Food on Holland America Nieuw Amsterdam

Posted on May 22, 2026 by LBcruiseshipblogger

display cake

The food on Holland America ships is similar from one ship to another, but there were some differences on the Nieuw Amsterdam from other Holland America ships I’ve sailed on. The buffet was arranged a bit differently with a refrigerated case taking up space in the central walkway/drink station. That made an extra place to obtain things like fruit and juice at breakfast or dessert at lunch or dinner, but it also eliminated some counter space. Other ships used that counter space for a tray of muffins and pastries in the early morning before the buffet opens, but the Nieuw Amsterdam only had fruit and cereal available. They could easily have solved that by opening the curtain at one of the pastry stations next to that area early where there were already an assortment of things stocked, but they never did.

buffet seating

Another change to the buffet is having taco and nacho type offerings at a station within the buffet instead of at a serve-yourself taco bar out by the pool and having a separate pizza place out on the back deck rather than serving pizza from a station at the buffet. In the morning they had regular waffles and crepes at the station that on previous ships used to make gluten free crepes out front. They recently changed that to pancakes, which this one made behind the scenes. The gluten free crepes they used to make were a whole lot better than the pancakes that they make now, but they won’t make gluten free crepes any more even though all they’d have to do is spread the dough out thinner. They did not make any gluten free baked goods in house at all on this ship and in the dining room people had to order gluten free in advance for any meal, not just dinner.

Tamarind sign

An additional difference on the Nieuw Amsterdam was a third premium restaurant in addition to the Pinnacle Grill and Canaletto that all of their ships have. The new one was called Tamarind. It served Pan-Asian food at dinnertime. It’s located at the center of deck 11 and accompanied by a sushi bar and an Asian themed bar with great views. Tamarind is available on only 5 of Holland America’s ships.

Tamarind bar

In addition to Nieuw Amsterdam it can also be found on Rotterdam, Nieuw Statendam, Koningsdam, and Eurodam. These are the larger ships of Holland America’s fleet, though nowhere near the megaship size some other lines have.

Canaletto

As previously mentioned, Nieuw Amsterdam also has Holland America’s standard pay-extra restaurants Canaletto and the Pinnacle Grill. Canaletto serves Italian food. It’s open at dinner only and located in a corner of the buffet seating. That works out well for the buffet as the seating area is open for anyone to sit there at breakfast and lunch when the buffet is more crowded and that corner of seating is restricted to Canaletto customers at dinner when more people eat elsewhere.

Pinnacle Grill

Pinnacle Grill is the upscale steakhouse and has its own space that is open for lunch and dinner. The lunch menu is different from the dinner menu and about half the price. The ship also had Holland America’s standard free Dive- In Grill next to the pool. Well at least the food there is free. You have to pay for it if you want a milkshake to go with the burger and fries. The Dive-In will make gluten-free or beyond meat burgers on the spot without having to order the previous day like you do in the dining room.

standard afternoon tea

You can also ask for gluten free on the spot at afternoon tea, but it’s pretty pitiful. The regular afternoon tea has the little 3-tiered tray with sandwiches, scones, and sweets on different tiers. Gluten free they bring a little plate.

gluten free afternoon tea for two

To share for 2 people they gave us one plate with 2 tiny very dry egg sandwiches with barely any filling and one big blob of chocolate. That’s it. What a disappointment. It wouldn’t be that hard to put together something nicer without even baking anything or putting much effort into it. They could add things like mini muffins which you can buy ready-made and some macarons, which are made with almond flour anyway so they’re always gluten free. (Macarons are the little fancy sandwich cookies, but coconut macaroons are often gluten free so they would work too.)

pork meatballs that were raw in the middle

The dining room food was generally good if refraining from ordering pork. At least I didn’t have any luck with it. I ordered pork 3 times. Once as an appetizer and twice for the main and every time it ranged from undercooked to nearly raw so after the third strike I did not order anything with pork again on this cruise.

pork dinner looks good, but is way undercooked when cut open

Other people at our table managed to get pork that was actually cooked all the way. It was just me that kept getting it undercooked. Kind of the opposite of an MSC ship we were on once where whatever I ordered for dinner was cooked perfectly and whatever my husband had was way overcooked. Even when we both ordered the same duck meal on that MSC ship mine was beautifully golden brown and his had the color and consistency of old leather.

this gluten free puffed pastry was the only GF baked item all cruise that didn’t come straight from a package – and it was delicious

Other than pork they did a good job with the mains and appetizers, but gluten free desserts were an issue.

one of many renditions of the flourless chocolate cake

If ordering anything chocolate it was always their flourless chocolate cake with various different toppings rather than whatever it was supposed to be. The flourless chocolate cake is good, but it’s nice to have some variety in cruise ship desserts rather than the same thing over and over. Pies were just the filling in a jar served like pudding, which was at least something different each time. Since we are just limited tolerance rather than celiacs we had better desserts sometimes up at the buffet where we could get things the way they were supposed to be. In the dining room it’s all or nothing on gluten free because anything else confuses them. They probably have to treat everyone who asks for gluten free as if they are a celiac to prevent causing anyone problems.

vegetarian dinner

There’s always a vegetarian option on the dinner menu. One night it was cauliflower steak, which sounded better to me than anything else on that night’s menu. It was pretty good.

turkey dinner in the dining room

One night after disappointing dining room desserts we went up to the Lido buffet to see if we could find something better and they had an assortment of cakes made with different types of booze. They were moist and delicious and some of the best desserts we had all cruise. We didn’t try all of them, but shared little pieces of a few different ones and they were all good.

lots of cakes at Cake Me Away

The other good cake day is when they have Cake Me Away one day at lunchtime in the buffet. They have quite a variety of fancy cakes for that. Their gluten free offerings were pretty bad, but any of the rest that we tried were good. They had that twice during our cruise because even though we had booked it as one cruise the last few days was sort of like a back-to-back because a lot of people got off in San Diego and new ones got on just from there to Vancouver. Which meant a chance to try some different cakes the second time around.

chicken dinner

The other special dessert thing they had was chocolate surprise one evening which is where you hang out on deck 2 and wait for the galley crew to come out with trays of a variety of different chocolate treats. Finding the door they come out of is the ideal way to see the entire selection on some ships, but on this ship there seemed to be quite a lot of each thing so at least some of the trays of each thing managed to make it all around the deck. They had little chocolate muffins, white chocolate fudge, dark chocolate macarons, and chocolate covered cheerios, raisins, almonds, and peanuts. Each item comes out one at a time and when all of the trays of one thing are gone they come out with the next treat.

dining room tacos

Copyright My Cruise Stories 2026

Posted in Cruise Food, Holland America, Nieuw Amsterdam, Shipboard Life | Tagged cruise, cruise food, Holland America, Nieuw Amsterdam, photos, travel | Leave a comment

Carnival Luminosa Spa Balcony Cabin

Posted on May 19, 2026 by LBcruiseshipblogger

spa balcony cabin

On the Luminosa, we had a spa balcony cabin, which is similar to a standard balcony cabin only it comes with extra perks including use of the thermal suite and is listed as having nicer amenities. Pictures show the interior décor of Carnival’s spa cabins in a green and blue color scheme, but ours was red and yellow so apparently they did not redecorate the spa cabins on the Luminosa when it switched from Costa to Carnival.

towel turkey

Spa cabins are supposed to come with upgraded amenities, but the shower still had conditioning shampoo instead of separate shampoo and conditioner so it was a good thing I brought some from home. It did have body wash separately so it wasn’t quite an all in one. There was bar soap for the sink rather than liquid hand soap. The bathrobes said cloud 9 on them and the provided beach towels were soft yellow ones that said serenity so they were serenity deck towels rather than the main pool deck towels standard cabins receive.

wall hooks and magnetic hooks

The cabin had ample storage space with 3 closets, 2 of which have hanging bars and one with shelves. As is usual on most any cruise we had to ask the steward for extra hangers. There were 3 empty drawers in the desk as well as 2 that had some stuff in them – like a hairdryer and laundry bags and forms. There were 2 built in wall hooks, and with magnetic hooks we added more places to hang things. The refrigerator came empty so we did not have to ask the steward to clear out mini-bar items, but there were two water bottles on the desk with price tags on them. Because we are returning guests the steward took the pay tags off and said we were entitled to have them for free. That perk may change in the near future though since Carnival’s overhaul of their loyalty program will soon take the earned status away from everyone who has not made diamond by the end of the summer and base it on money spent in a 2-year period rather than points accumulated from all past cruises.

