Travel day musings

I actually started this travel day post a couple of days ago and have continued to add to it since, so it’s going to read like a sea day post, disjointed and GPS-worthy. It’s merely a collection of thoughts I have had for a few weeks, and have said to myself, ‘Oh, I must remember to mention that on my blog’, which I do, quite often (the self-talk part, not so much the remembering part), so whatever I mention here will probably include only half of what I intended to.

There may be a lot of that this season. 

First, I would be totally remiss not to mention the devastation of Hurricanes Irma and Maria in the Caribbean, and even Harvey in Texas, and now Nate in the Yucatan peninsula. Horrified, we sat glued to the coverage on TV when it was occuring, sick at the thought of what might happen and then sicker when we saw pictures of what did. On a personal note, it is slightly bizarre that this winter was to be the first since 2007 when we have not cruised in the Caribbean. It was simply never in the cards for us this year, so we have not been personally affected by what has occurred.  But after years of extended travel in the area, those islands are like our neighborhood, and we have several friends who have been displaced or who are trying to pick up the pieces of their lives. Our hearts ache for them right now.

Maybe our late spring snows are not the worst pain Mother Nature dishes out. 

On to other things...

Obviously, cruising from Australia means not only a wicked-long travel day to get there, but also one heck of a time change to adjust to. Or so I thought. When I actually did the math, I was pleasantly surprised to see it’s not all that much different from what we adapted to last year in the Mediterranean. Sure, it seems pretty awful, looking at it from a clock perspective - Sydney is currently 15 hours ahead of EDT (16 hours ahead after DST ends on November 5)- but the body doesn’t care if it’s Thursday or Friday, so it’s really equivalent to a 9-hour time difference in the opposite direction.  I know from previous westward travel that the trick will be to stay awake for the first half of our long flight (tough to do, as it will be the middle of the night at home), sleep several hours just before we land (tough to do, since we’re flying coach), stay awake as late as possible tomorrow night in Sydney (at least 8pm) and then fight the urge to wake up at 2am the following morning. Of course, knowing and doing are two totally different things, and I think a fair amount of jet lag is inevitable. God bless those people who do this for a single cruise!

Time relative to 6am EDT

On a related note...I always get a few questions about the dates and time zones in my blog, and rightfully so.  Sometimes posts do seem out of order, or I’ll wish you a Happy New Years on a day that’s not exactly January 1. The reason is quite simple: I had to choose one time zone for my entire blog when I first set it up years ago, and I chose EST. When we were cruising in the Caribbean, things never seemed amiss, but beginning the year we traveled to French Polynesia and then again last year in Europe, the dates listed in the blog and the day I actually write a post might have been off by one, and astute blog readers noticed. With the 15/16 hour time difference, I imagine there will be even more frequent disconnects this year.  Just keep in mind that the things I report happened on a Tuesday might show up in the blog under Monday’s date. 

While it’s often night in Australia when it’s day in the US (and vice versa), this live webcam of the Sydney Opera House and the Sydney Harbour Bridge is spectacular anytime, but it’s particularly fun beginning about 2pm EST as the harbor comes alive with boat and ferry traffic. You might even spot the Golden Princess at its berth at the Overseas Passenger Terminal on a turnaround day, though watching sailaway on the first day of each cruise might not be feasible for most US and Canadian readers. Our scheduled departure time is 4pm, which is 1am EDT (earlier, on the same day) and midnight EST. Still, if you can’t sleep...we’ll be waving at you!

Live webcam of Sydney Harbour

(click on the right arrow for a live view)

An aside here...people ask us all the time if we get tired or bored of cruising as much as we do (which we find kinda harious, because I don’t think people who winter in the same condo in Florida every year ever get asked that), and, of course the answer is NO. We would never continue to do something that bores us, although, frankly, I can’t remember the last time we were bored. In fact, we still find excitement in things that others might not even notice (because we are a simple people). ;-) Case in point...on Sunday, October 1, while we were watching split screen NFL football and NASCAR, G casually asked what time it was in Sydney (because he is not fluent in time differences). When I told him it was between 5 and 6am the next day, he said that October 2 was the last turnaround day for the Golden Princess in Sydney before we board the ship. And then he checked the Sydney port schedule online and said the ship should be arriving in at the Overseas Passenger Terminal in Circular Quay anytime in the next hour. Huge excitement!

So there we were, watching three screens then (football and racing on TV and Sydney on my iPad). It was nearly 6am Sydney time when I spotted the lighted bow of the Golden Princess appearing in front of the Opera House in the pre-dawn darkness, and we temporarily abandoned sports to watch as the ship slowly made its way into the berth.

