OlsSalt

We had been chasing puffins all over Norway and Iceland, and never saw a single one. But there floating in the Petropavlosk Bay, we finally saw a puffin. Now we could believe it was not a mythical creature after all. even though this was a Pacific Ocean/Alaska puffin. Were you also on one of the last Maasdam In-Depth cruises that took us deep into Russia Far East and on to Japan?

They apparently are also changing the ground rules for cabanas - both children and adults are now allowed. Large numbers for each cabana. Don't assume this will be a quiet retreat space any longer.

Something gets screwy and I get these repeat glitches from time to time when I try to post - it kicks back a former post and I don't know if it really posted earlier or not. I was having a deja vu moment too when it just happened again now.

When I was traveling solo by land many years ago, I joked I always looked for off-season, politically unstable countries to visit. Cheaper, fewer crowds, and always surprising extras since the people living there still wanted to enjoy life - concert seasons, winter festivals, local holidays, special seasonal foods, and just breathing room after the summer crowds were gone. As they say in Noway, there is no bad weather, only choosing the wrong clothing.

There is no formal divider, just a much (much) larger space in the Neptune between I assume the sofa bed for the third person and the main sleeping area. There may be a curtain, that can separates the sofa (hidabed) and the other double beds in the main sleeping area in the Vista suite, as best I recall. But again no formal separation of these two areas.

Avoiding 7-day weekender Alaska cruises can be good advice, but not to write off all Alaska cruises. Recent 14 day Alaska was still quite wonderful since they go well beyond the standard 7 day run Alaska ports now taken over by generic cruise crowd marketing and multi-ship crowds. We found the addition of Valdez to be a special treat on our last 14 day Alaska. The advice remains good - go North to Alaska - the further the ports are from the Big Three, the better. But even those still do remain their special charms, if you can visit during off-peak times and days of the week and take the time to get out of town.

Reminds me of a poll once taken - what would you do if you learned you only had 6 months to live? Top response was - I would travel around the world. Yet in fact, few ever did. Some of us were lucky or cursed to be born with inherent wanderlust, but have also been lucky enough to carry out much on this list of must sees and do's, before it became a final bucket list. I believe there is a word for this in the German language (Reise Weh????) - something like a "travel sickness" but not the kind one gets from drinking bad water. Just a part of the soul that needs to see what is around the next corner. While other get blessed or cursed with the opposite - "home sickness" and never need to leave. Kazu, lots here share your untimely loss since the two of you took us all along on so many of your travels. DH and I never would have jumped at the last minute upgrade offer to the Amundsen's Suite on the Prinsendam, without your timely and knowledgeable advice, about 48 hours before we were ready to depart.

I'll say it again. Which ship do you want in the foreground of your scenic photos if sharing the same itinerary routes, like Glacier Bay? The ugly Princess ships, or the elegant traditional lines of HAL ships. That is the one deal breaker when most other reasons are a toss-up. This one consideration does require choosing Princess, in order to set up our elegant photo shoot foregrounds. 🤭

How many other ships are in port with you that day, both close and near by. This is a popular excursion. Might want to consider rafting on the "Bray" (?) River in Jamaica -it was pretty and serene. Crowd handling was good.

Thinks this might work for you - image found on the net for Konigsdam Thermal Spa - their heated loungers in a room with a view. 🥰

Reminds me of a poll once taken - what would you do if you learned you only had 6 months to live? Top response was - I would travel around the world. Yet in fact, few ever did. Some of us were lucky or cursed to be born with inherent wanderlust, but have also been lucky enough to carry out much on this list of must sees and do's, before it became a final bucket list. I believe there is a word for this in the German language (Frenweh????) - something like a "travel sickness" but not the kind one gets from drinking bad water. Just a part of the soul that needs to see what is around the next corner. While other get blessed or cursed with the opposite - "home sickness" and never need to leave. Kazu, lots here share your untimely loss since the two of you took us all along on so many of your travels. DH and I never would have jumped at the last minute upgrade offer to the Amundsen's Suite on the Prinsendam, without your timely and knowledgeable advice, about 48 hours before we were ready to depart.

Aha, I have been pushing to turn Port San Luis back into a passenger ship port. Perfect location to explore Central California. What do think. Can it absorb the onslaught? What would it take to turn that long pier into a tender dock? Just like I keep suggesting turning deep channel Port Hueneme into a cruise port too, but apparently can't happen as long as it is a liquified natural gas cargo port - too much hazard to co-exist with passenger traffic. BTW: Please have some Mo's Philthy Phil pork ribs for us, where "Bakersfield comes to play". Very nice improvements to the Pismo waterfront of late - we day trip up that way occasionally. One can dine very well today around the Central Coast - California the way it used to be.

HAL crowded Lido: wonder if HAL has more "early eaters" than Princess ships, because we find the way to avoid Lido crowds is to not go right after it opens - wait at least a half hour or so. Early MDR as-you-wish seating on HAL ships also seems to have the same back up crowding problem, when it first opens.

An intangible argument the pro-cruise people do make is hoping a single day cruise visit will bring people back to the city for more contributions to the local economy. But mainly, the comment was intended to be a joke. Yes, the port fees do contribute a significant amount to the city's Harbor enterprise zone operations. Good question. Don't know if this amount was included in the "average" benefit to the city, but it should. Probably depends whether one is pro-cruise ships or anti-cruise ships -we have both working inside our local government operations. Suspect the final number are pretty fuzzy because who can really tell if any purchase was by a cruise passenger or not. They probably go on averages of averages - sales taxes, revenues and fees collected on cruise ships days compared to non-cruise ship days.

