jlawrence01

We will be staying at the LaQuinta Inn and Suites in Richmond that is close to the Lansdowne Station. We are thinking of leaving the hotel around 9 am, head over to T&T Supermarket for lunch and then head over to Lansdowne station for the trip. Since we are leaving so early, getting to the ship should not be that much of a problem. Our original plan was to fly PHX - Bellingham, stay in Bellingham and take a shuttle to Vancouver. However, I could not get the shuttle options from Bellingham to Vancouver to work that well. Thanks for the information. That was a big help.

I am staying in Richmond, BC about a block from the SkyTrain. How feasible will it be to use it to Canada Place. Is there a place to hold on to the luggage for the 35 minute ride on a Sunday morning?? I have used rapid transit to get to airports and it is hard to carry luggage on some of them.

Calamansi is produced in the Philippines and is similar to a lime. It is NOT imported into the US but calamansi juice is available at some Asian markets and Seafood City.

A lot of people minimize the importance of the ship on the overall experience of your Alaskan cruise. We took an Inside passage cruise on the old Costa Riviera in 1989. It was a cruise that we paid for using my DW's Diners Club points and the cost was a major benefit. It was a terrible ship for a Alaskan cruise. It was a ship that was more geared to the Caribbean with outside pools and the like. There was just little to do other than watching the scenery. We swore off cruising until 2019 as a result of the trip. The best part of the cruise is that in June, we could experience the midnight sun. We will be returning to Alaska with two cruises in September. The first week will be a RT Inside passage tour on Celebrity Solstice. Then we will do a 14 day cruise on HAL Nieuw Amsterdam from Vancouver to Seward and back. Our choice was dictated by the lines that we prefer to travel with. We like the level of service and the food on these lines and this is really important to us. Some of my recommendations: 1) Plan your port visits very carefully and make them in advance. Do realize that the weather at ANY time of the year can turn bad and keep you from doing a dream excursion. 2) Pack layers of clothing. What worked in MOST other cruises will NOT work in Alaska and prices in the port are VERY expensive if you need to make a purchase. 3) You will probably not see everything you want to see. However, you will see things that you did NOT expect to see. 4) Get ready for sticker shock. Helicopter and flightseeing are available BUT can exceed the cost of the cruise fare! Make sure that you have it in the budget.

They are literally running out of ports to use. That is why you have seven or eight ships at Cozumel nearly everyday.

When I was working in the housing projects in Detroit, my vacations were spent hiking to the ghost towns of Ontario all throughout the province guided by a book that I picked up. On one particular hike, a guy appeared with a rifle pointed at me and my wife telling us to get lost. While we were on public property, I did not fell like pushing the point in a remote rural area where our bodies may not be found. We went back to the car and moved on to the next town.

It certainly exists: https://travel.gc.ca/destinations/united-states FWIW, with all the years I have lived in the US, the ONLY time that I have had a weapon pointed at me was in Northern Ontario.

That makes a lot of sense.

You are on cruise #5 back to back. Do you ever get tired of being on the same ship, eating the same menu and even having a LOT of repeats on the entertainment. Have you ever been tempted to head out on a different cruise line to break up the similarity? Or take a week off at one of the ports? Great pictures, by the way.

Two comments based on recent trips: 1) In the Falmouth area, the cruise port area is pretty much closed off from the rest of the town and has the usual type of shops that are everywhere. I would consider that area to be pretty safe. We did walk out of the port into the area adjacent to the cruise port. I am not going to say that it was a rough area but I probably would not do it again. When crew members leave the port area, they are instructed to travel in groups. 2) In February 2023, we did take a cruise sponsored excursion on a 25 passenger bus with a guide and a driver that involved about a 45 minute drive each way. I will say that in my life, I have never had as many near "head on" collisions as I had on that drive. Jamaican drivers will pass on narrow and windy two lane roads. I think that one of the issues with cruise lines these days, is what ports can all of these ships visit on an itinerary? Places like Cozumel have 7-8 ships in one days. This almost requires them to travel to less palatable destinations that they would probably like to avoid. Personally, we do not like the private islands and try to avoid certain ports like those in Jamaica and Belize City where there are security concerns.

Was this menu offered every week because I do not remember if during the first week? Also, when you head to one of the specialty restaurants like Tamarind, what do you get? If it an appetizer, entree and dessert or can you have multiple entrees and apps like in the MDR? In eight cruises, we have never tried specialty dining. Yes, seriously.😊

I am jealous of all the time you had in Bonaire. It is a great island to walk around. Unfortunately on our last visit, we were only there from 7 am to 2 pm. So many of the restaurants and businesses opened at noon. We found a Dutch grocery called Van der Groots that was quite excellent.