Can you see the bow of the Golden Princess, partially blocking the view of the Opera House,

on the far left side of the screen?

Making the turn into Circular Quay

The next time the Golden Princess is at this berth, we’ll be on it!

I was still awake when the ship sailed later that day, and it was an equally beautiful sight. 

Sailaways are always so much fun, but sailaways from Sydney are among the best in the world. 

I hope our weather is just as beautiful, at least once or twice!

Bored?  Not us, not by a long shot. :-)

And for the usual links I post each year for the ship’s webcam and location:

Golden Princess bridge webcam
(this is not always up to date)

Current location of the Golden Princess

As for photos...I can’t predict whether I’ll be able to upload none, some or all of the hundreds I’ll want to include. I’ll try to post at least a few while we’re Down Under using our free international cellular data plan through T-Mobile, but I suspect that speeds won’t be fast enough to upload photos in quantity (not to mention that labeling them takes a fair amount of time). Like last year, I’ll upload the rest from Hawaii, where WiFi is fast and free.  I’ll always let you know when I’ve added photos and direct you to the blog posts they’re attached to. 

And speaking of travel blogs, I want to share with you one that Cruise Critic friend DChip brought to my attention this year. She and her husband have been cruising Holland America Line, and one of their ship captains (luckily, one who usually commands their World Cruise) keeps a fantastic blog. In addition to the usual sightseeing tidbits, he posts amazing time delayed videos of port arrivals and departures, and talks about navigational and command topics most of the rest of us aren’t aware of. I think he’s on vacation at the present time, but he has years’ of posts to read and I found it fascinating to read about the ports we’ll be visiting this year by clicking on the labels on the left side of his blog (in web view), particularly Melbourne and Lautoka and Noumea, all of which will be new for us. You can find Captain Jonathon’s blog at:

Captain, who’s driving? A medley of command, travel and family

I have again loaded up my iPad with plenty of reading material for our cruises, but this year, with the international data plan, it should be easy to add to my electronic bookshelf along the way by tethering my non-cellular iPad to my iPhone. In addition to my Kindle library, I’ve focused on ‘checking out’ travel guides that were available through our library using the Overdrive app, plus a few other books about the areas we’ll be visiting. I’ll be re-reading possibly the funniest book ever written, Bill Bryson’s In a Sunburned Country, about his travels in Australia. I first read it on a cruise 15 years ago and knew right then that Australia was a place I had to visit one day. I never, in a million years, imagined I’d soon be making my third trip to that country. 

Screen capture from the Overdrive app

I’ve also saved several magazines on my iPad using the Texture app. Sure, there are plenty of political and sports and lifestyle magazines, but I’ve also downloaded some articles about travel in and the history of the places we’ll be visiting. I’ve discovered that I love getting caught up with magazines while traveling, even moreso than books; the short story format works perfectly for grabbing a few minutes of reading here or there. While I used to bring a small handful of magazines each cruise to read and then give them away, Texture allows me to bring an electronic slew of them, a luxury I didn’t have in the pre-digital age. 

Screen capture of some articles I’ve saved using the Texture app

We know that the Golden Princess, launched in 1998, has few of the bells and whistles featured on the newer ships (but it does have four pools and eight hot tubs so that’s fine by us). I predict that the TVs will not offer On Demand programming, but will instead feature the same Love Boat reruns we’ve seen for years...and years and years. That’s ok; my new iPhone 7 has 256G of storage and it is chock-full of videos for us to watch on our cabin TV.  I’ve also maintained my Netflix subscription, at least for the next couple of weeks. First, I’ve been able to download several videos to watch on that long flight south. If it turns out that I can download videos while in Australia (I’m not totally clear on whether that will work), and if data speeds allow, I’ll be able to continue to add to them.  After all, the new season of The Crown is coming out in December.

I have a few apps on my iPhone that we use for travel outside the US.  ConvertUnits does just that...converts the units of measurement (particularly temperature) the rest of the world uses to what the US uses. Currency is a wonderful exchange calculator, and, if you load the countries you’ll be visiting ahead of time, internet access is not required for use.  And Google bought the WordLens app we loved and renamed it Google Translate, and it works well offline on an iPhone, too. Fortunately, we won’t be needing it as much this year, with most of our port days spent in Australia and New Zealand. We also have offline maps for all the countries we’ll be visiting downloaded through the Maps.me app. This app saved us a few times last year in Europe when we got turned around.

An app we really need, but that doesn’t exist, is one that senses when we are about to cross a busy, big city intersection in left-driving counties and calls out “Stop!  They drive on the left here!  Look Right-Left-Right!, instead of Left-Right-Left”.  I think. Or is it the other way around?  No, I’m pretty sure it’s Right-Left-Right. That’s a hard habit to break. In the absence of such an app, we’ve packed our ‘Don’t get hit by a taxi’ T-shirts in all sorts of hard-to-miss colors. 

