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LIVE from the Ocean Princess - 28 days from Rome to Singapore 10/15 - 11/12/2011

Pia1913

By Pia1913,
in Princess Cruises

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lovevacadays

lovevacadays

Posted
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Waynetoe, thank you for adding your comments. It makes it so much more interesting when we hear from a few different people all giving their views from another perspective. Well done!

 

Sounds like you are all having a great cruise!:)

 

I agree. This thread just gets more and more interesting.:)

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Guest012

Guest012

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Waynetoe, thank you for adding your comments. It makes it so much more interesting when we hear from a few different people all giving their views from another perspective. Well done!

 

Sounds like you are all having a great cruise!:)

 

Totally agree and my thanks to Wayne for the ship info.....see you onboard :D:D cheers Shiona

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Pia1913

Pia1913

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Good Morning from Aqaba, Jordan where it’s already almost 80 degrees. We lost an hour last night, but we’ll get it back tonight. One night back; one night forward; something else to confuse us. ;)

 

　

Decided to see see comic Tom Briscoe last night. OK. Some funny stuff; mostly corny stuff. Also lost $9.00 in the slots. Didn’t wait around to lose the remaining buck. And now you know I wasn’t kidding when I told you Donna would write a great report of yesterday’s trip. Will most likely con her into doing it again today.

 

　

With reference to today, we leave very shortly for Petra. Need to check in at 7:30. Boy, is it early! Just sipping my caffeine as I write this and will grab a piece of cheese. Too early to eat. This is going to be a 10 hour excursion, so if we don’t check in again today you’ll know we pooped out.

　

 

Only two tours offered here; Petra and Wadi Rum Drive. Can’t tell you anything about Wadi other than it’s a 5 hour Arabian desert drive; first by motorcoach and then by four wheel drive. Pretty expensive too. But they will be getting tea and cookies at a Bedouin tent.

　

 

Those staying aboard will have nothing to do except perhaps watch the movie “Thor” at 3:00 PM. Tonight will be the movie “Limitless” shown at 8 and again at 10 and Dan Hodge again with a tribute to Nat King Cole. We were told that dinner tonight and tomorrow night would be open seating and the buffet would be open too. Off to Petra we go. See ya………..

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Renmar

Renmar

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I know it is a little off topic and I don't want to hy-jack this tread but while you're on the Ocean would it be possible to get me some pictures of the view from obstructed view cabins to add to my collection. I know there are not very many of those cabins but every little bit helps.

Thanks,

Theo

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icat2000

icat2000

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Only two tours offered here; Petra and Wadi Rum Drive. Can’t tell you anything about Wadi other than it’s a 5 hour Arabian desert drive; first by motorcoach and then by four wheel drive. Pretty expensive too. But they will be getting tea and cookies at a Bedouin tent.

　

I have done both the Wadi Rum and Petra. I camped in the Wadi Rum. It is beautiful. Sounds like a great cruise.

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caribill

caribill

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With only 5 production shows in 28 days the singer/dancers have lots of time so they act as the general cruise activity staff.

 

On the Ocean Princess and the Pacific Princess, the singers/dancers always double as part of the cruise activities staff. They enjoy doing this (avoids boredom) and get extra pay for this.

 

By the way, on a recent small ship cruise, they did five production shows on a 12 day cruise. They were very busy.

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Pia1913

Pia1913

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Let’s begin with the good points. The weather couldn’t have been better. It was much cooler than anticipated, which interpreted means the expected intense heat never materialized.

　

 

We were on the bus to Petra at 7:30 AM and returned to the ship almost 6:00 PM. It took 2 hours of driving time to get there and there was one potty stop in a huge gift shop. With nine buses all arriving at once, some of the women needed to avail themselves of the men’s facilities. While the men were still in there. Guess who one of them was. I’m going to deliberately skip Petra and our guide because Donna will take over and give you the nitty gritty. Our included lunch at the Crowne Plaza Hotel consisted of many different cold salads, a large bread assortment, wonderful pita bread and delicious hummus, beef, chicken, fish, lamb and pasta were the hot dishes and assorted veggies such as carrots, cauliflower, zucchini and roasted potatoes. Also a whole lot of different desserts, most of which I didn’t know.

　

 

 

That’s it from me. We are now a tag team, and Donna will be along shortly. And to the person who asked about the MDR, no, it is not open on port days.