balcony

The room had a cupboard with two fairly good-sized shelves and and two open small shelves next to it. The nightstands were quite small, but did have a tiny cupboard with 2 shelves inside each one. The framework of the couch under the seat has a couple loops sticking out of it and pulling on them I found 2 large drawers, empty and available for storing stuff. One of them could probably hold nearly as much as all of the drawers in the desk combined.

cabin 8224

The room has a king bed that can be separated into two, a chair at the desk, a full-sized couch, and a larger than average balcony with two chairs and a small table. Since this was a spa cabin we expected a very comfortable mattress. but this one almost felt like sleeping on the sort of carpeted floor with some kind of matting under the rug. Cruise ship beds are usually a lot more comfortable than that. The floor felt like its flat carpet was directly over a hard surface with no matting under it at all so the bed was somewhat softer than the floor in this room, but a softer mattress definitely would have been nice.

bathroom has 2 sets of shelves on the mirror

The bathroom is standard cruise ship size – small with a small shower. It does have a fairly long counter and a set of 3 shelves on each side of the mirror above the bathroom counter for a total of 6 rather than the standard only 3 on one side found on many ships. There is not any storage space under the counter. Some ships do have a shelf there, but this one did not. The center area underneath the sink is closed off with just a trash can at one end and a small shelf area filled with spare supplies like Kleen-x and toilet paper at the other.

magnets are useful for keeping paperwork organized

Most of the cabin walls are magnetic. The door can hold a strong magnet, but not a weak one. Door décor on week magnets hung just fine on the walls around the door, but not on the door itself. Of the magnets I had only the strong hook magnets could hold things up on the door.

wall art

The room has a pretty big mirror over the desk and a small TV hanging on the wall next to the mirror. There are a variety of different lights around the room. Wall art in our cabin was 3 pictures that looked like watercolor to me, though I’m no art expert. One was a tulip, one a vase, and the other the sort of abstract design that you can find to look like something if you stare at it long enough. It also had a little oval table by the couch.

using an adaptor to increase the available outlets

The biggest drawback of the room was that it had only one American and one Australian outlet and those so close to each other that even a small plug going into the American one was crowded by a smaller than average adapter in the Australian one – of which I plugged a plug extender into, though the 3 are spaced close enough that with most items you can only actually use the outer 2. This gave us 3 outlets to plug into rather than just one. Luckily electronics are OK on different power. My clock is not so it got the one American outlet. There were also some USB ports on one of the nightstands.

We were in cabin number 8224 which is located right at the opening for the stairway and elevators. We thought it might be noisy there when we saw where it was, but we didn’t hear the elevators from inside the room at all. Occasionally there was a group of people with loud voices waiting for the elevator and we did hear them.

cabin door

The location of our cabin door was pretty handy for duck mailboxes since anyone going up or down the stairs could see it. The spa was just above us and the gym one more floor up. The entrance into the Lido pool area was also on the deck above us so it was an area where people would go. We got a lot of ducks traded in our duck mailboxes, but sometimes people took them without leaving one. Sometimes people left a duck without taking the one that was there and one day somebody put a ship on a stick (Carnival’s version of a trophy) on top of mine, which I figured was an award for having the best duck mailbox since mine was homemade.

ship on a stick on the duck mailbox

The only other duck mailbox on the ship was just a few doors down from ours. It was the little yellow sort you buy online like what John had. (I would not recommend those, they break easily.) The people in that cabin took theirs down for much of the cruise due to a couple kids who constantly raided all of the duck mailboxes without ever leaving any ducks in trade. Those kids were probably somewhere between 10 and 14 so definitely old enough to know better, but since they often had a grandmother with them who not only allowed, but actually encouraged their bad behavior they aren’t likely to ever learn any respect for other people’s things. If they leave it empty then the next person who comes along to trade a duck won’t get one. One of the people in a nearby cabin caught them in the act and gave them a pretty good lecture so after that we got a lot more ducks in the mailbox rather than always finding it empty, and a lot of other people had fun trading them too. We even found one lady who just liked to look inside and see what was there. Duck mailboxes bring enjoyment to a lot of people.

ducks we either found or acquired in the mailbox

Our cabin steward was the friendliest one we’ve ever had. He was also a good steward. It was a 22-day cruise and we had a different towel animal every day. Overall it was a good cabin in a good location. The fact that cabins in our area stayed dry when a leaky pipe flooded some down the hall made our location that much better.

Copyright My Cruise Stories 2026

Posted in Caribbean, Luminosa | Tagged Carnival, cruise, Luminosa, photos, spa balcony cabin, travel | Leave a comment

Norfolk Island Cruise Port

Posted on May 15, 2026 by LBcruiseshipblogger

island tender at Cascade Pier

Norfolk Island, Australia is more than 1000 miles from mainland Australia. It’s of volcanic origin and about 5 miles long and 3 miles wide. None of the animals associated with Australia are native to the island. Neither are its venomous spiders and snakes. Other than domestic animals and creatures of the sea, Norfolk is mainly home to birds and insects. The highest elevation in the island is about 360 feet above sea level. The coastline mainly consists of cliffs. Tourism is the island’s main industry.

Norfolk Island Map

About half the island’s residents are descendants of the mutineers from the bounty and some Tahitian women that the mutineers brought with them to Pitcairn Island where they lived before being relocated to Norfolk Island. Prior to that the island was used for two different sets of convicts. One as Sydney was first being settled, which turned out advantageous for Sydney’s settlers since food was more easily grown on Norfolk Island at that time, and the second time for repeat offenders. Before that the island was not inhabited full time, though it did have some historic artifacts from Polynesian visitors. The rest of the population mainly comes from mainland Australia and New Zealand.

view of the tender pier from the ship

It’s a tender port with a couple different dock options, of which the one best suited to the day’s weather will be used – if the tenders can make it in at all. Sometimes the sea is too rough and the port gets skipped. This is a port with a high likelihood of getting skipped, but luckily the seas were not so rough to prevent us from coming ashore on our scheduled port day there. The docks are located at Kingston and Cascade.

Cascade tender pier

Tenders come out to the ship from the island rather than using the ship’s tenders at this port. The tender crew is also from the island and were far more skillful in docking their tenders than the Nordam’s crew had been with theirs. They managed to dock on both ends without crashing the tender into the ship or the dock, and made it to the dock on the first try. Neither of those things were likely when using the ship’s tenders. They also knew how to tie a proper knot to the cleat on the dock, another thing that sometimes escaped the ship’s tender crew.

shuttle bus near the dock

Holland America Noordam anchored out near the pier called Cascade, which is a remnant from the whaling industry of the past. Cascade is just the name of the pier. There’s nothing else there. Free shuttle busses wait to take people to the nearby town of Kingston. Other busses wait for tours booked through the ship.

mermaids on the rocks

Mermaids aren’t normally seen from the Cascade pier, but there were a couple out on the nearby rocks entertaining the crowd waiting for the next tender to arrive. The entertainment of the crowd was incidental though. The mermaids were a couple crew members who like to pose in mermaid costumes and were really there for their own enjoyment. They didn’t swim in their costumes at that location because the sharp rocks and harsh waves were far too dangerous for swimming in that area.

shore excursion bus

Kingston has all sorts of shops and some restaurants. There is a visitor’s center and another tour place where people can go to book tours. Both are a bit of a walk from the shuttle stop. I just saw them from the bus and don’t know if they book last-minute tours for cruise passengers or if they are just there for people staying on the island. There were a couple last-minute local tours available right at the shuttle stop as well as a few local crafts for sale. One of the tours from the shuttle stop went up a mountain, the other to the Kingston pier.

view from the national park

Ship’s excursions offered at this port included a fish feast, golf, a hike in the national park, a visit to a botanical garden, museum tour, 4×4 adventure, glass bottom boat tour, liqueur factory, historical tours, and a scenic drive. Whether a ship’s excursion or just the shuttle driver to town, locals are likely to share a bit of island history. All of our drivers and tour guides mentioned that they personally are descendants from the Bounty. Locals are quite friendly and go out of their way to be helpful. Someone we met on the ship left their jacket on one bus and another driver on a different bus tracked it down and brought it back to the port for them.