And, finally, you may notice I’m undertaking a few dietary changes this year. I’m not too concerned about finding food I can eat on board  (salad and salmon are always options, though my beloved Stilton and herbed goat cheeses- and every other kind of cheese, too- are out), but am heartbroken at the fact that there is no longer a place in my life for alcohol. I always knew that beer and spirits are nutritional- but nice- wastelands, but apparently red wine is not quite as healthy as we’ve been led to believe either (which was truly as devastating as learning the truth about Santa Claus). While I haven’t missed it this summer at home, I know I will feel it acutely while traveling. It doesn’t help that we’ll be visiting the world renown wine regions of Australia and New Zealand. Just imagine the hours we could have spent enjoying local wines and cheeses in little out of the way wine bars like we enjoyed d’Vinos in Dubrovnik. Weep!

So, let’s see...in addition to at least 10000 (preferably 15000 to 20000) steps each day, there’s no alcohol, caffeine or processed foods, minimal animal fats, limited sun (and even then only slathered with SPF 150), and do I even need to mention no smoking? Are we living longer, or does it just feel that way?

Life is good, but the struggle is real. ;-)

A little bit of planning and a whole lot of prep

At one point in our cruising career (because we really do work hard at this!), we never left home without a detailed schedule for every day of our vacation. I could tell G what, where, when, why and how much for nearly every waking moment of a cruise. But in recent years, especially since we’ve started cruising for longer periods of time, we quite often leave home with plans still in progress, or change our minds mid-trip (as proof, I offer two of the past three seasons, which featured major changes made on the fly). While I initially felt conflicted about this, I’ll confess to feeling increasingly ambivalent about planning with each passing year.

This season, for obvious reasons, our planning has been even more sporadic. While we continued to make any fully refundable plans we could, we were hesitant to commit to things non-refundable. We got a bit braver (and more optimistic!) as time went on, but some travel details were locked in just recently and there will be still more plans made along the way. 

We never fully appreciated, until we spent a month in a condo in Hawaii last winter, just how forgiving vacation planning with Princess Cruises is. We keep an ample supply of Future Cruise Deposits (FCDs) on hand, and are able to reserve cruises for basically $100 (usually refundable) per person until final payment dates. With Princess’ Flexible EZ Air, we can even reserve flights with no payment and no commitment until 75 days pre-cruise. Contrast that with a condo stay in Hawaii: our down payment was 30%, flights had to be paid in full at time of booking and everything was non-refundable. For two people who like to change course mid-stream, that was a big (and scary) adjustment to make. 

For our cruises this year, August 1 was our first final payment date, and we were fairly confident by then that, armed with Princess Vacation Protection insurance, we were safe to begin making limited commitments. Though we could have saved about $100 by locking in non-refundable rates for our pre-cruise hotel, this just wasn’t the year for non-refundable, so we made a reservation that is fully refundable until tomorrow. One of the most recent things we’ve done was to book air from Melbourne to Honolulu on January 3. We intended to wait even longer to do that but the fare dropped $300 AUD one day and we decided to commit. And, as I’ve mentioned, we are still leaving home with parts of our plans in flux. C’est la vie (with a nod towards our stops in New Caledonia, which is part of French Polynesia). At least, c’est OUR vie!

So it’s probably easy to see why the details of actual excursion planning in ports took even more of a back seat. We each had a few things we really wanted to do on these cruises, and have some basic plans in place, but, unlike last year, when we had ten port days on every 12-day cruise for five cruises back to back (how did we ever do that, plus fly home and then return in the midst of it?), our pace is a little slower this year, and there will be more time to do research along the way. 

To aid us in that effort, we recently changed our cell phone carrier from AT&T to T-Mobile.  First, their monthly rate was about 1/3 of what we were paying with AT&T, but they also have a fantastic international plan included at no extra cost. We will have unlimited text and data in Australia and New Zealand and $.20 per minute calls, too, but who needs that when we can make phone calls for free over the internet? This will hugely simplify those things which, in the past, have been difficult when traveling internationally for extended periods of time. Maps, Uber, phone calls to excursion operators, bus and ferry schedules, last minute travel research, paying bills and checking on things at home...these will be no more difficult to complete overseas than in the US. It’s a whole new world for us!