Heading to a US based fast food chain in the Caribbean is a strong guarantee that you will find decent WIFI.

I was really expecting that I would hate the chile relleno as that is a difficult dish to execute. However, it is one of the best that I have ever had. The pork belly was also excellent.

Seabourn is a super luxury line. Princess and Celebrity have Indian options at nearly every meal in their buffet.

The best menu of the cruise.. I hope that they continue this until the end of the calendar year.

I have been at a decent number of cruise ports recently so I might be confused. I thought that when you are at the port in Cozumel, you get in line to catch a taxi to town. The dispatcher asks you the number of people in the party and they get you a taxi for that many of people. I believe that there was also a sign telling you how much is the fare to different zones. A strategy that I have used along the US - Mexico border and at various Mexican airports is to shout out that I need a cab in earshot of five to ten drivers and generally one will shout out a lower price or they will all be the same. There are not many of them left but avoid the old Nissan Tsurus sedans that used to be the mainstay of Mexican taxi fleets. They are basically the equivalent of a 1980's era Nissan Sentra and has one of the worst crash ratings of any vehicle on Mexican roads.

If you are on back to back cruises, do you have the option of leaving the ship for 4-6 hours in lieu of sitting in a crowded theater? Thanks for all the good pictures.

In Mexico, MOST vendors prefer to be paid in USD. Ditto in many parts of Canada.

Other than the pool area on sea days and the MDR and buffet during meal times, there are a ton of places on the ship where you can get away. On my last cruise on the HAL Eurodam, I would generally disappear to the library, during the day, the walking track early in the morning and the observation lounge after 8 pm and never encountered a crowd. During the day, I would head to a lounge area around a closed bar and just relax. You can almost always request a table for one or two. Personally, we generally eat dinner with the same two or three couples every night and have been very fortunate to find people with similar interests. As one other thread says, "You do you." As a night owl, I almost always close the buffet or the last food option that is open at night. I have some great discussions with the various crew members, especially those practicing their English skills and the ship's entertainers.

Two issues. Last week in Cozumel, I bought two items totaling US$27 (prices were in USD at the cruise port). Generally, when you use a credit card in Mexico, you get a receipt showing you wheat you spent on what items and a slip showing what you were charged. My DW did NOT make sure they gave her both. I was charged 580 MXP or about $34 on my credit card. It is not the end of the world and part of it is tax. Just check your receipts. I think you do better paying cash for smaller purchases whether in pesos or dollars than using a credit card. Second, make sure that you understand the currencies of the locations that you are visiting as in many ports, prices will be in local currency. In Bonaire, I went to a Dutch grocery store a mile from the port. The prices l paid for spices looked really good as I thought that they were denominated in Florins at a $1.8 to US$1 rate just to find out that the currency in Bonaire is the US$. Always carry small bills as most people cannot make change in US dollars.

You make a good point. I would like to add that MANY of the dishes that you are served in the MDR and NOT dishes that many modern chefs have made since they left culinary school. I take pictures of a lot of the dishes on board so that I can duplicate a lot of them in my home kitchen. Some of the combinations are really great and not ones that I would have thought of (Heart of palm, Phillipine Mango and Florida avocado salad on HAL).

We were on Regal Princess in November 2023 and they two tours that were available to all cruisers at NO cost as part of an enrichment talk. First, they allowed everyone to go on the stage on the main theatre and they took us all back behind the curtains to the backstage where we could see all of the props used that week and meet with some of the performers that week. Second, they took us to the staging kitchen located behind the main dining room. Having run kitchens in large institutions, I have to admit that this was not a real point of the cruise. However, I would say that I was extremely impressed with the high levels of sanitation. That kitchen was spotless. I am sorry but I would not pay $$$ for a tour of the facility. By the way, there are a minimum of 50 YouTube channels that are done by crew members who are content producers that will give you great exposure to the life of the crew. I have watched hundreds of hours of this content. You might want to look at Chris Wong as he has done a number of videos showing crew areas on various RC ships.

$50 in $1 bills and $100 in $5 bills. Great for tips to and from the cruise and on the ship. Great for taxis as none of the credit card technology ever works Make sure that ALL of your bills are in excellent condition as most locations in Mexico, the Caribbean and in Asia will not accept a torn bill.

One way.