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Planning 3

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And Good to Go!

Our sea voyage home is booked. We are now planning the trip to Europe. Roughly calculating how much time we want to visit the various places on our list we settle for September 18th to fly to Singapore. “That’s odd” I announce one morning when I was checking out flights and hotels for Singapore, “everything is booked for 18th, 19th and 20th and it is six months away.” Our travel dates clash with the Formula 1.

So we book our flight to Singapore for September 14th and begin booking for hotels or Airbnb that I have already checked out and noted in the holiday notebook.

Just when we are sure that everything is set, we hear from Gray’s brother that he and his wife have moved to Umbria, Italy. We really cannot spend time in Europe without visiting them, can we? Italy hadn’t been on our itinerary this time.

Once more back to the drawing board, or more accurately the little notebook. We really have to think long and hard about how we are going to fit everything in. We cannot lengthen our stay as we have a ship to board and we cannot leave home any earlier, either. It is tricky, but eventually we manage to slot everything in.

Notebook

Planning the packing is another challenge. There will be seasonal changes. We anticipate that Italy and the south of France will still be quite warm, but Edinburgh in October is bound to be cold. But these seasonal changes are only part of the ‘what to pack’ dilemma. Mostly we will need casual clothes for hopping on and off trains, but on the ship coming home there’ll be formal nights requiring suits , jackets and evening dresses. And we really don’t want to be lugging huge suitcases around Europe. Problem solved. We’ll buy new clothes in London and store our 2 large suitcases in London whilst we train up to Scotland to visit friends.

 

There are no luggage restrictions on a ship, so we’ll collect our cases on the way back from Scotland and head for Tilbury.

Cases

It’s all in the planning!!

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Budgets

MoneyBox

Our travel budgets are intrinsically linked to our planning. As we are planning a trip through Europe, with most time in France, we know we’ll want to have quite a food and wine focus. Local food markets, wineries, and good local restaurants will be planned into the itinerary. If we have heard about a particular restaurant and really would love to try their food, we’ll decide that it is worth eating simple, cheap fare for a night or two so that we can indulge in their sumptuous food. Many fabulous memories are based on wonderful meals.

The cruise home will take us through parts of the world that are new to us, so we will probably choose to do some of the planned onshore excursions even though they may seem expensive. They can help you decide whether you want to return to a place and explore it further. Where we are returning to a place we tend to do our own exploring of the harbour or town.

 

Gray has been known to say, “you can only spend each dollar, once”, so therefore it is important that we make sure we know how much money is required to enjoy the experience. Getting the balance right is important to us. We don’t want to be so constrained by our budget that we cannot enjoy ourselves but on the other hand at our age we realise that the holiday fund is not an infinite pot of gold. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if it were? We have travelled with folk who noted down their spending each day, often whilst we were out and about. We felt very uncomfortable by this and are sure that they were not having much fun either. Once the spending has been planned and agreed, we believe it’s time to enjoy ourselves.

Calculator

So this ‘philosophical statement’ as Gray defines the budget, is a good guide to ensure we make the most of our experiences away. I interpret the budget as ‘an enabler’, stretching it as far as possible to enable us to have a good time. Together we manage to make successful budget decisions and keep on enjoying traveling.

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Planning 2

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With places and people we want to visit on our trip pretty much settled, it is time for us to consider at our modes of travel.

We loathe long haul flights! We have tried all sorts of flight combinations to make these long trips more bearable, but nothing has really worked. With that in mind we talk about traveling by ship for a good part of this journey. A few years earlier we traveled by ship from Auckland to Los Angeles and then returned home by a long flight. The trip home was so bad that it took away much of the joy we had experienced on the sea voyage.

PlanningNotebook

 

So this time we think that we’ll look for a sea voyage home. We’ll fly Auckland to Singapore; have a brief stopover then fly onto Frankfurt.

We like to visit Europe after the main summer season but before the winter sets in, so we are thinking about leaving New Zealand in September.

Now most cruise lines head south to our part of the world early in the New Year, so their passengers are escaping the chills of winter and heading into the Southern summer.

We search and search for a cruise ship that would be heading ‘down-under’ in our late spring/early summer. We both search independently as we go about searching the net differently from each other. We seem to be looking for weeks and we are almost at the point of giving up, when I decide to try cargo ships. I put in tentative dates and quite by chance come across a cruise-line called Cruise and Maritime Voyages. They do an annual repositioning trip from Tilbury to Fremantle, Australia with a stop in Auckland! Eureka!

Astor

We book our trip home; then begin working backwards for the middle and beginning bits!

