ekco

I can’t speak for this ship but a few years ago we spent Christmas and New Year in the Caribbean on the Dream.  Never again would we book a cabin below the pool deck.  They had endless pool parties into the early hours with what sounded like a team of clog dancers over our cabin.  It was passengers dancing.  The whole cabin trembled and the noise was horrific, making us having to stay up half the night.  Needless to say we have been very careful since and kept away from Christmas.  On the cabin, probably the traditional layout is best.

I thought the same thing.  On a side note we are watching the series of Great Railways Journeys in the Far East with Michael Portillo on the iplayer.  Quite a few episodes feature places that the ship visits so you can get an idea of what they are like. 

It would probably be best if you read through this thread or check out the reviews section.  It looks as though you will miss out on Sihanoukville, no great loss, and have Malacca reinstated.  Paying £23 for a visa in Sihanoukville even if you stay onboard really rankled so you might be lucky and not go there, it’s derelict.

Danube, nice.  I think I’m right in saying they are only flying from Gatwick so unless we travel not much use to us.  Maybe next year.  Good advice about the voucher Pensioncruiser.

Correction, just saw an offer on Travelzoo for a Tui river cruise flying from Heathrow or Birmingham.

Hopefully, as Keith says, things have improved on the ship and they are not sending passengers into markets in Kuala Lumpur and Bangkok as they did to us.  We didn’t go in, maybe overly paranoid but having caught a virus on a trip in a Tenerife from the Majesty a few years ago which made me very ill for 4 weeks it’s understandable I think.

Yes it was, hard earned too and it’s a good job we have free calls included with our internet package.  It could have walked here quicker. That’s the trips paid for anyway.  I think they could have organised the itinerary better in the first place, to keep Sihanoukville and Vietnam (3 days at sea in total) and knock off Koh Samui and Malacca was head scratching.  Luckily we just boarded in time for Koh Samui to return to the itinerary.

I noticed that the price of face masks has soared on eBay, average £1 each, we paid £2.99 for 50 four weeks ago.  Always an opportunity for some.  Maybe now Marella and Manchester Airport will start taking this seriously, hiding your head in the sand is not acceptable.  We have been responsible and kept to ourselves for nearly two weeks, we took precautions in port but lots of people on the plane coughing, all of which mysteriously stopped on landing when an announcement was made about reporting coughs and fever.

Rant over, lol.  It must be the weather getting to me.

Hurray! Finally! After countless phone calls and hours of time the refund is finally in the account.  Far from refunding it to the card as they said they wanted the bank account and sort code then had the cheek to say it would take 5-10 days, it took 7. A cheque would have arrived and been cleared quicker.  This started on the 20th December when they sent the email.

Almost an hour to the beach on the other side of Vang Tau.  If you look on google earth for the Imperial Hotel then it will give you some idea of the geography.  The beach is nice enough with fine sand BUT the strong incoming tide washed up a disgusting amount of plastic waste on the tide line.  Straws, bottles, cartons, fishing nets, etc.  Now, a lot of people couldn’t care less about this but I found it sad and disturbing personally.  How the sea life gets along I don’t know.  The same can be said of the harbour near Langkawi, lots of rubbish on the water mark on the breakwater, but we saw sea eagles flying near the ship early evening.  Langkawi, Singapore and Koh Samui are accessible from the ship, don’t know about Malacca as we didn’t go there (not even going to talk about Sihanoukville).  With a bit of research Singapore would be a good diy place as they use the western alphabet so easy to navigate and has a good transport system.  We did a trip which was very good, we went to the botanical garden with the orchid garden included, an hour not enough, drove past the Raffles hotel, same with the Indian quarter, had some time on the water front which was nice and then an hour in China town.  We had a fair amount of time to ourselves on this trip which is what we like.

You could get a taxi or a port side trip In Vietnam but everything is a long way.  Maybe brave the coach trip and do the Saigon on your own trip.  The beach day we did with the sightseeing knocked off was not worth the money at £46pp and I wish we had cancelled.  I overhead two ladies saying they couldn’t wait to get back to the ship.

When we were on we were the only ones wearing face masks off ship, just one other while we were in Bangkok.  Lots of locals everywhere wearing masks, although a lot weren’t.  We used ours in the city on crowded streets, also First Defence nasal spray.  The ship carries on as if nothing is happening.  Four cases positive from that cruise repatriation yesterday, now in Arrowe Park quarantine.