Copyright My Cruise Stories 2026

Posted in Australia, Holland America, Noordam, Pacific Ocean & Islands, Ports of Call | Tagged Australia, cruise, Norfolk Island, Norfolk Island Cruise Port, photos, travel | Leave a comment

Cruising with Teens

Posted on May 12, 2026 by LBcruiseshipblogger

girls on Symphony of the seas in Miami

When our 16-year-old granddaughter, Hannah, came to visit from Australia we booked a couple Caribbean cruises out of Florida to take her on. Symphony of the Seas is an excellent ship for cruising with teens because it has so many things for them to do. Besides the usual ship things like pools, hot tubs, and waterslides, Symphony also has a zipline, 10-deck dry slides, flowriders, rock climbing walls, ice arena, mini golf, a carousel, and arcades. It has a nice teen space where kids can go to hang out and meet other kids, and there are also organized activities just for the teens.

Violet on the flowrider

Along with us on the Symphony we had a friend with 15-year-old daughter, Violet. Hannah and Violet had not met before the cruise, but both are athletes. They had a lot in common and got along like they had been friends forever. Hannah is a competitive ninja and Violet plays basketball. They met other teens through the teen club on the ship and had a lot of fun trying out the various things the ship had to offer and going to teen activities.

the first few rows closest to the pool/stage are in the splash zone

Hannah said her favorite show ever was the Hiro water show on Symphony of the Seas. The girls watched it from the front row splash zone with other teens they had met and got soaked. The 3 adults of our group stayed dry watching the show from higher up.

swimming at Maho Beach

Teens are pretty self-reliant and both girls mostly went off and did their own thing while onboard the ship, often together. They came to meals and some of the shows with us, but did nearly everything else on their own.

airplane coming in for a landing at Maho Beach

In ports we all went out together as a group. In Saint Martin Hannah wanted to see the airplanes flying overhead at Maho Beach so that was where we all went. Most of the taxis out of Saint Martin go there so transportation is easy. There’s not a lot of beach there, but we did see a lot of planes and the girls went for a swim. That was Hanna’s favorite port of the trip so she definitely had fun.

kayaking in St Thomas

In Saint Thomas we went kayaking out of Margaritaville. This was not a ship’s excursion so we had to Uber from the port to get there, which is about half an hour away. It was in a part of Saint Thomas we hadn’t seen before. It was a bit windy that day, but Margaritaville has a beach in a fairly sheltered cove so it wasn’t too rough for launching kayaks from there. We paddled to another beach to go snorkeling and then across the bay to a dolphin rescue center where they had dolphins that had come from other facilities that either closed down or had kept them in manmade pools rather than open spaces in seawater like this facility had. The girls went in a kayak together and had no trouble maneuvering it.

ready to make chocolates

In Nassau we went to a chocolate factory and made chocolates. I think that was Violet’s favorite excursion. That one is at Greycliff Hotel which is a short walk from the ship and also booked through outside sources. We did not take any excursions through the cruise ship on this cruise.

girls in Margaritaville

When the Symphony cruise ended Violet and her mom went home so Hannah was on her own on the next cruise on the Majestic Princess. She did meet some other kids in the teen space there, but didn’t hang out with them as much as the ones on the Symphony.

scarlet macaw at the monkey and sloth rescue in Roatan

Although the Princess doesn’t have all the bells and whistles like the Symphony, Hannah still enjoyed that cruise. She found plenty to do with the gym and hot tubs, hiding ducks, and going to the teen space.

capuchin monkey

We had just two ports from the Majestic Princess. It overnighted in Roatan. The first day we had a long excursion, again booked through outside sources. This was also something Hannah had chosen. It picked people up in a van just outside the port. We went first to a sloth and monkey rescue. People went into cages with the monkeys who ran wild jumping from person to person. The sloths weren’t caged. They had an open pavilion surrounded in trees and went in and out as they pleased. They moved surprisingly fast compared to how slow their reputation is. Not nearly as fast as the monkeys, but they could cover ground when they wanted to.

riding at the water’s edge

Next we went to a beach that also had a stable. We had a short horseback ride that was mostly on a trail, but went down to a beach on a river where they walked through the edge of the water for a bit. Then we went out to the reef in a little boat to go snorkeling. The next day we went to the beach at the port and went swimming.

filming sea life through the bottom of the clear boat

In Cozumel we went out in a clear boat where you can see down to the bottom of the sea through the floor of the boat, which is a different way of viewing the sea life. The building where the clear boat tours start from is within walking distance of any of Cozumel’s three cruise ship ports.

Symphony of the Seas

Symphony was Hanna’s favorite of the two, both because of all the things the ship offered and from having another teen as part of our group. She said that was her favorite cruise ever because of all of the things available to do. She especially liked the dry slide which is a lot longer than the waterslides. The rock wall was right up her alley as a ninja so she had no trouble climbing it.

returning to the boat after snorkeling in Roatan

Cruising with teens is a lot easier than cruising with younger kids since the teens can pretty well take care of themselves and find things to do on their own. They can also navigate their own way around the ship to get to whatever activities they choose to participate in. It would not be so easy if the teens were the sort likely to cause problems, but these girls were not troublemakers. Of course that can apply to adults as well since some adults do cause trouble on cruise ships. While we have not sailed with troublemakers of any age as part of our group, the cruises we sailed on where there were other people who caused problems they all happened to be adults.

Copyright My Cruise Stories 2026

Posted in Caribbean, Majestic Princess, Princess, Royal Caribbean, Symphony of the Seas | Tagged cruise, cruising with teenagers, photos, travel | 1 Comment

Martinique Cruise Port

Posted on May 8, 2026 by LBcruiseshipblogger

Enchanted Princess in Martinique

Martinique is a Caribbean island territory of France. This 436 square mile volcanic island sits between Barbados and Saint Lucia in the windward islands of the Lesser Antilles. Mont Pelee is an active volcano at the north end of the island. Its 1902 eruption killed over 29,000 people and destroyed the town of Saint Pierre with almost no survivors. The city has mostly been rebuilt, but there are a few ruins left of the old city including part of a prison where one person survived in an underground cell. It last erupted in 1932.

view of Fort-de-France from the ship

Tourist attractions include rainforest, beaches, and a 17^th century fort. It also has a zoo, a botanical garden, and a banana museum. La Savane des Esclaves in the town of Les Trois-Îlets is outdoor museum in the form of a recreated native village.

cruise ship dock at Pointe Simon

Ships dock in the capital city of Fort-de-France. Currency is the euro. A lot of places near the port will take US dollars. The climate is tropical, usually warm, humid and often windy. Temperatures are usually in the 70’s to 80’s F.

ferry dock near the cruise port

We docked at Pointe Simon, which is the main cruise ship port. The port there was pretty much just the cruise ship pier. After walking down to the end of the pier it exited right into town, not into the usual conglomerate of cruise port shops. These are all unique local stores, not the same stores often found at every port. There is a ferry dock near the cruise ship dock where small ferries take people for a short ride to a couple different beaches. The little booth where you buy ferry tickets has a schedule and they do take US dollars. The ferry ride is less than half an hour and it runs pretty frequently. There is a secondary cruise pier called Tourelles Cruise Port which is about a 20–30-minute walk from the main tourist area. That one is used for the second ship when two ships come on the same day.

little beach below the fort near the cruise dock

Walking along the shore leads to a small sandy beach. It’s not the best beach around, but it is close to the ship. There’s also a park with a nice playground along the seashore.

one of many narrow streets

Walking through the part of town near the port there are narrow streets with narrow sidewalks. Some have fancy brick paving, others are asphalt or concrete in various states of disrepair. Buildings are mainly narrow rowhouses, often with business at the bottom. Many are picturesque old architecture, but some are newer. The newer ones are usually bigger.

one ruin in a row of buildings

Here and there crumbling ruins sit in a narrow lot between a couple buildings, still attached on both sides.

cathedral and really tall palm tree

The steeple of an old cathedral towers over much of the town, with a palm tree nearly as tall growing next to it. The cathedral is of the town’s tourist attractions, but the unusually tall palm tree next to it was interesting in its uniqueness.

reflection of the cathedral and palm tree

A building across the way shows a reflection of the cathedral and the tree. In actuality the tree was only slightly shorter than the steeple, but in these photos it looks taller in the one taken directly because it was slightly closer, but significantly shorter than it actually is in the reflection.

bottle garden in a vacant lot

Sometimes there are random things that are interesting only because of how odd they are – like the bottle garden we saw in a vacant lot on a street corner in Fort-de France.