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DonahCBrown

DonahCBrown

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Aqaba/Petra – We did a ship tour today, principally because my ‘private vs. ship’ shore excursion rule of thumb is if it is 90 minutes or more between the ship and the attraction, go with the ship. Knowing what I know now, I would do a private tour. Here’s why – one, the roads between Aqaba and Petra are good, the drive time is just at 2 hours, and, at least today (which, admittedly, was Sunday) the traffic wasn’t at all bad. Two, the actual time at the site on the Princess tour was about two hours, followed by a set aside of 3 hours to accommodate everyone for the buffet lunch. Three, and most important, is that the guide you get on the ship tour is totally luck of the draw. I’m sure that people on Bus 1 of the Petra Tour, and probably those on buses 6, 8 and 9, were all pretty happy with the experience. I say this because I ‘shopped’ their guides and they were all pretty informative, helpful and spoke good English. This is in stark contrast to our guide who, among other things, never even introduced himself. We had, perhaps, a total of 20 or 30 minutes of commentary of any kind (mostly incomprehensible) during the 120 minutes of drive time to and from Petra. I was trying to think of anything that I learned from our guide that I didn’t already know. Best I could come up with was the time and place for our lunch. This is very not good, as I came knowing very little about Jordan and except for what I heard from guides for buses 1, 6, 8, and 9 at various points in the Siq and/or around the ruins by hanging around their tour groups, I left knowing about the same amount.

 

Rant over – the site is hugely impressive – and not just the Treasury façade made famous by Indiana Jones and the Holy Grail movie – the rest of the site is amazing and the Siq is positively magical. It IS a strenuous walk with uneven paving (1st. Century BCE – thank you guide for Bus 1!) but it is shaded and cool in the Siq itself and there is significant shade throughout most of the site. The approach (and return) from the bus is in full sun and, downhill going in but uphill coming out. Options other than your own two feet include a two person buggy or horseback- the guide will lead the horse at a walk, but the buggies go back and forth at a pretty fast clip. You quickly learn the sound of the buggies and the whistles of the drivers warning you to get over to the side.

 

The rock formations of the Siq are stunning and throughout there are carvings that (again thank you Bus 1 guide) date from pre-history, and run all the way up into the Crusades, but the most impressive carvings and ruins date from the Greco/Roman era. Around the corner from the Treasury façade is the more extensive city, and at the foot of the city is a large (capacity 3,000) Roman ampitheater. There are steps carved into the rock faces (we didn’t go up there) that went to what the signage called “The Place of Sacrifice” but the steep steps that we read went up to the monastery were closed off during our visit. The local Bedouins seem to have the animal concessions, providing camel rides, donkey rides, horseback rides, and the aforementioned buggy rides. Prices seem to be pretty negotiable for the camel, donkey and horseback rides, but the buggy ride seems to be pretty much set at around $50 US for round trips, or so we heard from other passengers who availed themselves of the service. There are souvenir stands and shops lining the road into the Siq, and souvenir stands at a couple of different locations within the ruins. Camel rides are on offer at the Treasury and donkey rides are available in the city ruins area. The donkeys, at least, are stabled in some of the caves in the ruins. The cliffs are honeycombed with cave opening many of which have been ‘improved’ with carved facades and/or brick or stone work. Extensive damming has been undertaken at various periods anywhere where a trickle of water might have been available in the wet season. I’m not sure (didn’t find the right place to listen in) what or where the water source was for what was obviously an extensive population in antiquity.

 

All in all, Petra is a fascinating place, well worth the visit. I only wish we had had a better guide (or gotten on Bus 1…) as we also passed through Wadi Rum and I know nothing about this historic area other than that there was some kind of reference to the war with the Ottoman Turks and Lawrence of Arabia (I think it was the part of the Lawrence of Arabia movie where they attacked the train, but I’m not entirely sure.) Obviously, I couldn’t eavesdrop on Bus 1’s guide…too bad…

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san diego sue

san diego sue

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If the guide wasn't doing what you paid for, need to complain at shore excursion desk. Last year on the Ruby we had a tour guide that spoke very little and when she did, she had difficulty communicating in english. Thanks to Pia's complaint(we were on tour together) we both got refund of half the cost of tour.

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bigguy1

bigguy1

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Donna, thanks for the report on Petra. Sorry your guide was poor and a 3 hour lunch does seem a bit long. However, youir description of one of the most interesting places to visit was superb. We'll be following yours and Pias' 'live" reports. We're on the 49 day SA cruise with you.

 

Murray & Ro - Hello! Its been a while.

 

Joel & Susan

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kruisey

kruisey

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I am off to airport soon.My iphone will be too expensive to use in Uk.Will read next week end at my sisters on her laptop.

She has a small inernet package so I mostly read.

What an outstanding cruise this one is.Love reading about all the antiquities,

history.Lawrence of Arabia story is one of my favorites......Heather:)

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