To be fair, and give ourselves a little credit, our trip preparation (which is different than trip planning) is a perpetual effort, one that we started as soon as we returned home from Hawaii in March and before we even knew where we might be going. Our passports were due to expire in November, which means that they really weren’t going to be valid for travel after May, so one of the first things we did was renew them. We used the Passport Photo Booth app on our iPhones to take our new photos, and decided one morning on the spur of the moment to do just that, using an off-white wall in the foyer as a backdrop. We didn’t clean ourselves up at all- just took the photos and had them printed at Walgreens- and decided that our passport photos now look like we’ve just completed an overnight flight, which should make immigration checks easy, but slightly embarrassing.

A quick aside here...has anyone else noticed that they wish they now looked as good as the passport photo they hated from just 10 years ago? Please tell me I’m not alone in this. And then I look at the photo on my new passport and imagine that, 10 years from now, I’ll wish I looked that good. It’s really quite disturbing.  If I ever needed proof that time is marching on, my expired passports provide it. 

New passport numbers meant updating that information in our Global Entry and Princess Captains Circle accounts, and that was all completed in April. The replacement items we knew we needed for this year’s cruises, such as the first new over the door shoe rack in 15 years, were purchased by May. As always, I’ve been setting aside things like toiletries and formalwear since we returned home. And, after a bit of research, G solved the WiFi instability issue that plagued us last winter. We now run our furnace, sprinkler system, lights and security system through it; reliability is imperative. 

We switched into dedicated cruise prep mode around the fourth week of September, driven by those to-do lists that guide our preparation efforts every year.¹ Every day was busy and we accomplished quite a few things, but, honestly, it’s been more relaxed than it ever has around here just before a cruise. When I mentioned to G that was likely because we had not undertaken any major projects this summer, he replied, “YOU were the major project this summer!” Point taken.

But relaxed is a good thing, because I’ve been kept fairly busy attending the boys’ sports events. In addition to their beloved basketball, they’ve branched out a bit this year with McGuy playing tackle football and McGee running cross country. I love that they’re developing unique interests but didn’t fully appreciate that it meant that I’d be attending multiple games and meets every week. No matter; I love watching them compete! We squeezed in our traditional farewell dinner at Sweet Tomatoes three full weeks ahead of time, while I was staying with them one weekend in September. Their busy schedules wouldn’t otherwise allow for it, but aren’t I so very fortunate that they still want to make it work?

I predict we’ll be literally seeing eye to eye by the time I return home, 

just further proof of time’s onward march. 

We started getting more ambitious about packing just a couple of weeks ago. Mostly we were trying to determine how many suitcases we’d be taking with us. I put together an itinerary calendar for our cabin wall...

If I mentioned that this cruise season seems short, would you strain a muscle rolling your eyes?

I thought so. 

Never mind. ;-)

...and, while I was doing that, looked up seasonal temperature averages for the ports we’ll be visiting. I think it’s safe to say it will be warmer than it was for us last fall in the Mediterranean (hallelujah!), but we’re still going to see some fairly disparate temps. In general, it will be in the 80sF in Queensland, New Caledonia, Vanuatu and Fiji, the 70s in Sydney and the North Island of New Zealand, and the 60s further south, with temps warming from our arrival in October to our departure in January. We’ll leave behind a few pieces of cold weather clothes we packed last year and add in a few more quick-dry shorts and Ts, which will be perfect for our stay in Hawaii, where our access to a washer and dryer will be more limited this year.

While Delta, our carrier from home to Sydney, allows each coach class passenger to check two bags for free, Jetstar, which we’ll be flying from Melbourne to Honolulu, is not so lenient. They charge by weight (the luggage, not the passengers, thank God), and so we’ve decided to check just three bags between us. As a result, we’re leaving behind some beach toys and scuba fins and wetsuits, but I am squeezing in my own mask and snorkel. After all, it’s the Great Barrier Reef; hopefully, there will be at least one opportunity to stick my head underwater!  And so far we’ve managed to keep in both Swimways Papasan beach floats. We’ll see if they make it through the final weigh in tonight. 

Fortunately, shopping-wise, cruising out of Sydney is not a bit like cruising out of Papeete. We’re taking just enough toiletries to get us started, and have already scoped out the closest stores to Circular Quay, the transportation hub in Sydney Harbour where the Golden Princess will be berthed. Turnaround days will probably be a mix of sightseeing and re-stocking, and that’s fine with us. We’ve already spent over a week in Sydney in the past, and won’t be feeling the pressure to see and do it all. (Seriously, when have we ever felt the pressure to see and do it all?)

And, finally, I am thrilled to report that there is not one single package of Hebrew National 97% fat free hot dogs remaining in our freezer this year, simply because we never purchased any this summer. We have finally learned that lesson. G ate hot dogs just one time, at a Fourth of July BBQ, and we’ve decided that’s the right way to do it. Enjoy hot dogs once, and only away from home (think of the calories saved if we could just grasp that concept with ice cream!). We have already cleaned out and shut down the refrigerator, and took advantage of its near-empty state on a recent rainy day to clean under and behind it, too. All that’s left for tomorrow morning is to close up the suitcases, shut off the water, turn off some breakers at the box, disconnect the car batteries and set out the last of the trash. 