Fort St. Louis

We walked to Fort St. Louis. It’s an ancient stone fort, but it is still an operating military base rather than an old fort where tourists can go. At least the part you can see from the outside is ancient. There was a gate guard at the entrance motioning us away, but according to a website about the fort people can tour it. From their website it looks like tours are only allowed during scheduled times on certain days with tickets purchased for specific tour times for a one hour and 15 minute tour. From that it sounds like it’s probably a guided tour. The tickets are purchased elsewhere rather than right at the fort.

park across the street from the fort

A park across the street had some structures that were probably once part of the fort. It also had a lot of litter.

market

Many streets full of shops meander through the town in the port area. A lot of the women’s clothing displayed in the windows of shops that sold it looked so tiny that the average American might have a hard time fitting one leg through the waistband of a pair of pants with no possibility of actually getting a foot into the pantleg. Either Martinique is full of extremely skinny ladies or they actually sell some bigger sizes of clothing than what they show in their window displays. I don’t know what size they were, but if the smallest American size is 0 these clothes must have been about –5. There’s also a fruit market. Or at least a market with a lot of stalls selling fruit. It had quite a few stalls selling other things too.

carnival tent booths

We were there during Carnival so there were lots of white tent stalls along the waterfront selling food, clothes, jewelry, souvenirs and other merchandise. None of them were open when we first got off the ship, but they all opened while we were still in port. They had some sort of parade going on at the time our ship departed. We could hear it, but not see it so it was probably one street in, on the other side of all the booths at the waterfront.

waterfront near the cruise dock

Other than just wandering around or taking the nearby ferry to the beach, Martinique is the sort of place where it’s best to research what you want to do and how to get to it before going there if you haven’t booked anything. There may be last-minute island tours available. We did that there once before, but with their carnival going on during this visit everything was shutting down early that day and drivers of taxis and vans pretty much seemed to have taken the day off.

ruins at St. Pierre

The highlight of the island tour we took on a previous visit to Martinique was the bits of ruins in St. Pierre that remain from the 1902 eruption of Mont Pelee.

crazy looking bus

We saw a crazy looking triple bus at a bus stop, but I don’t know anything about it or where it goes.

waterfront walkway

Excursions offered through Enchanted Princess in Martinique from our cruise: Best Of Martinique: St. Pierre & Rum Distillery; Easy Martinique Panoramic Drive; Authentic Martinique By Cabrio Bus; Discovering Creole Martinique; Balata Botanical Garden; Histories Plantation & Botanical Garden; Local Connections Belfort Plantation House & Clement Rum Tasting With Cultural Expert; Martinique 4X4 Adventure; Walking Tour Of Fort-De-France; Catamaran Cruise, Grand Anse Beach & Swim; Two-Site Snorkeling Adventure

Copyright My Cruise Stories 2026

Posted in Caribbean, Enchanted Princess, Port Cities, Ports of Call, Princess | Tagged Caribbean Islands, cruise, Martinique, photos, travel | Leave a comment

Carnival Radiance Inside Spa Cabin

Posted on May 5, 2026 by LBcruiseshipblogger

cabin 1014

Carnival Radiance Cabin 1014

We had an inside spa cabin on Carnival Radiance, which is the first inside cabin we have had in years. It came with spa privileges so we got to use the thermal suite. Spa cabins also get some other things. This ship just offered one free yoga class though Carnival’s listed privileges for these cabins say you get two fitness classes. It’s also supposed to include a scrub for use in the steam room, but on most ships you have to ask for that. Discounts on spa treatments also come with the room, but you can’t combine that discount with other offered spa deals so it doesn’t always provide the lowest price. Other amenities include a spa robe and slippers. The spa robe is similar to bathrobes provided by the cruiseline for other cabins and the slippers might fit a sasquatch, but they’re mighty big for a human. That’s not unique to Carnival. All of the spa slippers I’ve seen on any cruise ship were too gigantic for me to even consider attempting to try walking in them.

sauna at the thermal suite

Cruise ship thermal suites usually have some sort of pool and some heated ceramic chairs as their main features. There’s usually a few other features like a sauna, steam room, fancy showers, or relaxation area. This ship had a very small thermal suite that did not include any sort of pool. It did at least have more of the heated ceramic chairs than some ships do. It also had a nice sauna. We would have been pretty disappointed in the lack of any sort of pool there had we bought the thermal suite package rather than it coming with the room.

inside spa cabin

The cabin had 2 closets and 3 drawers for storage space. Also a small refrigerator in a little cabinet. Besides the mirror in the bathroom. there was one small full-length mirror and a mirror above part of the desk. The bathroom was a bit bigger than the standard cruise ship bathroom. It had 2 shelves on each side of the mirror, which was nicer than the ships that just have 3 on one side. The shower had combo shampoo/conditioner and separate body wash. I guess that’s a step above all 3 in one, but since spa cabins are supposed to have upgraded amenities it would be nice if they provided separate shampoo and conditioner.

the bottom drawer doesn’t completely shut

There were several things wrong with this cabin. One of the drawers didn’t quite shut, the USB charging ports didn’t work (luckily I bring a clock that has a couple USB charging ports), there was only one nightstand, and the door on one of the closets folded out rather than opening on a hinge, but it didn’t work right. Shortly after mentioning it to guest services the USB ports were replaced with new ones that worked and another nightstand appeared, so they were on the ball about fixing complaints. Wrestling the closet door open and shut and the drawer sticking out a bit were constant throughout the cruise, but we hadn’t said anything about those so we can’t blame the crew for not fixing them.

towel rabbit

We were not the only ones with stuff wrong in the cabin. We heard other people complain about things in their rooms as well. We also did not have the only room with rollaway beds taking up most of what would otherwise be under the bed storage space even though there is no space in the room to set one of those up. When there are more than two people in a cruise ship cabin the extra beds are usually either bunks that drop down out of the ceiling (or from a wall on older ships) or a couch that converts to a bed. I’ve never seen a rollaway bed used on a cruise ship and have no idea why this one had so many stored under beds in cabins. Especially ones with no space to even set one up. We did once see a whole bunch of mattresses unloaded at a port that were being donated to a facility there, but these beds were never removed so unless they were for donating somewhere on a future cruise that wasn’t it. We also lost storage space in one of the closets in our room which apparently was used for life jacket storage. This was only a two-person cabin and it had 5 or 6 lifejackets hogging up storage space. On the plus side there was still room enough for our suitcases under the bed and we had a good steward. He left a new towel animal each day.

desk and TV

There were only 2 obvious outlets located right next to each other at the desk. Behind the TV there’s an extra one along with the one the TV is plugged into. None by the bed. Besides the bed the only other place to sit was a small stool under the desk. No chair or couch. Not room for one either. Inside cabins are generally the smallest on pretty much any cruise ship. People book them to save money because they are the cheapest or because they like a darker room if they want to sleep when it’s light outside.

duck mailboxes – one with enough magnets to stay on the barely magnetic wall, the other sits on a rail

The walls on this ship were not magnetic enough to hold up anything hung up on even the strongest magnets. The door and wall outside of the room were barely magnetic as well. The strip around the outside of the door was the most magnetic and the place where most people hung their door decorations if they had any small enough to fit in that space. I did have enough magnets on my duck trading mailbox for it to stay on the wall outside of the cabin, but it isn’t very heavy and has a lot of really strong magnets. On this ship it tended to slide down when touched, whereas on the next one it pretty much had to be pried off the wall. John’s duck mailbox had less magnets and had to be tied to a railing to stay on the wall on this ship, but it too stuck tightly on the next one.

one of the upper front bows

Our room was near to the end of a mostly dead end hallway, but still seemed to have more traffic going by than you would expect for the number of rooms between it and the end of the hall. It wasn’t quite a dead end since there was a door there out to one of the ship’s secret upper bows, but not many people knew about that bow access so it didn’t explain the amount of foot traffic in the hallway. Perhaps we had a popular neighbor.

bathroom

A few years ago some ships started adding motion lights by the floor which was annoying enough if not covered up at night. On this one there was a motion light in the ceiling in front of the bathroom which was way worse and not even necessary since enough light came through around the cabin door to not need a light at all to find the bathroom in the dark. It would have been way better to have that light in the bathroom so people didn’t have to turn on the fully bright one if using the bathroom in the night. That may be an unfortunate new trend since the next ship we went on had an overhead motion light in front of the bathroom as well. I suppose whoever decides to add these things considers it a safety feature, but what it really does is insure that nobody can get up to go to the bathroom without waking up everyone else in the cabin unless they magnet a towel over the light to block it. Like the walls, ceilings in cruise ship cabins are usually magnetic.

