Yesterday, we boarded Royal Caribbean’s Independence of the Seas in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida. We’re on board for a 14 day Atlantic Crossing with a destination of Southampton, England. From there we’ll stay on board for another 14 days as we tour the Mediterranean with stops in Barcelona, Gibraltar, Rome, and a few others. We’ll post more on that later. Continue reading →
We’re in the Caribbean aboard the Royal Caribbean Allure of the Seas. This is the biggest ship we’ve sailed, and probably the largest cruise ship afloat. This week, we’re traveling from the Fort Lauderdale Port Everglades, to Haiti, jamaica, Cozumel, and back. We’ll have three “sea days”.
It’s been a couple of years since we’ve been aboard a Royal Caribbean ship, and we’ve almost forgotten how different it is compared to some of the other cruise lines we’ve tried. The service is great and the ship is full of Wow factor.
Join us again in the next few days and we’ll have a complete description of this great ship with as many pictures as we think you can stand.
Last week we made a quick five day Caribbean cruise on the Princess’s “Caribbean Princess”. We left Fort Lauderdale on Saturday, November 29th and sailed to Nassau in the Bahamas. From there we made a stop at Princess Cays located about fifty miles east of Nassau, then back to Fort Lauderdale. There were two “at sea” days on this cruise. Continue reading →
Over the years, we’ve made eleven cruises on various ships and cruise lines. From that experience we’ve always maintained that “we never met a cruise ship we didn’t like”. We’ve been on Royal Caribbean, Carnival, Disney, and lately our last three cruises were on various Norwegian Cruise Line ships, the latest being the Norwegian Epic. The Epic is the largest ship we’ve sailed on, but it’s a far cry from the best, at least in our estimation. Continue reading →
Those of you who know us might know that we’re not city folk in general. We’ll go to a city and spend time occasionally, but we wouldn’t pick a city as vacation destination. Having said that, it isn’t a surprise that, while we were impressed with Helsinki, it wouldn’t necessarily be a destination for a vacation to Finland. Rather, we would probably fly in and spend an afternoon seeing the sights; maybe have coffee and a pastry in a coffee shop somewhere and then make our way north to Lapland to see some reindeer.
When cruising, there are places you visit that you’re glad you’re on a cruise and only have to spend one day seeing. It’s either because it simply doesn’t interest you or some other underlying reason. For us, we thought Estonia was going to be that kind of place. It was, in our view, something to do while we marked time waiting for the ship to get to a better port. As it turns out, Tallinn was one of the highlights of our cruise, so far. We thought Germany was the highlight, and to be truthful it was big on our list to come back and see more, but much to our surprise, Tallinn, Estonia was up there too. What we saw in our one day visiting the city left us craving more. Continue reading →
Germany is probably going to be the high point of our trip, at least the high point of our cruise. We arrived in Warnemunde along the Baltic Sea on Tuesday, May 20th. The day was about as perfect as you could imagine for a warm spring day.
We traveled by bus for about 1 ½ hours from Warnemunde to a little town called Schwerin for the purpose of viewing the Schwerin Castle, which has been in existence in one form or another since at least 973 AD when it was controlled by The Polabian Slav Tribe. It was primarily a fort at that time rather than a “castle”. Around 1160, it was targeted by Germanic Nobelmen under the leadership of Henry the Lion. From then on, the Schwerin Castle has had a rich history, serving as a castle and home for many nobles, a military barracks, and even a nursing college during the time of the German Democratic Republic after WWII. Presently, Schwerin Castle serves as a museum and the seat of the local state parliament. Continue reading →
Today was a lazy day in Copenhagen, Denmark. We left the ship at around 9:00 AM and were guided by a tour guide to all the various sites of the city, including the palaces of the royals of Denmark, the Parliament building, the Old Stock Exchange, and even passed an amusement park. Continue reading →