No, the Imperial hotel was right across the busy main road. You can see the larger part of the hotel here.

Here is a photo of the beach day at Vang Tau.  Also the Batu Caves at Kuala Lumpur with the hundreds of steps.

Yes, you can change up to 24 hours before.  Not sure if it’s the same one as we were there most of the day.  It’s basically a patch of sand by the side of a restaurant with a pool just above the beach.  Lunch was nice but I got bored after an hour as I can’t lie on a sunbed for long, we arrived about 10.30 and left about 2.30.  I don’t know why but I thought it was attached to a hotel with extra facilities, it isn’t.  After lunch a wind got up and blasted us with sand.  On leaving that evening we could see the bright lights of the actual Vung Tau resort and that looked a better option for a trip as the beach we were at was on the other side of the hill that Christ the Redeemer was on.  Depends if you like sunbeds really, we had them on our balcony and that was enough.  We did regret not cancelling when we had the opportunity.  My big tip would be to get small amounts of the local currency of countries you want to visit, we didn’t and found difficulties especially in Thailand where we had to find money change kiosks.  Even changing 30 US dollars we needed our passport details, photocopy is ok.

Talking of temple steps we did the Hindu temple one with hundreds of steps.  Ouch!

Actually coming down was more difficult as the locals think nothing of leaving banana skins on the steps.

We did the Vung Tau beach day and wish that we had cancelled as they cut out the temple and Christ the Redeemer stops due to “negative feedback” as they put it.  After lunch, and tiring of the sunbeds due to being blasted by the wind and sand, we walked across the road bridge and spotted Christ the Redeemer in the distance. Our coach didn’t go back that way but we did get the opportunity to see it lit up in the dark as we sailed away past the resort outbound,  it is the very last headland before the open sea.  Binoculars are helpful.

It’s not lovely weather here that’s for sure.  Howling wind AGAIN.  We have kept away from people as much as we could do, we are fine having taken face masks and used First Defence nasal spray while near crowds but were sat in between two rows of people coughing the whole way home.  An enormous jumbo jet sent to bring just over 30 people home last night, where are the other 40?

Walls do seem to be a recurring feature.😁  All quiet from the ship, all this fuss about the cruise ship in Japan when we were allowed to walk right through Manchester airport and disperse without any temperature checks. Unbelievable.

That Extinction Rebellion lot want to go over there and lecture them.  I hung over the rail for an hour leaving ports in Malaysia and lost count of the plastic bottles bobbing by the ship, not to mention small pieces of plastic and even large crates.  One of the guides in Langkawi told us that locals just dump their rubbish outside and when the monsoons comes it just washes away into the sea.  There was an awful lot of rubbish around, especially next to roadside cafes, which surprised us as we thought Malaysia was very strict.

Definitely, I would have done the whole cruise just with Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand.  Just a side issue, we were horrified at the amount of plastic rubbish bobbing about in the sea around Malaysia and when we did the beach trip in Vietnam the strong tide there had washed mile upon mile of plastic, including bottles, cartons and straws, onto the beach as well as the usual fishing nets.  On the beach at Koh Samui I had to drag a large tangled mess from the sea and a jagged broken bottle sticking up out of the sand on the water line.  Sad to see.

Oh, lucky them.  It makes the long sail to Vietnam worth it to spend two days there. It was rough seas when we went.  Keith is very quiet.

You were lucky, we queued for an hour to get off then the same to get back on in Singapore. The first week is very full on, every day is busy so we took time out in Koh Samui to wander around and find the beach and then walked up a country lane inland.  The other Thai days are very long and busy and the port is a container port and noisy so a day at sea after that is welcome to regroup. No chance to diy at this port.  The temples in Bangkok are magnificent, I haven’t posted photos as it would be like telling someone what is in their birthday present before they open it.  Enjoy.

That’s the one, he did say he was officially unemployed at midnight on the day before we got to Langkawi so not sure if he meant permanently as the show team and a lot of the spa girls came back on the Birmingham and Manchester flights.  It is now 3.30am and I have been in bed since 8pm so all over the place, lol.  The weather is wild here tonight, I find wind very unsettling.

We booked online Margaret, it’s the same old story with no information.  Same on the ship with the cabin coffee machines, no pods, always coming tomorrow.  We had to go to reception to find out we could get coffee charged to the ship at the coffee lounge.  It seems we were the only ones to find out about this as the manageress knew us by sight.  We will wait until after the weekend to see if the refund appears on the credit card we used on our ships account but I’m not holding my breath.

