That's All Folks

Hi Girlies,

This is what Gpa posted on our other blog.  It is so long that I won’t do a post on your blog, you can read this one.  It sounds a bit formal for you girlie girls, but we hope you like it.  We have loved blogging with you.

We love you,

Gpa and Nanoo

xoxoxo

We are home in Dahlonega.  We left the ship at 830am on Monday.  Since we had previously cleared immigration in St Thomas, we only had to go through customs in Miami.  We collected our luggage (5 bags) with the help of a porter named Fleming.  He loaded the bags onto a large cart, and we got in the line for the customs inspector.  After a short wait, we were cleared and made our way out of the terminal.  The company we were using to ship our luggage, Luggage Concierge, had a truck right in front of the terminal.  They collected the three bags we were shipping and the porter took us and the other bags to the car that was waiting to take us to the airport.  Crystal was providing car service to over 600 world cruisers, so scheduling all this must have been challenging.  We were each given a time to leave the ship, and I must say it worked perfectly.  In about 15 minutes we were at the Miami airport and checked in about 9am for our 1245pm flight to Atlanta.  Our flight left on time and at 230pm we arrived in Atlanta.  Waiting for us holding a sign with our name was the driver to take us to Dahlonega.  We collected our checked luggage, got in a very nice Cadillac sedan and made the hour and a half drive home.  We decided we could get used to limo service!

All was well in our home.  Our townhouse is so easy to lockup and leave for months at a time.  Our HOA takes care of everything on the outside.  All we have to do is turn on the water, do a bit of dusting, and we are home.  On Tuesday, Jer went to check on the motorhome.  After sitting for four months with the batteries not being charged, it started right up, YES!  After Jer worked a bit on a little electrical issue, the motorhome is ready for the trip to Traverse City.  We are leaving on the 16th for Forest City, Iowa for some warranty work on the coach, and then on to TC.  We are looking forward to our 8th summer in TC and seeing our Michigan friends.

So, what about the cruise?  Did we enjoy it?  Was it too long to be on a ship?  Yes, we loved the cruise.  Nearly four months on the ship wasn’t too long, but it was long enough!  We were ready to get home and on to our summer in TC.  We chose the cruise for the itinerary, and it didn’t disappoint.  The highlights for us were Easter Island, Pitcairn Island, New Zealand (could move there tomorrow), Australia, Africa, and especially South Africa.  We loved Buenos Aires.  Rio has never been one of our favorite cities, and it still isn’t.  The Amazon River is simply amazing.

Crystal is a wonderful cruise line.  They work very hard to meet the passengers expectations.  The service on board is absolutely the best.  The passengers are certainly of the senior demographic, so Crystal probably would not work as well for younger cruisers.  We are also seniors, but I would say we were in the youngest 10% on the ship.  The ship’s doctor told another passenger that over the 108 days of the cruise, 20 passengers were evacuated from the ship for medical reasons.  One passenger died on the ship (she was about 100 years old), and another very elderly woman died after being evacuated from the ship.  She was taken off the ship in Australia and died later in a hospital.  The ship had its share of the usual colds and bronchitis that seems to get passed around on any ship.  Except for one bout of the bronchitis, we stayed well on the ship.  Oh, except for that little stomach issue after drinking the Inca beer in Lima :).  Would we do another world cruise?  Maybe, but not anytime soon.  The itinerary would have to be really something special, as this one was.   For now we will return to the shorter cruises we have been taking for many years.  We have booked a Princess cruise to the Caribbean for the fall.

Now to our last day and evening on the ship.

Jer's last lunch, keeping it healthy.  Burgers so good, especially with bacon and blue cheese!!!

Crystal did a DVD for the entire cruise, each passenger received a copy.  We had a showing of it on our last afternoon.  At the end of the showing, a couple hundred crew members marched down the showroom aisles to the stage.  The crew on the ship were fantastic.

In the evening we had a big farewell party which included a ballon and confetti drop.  The Captain thanked everyone and wished them safe travels home.

Ready to go!

Dancing before the big drop.

Bombs away!

 

Helen seems dazzled by it all!

The heart and soul of the ship are the Lido deck crew members from the Philippines.  Each of them will call you by name after your first day on the ship.  Here are some of them.  Most of the pictures are with Jer since Helen was taking the pictures.

Joe always served us drinks by the pool and in the Cove in the evenings.

Nino, he went home after the cruise.

Raymond, a really nice guy!

Ed, always on duty when Jer went for coffee at 5am.

Leo, love his hair!

Mel

Lovely Pamela from Chile.  She always knew what we were drinking.

Helen with Crystal dancer Beverly who wowed us with many shows.

Crystal lead dancer Dimitri on left with friend.  Dimitri toured with River Dance, and he had some amazing moves.

We made many wonderful friends on the ship, here are some of them.

Peggy from NYC with her medal from team trivia.

Elaine from NYC on our day safari in South Africa.

Sal and Linda from California.

Kathy from Boston, we did some private tours together.

Carl and Christeen from New Jersey.  She does triathlons for fun!

Stephen and Peter, retired doctors from NYC, we toured with them.  They brought two bicycles on the ship which they used in many ports.  We always said they looked like brothers.

Lois from Vegas baby!