Copyright My Cruise Stories 2026

Posted in Carnival, Radiance, Shipboard Life | Tagged Carnival, cruise, cruise ship cabins, photos, Radiance, spa inside cabin, travel | Leave a comment

Würzburg Residenz & Walking Tour

Posted on May 1, 2026 by LBcruiseshipblogger

Würzburg, Germany

view from the ship while docked in Würzburg

Würzburg sits along the Main River in the Franconian region of northern Bavaria in Germany surrounded by vineyards including Germany’s oldest and largest one. The city is best known for its historical architecture, especially the 18th-century Residenz palace. It’s also famous for its dry white wines and has a well-known local pilsner beer and the oldest pizzeria in Germany. The city boasts numerous wine bars, cellars and wineries. The population consists of more than 125,000 people. Würzburg has a temperate climate with modest rainfall year-round. Average temperatures range from winter lows in the high 20’s F to summer highs in the mid 70’s, though it can dip down into the teens and rise above 85 degrees. Snow generally falls between December and February. Average annual precipitation is just under 30 inches. There are museums, parks and gardens, a famous bridge called Old Main Bridge, churches, palaces, and markets. Much of Würzburg was heavily damaged during World War 2, but has since been restored. The core of the Residenz palace survived relatively intact, but much of the rest of the building was severely damaged and restored over a 20-year period.

walkway along the river from the stone bridge to the ship

Würzburg River Cruise Port

Würzburg was one of the better ports of our Grand European Tour on Viking Skirner because it was both walking distance from the ship to town and the boat stayed in one place all day so people could come and go as they please. It was also quite scenic with castles and churches on the hill above the far side of the river and colorful houses along the water’s edge. The historical old stone bridge was also within sight of our docking space. The view was even nice from the little above water window in our below-water-level cabin until another ship came along and docked beside us, at which time the view through all of the windows on that side of the ship was of the other ship.

Würzburg, Germany

Würzburg Residenz & Walking Tour

The included tour in Würzburg was called Würzburg Residenz and Walking Tour. It started with a short bus ride to the Residenz. It’s a former prince bishop’s palace, though it doesn’t look like a castle. Prince bishops were the rulers of German towns back in medieval times and beyond. They ruled Würzburg from 1168 – 1803, but the rule of prince bishops started elsewhere in Europe in the previous century. The prince bishops were the ruler of their town as well as the bishop of its church.

Würzburg Residenz

The tour there started with a guided part, followed by free time. The guide said no photos during the guided tour, wait until free time when you can take all you want. Large bags, backpacks, and liquids are not allowed inside so they were all put into a big locked box where the ship’s cruise director would stand guard over them during the tour. There are individual lockers in another area for people who don’t come on an organized tour.

grand stairway

Entry into the building is through a tiny door within a giant door which isn’t really visible as a separate door until it is opened. There are 3 large doors there, which the guide said were originally openings without doors so carriages could pull right inside and let visiting kings, queens, or other important people right out at the grand stairway instead of outside. When Napolean came conquering his carriage had 8 horses instead of 6 and didn’t fit inside so he had to get out and walk in, which greatly displeased him, though the people getting conquered were probably not unhappy about that. Once inside a grand stairway leads from the entry area up to many rooms inside the palace.

Christmas tree in the entryway

Not thinking the tour had officially started yet since they had said we were picking up a guide from the building when people dropped off their stuff, I took a photo of a Christmas tree in the lobby and got yelled at by our guide. There was no additional guide after people dropped off their things like they had implied there would be, just the one we came from the ship with.

ceiling above the grand stairway

Most of the guided part of the tour was spent in just a few rooms while the guide went into great detail about all the artwork there, both painted walls and molded relief sculptures integrated into the paintings. Most of that time was just getting around the walkway surrounding the top of the stairway while the guide spoke about pretty much every painting and sculpture there. We’d move along maybe 10 feet before stopping for another long explanation of whatever bit of the paintings were directly above us.

even the heaters were ornate

Nearly all of the other people on the tour constantly snapped photos without reprimand. All throughout the entire tour everyone else took many photos and the guide never said one word about it to any of them. Didn’t even give so much as a dirty look to all the people holding phones up right in front of her face snapping away taking photos while she was talking about stuff. In fact she did not say a thing about taking photos to anyone else at all. Just yelled at me for taking one photo before the actual tour had even started. She did not get a tip from me.

marble room

One room had real marble floor tiles and columns with real marble bases, but imitation marble columns. The imitation marble took longer to make than cutting actual marble from stone. At the time it was cheaper to make it that way, but in current times because of the intensity of the labor and the modern technology that makes cutting stone much easier than it was back then the false marble would actually cost more to install than the real stone.

bed in the Residenz

During the free time part of the tour there were lots more rooms to see than what was included in the guided part, but as is with all of these places none of them were fully furnished as they would have been when in use. They all had some furnishings, but set as a display rather than how anyone would have used them. One room did have a bed, the first of those we had seen. Beds were quite short in those days. People were afraid of sleeping lying down because they associated it with death and they feared demons would press down on their chests. Instead they slept nearly sitting leaning against several pillows.

old time carousel in the Residenz

There was plenty of time during the free period to go back and take photos of the things we had seen during the guided part. Which was good for me since I was probably the only one in the whole group who didn’t take pictures during the guided part of the tour after getting yelled at for the one from before it really even started. It doesn’t take that long to get through the entire part of the building that is open to the public on your own, whereas it took the better part of an hour just to get around that one room with the guide.

fancy floor

All of the rooms had lots of artwork, some of it built in with sculpture and paint and other hanging in paintings and tapestries. Even some of the floors were intricately ornate.

Residenz church

Besides the main building there was also a church, which was a private one for the residents of the Residenz. It was smaller than the cathedrals we went to on other tours, but still quite ornate. This church had plain glass in the windows rather than stained glass which a sign in the church said was so those windows would look the same from the outside as the rest of the building. Apparently symmetry was an important tenant of baroque architecture. Besides all the ornate décor it also had a pipe organ up on a balcony at the back of the church, which seems to be standard for churches of that era. Like the church itself, the pipe organ was also smaller than the ones at previous cathedrals we saw in other places.

statue

After the free time ended the walking groups met up with their guides outside of the building and walked back into town with the guide stopping to give the history of various things we passed. One statue she said tended to get what she called sticker tattoos from the local college kids advertising all sorts of things likely not appropriate to the statue’s original purpose.

the 3 missionaries on the cathedral

Killian’s Cathedral depicts 3 Irish missionaries who came to town in 686 and attempted to convert the duke who ruled the town at that time to Christianity. For some reason I can’t recall from the tale the guide told this involved him either leaving his wife or disposing of her, something she of course did not agree to. Before making his decision on whether or not to convert he made a trip out of town. While he was gone she secretly disposed of the 3 missionaries, whose bodies were not discovered until many years later. Upon the duke’s return she said they had left so life went back to normal for them as if the missionaries had never come.

tram

Rail-based trams frequently passed by on the main streets of town. A lot of the European cities we visited had them as part of their public transportation systems.

decorated street

The tour went into the main shopping area of town and through part of a Christmas Market. Across from the market a festively decorated narrow street led through what used to be where all the shoemakers had their shops. It was also part of the historical Jewish area of town.

walking across the old stone bridge

That led to the street with the old stone bridge at the river end of it. The part of that street close to the river is supposed to be for pedestrians only other than taxis, but a random car drove down there looking lost.

chapel and Christmas market

The ship stayed at that port for quite a few hours after the end of the tour so we went from the bridge back to the Christmas Market and wandered around there for awhile. Pretty much all of the Christmas markets in all of the various towns are next to a church, but then again the towns are all full of churches so it may be hard not to be. The one at this market was just as big as many of the others, but called a chapel rather than a church because back in the middle ages commoners built it without the prince bishop’s permission so they weren’t allowed to call it a church. It’s a restored building, but the golden Mary on top is original having survived the bombing that destroyed the rest of the building.

