OK, this was the original purpose of the blog, our 71 day cruise around the Pacific on the Sun Princess. This got hijacked by our Cunard cruise earlier in the year, but that is behind us now.
With just 3 weeks until we are off, here is our itinerary:
20 June Fly to Sydney (stay overnight)
21 June Embark Sun Princess (sailing at 4.00pm)
22-26 June at sea
27 June Darwin
28 June-1 July at sea
2 July Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia
3-4 July at sea
5-6 July Hong Kong
7-8 July at sea
9 July Shanghai
10 July Jeju, Korea
10 July Jeju, Korea
11 July at sea
12 July Beijing
13 July at sea
14 July Incheon, Korea
15-16 July at sea
17 July Vladivostok, Russia
18 July at sea
19 July Hakodate, Japan
20 July at sea
21 July Tokyo
22-28 July at sea
29 July Seward, Alaska
30 July at sea
31 July Icy Strait Point, Alaska
1 August Glacier Bay (scenic cruising)
2 August Juneau, Alaska
3 August Ketchican, Alaska
4 August at sea
5 August Vancouver, Canada
6 August Victoria, Canada
7 August at sea
8-9 August San Francisco
10 August at sea
11 August San Diego
12-15 August at sea
16 August Honolulu, Hawaii
17 August Maui, Hawaii
18 August Hilo, Hawaii
19-23 August at sea
24 August Papeete
25 August Bora Bora
26-30 August at sea
31 August Auckland - Home again
So there are plenty of sea days for Vivian to get her bridge (& possibly Mah Jong) fix. Also (apart from internet connection) no reason why I shouldn't be able to keep the blog up-to-date on a regular basis.
Surprisingly we already know over 10% of the passengers - many were on our world cruise last year. The majority we have met through Cruise Critic, the on-line forum for cruisers. A couple of months ago we had a meeting of some of the New Zealand contingent, so more familiar faces. We got a big surprise a couple of months ago, when our table-mates on the world cruise, Margie & Ash told us that they too have booked this cruise, albeit as far as San Francisco. What is more, they are only 3 cabi...no, no, staterooms away.
Who wants to go to China?
Well, yes we do and the itinerary has 2 ports - Shanghai & Beijing. We had to get our visas in advance and there was considerable debate on-line as to whether we would need a single entry or a double entry. Princess advised that a single entry was adequate but..... After considering the pros & cons, we elected to go for a double (even though we were not leaving Chinese waters).
An update to this was that just last week, Princess advised that China has invoked the Maritime Cabotage Laws, meaning we can not go between 2 Chinese ports, but now must call at Jeju Island (Korea) for a few hours in between. So those people who got just a single entry Visa must now reapply for a double.
The Chinese Consulate office in Greenlane is only open from 9.00 - 12.00 for lodging applications & 2.00 to 4.00 for picking up and paying! On that topic, we paid $210 each for our Visas, whereas non NZ passport holders pay just $90 ! How unfair. We had heard stories of queues etc. so thought we'd get there early. We joined the queue at 8.40 and there were already some 50 people ahead of us, which took ages to process. The good news is that all our paperwork was in order, so the actual lodging of the application took less than a minute and we got back to the car in just under 2 hours (parking wardens have real fun there I am sure). Picked up passports the following Thursday, so at least that is off the list. None of the other ports (including Russia) require Visas, or at least a visa on arrival is organised by the ship.
The next thing is packing, and pretty well everything is partially packed, the problem being that we will experience the full 4 seasons while we are away. Perhaps the issue will be when we close the bags and weigh them. Oh well, we'll cross that bridge when we need to.
Expect the next post during our 5 sea days between Sydney & Darwin.
