Thoughts, impressions, and observations for the World Cruise.

[Jimbo]

7 hours ago, njkruzer said:

I think you've got the wrong ship. This board is the Serenade.  Twangster is on the Jewel. 

 

7 hours ago, Biker19 said:

I think the poster was talking about the Serenade (the topic of this thread) not Jewel.

 

7 hours ago, Arzeena said:

Yes, about the Serenade. Thank you.

 

7 hours ago, Arzeena said:

Thanks Jimbo, but I think we are talking about different ships.

Yes, wrong thread, wrong ship. Serenade was given the once over before the WC started, but not a full blown dry dock.

[ChutChut]

On 5/17/2024 at 7:52 AM, Jimbo said:

How would one use this document above for insurance purposes? Most everyone knows the cruise line is allowed to change itinerary if need be?

I would read your policy and determine whether missed ports are covered (with or without substituting ports). If your policy reflects that an originally scheduled port - missed - but substituted with another is covered, I'd absolutely file a claim!

[BecAus]

We spent Monday at Réunion Island, a French overseas region, formerly known as Bourbon Island.

It was a lovely day with an occasional splatter of rain, especially down on the south coast which is common apparently.

We only had a short day here with all aboard at 2.30pm. Due to this most people who booked a tour did so with RCI, including us. Captain stressed more than once that due to the distance required to get to our next port in South Africa they would have to leave on time, no waiting for late-comers!

 

We did a full day tour (7hrs) which did a loop around the whole island and included a lovely lunch near the beach

 

 

The Notre Dame des Laves in Piton Sainte-Rose

(Our Lady of the Lava)

The 1977 eruption of Piton de la Fournaise volcano came right up to the church front door but the church was barely damaged - the lava flow still remains outside 

 

 

 

 

Not a great photo but we went around the island travelling over this motorway built over the ocean, there were massive cliffs on our right - it was really stunning scenery!

 

 

We stopped at the Lava Fields in the south-east of the island which go from the volcano down into the ocean 

 

The Lava Fields

 

 

Anse Waterfalls near Sainte-Rose - an amazing walk through a park with a series of many stunning waterfalls - too many to count, coming down the cliff-face

 

 

 

A lovely little restaurant by the beach in Sainte-Philippe. There were 4 RCI buses but it was handled very well - each bus had their own buffet - food was very good!

 

 

The local brew - pretty good I’m told but served a bit warm for my husband’s liking! 
We had a great day in the time we had & got to see the main highlights of the Island. Long drive but it was worth it.

 

Three sea days ahead - she was really rocky last night, not as bad today but definitely not what I’d call smooth. Waiting for Captain’s midday address to get an update on the sea condition 

 

Not sure why this photo posted down here: not a great photo but was interesting to see

 

A photo on the church wall showing some lava that made it in the church front door

Edited May 21 by BecAus

[CSHS1979]

Rough seas shut down both pools, so they decided to do maintenance and deep clean on Solarium

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited May 21 by CSHS1979

[lovesthebeach2]

24 minutes ago, CSHS1979 said:

Rough seas shut down both pools, so they decided to do maintenance and deep clean on Solarium

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I’ve always loved the solarium on Radiance class ships! Looking forward to boarding in Ravenna!

[CSHS1979]

Upcoming stops, continental Africa

 

 

[CSHS1979]

This came up in Captain Corner today. John said the Captain would keep them posted, but thought they would pass by on the way to Ghana

 

It's not an actual island😉

 

 

 

 

[Ocean Boy]

4 hours ago, CSHS1979 said:

This came up in Captain Corner today. John said the Captain would keep them posted, but thought they would pass by on the way to Ghana

 

It's not an actual island😉

 

 

 

 

Any idea how of the water depth there? I'm just wondering how the secure the buoy in place.

[RobInMN]

41 minutes ago, Ocean Boy said:

Any idea how of the water depth there? I'm just wondering how the secure the buoy in place.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Null_Island

"The depth of the seabed beneath the Soul buoy is around 4,940 metres (16,210 ft)."

[Ocean Boy]

48 minutes ago, RobInMN said:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Null_Island

"The depth of the seabed beneath the Soul buoy is around 4,940 metres (16,210 ft)."

Thanks. Now I really have no idea how they keep it in place. 

[RobInMN]

1 hour ago, Ocean Boy said:

Thanks. Now I really have no idea how they keep it in place. 

https://www.whoi.edu/know-your-ocean/ocean-topics/ocean-tech/moorings-buoys/

https://www.pmel.noaa.gov/ocs/moorings

 

Edited May 24 by RobInMN

[Ocean Boy]

46 minutes ago, RobInMN said:

https://www.whoi.edu/know-your-ocean/ocean-topics/ocean-tech/moorings-buoys/

https://www.pmel.noaa.gov/ocs/moorings

 

Thanks. I had no idea a mooring line that long was a possibility.

[BecAus]

Yesterday (Friday) was our first stop in South Africa at Port Elizabeth 

Immigration officials came on-board and a face to face inspection and passport stamp was done in the Safari Club - super quick and easy and no wait.

 

We were off to the Addo Elephant National Park which was a 1/2 hr drive. We booked a private tour & ended up with 3 other couples from the ship who were a really fun and lovely group of people.  
Saw a lot of guests from the ship here. Others went to other game reserves in the area and some guests left on 2n RCI excursions to various parks in the area.

