January 9, 2025

Hello Readers,

Today we did the Panama Canal transit. This was my fourth time doing the crossing from the Atlantic side to the Pacific side. You readers can go back in the blog to previous years and read more about the crossing.

We entered the first locks at the Atlantic side around 7 AM. The whole transit took us about 10 hrs. The crossing fee for our ship was around $500,000.

During the crossing we witnessed wildlife like Sunbathing Crocs and Capybara’s

There was an opportunity to jump into the pool on the ship during the crossing. If you participate , you will receive a certificate that you swim across the Panama Canal.

The night concluded with a beer and burger night and rock music from the 70’s in the Rolling Stones Lounge.

Cheers

Cor and Carol

January 8, 2025

This morning we anchored at Puerto Limon in Costa Rica. As we had visited this city before, we took our time to have breakfast before we walked off the boat. It was pouring rain and 28 deg C when we arrived on the dock. We were greeted on the dock by a brass band belting out reggae songs one after the other.

It was not a great day to visit today, as there were 2  Royal Caribbean cruise ships anchored next to our boat. In order to get to the street we had to walk through a market where local vendors were selling their merchandise. With 3 cruise ships in town, what made it a perfect day for pick pockets. We wandered through the town checking out the stores and local highlights, like the Cathedral and City Hall. Meanwhile the rain had stopped, and we ended up near a rocky beach and the local park. We spotted a few sloths having naps in a tree high above us. on the way back to the boat, we had to wind our way back through the very busy market. Back on the boat it was nap time, likely inspired by the sloths. The night we filled with going to the show listening to an impersonator,  who was actually pretty good. After some more music and sipping on a few Casa Amigos, we called’r the night.

Cheers

Cor and Carol

January 7. 2025

This morning we arrived at Georgetown, the Capital of the Cayman islands. After getting tendered from the ship to the shore we were deciding where to go. The waterfront streets are lined with multiple souvenir and T-shirts shops. Georgetown is littered with banks including our Canadian big banks.

We flagged down a taxi off the sidewalk, he offered to show us around the Island for $25 ea. After we paid him, he said to meet him in 45 min. We figured this might have been the last time we saw him. We showed up at the agreed time and behold he was waiting for us.

After we boarded his van, we drove down the seven Mile Beach road which is lined with large resort hotels and condo buildings. It’s to the point that the beach and ocean are barely visible from the road. After driving for half an hour we ended up in hell. Hell is a large formation of volcanic rock and a souvenir shop. Our next stop was at the well-known Seven Mile Beach. Truly a beautiful public beach with nice white sand. On the way back the driver pointed out other buildings of importance including the governor’s residence. 

We were dropped off at the harbour, we had literally been to Hell and back.

After getting back on the boat we joined the sail away celebration with a glass of Cayman Rum Punch and watched the sun go down as we departed for our next stop.

Cheers

Cor and Carol

Pictures of Hell and 7 mile beach.

We were allowed to set foot on the ship by 12:00 Noon. It is truly amazing that they can turn the ship around that quick, as it had come in from the previous cruise at 7 this morning. The afternoon we spent touching base with passengers and crew we met on our previous cruise.

7 PM on Saturday night we left Fort Lauderdale for our Journey. Suitcases were stacked up in our cabin and now we had to empty them and put everything away. The remaining of the night we spend checking out the music venues and called’r the night.

Our first full day was a sea day. sea days are usually my gym days. After my gym visit in the morning, we spent the afternoon roaming the ship and even got a game of bingo in, we missed the Bingo by 1 box.

The night we filled with visiting more music venues and having the occasional drink.

Tomorrow, we will visit our first port.

Stay tuned

Cheers, Cor and Carol

Welcome back previous readers and new readers and followers.

We have arrived in Fort Lauderdale Florida after a brief layover in Mesa Arizona to ring in the new year. For the first time we flew with JetBlue, which was surprisingly very good. Excellent service and a low price.

Today we spent the day shopping for last minute supplies like bug spray and sunscreen. The weather here in Florida is great with temperatures around 25 deg C. I noticed night temperatures are considerably warmer here than in Arizona.

Tomorrow we plan to board the HAL MS Zuiderdam around noon with a scheduled departure of 7 pm. Our scheduled return date is May 9 2025 in Fort Lauderdale.