Viking ship in the locks

The river runs freely under parts of the old stone bridge, but at one end of it there are locks, in which another Viking ship was going through while we were there. After getting out of the lock channel it tied up to our boat. River boats often dock 2 or more deep tied to one another, especially if they are from the same company.

looking down from the stone bridge

The old stone bridge is scenic from both above and below. The walk alongside the river back to the ship was pretty scenic too. It’s called the Old Main Bridge. Built between 1473 and 1543 it’s one of Germany’s oldest bridges and one of the city’s most iconic landmarks.

stone bridge

It replaced an earlier Romanesque bridge from 1133. The German army tried to blow it up while retreating during World War 2, but were largely unsuccessful due to faulty explosives. The damaged portion was restored after the war. The bridge has 12 arches and spans 185 meters (just over 202 yards) across the Main River.

Copyright My Cruise Stories 2026

Posted in Europe, Skirnir, Viking | Tagged Germany, photos, Residenz, river cruise, Skirnir, travel, Viking, Wurzburg | 2 Comments

Back on the Royal Princess

Posted on April 28, 2026 by LBcruiseshipblogger

Royal Princess in Cabo

Royal Princess launched in 2013 as the first of the Royal class, though it is not the first ship named Royal Princess. They had one of that name back in 1984, and another in 2007, both of which are now sailing for different lines under different names. Other ships in the Royal class of Princess’ current fleet include Regal Princess, Majestic Princess, Sky Princess, Enchanted Princess, and Discovery Princess. The ship is 1083 feet long, 155 feet wide, and can hold over 3500 passengers and over 1300 crew. It was last refurbished in 2018 and is going into drydock for renovations this fall. There are 15 passenger accessible decks which start at deck 4 and end with deck 19. As is usual on American cruise ships there is no deck 13. Deck 4 is mostly crew space with just the medical center and a couple embarkation areas accessible to passengers on that deck. A couple of the upper decks don’t extend all the way across the ship.

stairway from the casino to the shops

The first time I was on the Royal Princess it was when Princess still kept their indoor smoking confined to a cigar lounge. Although the number of smokers has declined over the years for some stupid reason – probably a bigwig who smokes – both Princess and Holland America have gone to smoking casinos after years of keeping the interior of their ships smoke-free. This ship was definitely not designed to have smoking in the casino. It has a wide-open stairway in the center of it that goes up into the shopping area on the deck above, which is now a giant chimney spreading smoke throughout the ship. It also spreads through the entrances on both sides of the casino on its own deck, which includes into the central piazza that connects most all of the indoor public areas of the ship. Greed of hoping to get more money out of people who want to smoke and gamble clouds their judgement about the rest of the passengers who not only don’t want to smell smoke all throughout the ship, but also will spend less time in the casino or avoid it completely. Some will even avoid the entire ship due to the smoke. Not to mention the unfortunate crew who are constantly exposed to copious amounts of secondhand smoke on a daily basis.

duck machine in the arcade

The former cigar lounge which used to keep indoor smoking contained in a fully enclosed room is now an arcade that smells badly of stale smoke. Smoke pretty much infiltrated all of the public areas on decks 5, 6, & 7. Even into the dining rooms and all the way back to the Vista Lounge which is at the back of deck 7. If we had not already booked the first cruise after next fall’s drydock long before the cruise we just took on Royal Princess I would avoid this ship in the future due to the excessive amounts of smoke permeating the ship. Unless they do something to contain the smoke when it goes into drydock this fall I would not book on this ship again.

piazza

The piazza is the hub of activity for the ship with lots of activities scheduled there. On the ground level of it on deck 5 it’s ringed by the very popular international café, which is a coffee bar that also has things like pastries, desserts, and sandwiches. Food there is free, but the drinks cost extra. That coffee bar can get quite a line in the morning, but specialty coffee and other hot drinks can also be found across the way at the gelato bar and two decks above at the Princess Live Café, neither of which have food, but also don’t get the lines that the café does. Specialty coffee is also sold in the pastry room at the buffet.

International Cafe

Besides the café, and gelato shop there’s also a wine bar bordering the piazza on the ground floor. Guest services, the spa, the internet café (which is just a room with computers rather than an actual café) and a pay-extra Italian eatery are also on that level as is one of the ship’s 3 dining rooms.

entryway into one of the dining rooms

Deck 6 has the other two dining rooms, one at the back and one near the center of the ship. Around the piazza on that level there is a pizza restaurant so you can have pizza at the piazza. The pizza there costs extra, but it is free up on the pool deck. Along with the pizza place, the casino, photo area, and a bar surround the piazza there. The arcade is also on that level.

Vista Lounge

Deck 7 has a seafood bar, the cruise loyalty desk where people can book future cruises onboard, a bar, and shops around the piazza with additional shops on that level as well as a small library, Princess Live theater and café, the Crown Grill and its bar, and at the back a large lounge for activities and events called the Vista Lounge. There is a lot of seating by windows on that level where people like to hang out. The gift shop on this ship actually had some mineral sunscreen rather than just the chemical sort, the first I have seen on a cruise ship.

theater

The main theater is at the front of decks 6 and 7. It does not have balcony seating like a lot of cruise ship theaters do. Also no poles to blocking the view of some seats so most have a pretty good view of the stage.

stairway art

Stairway art varies. Some of it is scenery or animals or other recognizable things, but there are some abstract pictures as well.

fountain show at sunset

Besides the public spaces on decks 5, 6, and 7, there are more public areas on the upper decks. The centerpiece of the Lido deck pool area on deck 16 is a fountain pool that has fountain shows in the evenings with lights and music to go along with the fountains. There’s also quite an extensive buffet on that deck.

adults only retreat

Other outside space includes deck 17’s adults only retreat area with a pool, hot tubs, and deck chairs. Most of the retreat area is free to use, but the chairs in the little cabanas cost extra as does the entire pay-extra sanctuary next to it. There are some additional hot tubs on that deck in other areas. Indoor space at the back of deck 17 houses the fitness center and kid’s clubs for various different ages. There are additional small sun decks with deck chairs on the next two decks up. Most cruise ships have the spa and fitness center near each other, but on this class of Princess ship they are on different decks as well as on opposite ends of the ship.

Lido deck pool area

The main Lido deck has an outdoor movie screen. Other outdoor spaces include mini golf and a small driving range, a pickleball/basketball court, back deck pool & top deck track.

seawalk

A standout feature of this ship class is the seawalk, which is a little walkway on either side of the Lido deck pool area that curves out from the side of the ship and has glass panels in the floor so people can look down and see the lifeboats and the sea as they walk through it. If the ship is at a dock you can look down at the port through the floor on whichever side is by the dock.

thermal suite

The spa offers the usual type of services available on cruise ships with a salon for hair and nails, lots of massage rooms, and other treatment offerings like acupuncture and teeth whitening. Unlike most ships where the thermal suite has multiple rooms of which at least some have windows, on this ship class it is all in one room with no windows. The thermal suite includes 8 heated ceramic chairs, 2 steam rooms, a sauna, 2 little waterbeds, a pool, and 4 showers. One of the ceramic chairs did not work at all and several of the others could have been warmer, but at least the pool was nice and hot. The sauna and steam rooms are enclosed in their own little rooms within the main thermal suite room.

donuts at the buffet

The food was good on this ship. The buffet has several different lines for hot food with separate lines for salad, sandwiches, and other things and a whole different room for pastries in the morning or desserts at lunch and dinner. There are of course multiple bars around the ship as well.

hallway art

Hallways in the cabin areas have scenic photos themed to that deck with nearly all of the ones around a deck being from a similar location like Europe, China, Australia, or Alaska. Stairways also have photos, but not of the theme that the cabin hallways have.

medallions in the lanyard they come with and an amazon waterproof bracelet

Instead of key cards like other lines use, Princess has wearable waterproof medallions. These are especially useful when cruising to warm places because you don’t have to worry about what to do with your key card if you go out into the water at a beach. They come on a long lanyard, but there are other options. Waterproof bracelets are especially useful. You can buy those or other medallion wearables onboard, but amazon has them cheaper. The medallions have all of the functions of a key card, plus they unlock the stateroom door before you get there so you can just walk in. If you have the app it has a stalking feature where you can find your shipmates wherever they are onboard because the ship tracks the medallions. Creepy, but useful. People can turn that off if they don’t want to be found.

self-serve guest laundry

All of the decks that are fully cabins have a self-serve guest laundry near the back of the ship. Machines operate on tokens that can be purchased using the wearable medallion. There is also a vending machine for laundry supplies like detergent.

