…on a guided tour rather than exploring alone. Ten blocks are designated a National Historic Landmark District. Many original buildings, including the huge Ybor cigar factory, and homes survive. Unfortunately, some sections of the town were bulldozed down in a misguided and failed urban renewal scheme decades ago. The city is now rebuilding and renewing Ybor City following strict design and restoration guidelines. You can also stand on the only pi…
…d America Line Nieuw Amsterdam 7-night cruise was entering the Glacier Bay National Park to see these phenomenal glaciers: Reid Glacier, John Hopkins Glacier and the Margerie Glacier. They exceeded expectations! If you planning a cruise make sure that Glacier bay is included as not all ships and line go there. Holland America does. So I was pleased that who I was cruising with as missing Glacier bay would be a real gap for an Alaskan cruising vaca…
…ruise offers glimpses of many important buildings and places including The National Assembly, Institut de France, Cité de la Mode, City Hall, the Louvre, Place de la Concorde and its obelisk, the Grand Palais and Trocadéro. Choices The company offers a wide range of options that should suit any traveller’s time and interests. These range from one-hour river sightseeing cruises with multi-lingual audio guide commentary to packages combining a river…
…see three of Iceland’s most impressive and important landmarks: Þingvellir National Park, Gullfoss waterfall and the Geysir. If you go to see the “Jewels of the North” you visit the bubbling mud pots of Namaskard, Dimmuborgir and then the incredibly beautiful Godafoss, the waterfall of the gods. All the key sights that you’re going to want to see are on the coast or accessible from the coast. You will have to drive quite long distances or fly to s…
…like Panama, Liberia, and the Bahamas. There was a sense that these aren’t national companies, that cruising is a leisure industry and it’s going to be low in priority for authorities to lift those restrictions. Perception and reputation The second challenge cruise lines face is that cruises have come to be seen as not good for public health, relatively unsafe, and unpredictable. Cruising was always seen as this great safe way to travel: a way to…
…uch to happen, MSC Cruises has just announced that they are the first international cruise line to receive the required health and safety certification to be able to resume cruising in Japan as scheduled in April 2021. MSC Bellissima will be deployed to Japan, homeport in Yokohama to sail six to nine-night cruises in April, May and June 2021 and again during October and November 2021. Although unfortunately for most of us, these cruises will be fo…
…hich includes the Stokkr Geysir, stunning Gullfoss Waterfall and Pingvellr National Park where Iceland is slowly being pulled apart by the tectonic plates below. On the Jewels of the North, you visit the even more impressive Godafoss Waterfall, Lake Myvatn with thousands of birds and the Dimmoborgor lava fields and the freaky sulfur-smelling bubbling mud pits at Namafjall. On one trip we even drove up one of the vast glaciers in specially designed…
…uff going on, and access to most things it was here. As standard, the International Café, restaurants, bars, shops, photo centre and so on were all present. As great as the Atrium is, I find it very inward looking. There are no big views out to the sea. This was a pity for Alaska which is all about the outdoors and scenery. Scenic cruising – not so much Another thing, which was even mentioned by one of the Alaska enrichment lecturers, is Majestic…
…oss, the Golden Falls, Geysir geothermal area and Strokkur and Thingvellir National Park, where two tectonic plates are pulling apart. The other is what’s called the Jewels of the North, normally out of Akureyri. This includes Godafoss Waterfall, Namaskard bubbling mud pools, Lake Myvatn and Skutustadir craters and Dimmuborgir lava fields. Everyone likes Reykjavik and the Blue Lagoon, although I think that’s overrated. There’s much less choice of…
…ed into expedition alongside established players like Quark and Lindblad / National Geographic. And there are also new lines – Aurora and Swan Hellenic – meaning we can now go expedition cruising in more comfort, at a wide range of prices and we no longer must rough it to see isolated places. Smoking For me, another great change has been around smoking on board. It’s now restricted to a few designated areas, whereas when I started, people could sm…
…trohue falls, Falkland penguins, a heritage train through Tierra del Fuego National Park in Ushuaia. I always check excursions as soon as the cruise line opens them, and again a month before cruising. For this cruise, excursions opened 100 days before sailing, but on others like my Regent Seven Seas Japan cruise it was nine months before. As most passengers wait until they are on board, I was able to get every excursion I wanted. I made a note of…
