World cruise

[Carguy87]

Yay pictures!!! Maybe try just taking a bunch and upload them when on wifi at ports of call? Trying to live vicariously through you here OP

[RichardBartlett]

Originally Posted by Old Expat Beast

From the info in his first post you can easily figure out the ship, and follow its progress on a world map with sites like cruisemapper.com

Wow I never thought of that as the satellite network has us pinging all over the world including Finland

[JSol1]

We just returned from a 10 day cruise. We love sea days and the advice earlier to use the stairs as often as possible is spot on! We also make use of the gym which helps balance things out.
We’re researching a cruise like this so I’ll be checking in regularly!

[RichardBartlett]

The five days at sea were ok. The Atlantic was very calm and not the Poseidon adventure I expected.
Docked at 10.00 this morning & Barbados done.

Not a very exciting place and a bit of a dump tbh as most Carribbean islands are but the beaches are fabulous proper sand. Reminded me of Clearwater beach.
Walked past a burger king. A meal deal was 15 bucks so quite expensive to us at least

Just about to head off to our next Carribbean island hop

Ship is fabulous, food is amazing staff are brilliant. MSC get a bit of a beating on various cruise forums but for me they do a super job.
Weighing up everything a MSC cruise is a cheap AI vacation.

The cruise mapper site does a pdg job at tracking the ship so thanks for the tip btw.

Location pictures are proving difficult due to this tablet not being allowed out the cabin as it has Dalia's ongoing business dealings on without backup so it's too precious to risk loss or breakage. My phone doesn't have WiFi so I have pictures but can't transfer to this device. I will look to see if I can BT them over..

All in all its going great this is only my second cruise but I can feel the bug starting to nip

[RichardBartlett]

Ok Kingstown st Vincent done.
My mother once said to me when I told her I was moving to Tenerife
"I thought you'd go to a Caribbean island?"
I replied "problem with a Carribbean island is, after you've walked round it once there's nothing left of interest"

Barbados and more st Vincent pretty much uphold my belief for me personally although in fairness it's only a snapshot of each destination but I'm reasonably sure it's accurate for me at least

St Vincent is more beautiful and than *Barbados (*major disappointment tbh as my ex business partner raved about it for years and years) tbf but much less to do.
Locals were great mind and v. Friendly.

So we set sail in an hour or so to Grenada

Loving life onboard but jeese the amount of food I'm consuming is crazy..

Other thing I'm noticing is that obviously the vast majority are retired there has been a strong uptick in small and not so small injuries

I'm thinking of starting a sweepstake on who will die first but considering my calorie intake I'd be too high on the list and thus tempting fate..

[RichardBartlett]

Grenada today
A mix of the above two. More hussle when leaving the port by the taxi guys but not too pushy. Had a 4 km walk to a beach not the intended but small and quite nice. Beach reminded me of Tenerife beaches ie not very good. Mixture of sand and volcanic black sand I wonder if the beaches are man made here. Wandered around town not interested in a island tour of yet another waterfall or chocolate shop etc
All in all nice looking island pleasant day out
Day at sea then Willemstad which looks nice

Still gaining weight gala night tonight and my tux is starting to resist my attempts at doing the buttons up..

[knyshcollection]

Oh man how exciting!! Just know we are all jealous

[RichardBartlett]

Originally Posted by knyshcollection

Oh man how exciting!! Just know we are all jealous

Mad to think we are only just over 10% in so far .

[JParm]

Definitely need more pictures of this amazing adventure!

[JoeJoeBobo]

Originally Posted by Knappo 1307

No pics, it's not happening. I'm on Mars right now, at a bar, playing guitar with Jimmi Hendrix....

Originally Posted by knyshcollection

Oh man how exciting!! Just know we are all jealous

Well not all!

Have fun

[brandrea]

Originally Posted by JParm

Definitely need more pictures of this amazing adventure!

I agree

[RichardBartlett]

Upload Errors
IMG-20230118-WA0001 (1).jpg:
The Dimension limits for this filetype are 1250 x 1250. We were unable to resize your file so you will need to do so manually and upload it again. Your file is currently 1204 x 1600

[RichardBartlett]

Sorry the forum is a bit clunky and old and I can't reduce the dimensions of pictures to fit..