Regarding currency, it’s difficult if you only need small amounts as you get a lower rate.  They will rip you off using US dollars and give you change in their currency to their benefit so on consideration you might as well change on the ship to save the bother.  In Singapore they use English on all signs so I would think using an ATM should be easy.  In Thailand it was not as easy as we thought it would be, the ATM’s are in the Thai written language so impossible to understand and not worth the risk of putting your card in.  As I said earlier there are change booths on the jetty in Koh Samui which I wished we had used as little stress there, US dollars not much use for spending there so changing pounds would be better, take a photocopy of your passport in Thailand.  Not as cheap there as we thought it would be.

Regarding Koh Samui if you can take a sandwich or a sausage for an extremely thin but friendly big black and white dog to the right side from the jetty I am sure he would appreciate it.  His ribs and spine are showing, very sad.  We had nothing with us unfortunately.

Glad to hear Bangkok airport is not so far away.  We seem to have done a lot of long coach excursions the last fortnight.  Best one was not long though, Singapore, with a great guide who I think was called Jimmy but we called him Mr Woo after the character in Benidorm as his laugh was identical and so funny, anyone who has seen it will know what I mean. Great guy who appreciated the British influence there. Paul, the MC, has finished and was on our flight home and had us in hysterics as he took over the PA for a few minutes, a great double act with captain Chris who hopefully will be back for you after next week.  Apparently he has to testify in a murder trial, a dastardly murder which happened elsewhere where, rumour has it, a passenger allegedly strangled his wife and tipped her over the balcony.  Hopefully not true but ladies keep an eye on your husbands while on the balcony😉.  Jet lagged brain isn’t working now so off for a nap.  Oh yes, guess what? No refund yet.

Back home after a gruelling 13 hour flight yesterday.  Thank you to the ignorant couple in front who, yet again, reclined their seats fully right after take off and kept them that way for the whole 13 hours just like the flight out.  I digress, before leaving the stand in captain said that they were hoping for full propulsion from the weekend.  Why I don’t know, as no repairs done but this is the ship that made no mention of it during our cruise until leaving day and seemed to be operating in a bubble regarding Coronavirus.  Not a word about it or how to be hygienic, thank goodness nearly all the ports took our temperatures before going through.  Perhaps trips to markets are not a good idea.  Manchester airport didn’t even check our temperatures and allowed a whole plane load of cruise passengers to disappear into the ether, relying on honesty about coughs and fever.  The same couple in front coughed continuously throughout the flight but seemed to make a miraculous recovery when the announcement was made on arrival at a Manchester.  Here endeth the lesson, glad to be home after a very long day.  First week good, second not so with too many sea days and Cambodia and Vietnam not worth the long journey, in my opinion but others might disagree.  Highlights, Langkawi, Koh Samui and Singapore for us, plus some beautiful temples, sea eagles, monkeys, etc.  Thank goodness we flew into Langkawi as it is a small but well appointed airport only half an hour away, Bangkok is a two hour drive.

Hi everyone.  We are at the airport waiting for our flight, hopefully early.  The last passengers only left the ship for Gatwick at 22.10 last night, not good. It is extremely hot in Langkawi, we went on the mangroves boat trip yesterday which was good but all in all the last week had been a waste of time.  Sihanoukville last Saturday not good then a rough sea trip to Vietnam which was average then two days at sea back to a Langkawi.  Most of the week was at sea, the first week was better but far too many long coach rides.  Our favourites were Langkawi, Koh Samui, diy, and Singapore.  Kuala Lumpur too far and too many high rise buildings,  Bangkok too far away at two hours but the temples were spectacular. 
 

Thanks for the info about the Hornbills, we only saw the one and thought it might have been an escaped Toucan.  It was in the grounds of the hotel at Langkawi.  Watch for prices here, we paid two dollars more for two beers here than two weeks ago.  The guide yesterday suggested the app Grab which is their Uber as the taxi drivers charge 60 in their currency for cruise passengers when it is usually 12-20.

I forgot to say, Koh Samui is a tender port but plenty of beaches to walk to, we went early and saw sea eagles flying low over the sea.  Change money to Thai Baht on the jetty, you will need this currency inThailand and the ATM machines are incomprehensible.  Same applies to other countries, we have only used our US dollars in Langkawi and it has been a problem, we changed 30 dollars in Bangkok for a drink and it didn’t go far.  You will need a photocopy of your passport at some change places but not at others.