Fingers crossed for a healthy, and injury- (and shipwreck-) free cruising season that won’t have us ricocheting across the ocean as we did last year. Because one 26 hour travel day will be quite enough!

Life is good. :-)

¹ A partial list of cruise prep to do's:

• Notify credit card companies and bank (for ATM card) that we’ll be out of the country.
• Verify all credit card and ATM card PIN numbers.
• Change auto insurance to comprehensive coverage only.
• Calculate and mail estimated tax payment for Q4 (despite my accounting background, I abhor doing taxes and hate this one with a passion!).
• Kiss and make up after arguing while doing taxes. 
• Vacuum and wipe out all furnace ducts and vent covers.
• Start up furnace and pray.
• Shut off gas fireplace.
• Turn gas fireplace on again, because it got damn cold outside.
• Shut off gas fireplace again. 
• Print Christmas card mailing labels for us and Mom.
• Put Christmas card in envelopes and give to Martha to mail in December.
• Print hard copies of all reservations- flights, hotels, excursions and cruise (including cruise invoices showing On Board Credits)- because I don’t quite trust the electronic confirmations and tickets on our iDevices. 
• Change all online financial passwords.
• Backup laptops onto hard drives and take hard drives to safe deposit box. 
• Take valuable and sentimental jewelry to safe deposit box and promise myself that next summer I really will wear it (I do this every. single. year. but never follow through).
• Get passports and Australian currency left over from 2006 Transpacific cruise from safe deposit box.
• Dig out scuba certification cards just in case we decide to scuba dive
• Clean up perennial beds in yard.
• Saw down tree in yard that looks like it might fall down while we are away.
• Honor every Garbage Day Eve by purging yard and basement and garage trash.
• Clean house completely about a week before leaving and do a light touch up after the suitcases are packed.
• Scrub garbage disposal well to eliminate odors while away. 
• Really well. 
• Dispose of vacuum cleaner bags in upstairs and downstairs canister vacs. Clean their filters. Replace with new bags. 
• Clean out bag-less rechargeable vacuum.
• Lubricate and empty shredder.
• Fill up cars and put gas stabilizer in tanks.
• Clean the deck.
• Bring suitcases up from basement and open them on deck to air out. Vacuum still more sand out of them, leftover from beautiful beaches of cruise seasons past.
• Reminisce together about all those beautiful beaches of cruise seasons past. 
• Purchase and mail all Q4 birthday cards early, because of course I did. 
• Tweak security system. Test iPhone apps that control furnace, security webcams and lights. 
• Update all apps and operating system on iDevices.
• Foster house plants out to friends.
• Leave laptops and household keys with friends. 
• Give mail key and storage tub to friends.
• Distribute cruise calendar to friends and family. 
• Promise neighbors they will be the first to know if we unexpectedly return home early.
• Apologize again for stirring up the neighborhood when we did just that last year. 
• Really promise. 
• Finally, work on cruise beautification efforts, including hair cut, hair color, give self a mani/pedi and apply Sally Hansen Nail Strips in Frock Star (because it is nice to know that some things just never, ever change!).
• Unplug all unneccessary lights and appliances.
• Watch as much football as time allows, trying to get our fix before we leave. 

Season 8: Exploring the wonders Down Under

Welcome back!

We are about to begin our 8th season of cruising, and I am both thrilled and slightly incredulous that 1.) there even IS an 8th season of cruising (remember, this was a 5-year plan); and 2.) that you are once again interested in following along. No, it's not to French Polynesia (except for the part that is), nor will it be on the Pacific Princess. Instead, our planned destination is an entirely new one, blog-wise, and, though we've visited a few places there in the past, it will be mostly new territory for us too, and that makes it doubly exciting.

In just two days we will be flying to Los Angeles and then boarding a plane for a 15 hour flight at night over 7500 miles of dark Pacific Ocean in coach class to Sydney, Australia!  We'll be boarding the Golden Princess, docked at the Overseas Passenger Terminal between the Sydney Opera House and the Sydney Harbour Bridge on Sunday, October 15 and staying on the ship (kinda-sorta...after all, it's us!) until after the holidays, when we’ll fly directly to Honolulu and spend at least a month there.

Source:  http://www.cruisemapper.com/ships/Golden-Princess-678

Let me pause here for a moment, ‘cause it’s hard to type and happy dance and squeal in delight, all at the same time. 

