Ferry Beach Kayaker

Scary story, as a female I would be really concerned. I see how easy it can be to be left and we only take ship excursions. We have been delayed for. Various reasons out of our control and do wonder if they would really wait. I always take my passport now ever since the Concordia incident passports became a big problem with those people. I also take a back pack with my MacGyver tool Pac most any excursions there is somewhere to stow the bag I am prepared for nearly anything. I don't have enough cash some times but may rethink that . I do wonder if it was me I think I would have stayed at Atlantis and worked at getting back to Florida and wait for the cruise to be over. Check out my travel blog http://www.atouristlife.com

If you miss the ship and the ship has your passport, your passport is given to the port agent before the ship leaves so always keep that paper with the ship agents name and telephone number.

John, what did you mean with Semarang?

 

Borobudur will be the best place to go?

With a guide and car, or taxi on our own?

Just seen it on google, looks fantastic

 

Still mixed up with all the other ports we go. Have got tours now for Bali, komdo and Lombok.

We went to Borobudar last year from Semerang and the visit to this Buddist master piece was amazing. We did a private bus tour with other people from the ship and had a police escort to get us there and back in time. The traffic on the island of Java is horrible and Borobudar is up in the mountains. We were first off the ship in the morning and got back a little more than an hour before sailing. The trip was worth it.

Some credit cards charge a 1-3percent foreign transaction fee and some charges none. I make sure I Use the card without a foreign transaction fee and for me it is Capital One. Call your bank and ask do they charge a foreign transaction fee ( if so every time you use the card the 1-3 percent will be added on)..

You do have a talent for finding sad stories. Perhaps cruising is not for you seeing that you have ongoing safety concerns.

What we learned in kindergarten ...play nice, if you can't say something nice about a person, remain quiet. I feel very sad when I see someone respond with a negative personal attack to someone's comment or question.

We are doing the circumnavigation of South America on the Prinsedam from January to March 2016. I am looking for excellent and fun cooking classes in English. The major cities we will be in are Rio de Janario, Buenos Aires, Montevideo, Lima, and Panama City. Also any great wineries in Chile and if you used a tour guide for a winery tour.

We do the late dining and I like sitting at a set table so we get to know our table mates. I usually go to the gym or play board games around four to five p.m., if not at a special event or sail away. Or if we are in port we always get back at the last minute and I would hate to get back and rush off to dinner. At 5:30 I will often get a chilled soup or an appetizer from the Lido to hold us over until our late dinner, The Lido starts serving dinner at 5:30 and you can walk in and get anything that they are serving. I like to look at the samples of the main meals that they have displayed that helps me decide what I will order later in the dining room. I find I actually eat less if I have a light appetizer or a soup at 5:30. I am not starved at 8 p.m. And can bypass that very good bread they serve each night.

When I was new at crusing all the helpful information that I obtained including getting a credit card and ATM card with no foreign transaction fees, tips on getting to and from the cruise ports, making sure to bring New U.S. Dollars when traveling. I was once in southern Mexico and had Mexican Pesos that I obtained from an ATM and the taxi driver I hired for a tour would not take them.. He wanted U.S. Dollars. Another time we were in France and there was a strike so we couldn't get euros out of the ATM,.My US currency came in handy.

Now as an experience cruiser we usually just go off on our own in most ports and the information about these ports and what to do and how to get there is invaluable. Likewise information on ports that are not as safe or too hard to get from the port so we will planned on taking an organized tour. Holland America Line is my favorite line. I think their service is excellent. We do occasionally do other cruise lines but always come back to HAL.