Royal Princess in Mazatlán

It will be interesting to see if there are any obvious changes the next time we are on this ship after drydock. The best thing they could do is go back to the fully enclosed cigar lounge and non-smoking casino, but that is unlikely to happen. The next best would be to enclose the casino, which would be a major job on this ship since adding doors wouldn’t do it with that open stairway so that probably won’t happen either. Enclosing part of the casino that is not under the open stairway as a smoking area and having the rest non-smoking probably won’t happen either, though that would be a lot easier than enclosing the entire thing. Unless Princess wises up and goes back to non-smoking casinos I would not recommend this ship to anyone who doesn’t like breathing in second-hand smoke. Many people we talked to on both Princess and Holland America when they were first making those changes said they chose those lines mainly because of the non-smoking interior so we are far from the only people unhappy about the change. Even smokers don’t like breathing in secondhand smoke. Have you ever seen anyone hold a cigarette where the smoke blows into their own face?

Posted in Princess, Royal Princess | Tagged cruise, photos, Princess Cruises, Royal Princess, travel | Leave a comment

Train to the End of the World

Posted on April 24, 2026 by LBcruiseshipblogger

train to the end of the world

The Train to the End of the World in Ushuaia, Argentina is a ride in a vintage railcar on the world’s southernmost railway. The ride includes views of Tierra del Fuego National Park and from Ensenada Bay views of the Beagle Channel.

sign at the train station

According to Holland America’s excursion info the railway station is a short bus ride from the pier and the train ride includes scenic splendor on a railway built to haul lumber from the surrounding forests to Ushuaia. The train runs for 45 minutes going over a river and into the Sylvan Valley and into the national park. It passes mountains, forests, rivers, and waterfalls with stops for photos along the way. There is a gift shop for souvenirs at the train station. A bus ride goes to Ensenada Bay for the views of Beagle Channel, named after Charles Darwin’s ship. The excursion info notes say that the railcar has limited space and legroom. It advises wearing warm layered clothing with a waterproof outer layer. Also gloves and a warm hat and scarf.

train depot near Ushuaia

The bus for the Train to the End of the World excursion picked us up right at the dock next to our ship, the Oosterdam. The railway station where the tour starts is outside of town. People can book this tour on their own, but would have to find their own transportation for the 8 kilometers from the dock to the railway station. Last minute tickets at the station are only available if the trains are not fully booked in advance so it is best to pre-book tickets even if you go on your own rather than on the ship’s excursion. Considering the crowd at the station loading onto multiple trains there wasn’t likely any space left for last minute tickets the day our ship was there.

the front of our train

The train station has restrooms and a gift shop as mentioned in the excursion description. The waiting area where people line up to board was quite crowded. It took more than one train to hold all of the excursion guests from our ship, who arrived on 3 busses. On the excursion people were given tickets for a particular train as they disembarked the bus. When the train number matching your ticket is called you line up to board your train – though likely the line will already start forming as soon as the prior train leaves and stretch clear across the building to the far end by the time it’s actually called. Waiting at the end of the line for the prior train won’t put you at the front for your train if there’s already a bunch of people in a separate line for that train.

crowded train car

The trains are pulled by vintage steam engines. Each passenger car has numerous compartments each with its own doorway and 3 seats facing forward and 3 seats facing backward across a narrow aisle from one another. There is not a lot of leg space so anyone with long legs might feel crowded. The seats are not all that wide each either. The 4 people who get the window seats will have a nicer view of the side they are on than the 2 in the middle, though you can see out both sides from either side and from the middle.

wish we had this one

While our train was boarding one pulled up next to it that had way more room for each person. Instead of little compartments for 6 like our train had, that one had a row of little tables on each side of the train with one seat on each side of the table facing each other so everyone in that car would get a window and a whole lot more space per person.

narrow gage train track

The trains run on a narrow gage track. The railway line originally extended from the prison that is now a museum out to what is now Tierra del Fuego National Park. It was used as a work train taking convicts from the prison out to the forest to chop down trees. Wood from those trees was initially used to build the town and then to provide fuel for heating and generating power. Before building the town the convicts had to build their own prison. Since they were in a harsh climate far from anywhere escape would most likely lead to death.

employee in convict uniform at the second train station

Before boarding the train everyone is stopped to pose for a photo with a couple people dressed as convicts, in keeping with the prison train theme which they followed through with at the next stop. People are given headphones which plug into the train for narration along the journey. There are 7 languages to choose from. Narration is mostly on the history of the prison and the train.

another train went by going the other way at the brief stop along the way

Life was harsh for those prisoners. Cells in the prison were small and damp and lacking in sunlight. One of the punishments was not being allowed to go out and work in the forest because the men would rather go out and work where they had a chance to get some sunlight and fresh air than stay in a cold damp tiny cell all day. They were given food at their lunch break, but had nowhere to sit except the ground and no shelter in a climate where it rains or snows about 200 days of the year.

little waterfall near the tracks at the little station stop

Though the rail cars look vintage on the outside it is highly unlikely that the prisoners had the plush seats that are in them now. Also likely they faced even more crowded conditions. They would of course have needed rail cars to haul all of the wood they chopped back to town as well.

train station where the train stops briefly during the ride

The train made a short stop at a station partway through the journey. Though the people working there were dressed as convicts they had a much easier job than the actual convicts of the past. If people want to buy the photos that were taken at boarding that is where to get them.

Macarena waterfall

There is also a trail to a waterfall and viewpoints that overlook the train for taking photos of it as well. The waterfall is named Cascada de la Macarena.

stairway to the waterfall trails

At one point the trail to the waterfall comes to a split where you can choose a path that goes to the top of the falls or one that has a viewpoint partway up. We did not have time enough for both. Even if you can climb all the stairs fast enough to do both it doesn’t mean the people ahead of you will.

train at the short stop along the way

The trail and station at that stop are above the tracks where the train stopped. It’s a good place to get a view of the train, though pretty much impossible to get any photos without other people in them.

stumps and horses

The train passes through forest and grasslands. There are many old stumps of chopped down trees along the way. There were lots of horses, but they aren’t wild. They belong to people living in the area. If any of them wander into the park they are microchipped and any future ventures into the park will bring the owner a fine. Within the national park the forest is protected and by eating the natural vegetation the horses cause damage as they are not native to the area.

scenery on the train ride

The ride is quite scenic. Besides lots of forest there’s mountain and river views.

red fox

Native animals to the area are foxes, otters, and a relative of llamas called guanacos. Beavers are a non-native invasive species. In ecosystems where beavers belong their dam building makes wetland habitats that control flooding and create fire breaks that help fight wildfires, but in this ecosystem where they don’t belong and have no predators to keep them in check their dam building causes flooding in the forest and kills the native trees that aren’t equipped for that sort of environment.

train station at Tierra del Fuego national park

After disembarking the train at the station in the park we walked up a hill to the waiting busses. A little red fox came out of the woods and strolled around the area for a bit showing no fear of the humans.

view at Tierra del Fuego national park

The bus took us down to a beach with a view of Beagle Channel and the Andes Mountains.

southernmost post office

The southernmost post office in the world sits on a pier there, but the pier was old and unsafe so the post office was closed. People could walk along the beach or on a trail paralleling the beach.

wild geese

There were some small geese by the beach.

too many busses

There were more busses than the parking area really had room for along with some cars and vans. Some of them had a hard time getting out of the cluster of vehicles.

beach at the park

This was a good tour for seeing the sights and learning about the area and its history. The train ride was fun, though it would be nicer if there were just 4 people in each compartment so nobody had to sit in the middle seats and if there was a bit more leg room between the seats. Or if they had used one of the cars that had seats in pairs with tables instead of the crowded one we had. Those must have been some sort of premium cars. They were not an option on our tour.