You might remember that last year we considered doing cruises similar to these on the Emerald Princess, but chose instead a different experience: extended late season cruising in the Mediterranean on the Pacific Princess. Despite cold and rain and even a shipwreck, we adored those cruises, and, in fact, have thought about them with no small amount of nostalgia in the months since we returned home. On Easter Sunday morning, we watched a CBS special about St. Peter's Basilica that prompted us to think long and hard about returning again this fall, and we might have done just that, particularly as we had no other firm cruising plans. However, I was perusing the Princess Cruise Atlas one day in May (it's the adult version of a Sears Christmas Wish Book, except what's being sold is a whole lot more expensive than the Baby Cheryl and Baby Pattaburp dolls I received from Santa) when I spotted these cruises on the Golden Princess.

I studied them for a week or so, looking at the ports in detail and determining on which date we might begin our season of cruising. It's always a bit of a calculation to do that.  While we like to get to as many ports as possible, we also don't mind itinerary repeats. We prefer not leaving home before October 1, but we do like to be gone before the leaves (and snow) start to fall. Furthermore, we already had reservations in Hawaii beginning January 3; our original plan, regardless of where we went before then, was to be home for the holidays and then fly to Hawaii after the New Year.

I discovered that, if we stayed on the Golden Princess for the holidays (I'm publicly admitting here that it was my idea to be away from home for Christmas), we could return to Melbourne at the end of a cruise on January 3 and, providentially, fly directly from there to Honolulu, arriving on January 3. I love it when things fall into place like that!  I put together a couple of spreadsheets of itineraries and costs and presented the plan to G. His response?  "Book 'em, Danno!" (I think that, in the world of addiction, he would be known as my enabler.) And so I did, and was smug in the knowledge that it had all come together so easily and perfectly by early May. 

Sunrise over the Sydney Opera House from our 2006 visit

View of the Sydney Harbour Bridge from George Street, in Sydney's historic Rocks area.

We’ll be staying at the Holiday Inn Old Sydney on George Street again this year. 

Hard to believe this was over 11 years ago (and I was a redhead)!  

We climbed to the top of the Sydney Harbour Bridge with a group we'd met on Cruise Critic. 

A few hours later we boarded the Diamond Princess (in the right background) 

for a 30-night Transpacific cruise back to San Francisco. 

Little did I know that would be the high point of our summer, one that I've come to think of as our Summer of No Fun. It was bookended by travel-related bronchitis in May and smoke-related bronchitis in September and, in between, I was diagnosed with one of those diseases no one wants to get. Are you surprised that my first thought was not, "OMG does this mean I'm going to die?" but was instead "OMG does this mean we won't be able to go to Australia?" I didn't think so. ;-) Most amazingly (...thankfully...blessedly), it didn't mean either one, and this is my Public Service Announcement for early detection. I've said in the past that we know how fortunate we are to be able to cruise as we do, but this year I am adding about eleventy dozen exclamation points to that sentiment.  

And maybe I should call it our Summer of Not Much Fun, because I don't mean to imply that there weren't any enjoyable moments since we returned home from Hawaii in March. I flew back to Ohio in May to visit Mom and...ok, not a great example. While there was lots of laughter (watching Carol Burnett skits together on YouTube on my iPhone while waiting for doctors), Mom had a run-in with a chair in a Greek restaurant and an ER visit on Mothers Day and then hospitalization and surgery and subsequent rehab. However, by mid June, Mom was once again settled in her apartment and is doing wonderfully (thanks to all who ask about her in their emails!). And G and I took a brief road trip in July, and it was fantastic. I mean, sure, there was the heat and wind and air heavy with smoke from wildfires near and far, but aside from that- and the holiday traffic, of course- it was good. Finally, I had two extended stays with the twins, and, as always, they really were the best. Well, except for that Algebra homework I struggled to help with. It's been 40 years since I last studied Algebra and those x and y variables are still in the midst of an identity crisis. But the rest of my visits with them were perfect, which I guess means that the highlights of my summer vacation were sitting with my mom in the hospital, a two day road trip in heavy smoke and traffic, and chauffeuring and cooking and doing laundry for teenagers. This year, I'll take it! 

As for where we'll be going on our Golden Princess cruises...the itineraries are rather varied and, though we'll be repeating two of them- New Zealand and Tasmania- there is at least one new port on the repeated itineraries the second time around. We'll start out by cruising up to Queensland, Australia and the Great Barrier Reef, and, over time, will cruise to New Caledonia, Vanuatu and several ports in Fiji.

We’ll enjoy the stay in Hawaii on our return, breaking the long flight into segments. 

Source:  MapCreator.com

Turnaround days will be in Sydney through November 28, and then Melbourne after that. 