Hans and Sylvia from Germany, they played golf in many of the ports. 

Jean Guy from Canada.  He was Helen’s daily ray of sunshine (wait, I thought I was).

So that wraps up our last day on the cruise.  The next day we were in Miami heading for the airport.

The car that brought us home.

 

We have loved doing the blog and hope those that followed it enjoyed it.  We have a request.  If you were along with us, please drop us an email at gbfleming@att.net, we really don’t know who was viewing the blog.  Thanks.

So, bye for now from Jer and Helen!

Have a great summer!

Grand Gala Buffet

Hi Girlies,

Yesterday we were at Devil’s Island.  I posted on jerryandhelentravels about our day there.  If you want to see it, ask Mommy.

Today on the ship we had the Grand Gala Buffet.  We have had six of these on the World Cruise.  We don’t usually eat at this buffet because it is a bit crowded, but we thought you might like some pictures of the food.  Before the buffet is opened, all the chefs are introduced.

Desserts

Chef carving a seafood puff pastry.

Fruit

More dessert and a flan cake

Fancy cake

Bread and rolls

Seafood

More dessert

Lobster

So, do you think there is enough food here?  And I didn’t take pictures of all of it!

We strarted packing today to get off the ship on Monday.  The cruise is almost over, we will be talking to you soon!  We love you.

Gpa and Nanoo 

xoxoxo

 

The Amazing Amazon

Hi Girlies,
This post was meant for the other blog, that's why it reads like this.  But since I have put it on your blog, I won't post again about the Amazon.  Enjoy!  Gpa and Nanoo  xoxoxo

Hi All,
Today we are at sea heading for our next port of Devil’s Island.  We have been on the Amazon for the last three days. The river is simply amazing, and enormous!  At 4000 miles long, it is the second longest river in the world (the Nile wins).  But, it by far contains more water than any other river.  The river’s flow rate of 55 million gallons per second is greater than the next seven largest rivers combined.  The Amazon is responsible for 20% of the Earth’s fresh water flow into the oceans.   The width of the rivers ranges from as little as a mile to 240 miles where it enters the Atlantic ocean.  Pictures can’t really convey the vastness of this river, here are a couple.  The Amazon is brown, not because it is polluted, but due to the silt that runs off into it.


Our first port of call was the city of Macapa.  We stopped here to pick up the Amazon river pilot who guides us through the river.  Most of the passengers made the trip into Macapa; but, to quote Gertrude Stein, “There is no there there.”  There really wasn’t much to see.  The town’s main attraction is the Marker Zero which sits on the equator.  At this spot, one can stand in both the southern and northern hemisphere.  We didn’t make it to Marker Zero, but Helen snapped this picture as we rode by on our bus (pretty exciting, eh).

So after a short stay in Macapa, we set sail for our next port of Alter Do Chao.  About this time the Captain came on the ship's PA system and told us we might run out of fresh water and that we should all conserve.  Huh?  After sailing 18 hours from Macapa, we arrived at Alter Do Chao.  The ship lowered about four tenders into the water to get all the passengers ashore.  They then discovered that the water at the dock was too shallow for the tenders to operate.  So, the Captain then said we would not anchor at Alter Do Chao, but instead we would proceed to Santarem where we could refresh our water supply.  It only took about two hours to get to Santarem, this was our arrival.

Shortly after docking two 4 inch hoses were hooked to the ship and the water crisis was resolved.  The next day many passengers took these boats on a tour which was described as a Piranha fishing trip.  We have been to the Amazon before and we did catch a Piranha, so we didn’t see any need to do this tour.

Presumably no one catch a Piranha this large.

So, we walked from the ship into Santarem’s city center which was a couple miles from the dock.  Along the way, we stopped at this market on the water.   Most of the stores were closed as it was Sunday.  This market was quite busy.




This family is loading their canoe after shopping.

At the market a young boy was using fish on a string to attract the famous Amazon pink dolphins.  The fish floated on the surface and the dolphins would come and snatch it off the string (no hook).  Helen got these dolphin pictures.



Across the street from the waterfront market was another large and active market.  Lots of products being sold.

Shrimp


There are very few roads in the Amazon region.  Most travel is done on boats such as these.




Sometimes a powered boat will pull a group of canoes behind it as you can see in this long range photo.  All these canoes had people in them.

For overnight travel, people hang a hammock for sleeping from hooks on the ship’s ceiling.  On the mid deck of this ship, you can see hammocks hanging down.  Quite a contrast to the Crystal Serenity docked behind.

After a couple hours of walking, we returned to the ship.  At almost every port we visit, a craft market like this one will spring up on the dock.  Bargaining skills are important when shopping here!

At 4pm we set sail for Devil’s Island.  Santarem as we sailed away.

We have been to Devil’s Island twice before, but we are still looking forward to our day there.  Many of the old buildings from the infamous French prison remain, and it is an interesting place to walk around.  After Devil’s Island we have a sea day before a day in Barbados.  Then St Thomas the next day, two more sea days, and then Miami.  Today we pulled out the first suitcase to begin packing.  We have 5 very large bags.  Three will be shipped UPS to Dahlonega, and two will be checked on our flight to Atlanta.  Will post again after St Thomas.  Bye for now.
Jer and Helen