Mostly Live. Explorer-Tokyo to Vancouver

[Chateaunole-du-pape]

42 minutes ago, jctdlt said:

What airline were you flying.  Love upstairs on 747.

Delta! It was a few years after the merger with Northwest and the cabin had been re-done with DL flat-bed seating in a 1x1 configuration upstairs. It was like a private jet up there... I would always book it when traveling for work if it was on the route I was flying. Probably got to do it 4 or 5 times.

[GOARMY]

Ah! 

 

Up that winding staircase on a 747.  A "trip" back through history.  Northwest Orient Airlines (NOA).  Upper deck was a cocktail lounge with sofas.  Long-hauls from Seattle to Far East; and visa-versa.  Really 1st Class.  

 

Those days are long-gone, as is NOA. . 

 

British Airways and United also maintained the upper level for Business Class seating on long-haul flights.  No cocktail lounge, of course.  We always selected seats in Rows 62 or 63. Quiet, and often provided opportunity to exchange greetings with Flight crew when they exited cockpit for a Potty break.

 

No more 747s on BA or United on these long-hauls.  Not fuel efficient. We were on one of BA's last 747s back in 2019 when returning to SEA from Heathrow following an Explorer segment.  The ensuing 2020 Pandemic accelerated BA's decision to discontinue using 747s.

 

GOARMY!

 

 

 

 

 

[mj_holiday]

OK,  we have been through our second April 20, April 21, and we are now starting April 22, I think. As I said we’ve been notified that we have to miss Dutch Harbor and they gave us another port and they passed out the schedule. But then last night I got excursion tickets from destination services that say today we’re going to be in Kodiak Alaska. So I’m not the only one that gets confused. I will head down to destination services this morning to make sure where we are.   
The second April 20 was uneventful, except our trivia team placed first.

April 21 was a Sunday and they had the Sunday brunch. The way they have it scheduled they’re really wasn’t a crowd whenever you wanted to go. It was a very nice display and I’m glad we went.

I have no pictures but I need to say how great the food has been in Compass Rose. We are on our 21st or 22nd day and I have not seen a repeat in the menu.

I will provide more details from either out to sea or Kodiak Alaska, once I figure out where we’re going to be

[Lonedaddy]

On 4/18/2024 at 4:00 PM, mj_holiday said:

Wednesday, April 17 Otaru 

 

A local brewery, in fact, it brews a Otaru beer. This was a very large warehouse and had a hint of Germany in their bar. DH ordered a beer and I ordered a Pilsner. The beer was very good. They did their brewery for those and the copper tanks were right in the middle of the public area. 

 

Beer looks great wish they served them on tap like that on the ship!

[Lonedaddy]

On 4/20/2024 at 8:53 PM, Nachosdelux said:

There was only the option to make specialty dinner reservations on the "first" April 20.

 

It is a limitation of the computer system.

 

When we boarded, we were able to make a reservation for the "2nd" April 20 (which was wide open)

 

It is now snowing!

Nice I'll have to remember that trick

[mj_holiday]

After six days at sea, we can finally walk on solid land. 
The first thing we did was turn our phones off of airplane mode so that we could get the correct time on our phones.

The excursion was a panoramic drive around Kodiak. You really didn’t get to see that much because windows were fogged, but stopping outside the bus (a school bus at that.) you could see beautiful vistas.

The extemporaneous talk of the driver was very interesting, such as 99% of the power used on Kodiak is renewable.

In search of a toilet I found this. 
After the tour I went in search of a pharmacy to get some stuff that we’ve run out of. I headed to a small Safeway store that had 95% of its shelves devoted to liquor and beer. The guy at the register was able to help me with a small display that they had, and I found some of what I needed. 

Back to the ship in time for trivia and we placed third again. We had an excellent dinner, everything from the selection to the taste, and the service was very good. 

