Friday, December 30, 2016

Our Second "Once in a Lifetime" World Cruise

We know how special it was to be able to take even one cruise around the world, and here we are doing it again! We are going on the Pacific Princess which is the same ship as the one in 2013. It's also special that so many people that we met in 2013 are also on this one! We look forward to seeing them again and doing some tours together. We also look forward to all the new people we will meet and tour with this time around!

The Pacific Princess is a small ship with 680 passengers and around 350 crew. Her inaugural cruise was in 2003. There are pros and cons to small ships. The best part is she can get into more ports without the use of a tender boat. There isn't a flexible dinner schedule due to her size. It becomes like a big family on the smaller ships and even the crew were saying "welcome home" when we returned from shore excursions. We personally don't mind a larger ship with flexible dining in the evening and more options for restaurants on the ship, but we enjoy the Pacific Princess of course!

Pacific Princess

Like last time we decided to do a combination of touring ports on our own with and without a guide, renting cars and touring on our own, and for our overland tours we used tour companies. For the guided tours we booked many with small groups of people from our roll call on Cruise Critic and some we chose to do with “just us”. We booked 2 ship tours, one for the Great Barrier Reef because the port times conflicted with any I tried to book locally and the other for Ceuta, Spain (Spanish Morocco) to Chefchaouen.  I love to plan and organize tours and after almost a year and a half of planning it's finally time to board the ship and hope all goes well with my planning.
We did 3 over-land trips off the ship last time and are doing 2 this time. An over-land is when you leave the ship in one port and catch the ship at the next port a few days later. This requires permission from the cruise line and it's a good way to see some areas in more depth. We prefer to do it over sea days so we aren't missing any ports we have not been to before. 
Here is a link to the ship cam:
http://www.princess.com/webcam/pa_bridge.jpg
Last time it was time prohibitive to add photos to my blog, but I kept up my Web Albums to go with the text in the blog. We'll see how it goes this time, but it may be the same this time. Like last time I will keep up the blog on sea days.

Here is the link to the photo albums: https://get.google.com/albumarchive/116659709528973371528

I have no delusions that any of this will be great writing or terribly interesting, but it will help me keep our travels straight and family and friends can know where we are and what we are up to. So, please be kind and ignore typos, misspellings and any ignorant statements that I'm sure I'll make. I read world cruise blogs for years in hope of doing one some day and I learned a lot from reading about other people's experiences.

When traveling the best way to reach me is by email since I unfollow everyone on Facebook until we get back. We will miss you one and all!

We are often asked how many countries we have been to. I do keep a list as I'd have no idea otherwise. We have been to all 7 continents and at least 69 countries prior to this cruise. If we make all the ports on the itinerary we will have 42 port days, 66 sea days and 3 canal days. We will have 24 new ports and 18 repeats and 10 new countries.


We have had 2 port changes so far. Originally, we had Gibraltar, Great Britain and it was replaced very early on with Ceuta, Spain (Spanish Morocco) which despite belonging to Spain it is on the continent of Africa. The second one was recent and expected with the safety in Turkey. Bodrum, Turkey was replaced with Rhodes, Greece. It's all good as we have not been to either.

Here is our itinerary:

Blue means we've been there before and red indicates new ports and/or countries for us.