We cruise a lot and I have not gotten the noro virus while cruising. I am careful about washing my hands and not touching my face. I also was a camp nurse for years and we would always have an outbreak of GI problems (nausea and vomiting and diarrhea) which was most likely noro virus. As the camp nurse, I would strongly recommend serious cleaning of the campers cabins and bathrooms with bleach and for the camp not to re-serve food from the buffet. This GI virus also runs through schools, nursing homes, daycare and any other place that people are together in large numbers. The difference is except for cruise ships nobody else has to report it to the CDC. I think the cruise ships do a remarkable job trying to contain the norovirus once they have an outbreak that most likely one of us brought onboard. My advice, wash your hands frequently, and practice good buffet and bathroom manners which sadly some people don't. And if you get sick... quarantine yourselves.

Sorry duplicate post

We tendered into Cannes and the beach was a 10 minute walk. The promenade along the beach was a good place to stroll and people watch. We also walked around town filled with old interesting houses and walked up a hill to a castle with a turret. There was a lot of cafes. You can easily spend an enjoyable day wandering around Cannes.

Does anyone know if you ever get lobster in the MDR on the New England Canada Cruise?

 

 

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Make sure when you stop in Bar Harbor, you get a Maine lobster at one of the numerous restaurants in town. You can either get a lobster roll where someone else does the work of removing the lobster meat from the shell or a whole lobster where you enjoy ripping it apart. The ship tenders you in to the town. No lobsters come close to freshly harvested Maine lobsters for their sweet succulent taste. It would be nice if the cruise ships brought fresh Maine or Candian lobster while in port but I don't think they do.

Wow, makes my mouth water

Hi

Here is the link to the CDC travel vaccine recommendations website, put in that you are on a cruise ship and where you are going and pages of recommendations will come up.

http://wwwnc.cdc.gov/travel/destinations/list

I would print out the list and either take it to your family doctor and ask for prescriptions for the needed vaccines or find a local travel clinic. With prescriptions some pharmacies can administer the vaccines or if you go to a travel clinic they can recommend and administer.

Hi

The CDC has an excellent website for their travel vaccine recommendations for every country. it is very easy to use. On the pull down menu you select the country and that you are a cruise ship passenger and it pulls up the recommended vaccines for that country. By the way TDAP is a vaccine for tetanus, diphtheria and pertussis ( not polio)

In the domestic terminals at Philly there is lots of places to eat and shop, and rocking chairs to sit in to relax, plus free wifi. Philadelphia has done a nice job here. Some of the terminal are connected after security so you can walk around from one domestic terminal to another. The international terminal is separate but easy to get to. There is not much around the airport. You could take a train downtown which is about 1/2 hour away but with trains leave either every half hour or an hour depending on the time so I would carefully check my time and maybe take a taxi back. If you wanted to do this take the train to Market Street East and spend an hour at the historical sites which are close to The station ( Independent Hall, the library bell). But I would be very careful of my time here. Boarding time usually starts well before the actually time for the flight and you would need time to get through security at the airport which at times in Philadelphia can be a nightmare. Too bad you are not flying in a day early! Philadelphia is a great city to explore. it is becoming a real foodie city and the historical stuff and art museums are fabulous.

Hi Marianne and Bill,

We sailed on the first half of the world cruise from FLL to Singapore and I miss that DAM ship. I am very much enjoying reading your posts. I can almost feel that I am still onboard and immensely enjoying the days. Thank you

We stayed five days post cruise in Singapore. It is very easy to use the metro in Singapore. We brought an EZ Card for $22 Singapore (5 dollars was for the card and the test for the fares which is automatically deducted from the card.) It worked great. We were able to get money back that we didn't use at the Airport metro minus the $5 charge for the card which you can keep and re top if you make it back here. If you have just one port day ..you can buy a one day travel pass for the metro.

Please don't flame me but IMHO I think those poor people who were gunned down at the museum in Tunis didn't start out there day worried about their security. Unfortunately as Westerners we are targets for the terrorists. And no you don't want them to win but I also don't want to put myself in harms way.

