can complicate matters but I work it out)

now if i could only make the correct decision when leaving the cabin to go to various places;  My new go-to is "eat right" (always a healthy idea!) to head for Terrace and "lounge left" (both begin with "L") for trivia, etc. 

I'm old and need all the memory tricks I can think of. 

Deus!  (good morning!)

 to look your O Club benefits find "Ultimate Value" tab in upper right of O website.  Click and now you'll see what you get for  each level!

have a great cruise(s)!!! 

We too use a battery charger, but not that brand name and have for years.  Ours came from Harbor Freight and works great.

We also fill the gas tank and Dave adds Stabil to it because gasoline degrades and he says Stabil maintains it for about a year.

We set the thermostat for a/c at 83 and the furnace for 53 (approx) so we don't worry about it getting too hot inside or, alternatively, the pipes freezing!  And we turn off all water to the house so no worries about leaks.

"+1 . 

They want the 20th to be a milestone.  "  You are both totally correct; i misstated policy when I wrote "21"...sorry about that.

Get this one!  Upon returning from ATW16,  we applied for our free cruise--a 14 day one and at the same cabin category we always reserve.  

We were told that we had missed our opportunity to take our free cruise because it MUST be #21--but we were in the middle of ATW!

It took us climbing the Miami phone ladder until we reached the desk of someone who didn't say "No" but said "oh....this hasn't happened to us before but let me double check" and so it was finally straightened out.

Our TA said it was like banging his head against a wall to get anyone to listen to him so he enlisted Mr Wonderful's help--a master of corporate ladder climbing to get an answer.

  Moral is--keeping working your way up management until you find someone who can make a decision--AND GET IT IN WRITING!!!

Go Bucks--

I've seen those rooms and have been glad i'm not a roomie of that person--couldn't handle it! 

Our last cruise I bought fresh flowers every week or so and our room attendant enjoyed them as much as we did.

We discussed which port had the prettiest flowers and where I had purchased them. 

We've told our attendants not to do our rooms on turn arounds and overlands for years--I wonder if you had a new supervisor since we just returned from 2 mos on Nautica and talked to our attendant several times about our cabin and he was able to skip us successfully. 

Oh well, we all try...

and I forgot to say, that in the mid-cruise and end of cruise survey we ALWAYS commend our attendant by name.  If I see Head of Housekeeping in the hall, I tell her my cabin # and state that my attendant is excellent.  Those comments are passed on to the attendant.

OK, to summarize:

your cabin attendant will introduce him/herself day 1 of your cruise.  (there will be a little sign on the wall telling you the name of that attendant so if you don't catch it or forget it....no worries)

take that opportunity to tell him/her EXACTLY what you want daily.  We always say that Mr. Wonderful likes Diet Coke so pretty much everything else in the fridge can be removed.

We tell ours that we will place the "please make up cabin" card in the door when we leave in the morning for breakfast and it remains there until the attendant removes it.  We further state that in no way are we asking for them to do it immediately, but rather is an indication that we ARE out of the cabin.  Often they appreciate getting that early start--sometimes it means they can be done by noon.

I pack neon colored post-it notes and tell our attendant that if we need anything I will leave one of the post-it notes on the bed where it is hard to miss on white sheets!

If we are gone on overnights we tell them to make up the room for bedtime and they need to do nothing else for us.  

If we are remaining on board at the end of one cruise we tell the attendant that he/she will not be needed for that day or night.  We can make up our own bed and reuse towels as we do at home and they are grateful that it is one less room to have to do that very hectic day. 

We have sailed with O for many years and have yet to have a poor attendant.  They are wonderful.

Go Bucks,

I followed several of the passengers experiences on ATW19 as they were friends of mine.  Yes, you had a very different itinerary for your ATW cruise.

And, it is different than the ATW20--I'm glad O changes their itinerary so we can see the world.

Glad you had no problems with mosquitoes. 

GoBucks, our ATW itinerary had us in a tributary of the Amazon as well as both western and eastern Africa,  several ports in SEAsia and a bunch of tropical islands and their jungles.   We took no chances!  Our friend Don Horner did the same with the permethrin spray and we proudly modeled for each other in the Amazon boat!

We stuck the Ben's the ship gives us in our backpack for port use and bought deet wipes  so that we could take them in carry-ons for overland flights rather than liquids & will do the same this time.  (and I'm ordinarily a freak about using too many meds, sprays, etc but caution won out)

we got Yellow fever shot at our doc's & travel clinic's rec for ATW16.  He said we travel so much he thought it was warranted. One less thing to think about for ATW20! (and no side effects for either of us)

Malarone made Mr Wonderful ill so upon advice of Insignia doc we just wore long pants & long sleeves in some ports. In other ports we used lemon-eucalyptus oil  which is much better smelling!

Consumer Reports tested deet products & lemon-eucalyptus oil and said both were highly effective. 

We had sprayed the long pants, shirts, & socks at home with permethrin and it also affords protection against zika, west nile, dengue & chikungunya.  Consumer Reports also rec'd it.  Check their ratings for 2019 to see if these rec'd have changed.

Permethrin will last through several washings although it is the agitation of the washer that breaks down the protection so we just dunk them in bathroom sink and hang to dry in the shower stall. 

We put them in a ziplock bag so as not to taint the rest of our clothes and on those days where the presence of mosquitoes was almost guaranteed that is what we wore.  Also sunblock then followed by dabs of deet on unprotected areas.  Worked great! 

common sense tells you not to be out at dawn or after dusk in some areas-- limit your exposure. Don't be like the woman who said she was 'eaten alive' on a shorex and when asked what repellent she used she said 'none, because nobody told me to.'

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