[RichardBartlett]

https://www.dropbox.com/s/3wjf0ftkdm...0_543.jpg?dl=0

[RichardBartlett]

https://www.dropbox.com/s/6hnfivnk3z...07693.jpg?dl=0

[RichardBartlett]

https://www.dropbox.com/s/k3mrbkp3mj...9_711.jpg?dl=0

[RichardBartlett]

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/p4iqqrkul...ekO-EubVa?dl=0
View here. I will add more as and when I can

[THC]

You may run into fellow TRF member Jesse and family at a port of call somewhere, lol

[RichardBartlett]

Day at sea to Carta somewhere Columbia

I think

[Speedbird-1]

Originally Posted by RichardBartlett

Day at sea to Carta somewhere Columbia

I think

Sounds like a great trip already!

They don't like 'Columbia'..........they prefer Colombia.

[Carguy87]

Looks like fun so far!

[1st amg]

Originally Posted by THC

You may run into fellow TRF member Jesse and family at a port of call somewhere, lol

LOLOLOLOLOL....good one

[RichardBartlett]

Originally Posted by Speedbird-1

Sounds like a great trip already!

They don't like 'Columbia'..........they prefer Colombia.

Yeh sorry about that

ColOmbia done.

On the way to colOn Panama way apparently AU and NZ customs dept demand the hull is cleaned prior to entering their waters


So day at sea to get there . Hot and very humid onboard outside..

Santa Marta.. nothing much to see a busy port town with little else going on
Cartagena.. much nicer and worth a visit on a cruise but not a holiday destination imho
but the bummer was 3 cruise ships landed at the same time so several thousand herded through narrow streets getting hussled by street sellers. Made traveling difficult both by coach and foot. Still nice but would have been much better for all concerned if they'd split it up better.
For instance they make great play of the old fort which is at least an HR walking around. Fair enough looked worth the walk.
Our bus has 12 minutes stop only, next one had 4 minutes and one group never even got time to get off the bus..

If you go I'd recommend calling the port chief to see if he can hold back any other ships till you've done your day trip..

[RichardBartlett]

Panama canal first leg done.

Lost a day faffing about waiting for the cleaning which didn't happen so lost a day apparently plus worse Nicaragua has been cancelled so we have another day at sea heading to Costa Rica instead.. heyho
https://instagram.com/stories/richar...d=MDJmNzVkMjY=

[m j b]

Originally Posted by RichardBartlett

The trip was 14k euro each.

Seems like a bargain to me!

Originally Posted by Blansky

Have fun and eat lots of fruit.............scurvy is no laughing matter.

Neither is pirates. Watch out for pirates with scurvy.

Originally Posted by RichardBartlett

I'm thinking of starting a sweepstake on who will die first but considering my calorie intake I'd be too high on the list and thus tempting fate..

My Mom lives in an active senior retirement village facility place, and that's her biggest complaint, that people keeping dying there.

Originally Posted by RichardBartlett

... but the bummer was 3 cruise ships landed at the same time so several thousand herded through narrow streets getting hussled by street sellers.

I took a cruise, once, a typical American cruise of the Caribbean on Carnival, but the good part was that I bought my ticket via a "singles" cruise reseller, so we had a coordinator/cruise director with us that scheduled his own excursions, missing all of the crowds and lines and marginally cheaper as well.

Cruising really isn't for me, but then Carnival tends to be at the lower end of the industry both in quality of the facilities, food and customers. Present company excluded, natch. I've heard both good and bad about MSC. Kind of like anything these days, it doesn't matter how good it is, someone got pissed off about it.

[Cazador60]

Took my family on 2 cruises: western Mediterranean and one eastern Med on Costa Cruise line. Both very enjoyable but we were probably the only Americans on the ship.
On another note, Cartagena is very nice but the venders and middle men trying to make a buck are very pushy to the point of being confrontational in the old walled part of the city.
I enjoyed the sleepiness of Santa Marta and did some diving in Tacanga.

[Tri-Tip]

Originally Posted by RichardBartlett

Ok Kingstown st Vincent done.
My mother once said to me when I told her I was moving to Tenerife
"I thought you'd go to a Caribbean island?"
I replied "problem with a Carribbean island is, after you've walked round it once there's nothing left of interest"

Barbados and more st Vincent pretty much uphold my belief for me personally although in fairness it's only a snapshot of each destination but I'm reasonably sure it's accurate for me at least

St Vincent is more beautiful and than *Barbados (*major disappointment tbh as my ex business partner raved about it for years and years) tbf but much less to do.
Locals were great mind and v. Friendly.