We did the circumnavigation cruise around Australia two years ago and we had a wonderful time. We made friends with many Australians and they are a blast to be around.. They got the ship to televise the Melbourne Cup and did they party in fancy hats in all. In most of the big cities we had an Australian guidebook and took public transportation into the historical areas and toured on our own, and at some of the more rural place, we and an Australian couple rented a car and we went off exploring. I would do this cruise again in a heartbeat. It is a great way to see Australia. We stayed extra at the end of the cruise and spend time in Sydney, Grassy Head..Coff's Harbor and Brisbane. We took the train from Sydney up north then flew home from Brisbane.

In Cairns a wonderful excusion is a Boat trip to Great Barrier Reef.. A boat takes you out to an anchored pontoon boat about 45 minutes from shore. We did this excusion on our own by promptly getting off the HAL Ship and going to the visitor's center to buy, you can also buy as an ship excusion. This is a must do.. We paid a little extra and went snorkeling with a guide and she showed us all kinds of sea life. it was amazing.

We overnighted in Cairns so on Day 2 we did an excusion to Kuranda which was a little town up in the mountain surrounded by the rainforest. We took a cute train up the narrow gouge to Kuanda then walked around the town and took the aerial tram down through the rainforest, we got off a couple of times to walk around a wooded path with a guide. Again we did this on our own by this time booking online but you can also do it as an HAL excusion. Our self arranged excusion covered the train ride up, the aero tram down and a bus at the bottom to take us back to Cairns.

Cairns is also a neat place to walk around, they have a large park with a very pretty concrete water basin to swim or wade in since you can't go in the ocean right off shore because of the salt water crocs,. Cairns also has a beautiful Catholic Church with very unique stain class windows with the science story of creation. The little gift shop turned on an commentary about the windows and it is quite interesting. Walking up to the church we stopped at the nicely air conditioned public library for some cool air and stumbled upon a very unique small air collection with gifts from Cairns's sister cities all over the world.

it is a shame HAL is dropping Easter Island. We twice did a segment of the World Cruise ( In 2012 Fort Lauderdale to Sydney and in 2014 Fort Lauderdale to Hong Kong). Easter Island was a highlight of both cruises. I like sea days but eight in a row is a bit much. I also notice that the 2015 cruise is stopping at a lot of small Pacific Islands. The islands start becoming too much of the same after awhile. Easter Island is unique with their Moai Statutes.

Hi

We docked in Alotau in February on An Holland America Cruise. We took a free shuttle to the marketplace. The driver and guide was friendly and actually took us above the town to get a picture of the boat. the guide helped me get a small amount of local money from the ATM and then dropped us off at the local market. I brought some fruit and than asked to take pictures and they were priceless. While walking around the crowded market, one of the ladies started yelling at a man who was behind me. He was trying to pickpocket the bulge I had in my back pocket and the local woman was trying to prevent it. The guy took off and I showed the lady what the bulge was.... A wad of clean toilet paper. We both had a good cross-cultural laugh. We then took a free shuttle to a resort about fifteen minutes outside of town. It had a very clean restaurant on the water. We sat, had a couple of beers and some fried fish. It was delicious. The resort was offering a boat tour but the water became too choppy.

We will be on the Golden Princess May 24 sailing, for the berths does anyone know what ORE for Skagway means and FKL for Juneau means?

I just got off the Amsterdam after doing half the world cruise from Fort Lauderdale to Hong Kong. We visited two ports in Papua, New Guinea ...Madang and Alotau .. We met some very nice helpful local people in both ports but I do think that these are two ports that you have to be especially careful in. In Madang, one of the ship's officers was off the ship riding his bike in port and was robbed at knifepoint by three men. He suffered superficial knife wounds and was able to get back to the ship.

I am on the world cruise sailing out this Saturday. I kept an eye on my flight and when they issued a weather advisory starting at 1 a.m. About 8 hours before my flight, I flew out the day before (yesterday) on US Air and there was empty seats. I have learned that if you try to fly out after your flight is cancelled it can take days to get a new flight. The airlines usually will let you change your ticket without a fee if you do it online, if the airline issue a weather advisory. You have to fly in the dates they approve and fly to and from your original airport pairing