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WOW just WOW!! I enjoyed every word and every photo!! Your review is sooo impressive and thorough and entertaining and interesting!! It was our pleasure to have met you and your wife - Clayton and I really enjoyed our day with you. Lauren

Re Coral Cuts My husband got about six cuts from coral, two or three looked quite significant. He washed them for 15 minutes in the shower using the hand held nozzle. Yes it was a pain but he stayed in the shower for the full 15 minutes washing them well. We also bought the Tamanu oil in Bora Bora and applied it after cleaning them. He is on blood thinners because of blood clots and he had no problems at all. We had brought with us a prescription from our doctor just in case we did get cut from coral, but he never had to take them. I think you just have to wash them thoroughly and I mean thoroughly. Do not think a few minutes are ok, do it well. He never used any antibiotic cream, bandages. They healed beautifully I think because he cleaned them really well and used that Tamanu oil. I also got cuts and did the same as my husband and healed with no problems.

Fakarava - my husband remembered that there is a beach down the road about 100 to 150 meters. We never knew about this beach until we were leaving Fakarava but another passenger told us that they had gone there for the day.

Hi Mrs f. - Thank you for the kind offer, I have now sent you an email.

Ours left at 12:30am - we had been delayed an hour. We took the air with Oceania. Also we had a lot of OBC so we took the day room at a hotel through Oceania which I think costs $175 each, we just booked this while on the Marina. They had water, juice, sandwiches, desserts, free of charge. We paid for our lunch at the hotel restaurant. Also if you wanted to go on a tour they provided that for an extra charge.

Bob - Yes those sweatshirts are a fortune in Big O Points - hehe! Our last cruise in January he got one like I said for 10 points but there were only 3x available - I think that is why they were so "cheap". He is quite tall so they fit him like yours.

Mrs F. - My husband and I are taking the Oceania Cape Town to Singapore in 2021 and was wondering if you wouldn't mind sharing some of your tour companies you used for your cruise. I think I saw you contributing to the 2020 cruise. Thanks Lauren

Bob et al really enjoy reading each and every day your adventures!! Now as to that sweatshirt you were wearing Bob, did you get that with your Big O Points. My husband got one very similar to yours with 10 Big O Points. Great Deal!!

ducruiser01 We went to Luxor for two days in 2018 and I found out that the Valley of Kings opens at 6am. So we were picked up at 5:15am by our tour company, Love Egypt Tours. We were the only people in the tombs and we saw every tomb that was open for the day. It was truly spectacular to see and take our time in each tomb.

From "Hawaiidan" Just a reminder..... EVERYONE in Bora Bora who has a boat and does a tour...goes to the SAME spots. No one has any special secret spots. Thus other than the boat its self there are really no difference in your experience That said the best Bora experience is the Wave Runner tour ! In picking a tour there is a huge tourist pavilion where the tenders come in will have dozens of vendors. However, this will NOT be the case for most of the other ports...Taxi's are few Don't expect the smaller islands to be all that developed.... The ship will overwhelm most ports...." Actually Hawaiidan that was not the case with me and my husband. We did Patrick's tour and it was completely different that Tohora Bora Bora's. Tohora Bora Bora's we went to a coral garden that was a "drift" snorkel but not so with Patrick's tour. Patrick's we went to his motu and swam with some sharks, swam over a small coral area, no small fish area. So two completely different tours and sights.

Hi Terry - I just sent you an email, please let me know if you got it.

Terry - That is a beautiful area you will be seeing in Alberta and then again up to Alaska. We did an Alaska cruise a few years ago and loved it. Vancouver is a beautiful city and I am sure you will enjoy it. If you are interested, my husband and I are always up to being tour guides for a day. Just leave your email and I will contact you.

Hi Terry I just had a couple of more things to add, don't wear your life jackets in the coral gardens. The current is very swift and you go through too quickly and have no control - so don't wear them there. We bought water shoes and goggles at Costco at this time of the year - they were good enough. Just spit in the masks and wash it out and they stayed clear. Don't put them on your forehead where they get mucked up with sunscreen. Both my husband and I got slight cuts from the coral. We washed them out on the tour boat with our bottled water and when we got back to the ship for about 15 minutes in the show. Also we bought Tamanu oil $20US in Bora Bora and applied that to our abrasions and we got no infections. We brought antibiotics with us just in case but we never used them.

Hi Terry - we did a 18 day from San Antonio, Chile to (Easter Island 2 days - yeah) Papeete and then a 10 day Papeete to Papeete - January 2019. The best tour snorkelling wise was with Tohora Bora Bora. He takes 6 people to a beautiful coral garden, and then three other stops, saw a huge manta ray, 22 eagle rays and to an area where there are hundreds of small fish which we fed right out of our hands! Best advice to you and your wife - bring an inflatable life jacket and wear it!!! We bought ours from Amazon and it was worth every penny. We met a couple who told us that on a tour with Oceania someone was swept away 200 metres from the tour boat. They luckily got the man but he and his wife were pretty shaken by the incident as well as everyone on the tour boat. So bring a life jacket and wear it. I was wearing my life jacket on one of my tours and I was trying to fix my goggles in the water and I got taken away by a very slight current may be 75 meters from the boat and one of our guides quickly came and brought me back. I didn't even realize I was that far from the boat - it happens quickly. If you are thinking about buying pearls, buy them from the actual pearl farms, I think they are cheaper. I luckily bought my vanilla beans from the market in Papeete. A fellow cc member, drbuster, gave me the exact stall that was the cheapest - $22 US for five beans. We had only one tour that was going to a vanilla farm and they had no vanilla beans left. I was able to buy vanilla paste so I purchased that at the farm. It is so beautiful in French Polynesia - it actually is paradise on earth!! We loved it there!

CBB - That was a wonderful cruise - Mumbai to Rome. I don't think we were on the tour with you to Petra but our guide was doing the same thing. We left him too and looked around ourselves. The Israel guide talked non stop for 10 hours so that was also a little much. But all the rest were informative and interesting.