 

 

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A Special Birthday! – Planning 1

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FridgeWishList

On a warm summer evening in the New Year, Gray asks me what I want for my birthday this year. “It’s a special one so we need to do something special to celebrate, don’t you think?”

I think for a moment, then say with a grin , “How about a trip around the world in 70 days, a day for each year!” I shouldn’t really joke when it comes to travel, as Gray needs no encouragement at all to be off and away.

So, it is decided. We begin to plan our Trip Around the World for 70 years. We decide that trying to fit into exactly 70 days may place too many constrictions on us. We begin planning what we really want to do.

The first view is, Europe. We love France, so it is obvious that we’d want to go there again. England is another obvious choice as Gray still has some family there. We wonder about Scandinavia as we have been enjoying watching some Danish TV series. And are intrigued to find out more. Maybe we could travel by train from Paris through Brussels up through Holland. The possibilities for a great trip are endless.

After many long, excited discussions I decide that I need a notebook to jot down all the possibilities for us to mull over. We use the net for most of our research as well as listening to friends about their recent trips.

PlanningNotebook

Many mornings over breakfast Gray says, “Now, this is just an idea, not set in concrete, but have you thought…?” Sometimes I enthuse and rush for the notebook and other times I mutter that my notebook is looking pretty scruffy with all the cross outs. There are pages titled Final, final, final plans by the time we’d start any bookings.

 

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Welcome

We’re always ready to start traveling: to leave on our next holiday or to plan the following one.  Holidays have been our passion for a long time.  Not just ‘Doing’ the next country, but exploring places and people in the world in purposeful and meaningful ways.

We hope you’ll join us in our ventures. We are especially keen for your to contribute to this blog.   Either with comments or suggestions, or with stories of your own.

We’re ready to go.  Are you?

 

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Blog posts

Our latest news is below – newest to older. You can find previous posts by choosing a Category or scrolling down. You can also go to our other pages – ‘Our Place’, ‘Yesteryear’ and ‘About Us’ by clicking on the headers at the top right of this page.

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Home!

Home!
Auckland, New Zealand
Thursday March 14th 2013

Auckland, New Zealand


LA was pretty awful. We booked an expensive Hospitality Room at the Crown Plaza at LAX, that turned pout to be a very drab, run-down place with no service, no comfort – just a trial to endure for a day really. We then took a shuttle for our Air NZ flight home at 10.15pm. Crossing the dateline we lost our ‘extra’ day and arrived back to a bright, sunny Auckland morning. We landed at 6.45am and got easily through customs etc so were on the road heading home on quiet roads, arriving back for morning teatime. 🙂

It was a great experience, we revelled in all of it. We probably won’t do another one (‘Been there, done that) but will always remember our Voyage on Queen Elizabeth.

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En Voyage to LA

En Voyage to LA
Kahului, HI
Saturday March 9th 2013

Kahului, Hawaii

At the next port we get off to head home. We are really loving this holiday, but at the same time we are looking forward to coming home; in fact we are talking about home more and more. I’m wondering how many peaches are littering our lawn and will we get to eat any. We are also looking forward to Todd coming home 5 days after we get back. We are feeling guilty about our imprisoned cats – they will let us know about it!

Today we went to the Albek Duo’s last concert. We have enjoyed their music. Being twins they seem to be so in synch with each other.

Tonights show was Stuart Gillies, a Scots singer who had a repertoire of old show songs and ballads. The audience loved him.

Saturday 9th March Ready for Home?

Over the next few days we are putting our clocks forward one hour each day. It is putting us into going home mode.
The daily activities programmes are slowing down which further enhances this feeling.
Once again it is too windy to go outside on to the decks.

Tonight we were entertained by a Welsh guy, Mike Doyle who is a comedian and singer. He was really rather good.

Sunday 10th March
This will be our last blog whilst we are on board. We arrive in Los Angeles early Tuesday morning, having all our luggage packed and taken away the night before.

When we are home we’ll add more photos and the last 2 days. Using the internet has been quite a mission and extremely expensive.
Tonight’s show was A Night at the Palladium with the singers and dancers.It was another really good show.
It was also our last formal night, so we took photos of us in our finery. Dressing up has been fun, but we’ll enjoy eating dinner at home wearing jeans!