[mj_holiday]

April 24, Homer, Alaska
it was a beautiful day and we took the shuttle bus into town. The shuttle bus was very convenient and went to three places around the town. We went through all three stops and decided on a stop on the strip we walked into the first building we saw with an open sign and it looked familiar. I’m sure I’ve seen it on TV on some travel show they did not have food but they had cold beer and DH I had one and then headed back to the ship for lunch. 

[mj_holiday]

April 25 Seward
Seward is a large port with lots of stuff going on. As I got off the ship to take the shuttle into town, I suddenly realized there weren’t any arrows telling me which way to go. We have spent 15 plus days in Japan where there was an abundance of arrows to make sure we knew which way to go. Not only were there no arrows today, but there were no other regents guest just then for me to follow. Well, I headed out of port and yes I got stopped and told I was going the wrong way. 

I finally made it out of the port, and after being turned around a couple times to get to the correct bus and the correct side of the temporary fence I was in line for the shuttle. There was another cruise in port today. Each ship was running a shuttle plus the port itself had a shuttle.
The town of Seward had a lot more homes and businesses and hotels than I had imagined. We have been here 15 years ago just going from the train to the ship in the rain. So it was very interesting seeing the town. Lots of the homes had large windows and plexiglass balcony railings to take in the view, but it must get cold here in the winter. We did not take an excursion, so the walk around town was very interesting. Back to the ship and trivia and we did not place at all. 

[mj_holiday]

Friday, April 26, Cruising Hubbard Glacier.

The pictures tell most of the story. 

It was a sunny day getting to the bay, was a very pretty sail in. The main glacier and a couple smaller ones were really interesting to see. The narrative was very informative. Apparently, later in the season you have a better chance of seeing the glacier calf. 

The ship did a 360 turn, so all definitely had a chance to see the glacier

[mj_holiday]

Saturday, April 27, Sitka
Great sun sunshine started off the day. The port had a couple of golf carts at seat six to take those with some mobility issues parent DH parent from the dock to the shuttle buses, a great idea.

The shuttle buses took us to a central parking lot in town. That would be easy to find when it’s time to head back to the ship.

several of us needed to go to the pharmacy, which was maybe three blocks down the sidewalk. After those errands, DH and I stopped in “. Ernie’s Saloon”, and found a table to sit at.  

Before we had a chance to order a beer, a very senior gentleman walked up to us and invited us to join him at his table, which we did. He has lived in Alaska since he got back from Korea and was a wealth of information about the area. He showed us the cut out from the local newspaper which had announced our ship in Port that day. The bar also had a very nice bar dog named George. 

The rest of the afternoon was spent shopping for souvenirs and looking around town. There was a fantastic Russian orthodox church. We had a late lunch in a local establishment, we had fish and chips made with local freshly caught halibut. We split a lunch and still couldn’t finish it all. Just a great lunch. 

Back to the ship for trivia, not good. Ordered a small snack for our suite since  we had such a big lunch. 

 

 

 

[mrlevin]

One of the best cruises we have ever taken; officers, staff, and crew fantastic.  Lecturers and entertainers wonderful. We won cumulative trivia just icing on the cake.  Orchestra one of the best.  Alvi and geovanni behind the bar even more fantastic. I love Regent. 

[mj_holiday]

On our way home and bring this up to date then. It was a great cruise. 

[briar14]

18 hours ago, mrlevin said:

One of the best cruises we have ever taken; officers, staff, and crew fantastic.  Lecturers and entertainers wonderful. We won cumulative trivia just icing on the cake.  Orchestra one of the best.  Alvi and geovanni behind the bar even more fantastic. I love Regent. 

It was a great 30-day cruise and wonderful itinerary. Icing on the cake was our winning congenial trivia team!

[mj_holiday]

Ketchikan, April 28
We stayed on board this day, DH had a cold/allergies/something that was bothering him and we just had a relaxing day. 

We did start planning for what to put in which suitcase as we will soon be leaving the explorer.
Didn’t do any good trivia.
We went to dinner and DH got a coughing fit and couldn’t stop, so I took our two glasses of wine and we left the main dining room. Both maitre ds understood what was happening and asked what they could send  to our room to eat.

