This time last year we were down to a few days until our lovely UK/USA holiday started; now I'm counting days until the next two. Well, to be honest, I've been counting days ever since I booked them, because that's what I do :-)
99 days until we get onto the Voyager of the Seas in November for a couple of weeks of bliss. This is real relaxation; the hardest work is getting to Sydney and then the rest of the time as I keep saying, I fully intend to do as little as possible as often as possible. We don't really need to do a lot of preparation for this one. There's no flights and therefore no worries about size or weight of bags or whether they'll try to confiscate Paul's gel-packs for his insulin or any of those things that can be a real drama for overseas travel. Just get a taxi to into the city, a bus to Sydney, a train down to Circular Quay, dump our bags and climb onboard!
And, it's just over a year from now until the the Baltic cruise. But, this one is going to be completely different. When we're doing both a cruise and land travel on a holiday, so far we've usually finished with a cruise - it's a nice way to properly rest and relax to end a holiday before the long flight home. This time though, it looks like timing-wise it will be best to do the cruise first, so the land travel is mostly in September - so it's not school / summer holiday time in the UK. And, given that it's a Baltic cruise, it's not going to be all that relaxing anyway - Baltic cruises tend to visit a lot of ports with very few sea days for recovery, and this one is no different. I've been looking at other people's blogs describing their Baltic cruises and I just can't wait! Although to be honest, with the $AUD the way it is and work the way it is, we aren't making any final payments just yet - at the moment every cent we've spent on this cruise (basically, I've paid a deposit and booked a drinks package) is refundable so if our financial situation changes dramatically we can still back out of it without a loss. Of course, that's apart from losing the chance to see such lovely places!
Saturday, 3 August 2013
Sunday, 26 May 2013
How time flies .....
A month since the last post and I really haven't done much more about either of our upcoming holidays. It's really too early to do much for the UK / Baltic one next year - way too early to book flights and hotels and anyway none of that can happen until we decide exactly when we're going to be there and where we want to go. And that in turn is at least partly driven by when and where any interesting game conventions might be happening - for Paul of course. I have started looking at the (thousands of!) places we could visit, but Paul won't really start to hear about gaming conventions for a few months yet.
We're now almost certainly going on the Fiji - New Zealand cruise in November, but again, there's not a lot of planning to be done.
I've already booked a shore excursion in Noumea as there isn't a lot of choice there - we're going to go on a Segway ride through the botanic gardens. Not sure about what we'll do in Fiji - if you're a beach person there are many many options but I just want to have a look around and learn a little about the country. Those sorts of tours are a little harder to come by, but I'll find something - I think we're most likely to go for something like this one.
There are only three ports in New Zealand on this cruise, and we're pretty much settled on what we're going to do in each of them. In Auckland we're just going to wander around town again. In Wellington we're going to walk from the port down to the Te Papa Museum and have a really good look through the museum, and then maybe wander into the city. And in Tauranga - we're actually going to take a tour to Rotorua and look at the boiling mud! There are some private tours that go there, and also ship's tours, or of course we could just drive there - I'm leaning towards the private ones like this one but again there's no huge rush to sort this out.
Really though, my intention on this cruise is to do as little as possible as often as possible. There are eight sea days and we've got a balcony cabin - I plan to read many books and generally laze around in a dedicated fashion!
And, since the cruise starts and finishes in Sydney, the only other thing we need to do is work out getting there and back from Canberra. And, this is a no-brainer this time; we'll almost certainly catch a bus and let the bus driver do all the hard work. We could hire a car but Avis is still charging a one-way fee between Canberra and Sydney which still really annoys me!
We're now almost certainly going on the Fiji - New Zealand cruise in November, but again, there's not a lot of planning to be done.
I've already booked a shore excursion in Noumea as there isn't a lot of choice there - we're going to go on a Segway ride through the botanic gardens. Not sure about what we'll do in Fiji - if you're a beach person there are many many options but I just want to have a look around and learn a little about the country. Those sorts of tours are a little harder to come by, but I'll find something - I think we're most likely to go for something like this one.