DAYSDAYDATEPORTArriveDepart
1Tuesday3-JanFt. Lauderdale, Florida 4:00 PM
2Wednesday4-JanCruising the Caribbean Sea
3Thursday5-JanCruising the Caribbean Sea
4Friday6-JanAruba 12:00 PM8:00 PM
5Saturday7-JanCruising the Caribbean Sea
6Sunday8-JanSanta Marta, Colombia 7:00 AM5:00 PM
7Monday9-JanCruising the Caribbean Sea
8Tuesday10-JanPanama Canal, Panama5:00 AM4:30 PM
9Wednesday11-JanCruising the Pacific Ocean
10Thursday12-JanSan Juan del Sur, Nicaragua 7:00 AM5:00 PM
11Friday13-JanAcajutla, El Salvador 10:00 AM7:00 PM
12Saturday14-JanCruising the Pacific Ocean
13Sunday15-JanCruising the Pacific Ocean
14Monday16-JanCruising the Pacific Ocean
15Tuesday17-JanLa Paz, Mexico 7:00 AM5:00 PM
16Wednesday18-JanCruising the Pacific Ocean
17Thursday19-JanCruising the Pacific Ocean
18Friday20-JanLos Angeles, California 7:00 AM4:00 PM
19Saturday21-JanCruising the Pacific Ocean
20Sunday22-JanCruising the Pacific OceanCross Equator
21Monday23-JanCruising the Pacific Ocean
22Tuesday24-JanCruising the Pacific Ocean
23Wednesday25-JanCruising the Pacific Ocean
24Thursday26-JanHonolulu, Hawaii 7:00 AM8:00 PM
25Friday27-JanCruising the South Pacific Ocean
26Saturday28-JanCruising the South Pacific Ocean
27Sunday29-JanCruising the South Pacific Ocean
28Monday30-JanCruising the South Pacific Ocean
29Tuesday31-JanCruising the South Pacific Ocean
30Wednesday1-FebPago Pago, American Samoa 8:00 AM5:00 PM
31Thursday2-FebCross International Date Line 12:00 PM1:00 PM
32Saturday4-FebNuku'alofa, Tonga 8:00 AM5:00 PM
33Sunday5-FebCruising the South Pacific Ocean
34Monday6-FebCruising the South Pacific Ocean
35Tuesday7-FebBay of Islands, New Zealand8:00 AM6:00 PM
36Wednesday8-FebAuckland, New Zealand 7:00 AM10:00 PM
37Thursday9-FebCruising the South Pacific Ocean
38Friday10-FebCruising the South Pacific Ocean
39Saturday11-FebCruising the South Pacific Ocean
40Sunday12-FebSydney, Australia 7:00 AM6:00 PM
41Monday13-FebCruising the South Pacific Ocean
42Tuesday14-FebCruising the South Pacific Ocean
43Wednesday15-FebCruising the South Pacific Ocean
44Thursday16-FebCairns, Australia 7:00 AM5:00 PM
45Friday17-FebCruising the South Pacific Ocean
46Saturday18-FebCruising the South Pacific Ocean
47Sunday19-FebRabaul, Papua New Guinea 8:00 AM6:00 PM
48Monday20-FebCruising the South Pacific Ocean
49Tuesday21-FebCruising the South Pacific Ocean
50Wednesday22-FebCruising the South Pacific Ocean
51Thursday23-FebYap, Micronesia 8:00 AM6:00 PM
52Friday24-FebCruising the South Pacific Ocean
53Saturday25-FebCruising the South Pacific Ocean
54Sunday26-FebCruising the South Pacific Ocean
55Monday27-FebKaohsiung, Taiwan 6:00 AM5:00 PM
56Tuesday28-FebCruising the South China Sea
57Wednesday1-MarHong Kong, China 7:00 AMOvernight 
58Thursday2-MarHong Kong, China 10:00 PM
59Friday3-MarCruising the South China Sea
60Saturday4-MarSanya, China 7:00 AM4:00 PM
61Sunday5-MarCruising the Gulf of Thailand
62Monday6-MarCruising the Gulf of Thailand
63Tuesday7-MarSingapore 10:00 AMOvernight 
64Wednesday8-MarSingapore 6:00 PM
65Thursday9-MarCruising the Bay of Bengal
66Friday10-MarPhuket, Thailand 7:00 AM6:00 PM
67Saturday11-MarCruising the Bay of Bengal
68Sunday12-MarCruising the Bay of Bengal
69Monday13-MarCruising the Bay of Bengal
70Tuesday14-MarCochin, India 8:00 AM5:00 PM
71Wednesday15-MarCruising the Indian Ocean
72Thursday16-MarMumbai, India 7:00 AM8:00 PM
73Friday17-MarCruising the Indian Ocean
74Saturday18-MarCruising the Indian Ocean
75Sunday19-MarDubai, United Arab Emirates 1:00 PMOvernight
76Monday20-MarDubai, United Arab Emirates 8:00 PM
77Tuesday21-MarCruising the Arabian Sea
78Wednesday22-MarCruising the Arabian Sea
79Thursday23-MarCruising the Arabian Sea
80Friday24-MarCruising the Arabian Sea
81Saturday25-MarCruising the Arabian Sea
82Sunday26-MarCruising the Arabian Sea
83Monday27-MarCruising the Arabian Sea
84Tuesday28-MarAqaba (for Petra), Jordan 7:00 AM7:00 PM
85Wednesday29-MarRed Sea Suez Canal, Egypt 7:00 PMOvernight
86Thursday30-MarSuez Canal, Egypt 5:00 PM
87Friday31-MarCruising the Mediterranean Sea
88Saturday1-AprRhodes, Greece7:00 AM6:00 PM
89Sunday2-AprChania - Soudha Bay, Greece 8:00 AM5:00 PM
90Monday3-AprZakinthos, Greece 7:00 AM4:00 PM
91Tuesday4-AprBari, Italy 9:00 AM7:00 PM
92Wednesday5-AprHvar, Croatia 7:00 AM5:00 PM
93Thursday6-AprVenice, Italy 9:00 AMOvernight
94Friday7-AprVenice, Italy 6:00 PM
95Saturday8-AprSibenik, Croatia 9:00 AM6:00 PM
96Sunday9-AprCruising the Mediterranean Sea
97Monday10-AprValletta, Malta 8:00 AM8:00 PM
98Tuesday11-AprSicily (Trapani), Italy 8:00 AM6:00 PM
99Wednesday12-AprCruising the Mediterranean Sea
100Thursday13-AprCruising the Mediterranean Sea
101Friday14-AprCeuta Spanish Morocco8:00 AM6:00 PM
102Saturday15-AprAlgarve Coast (Portimao), Portugal 8:00 AM5:00 PM
103Sunday16-AprCruising the Atlantic Ocean
104Monday17-AprCruising the Atlantic Ocean
105Tuesday18-AprCruising the Atlantic Ocean
106Wednesday19-AprCruising the Atlantic Ocean
107Thursday20-AprCruising the Atlantic Ocean
108Friday21-AprCruising the Atlantic Ocean
109Saturday22-AprBermuda (Hamilton) 9:00 AM5:00 PM
110Sunday23-AprCruising the Atlantic Ocean
111Monday24-AprCruising the Atlantic Ocean
112Tuesday25-AprFt. Lauderdale, Florida 7:00 AM
                                              
Happy New Year!!!











































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