All the Hobbit and Lord of the Rings movies were filmed outside of Auckland, New Zealand in a town called Matamata. Of the 42 people in our tour group, I was the only one who hadn’t read the book, or seen any of the movies. I was surrounded by 41 aficionados who happily snapped pictures […]
The New Zealand Cruise – February 2024 Read More »
This cruise should be titled How I Got 2 Cruises For The Price Of One. Thanks to Mother Nature, heavy snows and abundance of rain caused the Rhine River to rise, making it impossible to sail under the bridges. Halfway through the cruise, our captain sailed the AmaSiena as far south as he could go.
The Christmas Markets River Cruise – December 2023 Read More »
The Land of the Rising Sun. Windstar named this voyage the Grand Japan cruise. Starting in Osaka and making a counter-clockwise journey hitting seaports only smaller ships and yachts could get into. This cruise was half full at 144 passengers and 197 crew. Windstar is a luxury cruise line and offers exceptional food, highlighting chefs
The Japan/Korea Cruise – October 2023 Read More »
We cruised for 7 nights on the Danube River with AmaWaterway’s ship, the AmaSonata. But first, by coincidence, we joined another group of Hawaii friends in Regensberg, Germany. They were at the tail end of their cruise which started in Budapest. We were literally two ships passing in the night. Through some unforseen incident, they
The Danube River Cruise – June 2019 Read More »
In June of 2019, four of us was planned to sail on AmaWaterways AmaSonata. The cruise line offered a pre-cruise option in Prague but my partner and I decided to plan our own itinerary. Prague is a beautiful, walkable city and some of the city landscape looks like it’s straight out of a James Bond
Prague, Czech Republic – June 2019 Read More »
One night, sitting around the dinner table, my brother informed us that he had signed up for an Alaskan cruise on Royal Caribbean Lines. Everyone around the table thought it would be a fun idea to do a family trip. After months of planning, 27 of us known as The Alaskan Cruisers 2022 boarded the
The Alaskan Cruise – April 2022 Read More »
This trip to Osaka was a foodie delight and will definitely require a return trip. It’s a walkable city and attractions are easy to get to by taxi or train. Here’s my photoblog of the places we went to in Osaka, Kyoto, Kobe and Narita. ###
Osaka/Kyoko/Kobe – September 2016 Read More »
I took my young adult children on a 5-night Mediterranean Cruise on Disney which started and ended in Barcelona, Spain. For the most part, it was a nice cruise. There were lots of young children and a handful of young adults between ages 18 – 24. The restaurant manager cleverly sat us with another family
The Disney Cruise – August 2017 Read More »
We enjoyed the AMAWaterways Danube River cruise so much that the same year, we booked a river cruise on the Mekong River. This was a 7 day cruise on the AmaDara. December is a great time to visit this country as the weather is quite pleasant. The added bonus is that you can escape the
The Vietnam/Cambodia Cruise – December 2019 Read More »
21 Day sail on Holland America’s Eurodam from Seattle, WA to Fort Lauderdale, FL in October 2022. The first port we arrived at is Puerta Vallarta in the Mexican state of Jalisco. After four days at sea, I was anxious to get off the ship, so I went horseback riding on a beautiful Andalusian horse. Of
The Panama Canal Cruise – September 2022 Read More »