There are only three ports in New Zealand on this cruise, and we're pretty much settled on what we're going to do in each of them. In Auckland we're just going to wander around town again. In Wellington we're going to walk from the port down to the Te Papa Museum and have a really good look through the museum, and then maybe wander into the city. And in Tauranga - we're actually going to take a tour to Rotorua and look at the boiling mud! There are some private tours that go there, and also ship's tours, or of course we could just drive there - I'm leaning towards the private ones like this one but again there's no huge rush to sort this out.
Really though, my intention on this cruise is to do as little as possible as often as possible. There are eight sea days and we've got a balcony cabin - I plan to read many books and generally laze around in a dedicated fashion!
And, since the cruise starts and finishes in Sydney, the only other thing we need to do is work out getting there and back from Canberra. And, this is a no-brainer this time; we'll almost certainly catch a bus and let the bus driver do all the hard work. We could hire a car but Avis is still charging a one-way fee between Canberra and Sydney which still really annoys me!
Saturday, 27 April 2013
Holiday plans slowly moving forward
The lotto win hasn't happened yet, so sadly the Hawaii to Sydney cruise isn't on the cards :-(
I have booked a (much cheaper) cruise in November this year, but Paul isn't all that keen - he doesn't mind the idea of a cruise but he thinks we should be saving all our money for next year's holiday. He has a good point, but I'm really going to need a holiday by November! Anyway, we've got until early June before we have to reach an agreement - after that we'd lose our deposit.
In the last posting I said that we had booked a Baltic Cruise with Princess - well, yesterday I cancelled it. The main reason we picked that particular cruise was because one of the ports of call was Gdansk in Poland - Paul and I are both quite keen to go there. But, on Thursday night we got an eMail from Princess cruises saying that they had completely revised the itinerary and it's now longer going to Gdansk. That turns it into just another Baltic cruise, and a comparatively expensive one too. So, we cancelled it.
Further research tells me that there are no cruises that stop anywhere in Poland in our available time-frame next year - any attempt by me to take leave in the first 6 months of any year is doomed to failure, and the only ones I can find are in May and June 2014. So, unfortunately Poland goes onto the back-burner for now - there's a vague plan in our minds to do some land travel in Europe in a couple of years time, and we'll make sure to get there then.
In the meantime, we still want to do a Baltic cruise, and I've already got another one booked. We will actually be leaving the same port (Southampton) on the same day (16 August 2014) - but now we're going on the Celebrity Eclipse. We've never sailed with Celebrity before but by all reports they're a bit of a step up quality-wise from any of the cruise lines we've been on so far. This cruise has a very similar itinerary - almost all the Baltic cruises will do some variation on the same basic set of cities - but we will at least get to see Berlin (which wasn't on the Princess itinerary).
Now that's sorted - hopefully! - the next step is to get into research about where we want to go in the UK and what we want to see and do. From our first trip we know there are a few places we want to go back to, and we already have a list of some other places we definitely want to see, but I keep coming across more and more things to do. And unfortunately there's only so much time (and money) we can spend. The current plan is to identify maybe 3 or 4 different cities that are in the general area of things we want to see, and base ourselves in each place for a few days. Some places I expect we'll have to hire a car; in others we can use public transport. What we're definitely not doing this time is going on an organised coach tour; it was a good way to get a big picture look at some of the UK, but this time we want some control over how long we spend in each place - not to mention that we want to be able to stay inside if it's raining!
I have booked a (much cheaper) cruise in November this year, but Paul isn't all that keen - he doesn't mind the idea of a cruise but he thinks we should be saving all our money for next year's holiday. He has a good point, but I'm really going to need a holiday by November! Anyway, we've got until early June before we have to reach an agreement - after that we'd lose our deposit.
