At the future cruise presentation at 11am in the Queen's Lounge, we learned about Tina's top ten destinations. They included just about every place we have been, except for a few. But the real reason we attended was to hear the news about the itinerary of the 2019 World Cruise. A couple of months ago, we all had been given 4 possible world cruise itineraries to vote on. Three of them went through the Suez Canal and the Mediterranean, while one went around the Cape of Africa. The one that resembled B was the one chosen by HAL. Leaving on January 22, it goes westbound through the Panama Canal, then south to Panama, Peru, and Chile. Then it heads to Easter Island, and Pitcairn, followed by French Polynesia and one stop in Tonga. There are four ports in New Zealand, and four stops in Australia. Indonesia has two stops, and Singapore, and Kuala Lumpur are on again. No Hong Kong, though. There is one stop in Sri Lanka, and two ports in India. The port of Muscat is followed by Jordan before transiting the Suez Canal to the Mediterranean. Naples, Barcelona, and Cadiz are on, as well as two stops in Portugal. Now this cruise goes into a different direction that has not been done for many years, if at all. There are stops in Cherbourg, France, Belgium, Amsterdam, and Copenhagen. Then there are two ports in Norway, one in Scotland, and three in Ireland. Then it goes transatlantic to Bermuda and finally back to Ft. Lauderdale on May 16th. Quite a different itinerary for sure. No prices yet either. We stayed until the very end, in hopes of hearing if there were plans for a 2018 Asia/Pacific cruise, but it was not announced.
We met Barb for lunch, and got her up to speed with the cruise news. Lunch is always good in here, and it is apparent that more folks are trying it. For a change, we have spent more time for lunch in the dining room than anywhere else on sea days.
Today we went to see Sarah, the Luggage Service expert for Fed Ex. We needed to add three suitcases to the list and some insurance on the duffels. Since we debark in San Francisco, the luggage will stay with us, and be delivered to us from the port. That way we don't have to drag anything with us.
The other big event was the Filipino Crew Show held in the Queens Lounge. This year the performers were from different departments such as the front office staff, the beverage crew, and the culinary people. Although we missed it, we heard it was well done and also well-attended. We had started watching an excellent movie, Lion, and did not want to miss the ending.
Dinner found all of us present, as well as a guest of Barb's, Ray a dance host. He seems to like coming to our loud table, even though he is pretty quiet. We enjoyed our dinners of chicken cordon bleu even better than last night's Pinnacle Grill dinner. At least everything was hot, as our waiter Slam really takes care of all of us. We only have five more nights together and the party will be over. All good things must come to an end.
Once again, the clocks went back one hour. This is going to catch up with all of us soon. Technically, we will be eating dinner at 8pm, when a few days ago, we were already turned in for the night.
The entertainers this evening were a group of four fellows from Trinidad with Broadway and Classical melodies. They are called Island Magic.
Bill & Mary Ann
The itinerary of the 2019 World Cruise