So we set sail in an hour or so to Grenada

Loving life onboard but jeese the amount of food I'm consuming is crazy..

Other thing I'm noticing is that obviously the vast majority are retired there has been a strong uptick in small and not so small injuries

I'm thinking of starting a sweepstake on who will die first but considering my calorie intake I'd be too high on the list and thus tempting fate..

When i graduated Jr. High School (1982), my parents took me on a 2-week cruise to Alaska, starting in San Francisco. It was a small ship, 600-800 passengers if I remember correctly, many of the passengers were quite elderly and we lost 3 to old age during the two weeks.

Each night at dinner, the waiter would tap a spoon on the butter and say either "Soft...we had to make room in the freezer", or "Hard...all is good".

We are nearly at the end of our 15 day trip cruise to Hawaii. On day 12 I hit the wall with eating and drinking and was ready to be home.

[RichardBartlett]

So been a bit quiet. Never got off the boat at Guatamala as the port is so far from anywhere of interest it seemed too much. And those who did seemed to agree.

Day at Puerto Vallarta. Fantastic place and well worth a visit. The romantica quarter is lovely.we walked 6km along the beach and hopped on a local bus back..
However seems to have a large population of non indigenous 'bears' who've migrated south for winter
We were well into the area when looking at a very large restaurant I had a sudden realisation that there were no women in there..! The great thing about being in a gay area is they always seem to love in the best areas. Duel income no kids etc and a taste for the good life means they congregate in nice places. Key west, Brighton, etc
Whilst wandering we bumped into a couple of guys from Switzerland on our trip (both watch guys so we talk about that) who are obviously a couple and the first thing one said to us was "wow it's so gay here!"
So we had a laugh about that because it really is. Tbh it's non threatening and as I say don't let it put you off.

Onto another Mexico port tomorrow but tbh I've forgotten what it's called

It's now the 31st so we're 1/4 the way through..

As above MSC get a bad rep mainly from those Americans who want 'A traveling mini America' a Disney version of every country rather than the real thing. Hence why Epcot and Vegas are so popular.. A MacDonalds level of cultural exchange seems to suit.
The Americans on here are those that seek and wish to be among different people from different countries and get that the tannoy messages are done in 5 languages for a reason
Food, service and quality is beyond approach. Apparently there is an inter MSC boat rivalry between Poesia and Majestica
guests on Facebook somewhere and both sides agree our ship is killing it all round

[Maleg]

Great update. Agree with your comments on Puerto Vallarta. It’s a lovely spot this time of year.

Originally Posted by RichardBartlett

So been a bit quiet. Never got off the boat at Guatamala as the port is so far from anywhere of interest it seemed too much. And those who did seemed to agree.

Day at Puerto Vallarta. Fantastic place and well worth a visit. The romantica quarter is lovely.we walked 6km along the beach and hopped on a local bus back..
However seems to have a large population of non indigenous 'bears' who've migrated south for winter
We were well into the area when looking at a very large restaurant I had a sudden realisation that there were no women in there..! The great thing about being in a gay area is they always seem to love in the best areas. Duel income no kids etc and a taste for the good life means they congregate in nice places. Key west, Brighton, etc
Whilst wandering we bumped into a couple of guys from Switzerland on our trip (both watch guys so we talk about that) who are obviously a couple and the first thing one said to us was "wow it's so gay here!"
So we had a laugh about that because it really is. Tbh it's non threatening and as I say don't let it put you off.

Onto another Mexico port tomorrow but tbh I've forgotten what it's called

It's now the 31st so we're 1/4 the way through..

As above MSC get a bad rep mainly from those Americans who want 'A traveling mini America' a Disney version of every country rather than the real thing. Hence why Epcot and Vegas are so popular.. A MacDonalds level of cultural exchange seems to suit.
The Americans on here are those that seek and wish to be among different people from different countries and get that the tannoy messages are done in 5 languages for a reason
Food, service and quality is beyond approach. Apparently there is an inter MSC boat rivalry between Poesia and Majestica
guests on Facebook somewhere and both sides agree our ship is killing it all round

[RichardBartlett]

Double post due to internet issues