In the last posting I said that we had booked a Baltic Cruise with Princess - well, yesterday I cancelled it. The main reason we picked that particular cruise was because one of the ports of call was Gdansk in Poland - Paul and I are both quite keen to go there. But, on Thursday night we got an eMail from Princess cruises saying that they had completely revised the itinerary and it's now longer going to Gdansk. That turns it into just another Baltic cruise, and a comparatively expensive one too. So, we cancelled it.
Further research tells me that there are no cruises that stop anywhere in Poland in our available time-frame next year - any attempt by me to take leave in the first 6 months of any year is doomed to failure, and the only ones I can find are in May and June 2014. So, unfortunately Poland goes onto the back-burner for now - there's a vague plan in our minds to do some land travel in Europe in a couple of years time, and we'll make sure to get there then.
In the meantime, we still want to do a Baltic cruise, and I've already got another one booked. We will actually be leaving the same port (Southampton) on the same day (16 August 2014) - but now we're going on the Celebrity Eclipse. We've never sailed with Celebrity before but by all reports they're a bit of a step up quality-wise from any of the cruise lines we've been on so far. This cruise has a very similar itinerary - almost all the Baltic cruises will do some variation on the same basic set of cities - but we will at least get to see Berlin (which wasn't on the Princess itinerary).
Now that's sorted - hopefully! - the next step is to get into research about where we want to go in the UK and what we want to see and do. From our first trip we know there are a few places we want to go back to, and we already have a list of some other places we definitely want to see, but I keep coming across more and more things to do. And unfortunately there's only so much time (and money) we can spend. The current plan is to identify maybe 3 or 4 different cities that are in the general area of things we want to see, and base ourselves in each place for a few days. Some places I expect we'll have to hire a car; in others we can use public transport. What we're definitely not doing this time is going on an organised coach tour; it was a good way to get a big picture look at some of the UK, but this time we want some control over how long we spend in each place - not to mention that we want to be able to stay inside if it's raining!
Saturday, 16 March 2013
Final post about the NZ cruise - and the next holiday.
Well obviously we got home - a few weeks ago actually.
The last couple of days on the cruise followed the pattern of all the others - laze around, lose money at the Casino, eat, read, rinse and repeat :-) Just what I want a cruise to be.
However, having said that, I probably wouldn't cruise with Carnival again and it's not because their ships keep breaking down :-) There was just a bit too much bingo, karaoke and 'comedians' and not quite enough interesting entertainment of the informative type for me. Not saying it was bad - it was a really interesting itinerary and I'm astounded that they're not doing any NZ cruises next year - just that there are other cruise lines that suit us better.
On to the next holiday. If we win the Lotto, we're going to go to Hawaii in October, spend some time there and then cruise home on the Celebrity Millenium. And, whether we win the Lotto or not, we're going on a Baltic cruise next August on the Emerald Princess. I booked it this morning, and now I have 519 days to organise everything that has to happen on the cruise, plus a few weeks in the UK before and/or after the cruise. Pretty sure that's enough time :-)
The last couple of days on the cruise followed the pattern of all the others - laze around, lose money at the Casino, eat, read, rinse and repeat :-) Just what I want a cruise to be.
However, having said that, I probably wouldn't cruise with Carnival again and it's not because their ships keep breaking down :-) There was just a bit too much bingo, karaoke and 'comedians' and not quite enough interesting entertainment of the informative type for me. Not saying it was bad - it was a really interesting itinerary and I'm astounded that they're not doing any NZ cruises next year - just that there are other cruise lines that suit us better.
On to the next holiday. If we win the Lotto, we're going to go to Hawaii in October, spend some time there and then cruise home on the Celebrity Millenium. And, whether we win the Lotto or not, we're going on a Baltic cruise next August on the Emerald Princess. I booked it this morning, and now I have 519 days to organise everything that has to happen on the cruise, plus a few weeks in the UK before and/or after the cruise. Pretty sure that's enough time :-)
Sunday, 10 February 2013
New Zealand Cruise Day 11 - Fjordland
Today the ship took us through Dusky Sound, Doubtful Sound and Milford Sound. No-one seems all that clear on why they're called Sounds when technically they really are fjords. Probably Captain Cook didn't realise this at the time and no-one wants to correct him now :-)
We cruised through these same fjords on the Diamond Princess back in December 2008 - it mostly rained that day. Today it didn't rain but there was also very little sun. Apparently Fjordland is the wettest place in New Zealand and one of the wettest on earth, so I guess it's expecting a bit much to hope for the sun to shine.