We are very grateful for Megan and Kathy for taking turns to look after our home and dog (Gary). Gary we will miss you and hopefully you still remember us when we get back.

I hope you followers enjoy reading about our travels for the next 4 months and forgive all my spelling mistakes.

below a picture of our Mesa backyard and the hotel pool in Lauderdale

Cheers, Cor and Carol

May 5, 2023

At 7 AM this morning we arrived in Praia Di Victoria on the Island of Teceira in the Azores. We had an early breakfast and got on the bus by 7:30 this morning for a trip over the Island. Our first stop was on a hillside just outside the City, a good site for some pictures. Our next stop was San Sebastian, a small town where we visited a church from 1528, from there on we went on to a mountain on a peninsula called Monte Brasil. On top of this mountain we had a fantastic view of the City of Angra De Heroismo. There was a fort build all around the base of the mountain with Portuguese army barracks near the top of the mountain. At the very top there were several old machine guns from my guess is the second world war. After spending nearly half an hour here, we boarded the bus to the City of Angra D H. Here we were given an hour to roam around. We took this opportunity to visit a coffee shop. After Coffee we had about 20 min left to walk around. By 11 we boarded the bus on our way to the center of the Island. The country side is very pretty with it’s green pastures filled with cows. All the farm fields are separated by stone fences. These are volcanic rocks picked from the fields before they were sown into grass or Crops. From the middle of the Island we were able to see the runways from the US Airbase based on the opposite coastline. Our last stop was on the second highest mountain on the Island. There were several windmills situated there to supply power for the Island. Boy, was it ever windy on top you really had to hang on to your camera. The views were spectacular. After this last stop we set of down the mountain towards the ship for lunch.

Well this was our last port of call of the trip, all that is remaining are 6 seaday’s before we arrive back in Fort Lauderdale.

Cheers

May 4, 2023

Around 8 AM we anchored on the pier in the port of Punta Delgada on the Island of San Miguel. There are 69,000 inhabitants on the island, apparently there are the same amount of cows. Dairy is big business here. Other means of income are, fishing and tourism. Our first glance from the boat, it looked like a nice city with several hotels facing the harbour.For this morning we had a tour booked to visit the volcanic lakes up in the hillside. Apparently it is a stunning few to look down upon the lakes. We set off driving through the outskirts of the City and soon after that we were driving through green pastures. Soon as our road started to gain elevation we started to loose our sight because of the thick fog. Our first stop was in a small town named San Nikolau. In this town we looked at yet another old church. Besides that it was just an ordinary small farm town , several farm tractors were passing by on the street when we were standing around. Our next visit on the agenda was to do a drive by a lake named Sete Cidades. Well, we never were able to see the lake because of the thick fog. The fog stayed like that till we got back to sea level. Our next stop was a wine and cheese lunch in a local hotel. The wine and cheese were sourced from the Azores. This was an excellent lunch. After lunch we didn’t go back onto the bus , but ventured off into the City to do some site seeing. Pta Delgada is a very beautiful old city with a lot of stores and cafees. We spend the remainder of the afternoon walking through the streets till our feet were getting tired.For tomorrow we have our last stop off the voyage, one of the other Azores Islands named Ilha Terceira.

Cheers 

May 1, 2023

Today we set foot on shore in our second stop in Ireland, a port called Cobh (cove) this is Town of 12000 located on an island in the Cork City harbour . Cork itself has a population of 240K and is the second largest City in Ireland. Many large   international companies have set up factories here, like Johnson & Johnson, Phizer and many IT companies. Apple has its European head quarters here which employs around 3000. Ford motor Company used to have a large factory in Cork, but it has closed down. For today we booked a trip to the old Jameson distillery in Middleton, a city about 10 miles outside of Cork. On the drive to Middleton we enjoyed the green pastures filled with grazing dairy cows and cultivated potato fields. Soon after arrival at the old distillery we were lead on a tour through the factory which dated back to the 17th century. No whiskey is produced in this old distillery, it is still used to store barrels for the curing process. After the tour we enjoyed some samples in the tasting room.After the tasting we boarded the bus for a drive through the City of Cork back to Cobh, where the ship is located. In the afternoon we walked over to the Titanic memorial gardens.Cobh was the last port of call for the Titanic before it’s journey to New York. And we all know how that ended. From the passengers the Titanic picked up in Cobh ,74 died at sea and their names are displayed at the memorial gardens. Throughout History nearly 3 million Irish immigrants boarded ships in Cobh for a better life in the USA and Canada. The population of Ireland actually shrunk from nearly 8 million to around 4.5 million. Now the population is back up to just over 5 million. After the visit at the gardens we walked back down towards the ship. On this sunny spring day, the streets were filled with people enjoying the holiday Monday. There was a market set up in the park and music was coming from several pubs who were located across the street from the market. When it was time to sail out the harbour, a musical orchestra which was set up on the pier belted out tunes to wish us a safe voyage. I am looking forward to a couple of seaday’s after the previous four ports in a row before we set foot on the Azores.