 

April 29 – Sea Day – Inside Passage

We slept in this morning, and DH is feeling much better
I won a game at bingo, the prize money isn’t very shabby at all. 
Through the inside passage was very relaxing the view was obstructed by some fog, but it was still very pretty with the shapes of the mountains and the trees. 

Today was the last trivia game of the cruise, the Cruise Director had been keeping track of team points on all the sea days. We were very surprised to learn that we were in the running for a winning total.  The questions were tough and we missed several but I guess not as many as other teams. We got an all around third place and weren’t we surprised. 

Edited May 5 by mj_holiday
Correction

[mj_holiday]

April 30, Tuesday, Victoria, British Columbia

Our excursion today was wine tasting at three local wineries, well we had to drive about an hour to get to them, but I guess that’s local.

The drive was pretty and the wineries were also very pretty. 

The three wineries had different styles of wine and different ways for tasting. We learned a lot about each of the wineries and the various wines. The first winery had a Pinot gris with a little carbonation, which we really enjoyed.

The second winery we went to, the tasting was conducted by the owner’s wife. She gave us very good information about the different varietals that we were tasting.

The last winery had tables set up for us outside as they brought the various wines for us to taste. 
It was an interesting and fun tasting excursion but as I looked at one of the wineries on the web, I see that they cannot ship outside of Canada.

 

May 1, Vancouver, British Columbia
Time to be dragged off of the Explorer.

6 AM came very early, but we were ready to vacate our suite by 8 AM. The disembarkation was delayed by 40 minutes waiting to get a clearance from some government official.

We were heading to a taxi to go to a hotel in Vancouver for the afternoon and the evening. While the driver was taking us to our hotel, he arranged for taxi to pick us up the next morning. Our original airline reservations were for noon, but they change the flight to 6 AM. 

We  got to the hotel blue, got all our luggage in and the cab left and I went to check in. They did not have our reservation. I pull out my phone with my information show it to the lady and she inform me we are at the wrong hotel.  I had told the taxi driver we were staying at the hotel blue. That is where he took us. The lady at the reception desk read my information and said I was at the wrong hotel. We were reserved with Blue Horizon Hotel.😱

We got another taxi cab and then got to the correct hotel, the Blue Horizon. Thank goodness it was not a dump.  The hotel was very nice a little millennial, but very nice

I had to call the taxi driver we had a reservation with and let him know I had been at the wrong hotel and the address of our new hotel. Have you ever had a taxi driver laugh at you on the phone?
The room was nice and comfortable. We had a late breakfast at their restaurant which was very very good. Took a nap in the late afternoon. Walked around the neighborhood and found a restaurant and bar to go in for a couple drinks and a snack. 
Our taxi driver showed up the next morning at 4 AM. We made it to the airport and had an uneventful trip back to Texas. Our car was not damaged by any hail and we drove home to Oklahoma City.  
It really was a great cruise with great crew, great food,  a great ship and great ports, We really enjoyed ourselves   

[forevertravel]

We were on this cruise and it was one of the best. We reconnected with crew members we had not seen in years. The food at all restaurants was very good and so were the choices of wine. A couple of times we didn't care for what they were serving but we had our favorites and they brought to us. Crew service was top notch. We enjoyed the ports in Alaska and Japan. The three days in Tokyo were nice. The Hilton was in a great location and service was excellent. All in all an excellent cruise.

 

[briar14]

This was a very good cruise. Staff and crew were excellent. Even with crew changes in Busan, there was no diminution of services. Cherry blossoms, good weather, and a very good itinerary, especially in Japan, made for a memorable Regent cruise. Good job, Regent!

[chaunceyb]

We really enjoyed this cruise too! Service was outstanding and this ship provided some of the best inclusive wines I have seen on a luxury ship, and their wine list to purchase was very good. We dined at all the restaurants and they were very good. In Compass Rose if we didn't care for the daily specials, we settled for surf n' turf (lobster and boneless rib eye)! The lobsters were very well prepared!🙂