Posted in Holland America, Oosterdam, Ports of Call, Shore Excursions, South and Central America | Tagged Argentina, cruise, photos, Tierra del Fuego, train to the end of the world, travel, Ushuaia | Leave a comment

Noumea Tree to Tree Adventure

Posted on April 21, 2026 by LBcruiseshipblogger

two obstacles in course 1

For our visit to Noumea, New Caledonia on Carnival Splendor we booked an excursion called Tree to Tree Adventure. Our adult daughter Sheri came with us on this cruise. She’s a competitive ninja so this excursion was right up her alley. Her competitions have obstacles similar to those seen on American Ninja Warrior except they are over mats instead of water and not on TV. Hers are mainly in Australia since that’s where she lives. Competitions like that are where the people on the show get their experience before they are ever on the show.

Sheri harnessed up and ready to go

The excursion turned out to have a very small group for a cruise ship excursion with a van of just 10 people. About half an hour’s drive up a mountain brought us to an adventure park called Koghi Parc. All of the courses were built entirely by the couple who run it, which took them about 2 years.

Sheri on course 3

The small group from the ship were the only ones there besides the owners for our 2-hour visit. There was a bench people could leave things on that they couldn’t take on the course, but might want access to between courses and a place to lock up things they brought, but wouldn’t need while there. There was also an outhouse near the starting area.

John ready to start an obstacle in course 2

First we were all given harnesses and leather gloves. It’s important that the gloves not have holes in them since you use a gloved hand to brake at the end of the ziplines. Sheri’s gloves had holes so when she asked about it she was told to throw that pair in the garbage and given a new pair. Stopping yourself on a zipline with a gloved hand used to be standard on all ziplines, but it’s been years since we’ve seen one that didn’t have some sort of self-stopping feature at the end. Most often a giant spring, but we have seen other gizmos. The ziplines at the Tree-to-Tree Adventure are not as long or as steep as a lot of the self-stopping ones we have been to in recent years. Those were all zipline specific places whereas the tree-to-tree adventure is more of an aerial obstacle course with ziplines to transport people from one obstacle to another.

practice course

Once everyone had their gear the owners explained how to use it including how to hook and unhook the carabiners that are used on the safety lines throughout the course and how to use the bit that rides along the top of the ziplines. There are 2 very small practice courses there where everyone has to make sure they can properly use all of the equipment before moving on to the actual courses. People have to be able to clip and unclip the carabiners on each obstacle and to place the pulley bit onto ziplines by themselves. When not on a zipline it hung from a loop on the harness or sometimes fell off, which could mean a smack in the leg.

Sheri on a zipline in course 2

On the zipline courses we have done there was always a pair of people who worked there that did all the clipping and unclipping of equipment and lines, but on this course people did it all themselves. Sheri said ropes courses she has done are also do-it-yourself with clipping and unclipping the equipment so it seemed normal to her.

obstacle on course 1

The cruise ship excursion includes the option of doing 3 of the 4 available courses, or if you don’t want to do a harder course you can repeat the easier ones. Course 1 is the easiest and course 4 the most difficult. Everyone was required to start with either course 1 or 2.

John on a rope obstacle in course 2

We started on course 2. You have to work your way through various obstacles to get to the ziplines, of which there are several on each course. Obstacles are mainly made of ropes, logs, and cables. There are nets to climb through, tunnels to crawl through, and quite a variety of different hanging things where you move from one to another to cross to the next platform. Some of the obstacles are easy, but others take some effort to get through. Everyone else started with course 1 so we had course 2 to ourselves.

platform at the beginning of course 1

Both carabiners are hooked to a cable while on any obstacle or zipline. On the platforms in between there are places to hook and unhook as you work your way around the platform to the next obstacle. The two carabiners are at each end of a connecting line and work as a pair where only one can be opened at a time. You have to hook one to the next cable before you can unhook the other one meaning that you are attached to a safety cable at all times while moving through a course.

Sheri climbs a net on course 4

At the end of each course there is a little device to lock one end without actually attaching it to anything so that you can unlock the other one and leave the course. All 4 courses start and end at various places along the trail leading down into the forest from the top area where they store the equipment and give the instructions with course 1 being the first one you come to on that trail and course 4 the last.

two obstacles on course 2

On course 2 where we went first the obstacles are hard enough to pose a challenge to most people, yet not so difficult that they can’t finish. The owners did say if anyone got stuck somewhere to call for them, but we did not hear anyone do that. Since all obstacles have a cable that people are attached to as they cross if they couldn’t get through it any other way they could always use that cable to help them get across.

cargo net on course 3

After the 3 of us finished course 2 John didn’t want to do any more so Sheri and I moved on to course 3. The most challenging obstacle in that one was a set of 3 cargo nets with space in between and at the end of each it wasn’t just a straight gap to the next one, but also an offset requiring turning around to face the other direction. At least that was the one I thought was the hardest. Probably because my foot slipped through one of the holes in the net and it was kind of hard to get it back out on a swinging net.

the skateboard sort of thing

The most fun and unique obstacle on course 3 was a little rolling platform on two cables that you pulled a rope to bring back to the platform you were on from the one where it ends and then rode it over like a skateboard to the next tree.

obstacle where you crawl from one tunnel into another on course 3

Course 3 was difficult enough that when we finished it I went back and did course 1 rather than moving on to course 4. Sheri being a competitive ninja breezed through all of the obstacles on course 3 and went on to do course 4. That one included a bonus group of even harder obstacles at the end that people could choose to do or not. She breezed through that course as well, followed by 2 young guys who were the only other ones to try course 4. They made it through with great difficulty and a lot of screaming like little girls. She tried to give them advice when she saw them struggling, but they didn’t always listen even though they had seen her pass through all of the obstacles without any trouble.

angled poles on course 1

Course 1 had one obstacle I thought Sheri would really like that involved the cable passing through two rows of angled poles so you had to go back and forth on the two cables at the bottom changing cables at each pole to get around it. Since everyone else had done that course first it was wide open with nobody on it by the time I went there.

Sheri in course 4

Since John had only done one course he asked if Sheri could go do course 1 for one of his so she would get to do all of them. I asked if I could do that one again with her so we both did course 1 together. Since John had 2 courses he hadn’t used they let us do that since it still averaged out to 3 goes on a course for each of us.

net tunnel on course 1

I had a very small water bottle in a pocket that was snapped shut on the leg of my pants, which disappeared during my first round on course 1. My main suspect was a rope net tunnel for having snagged the pocket and let that out so when we got to that obstacle I looked for it on the ground and sure enough it was there. After we finished I asked the guy who ran the course if there was a walkable path out to underneath that obstacle so he asked if I had lost something and then he went out and found it for me.

slats in course 1

There is a minimum height requirement due to spacing on some obstacles as well as a minimum age of 6. There is also a maximum weight of 110 kg which is about 240 pounds. They weighed one big guy in our group before letting him on the course. He must have made it under the 240 pounds since they let him participate. Each course has a maximum height as well, which is shortest on course 1 and gets taller with each course as the numbers rise.

swinging baskets in course 1

This is a very unique excursion and quite fun for anyone who is physically active and in relatively good shape. It’s not for small children since besides not being allowed if they are under 6, they would not be able to reach the safety cable from a lot of the obstacles nor could they step from one bit to another on the ones that are spaced farther apart. It would not be a good choice for anyone who is afraid of heights or who has any mobility challenges or who is not physically active. Closed toed shoes are required, glasses need a strap, and the harness is easier to manage with pants that are longer then where the harness hangs to. Sheri had some issues with her shorts being shorter than where the harness sat on some obstacles. Long pants, capris, or long shorts are a better option than short shorts.

Posted in Carnival, Pacific Ocean & Islands, Ports of Call, Shore Excursions, Splendor | Tagged cruise, travel, photos, Carnival Splendor, New Caledonia, Noumea, Tree to Tree Adventure, ziplines, ropes course | Leave a comment

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