Cheers

April 30, 2023

We sailed into Dun Laoghaire early this morning. Dun is a suburb from Dublin. This port is also a tender port. Smaller cruise ships are still able to land in Dublin. Also, apparently the dock in Dublin is owned by a Chinese firm and the cost to dock there are very high I am told. For today we have a tour booked to the Malahide Castle and then on to the town of Howth for lunch in an old Irish Pub.Around 8:30 we left the Dun pier on the bus, driving through some of the main area of Dublin on our way to the Castle. When we got outside the City , the landscape changed to fertile farm land for the production of vegetables. Our Irish guide talked non stop about Irish history. We were glad to get off the bus at the Malahide Castle, 260 acre property which consists of gardens and sports fields. The Castle dates back to the 1170’s The tour through the castle was impressive all furniture and painting in the rooms dating back several Hundreds of years. After the Castle visit, we headed for the town of Howth. The country side consists out of lots of bike pads and walking trails connecting Dublin to the suburbs. There are very few people living downtown. Most live in the suburbs and commute into the City for work by train or bicycle. By now we had entered the small seaside town of Howth for our lunch. We got off the bus at the Irish pub for our lunch. The lunch consisted of corned beef and cabbage with mashed potatoes, a pint of Guinness and Irish coffee for dessert. We were entertained by an Irish band accompanied by Irish dancers. By 3:00 we got back on the bus continuing our site seeing tour with our nonstop talking Irish guide. He pointed out the large number of people employed by large IT companies like Google and Facebook. Several IT companies have their European head quarters in Dublin. After touring through Dublin for an hour or so we got back at the pier in Dun for our tender ride back to the ship. For tonight we were going to be entertained  by Irish musicians and dancers on the ship.For tomorrow we are scheduled for the City of Cork.

Cheers 

April 29, 2023

This morning we moored in the bay outside the port of Oban in Scotland. Today’s port is another tender port. Around 10:00 Am we left the ship to catch the tender boat to the port, about a 20 min boat ride.For today we didn’t book a tour, but decided to explore on foot. Our main goal was to visit the Oban distillery. When we set foot on shore, one of the first things we noticed was a large building on top of the hill looking like the coliseum in Rome. we decided it would be a good activity to hike up the hill and check it out. We followed a narrow road up the hill, passing by colourful houses and eventually we made It to the top. The building is an large round building with window openings and no roof on it. The inside of the building is landscaped with colourful scrubs and grass. The load down on the building is as follows,  the building is called Mc Caig’s tower. Mr John Mc Caig started the building to create work for the local stone masons during the great depression of the 1920’s.  Before he totally finished the building, Mr Mc Caig past away and his family didn’t want to carry on with the construction.Now nearly 100 years later the building sits there the same as it was left, and it has become a tourist attraction. The views from the building are epic. After we hiked back down to the town center, we decided to go for fish and chips at a local hotel. The meal was excellent accompanied by a pint of local lager.After lunch we set out to visit the local distillery to sample some of the local whiskey. The tasting room was actually a very nice venue all finished in wood. They offered tasting of whiskeys from northern Scotland, but we stuck to local Oban Whiskey. After the tasting we went downstairs into the shop and purchased a bottle of the local scotch to take home. By now it was time to go back to the pier and catch the tender back to the ship.We enjoyed Scotland and are looking forward to tomorrow’s visit in Dublin.

Cheers