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Kahuliu, Maui, Hawaii

Kahuliu, Maui, Hawaii
Kahului, HI
Friday march 8th 2013

Kahului, Hawaii


We were up in time to watch the ship dock at Kahalui. It still amazes us how this huge ship can twist and turn in such a tight space. Apparently it is something to do with anthropods?
Seeing bright sun and blue skies was quite a welcome relief from the dark overcast skies of the past week or so. This is our last port stop before we leave the ship in Los Angeles in 5 days time.
We headed off into town after coffee this morning. The queues for the shopping shuttle buses were ridiculously long so we headed into the Maui Mall on foot enjoying the warmth and sunshine. Shopping was fun.
We had lunch back on board – a bit wary eating at some local food outlets. Still have vivid memories of food poisoning on Moorea all those years ago. After lunch we tried to find a place where we could photograph the ship from the front, but we were not allowed – port security.
Did the ironing. Tomorrow is a formal night so our little laundry will be chaos all day tomorrow.
Afternoon tea in the Queen’s room – their scones are pretty good! The Eos Quartet were playing as usual. As I’ve said before, very 1950s.
The show tonight was a magician, but we gave him a miss and went up onto deck 9 to another jazz concert, then down to deck 3 to listen to the harpist. The clocks go forward an hour tonight.

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Hilo

Hilo
Hilo, HI
Wednesday March 6th 2013

Hilo, Hawaii


Saturday 2nd March On the Way to Hilo

It is hard to remember what day it is! Is that the sign of a really relaxing holiday?
Today was much like any other, though it was too windy to spend much time out on Deck 3. I had my first coffee since before Tahiti, this morning, so I must be feeling better.

Tonight’s show was La Danza with the resident dancers. It was extremely good. Of course we were envious of their youth, energy and fitness. Most of the passengers are neither youthful nor energetic.
Some say that the average age of the passengers is 70, but my guess is that is quite a bit older. There are more than just a few wheelchairs!
It was a formal night so everyone was dressed up. Those who chose not to, had dinner at the Lido buffet.
We have been thinking just how much Dori (Gray’s Mum) would have enjoyed this voyage with all the dressing up, the concerts and shows and dancing at the balls. She would have reveled in all of it.

Sunday 3rd March Two Days from Hilo

This morning we braved the presentation about our next destination, Hilo. Gavin, the tour manager has a most unfortunate way of speaking English despite the fact he comes from England. Never the less we did glean the information we needed.
Six more cases have been reported, so now everywhere we go, we have to sanitise our hands. Until now the units were only at the entrances of restaurants, cafes and bars.

The afternoon concert with the Albek twins was very good.

Tonight’ show was a US singer, Valerie Perri who as OK.

Seas are becoming quite rough and once again the stabilisers are out.

Monday 4th March More Sick People
Today the captain announced that officials from the US Health Department are coming on board when we arrive in Hilo before anyone is allowed off the ship. As you can imagine the rumour machine is working well. Some say we will not be allowed off the ship until we leave USA! So we may be flying back from Southampton in a few weeks time???

The Albek Duo concert was very interesting today. They introduced us to composers we’ve not heard of; in particular a Czech. composer whose music was pure emotion (despair – his reaction to the beginning of WW1) The music was raw!
We went down to the Queen’s Room for afternoon tea – very 1950s with dainty sandwiches and cakes.

We’ve booked our shuttle and dayroom for LAX to come home, in anticipation that we will leave the ship.
Tonight’s show was a flautist, Suzanne Godfrey who was very talented, playing many Mancini pieces then moving onto more complex music that we’d heard James Galway play many years ago in London. It was a great concert.

Tuesday 5th March Deck 3 Still Closed
We are getting a little tired of the windy, cloudy weather. Not being able to go for our deck walk every morning is quite frustrating. We did, however, manage to grab a chair each on the upper deck this morning, so at least we got some fresh air.

There have been no more cases of sick people which is great. It is interesting that it is no longer referred to as norovirus, but gastro-intestinal upset. Maybe it’s to be in line with the Queen!

Tonight the variety show was quite good.
Is tomorrow Census Day? We won’t be in the count!

Wednesday 6th March Hilo

This morning we woke early as we had to be ‘processed’ by US immigration before we went into Hilo (the tsunami centre of the world).
We did manage to get out onto deck 3 before breakfast only to see a coffin being unloaded! Not a great start to the day! Rumour has it, that there were 10 empty coffins on board at Southampton and now there are 8!
Immigration was very straight forward even though many passengers tried to jump the queues. I won’t mention their nationality!
We went on a tour called Waves and Waterfalls. We actually enjoyed going through the countryside and heading into the hills. It was also good to take photos.

It poured with rain as we left the ship but the sun came out for us when we were at the waterfall – so lush colours and sunshine were quite stunning. We enjoyed a really interesting presentation at the Tsunami Museum.
We watched the sail away then off to dinner.
Tonight there is no show so we think we’ll go to the movies. Tomorrow is Kahalui where we hope to shop.