 

We saw quite a lot of different animals including: elephants (of course), warthogs, zebra, hyena, water buffalo, monkeys, kudu, impala, ostriches and lots of birdlife.  
We never spotted the lion, cheetah or rhinos. The park is 630 sq miles and they have only a few of these so you are lucky if you see them.

The animals in Addo are all just roaming freely and it was fun trying to spot them.

 

We stopped for lunch at the restaurant and I can easily say it was one of the best beef burgers we’ve ever had!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The lookout overlooking the park - guess you can’t say they didn’t warn you!

 

It was a fun day out! We head to Kruger and Sabi Sands when we get off for a few weeks in Cape Town so will hope to see more of the Big 5 then.

 

Today we will be at a tender port, Mossel Bay, and on to Cape Town tomorrow for an overnight stay. We will get off on the 2nd day after doing a tour on Day 1.

[Etta1213]

@BecAus Thank you fir the delightful pics.🤗

[sgmn]

Oh wow @BecAus what great pictures. This would definitely be my kind of stop. I hope you post more of your African adventure when you do your land sectors 

[BecAus]

I hope the pictures are posting ok - it’s hard to tell as I only have my phone with me

14 minutes ago, sgmn said:

I hope you post more of your African adventure when you do your land sectors

Will do - not too many as I don’t want to annoy or distract people as this is the UWC thread. We go to Kruger / Sabi Sands then Cairo for a couple of days before heading to Rome and Odyssey for a week to hit some of the ports we’ve had to miss and rejoin June 20th.

Gotta think about packing today for the 24n off.  Not looking forward to that part!
 

Side note: not sure if they’ve started tendering here in Mossel Bay yet, it’s after 8am. They seem to be having trouble with the tender dock, certainly the one on our side anyway 🤷‍♀️

[BecAus]

Captain just made an announcement - there is some issues with the tendering. You can feel some ? light wind pushing against the ship causing some swell.

They are lowering a test tender on the calmer side of the ship to do a trial run to the dock to determine whether it is safe to do tender operations or whether they will have to cancel - it’s a wait & see…

[BecAus]

They’ve said they can tender but only on one side of the ship, using only two tenders and capacity will be reduced to 65 passengers/tender for safety so it will be a slower process than normal. They did say it will be a bumpy ride in!

We have a RCI tour but not till 1pm (tender about 12 noon) so hopefully some of the backlog will clear by then. Being a RCI tour (although we were supposed to meet on the pier) I guess they will get us on to the tender on time either way.

[pstone1]

Wow!  What a fantastic day in Port Elizabeth!  Great photos - thanks for posting!

[Ocean Boy]

6 hours ago, sgmn said:

Oh wow @BecAus what great pictures. This would definitely be my kind of stop. I hope you post more of your African adventure when you do your land sectors 

My kind of place to visit, too.

[Ocean Boy]

6 hours ago, BecAus said:

I hope the pictures are posting ok - it’s hard to tell as I only have my phone with me

 

Pictures are showing just fine! Thanks for posting them.

[BecAus]

We had a nice day yesterday in Mossel Bay. They finally got the first tender away about 9.45am, the delay due to the swell and then determining whether they could tender. They could only use one side of the ship and only 65pax a tender.

 

Some guests went along the coast, called the Garden Route, to visit a town called Knysna. Others went to a game park.
We took a tour with RCI and went up the mountains to a town called Oudtshoorn. It is where they do a lot of their agricultural growing (we are growers so it was of interest to us) Saw a lot of different farms including some really large ostrich farms. They gave us afternoon tea at a lovely hotel up there.

We went up the Robinson Pass and back down the Outeniqua Pass. The scenery in the mountains was stunning but a bit sickening looking at the huge drop off right next to the road!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[BecAus]

Some other photos from the ship:

 

 

Had to get my glasses back off the (?) rabbit before we left yesterday 

 

 

The sunset as we were catching the tender back to the ship

 

 

 

Africa cake the talented staff had done in the WJ

 

 

The beautiful moon as we were departing Mossel Bay

 

Today we are in Cape Town. We are hanging around off the Cape of Good Hope at the moment. Our arrival into CT got pushed back a bit several months ago, perhaps due to port traffic?, and we aren’t due to dock till 11am this morning.

[BecAus]

Our arrival into beautiful Cape Town

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[3yorkies]

14 hours ago, BecAus said:

Some other photos from the ship:

 

 

Had to get my glasses back off the (?) rabbit before we left yesterday 

 

 

The sunset as we were catching the tender back to the ship

 

 

 

Africa cake the talented staff had done in the WJ

 

 

The beautiful moon as we were departing Mossel Bay

 

Today we are in Cape Town. We are hanging around off the Cape of Good Hope at the moment. Our arrival into CT got pushed back a bit several months ago, perhaps due to port traffic?, and we aren’t due to dock till 11am this morning.

I love Cape Town and pretty much all of Aftica.  When I was 18, after high school, I flew to Nairobi and backpacked across Kenya, Tanzania, and Botswana for 3 months.   Greatest time ever!   I would have loved this part of the trip!!!!