Breach of contract - small claims, if you are out of pocket - or did perhaps she pocket the difference herself? Preserve all your documents and start a written, detailed summary of every step, if you want to later pursue legal action. Yes, escalate this case to the highest level possible. I am so sorry to hear this -thank you for passing it on. Can't imagine how hard this this is for you to face so close to your departure. Hope the cruise exceeds the very unfortunate beginning, but I would not let this drop once you get back.

Surprised they do not include more islands in the Indian Ocean, or India itself. India visa hassles have made themselves tourist unfriendly, but I assume they would welcome the tourism dollars. No longer Black Sea either - which is too bad. Exotic, challenging, often well out of the personal comfort zone. but just the ticket for those seeking new travel experiences. There are many accessible and unique Indian Ocean islands to visit: Mauritius, Andaman, Reunion, Seychelles, Maldives, Madagascar ........ I would include visits to Pakistan as well. Djibouti -horn of Africa. Both compelling, and do have a tourism infrastructure. (Present travails not withstanding) Considering the volatility of todays global flashpoints, choices for this type of long-range planning do become problematic. We are getting some major port changes in both Alaska and Japan, just on our upcoming 53 day Majestic Japan cruise starting September this year. Neither at this time are considered geopolitical "hot spots" -- -except for that new volcanic island emerging off Iwo Jima. Yet this itinerary is also subject to significant changes - but no deal breakers for us.

Our recent next door neighbors visited our town for the first time on a cruise ship, and then came back a month later to buy a house. Put that amount into the "average" amount a cruise passenger spends locally. 🤑

Often for late-fixed dining, which is a less impacted time slot, they will sit only two people at a table set up for four and take away the two extra place settings. This opens up nice possibilities for window seats on some ships. Particularly welcome when sailing into Lands of the Midnight Sun.

Spend the money on a great shore excursions instead. Or the Thermal Spa - some great views can be had from that location too, and you are warm and comfortable at the same time.

Having been to Key West FLA both before and after the big cruise port explosion, I totally agree. Key West is a great example of what not to do. It was heart-breaking to see small, charming and local become noisy, crowded, generic and way overly-impacted. I was surprised to see equally impacted Avalon on Santa Catalina Island (off Los Angeles) still did retain a lot of its small village feeling, even after decades of day-trippers from both local ferries and cruise ships. They kept the scale small - no more than two stories high and perhaps also limited the numbers of non-local businesses. Skagway AK could learn a few things from both examples, as it now teeters badly between previously quaint and local "Made in Alaska" and now the very non-local Diamonds International and Del Sol invasions. My own home town now struggles with these very cruise ship impact issues - how many, how large, how often. Activists now expanding the offshore "Marine Sanctuary" may well bring an end to all shipping, including daily cargo ship transits.

The Santa Barbara wine and tourism industry thanks you. Which wine(s) did you chose and how did you go about making these purchases? Had not thought about extravagant wine purchases driving tourist spending. What restaurant did you choose? Love hearing how cruise passengers view our city. People laughed back in the 1970's when Brooks Firestone, from the Firestone tire family, started putting the local area on the wine production map and stealing thunder from the far better known Napa Valley. Now vineyards dot the entire county, competing only with cannabis unfortunately, which has taken over the previous flower growing green houses. Yet strawberries remain the top ag crop, after giving broccoli a run for the money.

The ports are relatively close so you don't have a lot of sea days. But they do require excursions of some sort, so that adds to the over all costs. The range was fascinating, including the Dutch history still found in some of the ports - Fort Rotterdam -and the unique cultures of Komodo and Lombok. All pretty low key stops for the most part. The mayor of one small city invited us to a special reception at City Hall with wonderful refreshments. Jakarta was the one large city but we did a real survey from President Obama's elegant childhood home to some incredible colored ancient fishing boats in the harbor and the growing modern high rise city itself. Not unlike the huge changes one also now finds in Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia.

$65 was the "average" per passenger. Some more, some less. Some on shore excursions, will average out those who stay on board. Or those who just wander about and purchase nothing. Interesting to learn this was similar to Key West -thanks for that info. But it is helpful number for local authorities to use when there strong public reaction against cruise ships, - what are they bringing into the community, when so many of the locals in anti-cruise ship communities see only negatives.

Local Santa Barbara Visitors bureau reported the cruise ship passenger spent on average about $65 each, mainly on shore excursions and restaurants. The visitor profile ....had data from visitors on cruise ships, showing that the 47,400 visitor volume spent a total of about $3.2 million. HAL still makes a few stops in Santa Barbara, but other HAL cruises last year that included Santa Barbara got canceled with no explanation. Almost exclusively a HAL shoulder season cruise ship stop, going to the Alaska season in the spring and coming back from the Alaska in the fall.

Good point - about a 20 hour flight time from Boston to Singapore. That is a killer. Just about upside down jet lag wise. But if this is a bucket trip, there is no way to avoid ......half the fun will not be getting there. Longest direct flight I ever took was 16 hours - Dubai to LA over the pole, but luckily it was arranged on Emirates Air by that cruise line agency. What a dream of a flight -with full camera views from the belly of the plane as we traveled across the North Pole. That is now the hardest part of cruising for us as our own decades have flown by - just getting to the embarkation ports.