We love that we'll be on the Golden Princess, a nice, mid-sized ship with about 2600 passengers. It's obviously not at all like the Pacific Princess, but is similar, though slightly smaller (and less crowded) than the Emerald Princess.

The Golden Princess in Sydney

Source:  https://www.cruisecritic.com/articles.cfm?ID=2140

We took two cruises on the Golden ten years ago, and it features a few things we know we'll enjoy: a glass roofed pool and hot tub area, a necessity in the cooler weather we'll experience as we head toward Tasmania and the South Island of New Zealand; 

The glass covered Calypso Reef pool area

Source:  https://www.princess.com/learn/ships/np/photo_gallery/

a wrap-around Promenade Deck perfect for shaded walking and those after dinner sunset strolls we love so much;

Source:  https://www.flickr.com/photos/mytravelphotos/5454176642/

Photo by Jasperdo

and MUTS, the big screen overlooking the Neptune’s Reef pool with nightly movies (though I'm not getting my hopes up about NFL games with a largely Australian passenger demographic). 

Neptune’s Reef pool area with Movies Under the Stars (MUTS)

Source:  https://www.princess.com/learn/ships/np/photo_gallery/

Oh, and the best part:  that beautiful Terrace Pool with its aft views of the wake...

Source:  https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Aft_pool_golden_princess.jpg

Photo by Larry D. Moore

...or of the Sydney Harbour Bridge when berthed at the Overseas Passenger Terminal. 

,

Source:  http://theoandrosa.blogspot.com/2016/04/6-april-sydney-on-golden-princess.html

We have so much to be thankful for. We have so much to look forward to.  Even my singularly pragmatic husband is calling this season a miracle. 

Life is good. :-)

A book recommendation for those traveling to Croatia

I rarely do this, pop in during the time we're home to publish a blog post, but felt impelled today to do just that. As I mentioned in my blog posts from Croatia, particularly Dubrovnik, last winter, I was struck by the country's friendliness and hospitality to its many visitors despite its very recent past. How did these people, so recently at war, cope and subsequently recover? For those many crew members on cruise ships that come from that area, what had their childhoods been like?  How does a society move from peace to war and back again so quickly? I was left wondering...

While I was in Hawaii, I discovered an excellent book written from a child's perspective about growing up in Croatia during the Balkans War. It has won many awards and accolades, and today only is available through BookBub.com (a free service featuring daily ebook deals for free or at very low cost) for just $1.99. If you happen to read this post today you might want to check into it. If you don't see this until later, but are traveling to the area this summer, you still might want to buy it or borrow it from a library. 

It's a good- no, it's better than good- thing. :-)

 

Hawaii photos - Part 3

Our stay in Hawaii, and our seventh season of winter travel is coming to an end. After 31 nights spent in Honolulu, I have to admit that, with the exception of our Pacific Princess cruises (especially our two Polynesian seasons), and possibly our two Transpacific cruises, this has been the best vacation experience of our lives. That doesn't mean we'll become land lubbers and forego cruising altogether; it simply means that we now know how attractive this non-cruise option is for us. We loved it here. 

Naturally, hard-to-transition me might not have thought that after the first few days of figuring out the Honolulu Bus System (we both purchased unlimited passes), shopping for exorbitantly priced groceries and then hauling them home by bus/walking. But it didn't take too many days of completely unscheduled and purely casual living for me to adjust. We came here with just one roll-aboard suitcase each and had more clothes than we needed. Dressing up meant wearing a tropical shirt with shorts in lieu of a T-shirt. It. Was. Perfect. 

Thank you  to blog readers Pam and Jill, who have both lived in Hawaii and filled me in on grocery stores and restaurants to check out. We did eat a few meals out, but not often. Really, if the restaurant didn't offer the same amazing view we had from our condo, it was hard to find the motivation to pay so much to eat there. We did have a few meals at beach front bars and cafes and very infrequently ate somewhere else just for a taste of international cuisine.  We had a fully remodeled and complete kitchen right in our condo and, after a few days, a good supply of food in the refrigerator. Most restaurants just couldn't compare. 

If you are considering doing something similar and want more specifics about where we stayed and what we did, just email me. We did splurge on our condo and ended up with two bedrooms simply because we wanted the fabulous view and (after three months sharing a cruise ship cabin) two bathrooms. We could certainly settle for less in the future, and have checked out several places for potential future stays.