The scenery is simply amazing - huge sea cliffs and glacial vallies all of which have been photographed a million times by people who are much smarter with their camera than I am, so I'm not going to post any here.
There was a naturalist on the ship - he gave a few talks which I didn't go to; I kept missing them as they're not well advertised. He also gave a running commentary today. It was mostly just telling us which particular waterfall or island we were looking at, but he did cover a few other things as well - for example he showed us the glacial valley where they rediscovered the kakapo after thinking it was extinct.
We left Milford Sound on schedule around 5pm, but then when we were at dinner we realised that we could still see land (which we weren't expecting) and the ship wasn't moving. Then we went out on deck after dinner and it was pretty clear that we were still just outside Milford Sound. An hour or so later they explained what was going on - someone had been taken ill and they were concerned that they'd need to evacuate them off the ship. However, they decided that this isn't necessary, so we finally got underway.
Only three more nights and two more days to go :-(
Saturday, 9 February 2013
New Zealand Cruise Day 10 - Dunedin
Large ships can't dock close to Dunedin - we had to dock at Port Chalmers. Paul wasn't feeling 100% this morning so I went off into Dunedin by myself. I didn't have anything planned because I was going to do the Citywalksz guided walk - but as I said, the MP3 player died before we got to Akaroa. I'm going to write them a stern letter about their quality control.
As it happens, there's a huge 'flea market' in central Dunedin today, so there were heaps of things to look at and buy. I could have gone on other tours once I got into the city, but I just wandered around looking at some of the obvious sights, then wandered back to the ship.
We have now sailed out of Dunedin - tomorrow we see the Fiords and then sail for home.
The First Presbyterian Church - a beautiful old building. This and a number of others reminded me very much of England.
The Dunedin railway station - apparently voted one of the three most beautiful in the world, and I'm not really surprised
A collection of towel animals prepared by our room steward. I'm not at all sure what they're all meant to be!!
New Zealand Cruise Day 9 - Akaroa
Yes, as usual, updating a day late.
Akaroa is about 65 km south of Christchurch, and since the earthquake in 2011 it's where the cruise ships have mostly had to dock instead of Christchurch. If you want to, you can still do shore excursions to Christchurch from Akaroa, but it's quite a long day. We decided - like many others - to just look around Akaroa. It's obviously a tourist town, with or without cruise ships. We had a nice time just wandering around, then we had lunch at one of the local restaurants - fish and chips and salad - $18.90 NZ each and worth every cent of it.
One big disappointment - my 'Citywalksz' MP3 player has died - so my plans to get a guided tour of the town didn't come to anything.
Akaroa is about 65 km south of Christchurch, and since the earthquake in 2011 it's where the cruise ships have mostly had to dock instead of Christchurch. If you want to, you can still do shore excursions to Christchurch from Akaroa, but it's quite a long day. We decided - like many others - to just look around Akaroa. It's obviously a tourist town, with or without cruise ships. We had a nice time just wandering around, then we had lunch at one of the local restaurants - fish and chips and salad - $18.90 NZ each and worth every cent of it.
One big disappointment - my 'Citywalksz' MP3 player has died - so my plans to get a guided tour of the town didn't come to anything.
Above is the WWI memorial. They were planning to do repair and renovation work when the earthquake hit and caused more damage. It's now fenced off until they can raise funds to do all the necessary repairs.
This lighthouse was originally at the opening of the harbour but has now been renovated and moved to a spot nearer to Akaroa.
The seagulls are completely unafraid as in any tourist town. This bloke came over to say hello but left as soon as he realised we weren't going to feed him!
View of the Carnival Spirit from the jetty at Akaroa.
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