In the most 'just how small is this small world?' moment we could have imagined, we had checked on the availability of this unit for next year and noticed nearly seven weeks in the middle of the winter were already rented. That evening, we were walking across a bridge over the Ala Wai Canal when someone passed us walking the other direction, then turned around and came back and stopped us. She asked us if we had just been on the Pacific Princess in Europe two months ago and, and we realized when we looked at her that she had been, too. We had all enjoyed sitting in the Casino Lounge listening to Jere Ring on the piano. We asked her where she was staying and she was in the same complex that we are in but in a smaller unit. She said that next year she was coming with her parents and husband for her early 50th birthday and her parent's 50th anniversary. She said she had rented a two bedroom, two bath condo from a rental agency that was new to her and mentioned the name. It was the company we had used. Something clicked and I asked her if she was the one who had reserved our unit for almost two months. She was. 

We not only ran into someone we had sailed with on the Pacific Princess on a Honolulu street, but discovered she had rented the condo unit we were staying in for next winter. Those are some amazing odds!

After almost four weeks of nearly perfect weather, this week offered one all day rain (creating all kinds of flooding issues on the islands and causing a blizzard warning to be issued for Mauna Loa and Mauna Kea on the Big Island) and a few showers. We can't complain though. We've had day after day after day of picture perfect, 78-80 degree sunny days. It was warm but never too hot for the long walks we took almost every day as, armed with our bus passes, we explored the island of Oahu. 

And so I'll wrap up the posts for this year with a few more photos. As for our plans next year....I can't even imagine where we'll end up. For now, we are focused on returning home for the first extended time since October 3. It's been another five-month winter away, and, though we could easily stay here for another month (internet and phone service make all the difference in the world), it will be wonderful to be home. 

March 2:  We had hoped to get in a sunset sail on the Holokai catamaran before we returned home, but the combination of our long day on the North Shore and yesterday's weather stymied us. When we checked this morning, there were no seats left for this evening's sail. In the end, it was fortuitous. Though our day was gorgeous and sunny, around 5pm we spotted the (now familiar) storm clouds building over the ocean. By 5:30pm we were experiencing torrential rain, and while I was happy that we weren't on a catamaran during it, I thought for sure our final sunset would be a fizzle. Not so!

 

A spot of sunlight on the water gave me hope...

 

...and we not only had a beautiful sunset, we saw the brightest, longest lasting green flash we've ever seen

as the last of the sun sank into the water. A green flash on the last night of our seventh winter at sea!

 We'll miss tomorrow night's fireworks but an experience like that more than makes up for it!

March 1:  The only fully horrid weather day of our stay here. 

 

February 28:  It was a largely overcast but still dry day, and we decided to explore the entire eastern and northern shores of Oahu by public bus. It was my first time seeing some of these areas, though G remembers doing PT on Sunset Beach when he was stationed here in the Army. We were gone all day; though Oahu isn't a very large island, traveling along the coastal roads takes a fair amount of time. 

 

Watching surfers at Sunset Beach

 

 

 

The North Shore is home to the Banzai Pipeline and is a surfing Mecca. It's very laid back and hippie-ish,

but every ramshackle house on the beach is worth millions, and the nice ones are five times that much. These are rich hippies. ;-)

 

Juice is sold beach-side out of vans...

 

...and the area is known for its garlic shrimp trucks. 

 

Informal dining surrounded by the requisite chickens

 

Sooooo good!

February 27:  

 

Dinner in the condo with a sunset view

 

February 26: We watched sunset and enjoyed our third Mongolian BBQ dinner in a row on the beach at the Hale Koa. We also enjoyed our third fireworks show in three days at the Hilton Hawaiian Village as a special group had sponsored them. However, these weren't shown until 8:30pm and we watched them from our condo. 

 

 

February 27:  Mongolian BBQ again (so easy and casual and delicious!) and one of the prettiest sunsets we saw all month. Also, some unexpected fireworks that we watched from our condo. 

 

 

The Duke Kahanamoku Lagoon where the fireworks were set off Saturday and Sunday nights

 

 

 

February 26:  If it's Friday, it must be Mongolian BBQ on the beach at the Hale Koa, followed by sunset, mai tais and fireworks!

 

The beach on Friday nights is packed in anticipation of the Friday Night Fireworks at the 

Hilton Hawaiian Village. Note the outrigger canoe on the water. 

 

There were also lots of sailboats on the water for a good view of the sunset and the fireworks

 

 

 

The Rainbow Tower at the Hilton Hawaiian Village is so pretty after dark.

We stayed here in 2002 after B2B cruises through the Panama Canal and around the Hawaiian islands. 

 

My tripod-less photography skills improved a smidge over the course of a month!

I don't recall exactly which day this was, so I'll drop it in here.

 

 

 I showed G the weather at home...

 

...and in Honolulu. 

And we laughed and laughed (more mai tais anyone?). 

But no matter where we are, life is good. :-) Thanks for following along during our adventure in paradise!