Advance Planning

One of the realities of travel these days it that one is forced to make plans far in advance. If you wait until even some months before booking a trip you will find it either full, or all the good seats, cabins, etc are taken. We have booked cruises two years in advance, before the ship had even been built. Quite a leap of faith. In fact, once that didn’t work out for us. We booked a river cruise with a group, and they were using a brand-new riverboat that was yet to be built. A few months before the cruise, while the ship was in dry dock being fitted out, one of the workmen started a fire. Because the ship wasn’t yet ready, the fire suppression system wasn’t yet operational. The fire spread rapidly and gutted the vessel. It had to be scrapped before it had ever sailed with paying passengers. We got a full refund, of course; and we are going to do the same trip with the same group this fall on a different line.

So, today we made some bookings for the last part of this year. Before we join the group for the river cruise on the Eastern Danube River, from Budapest to Bucharest, we are going to do a land tour on our own and visit Ukraine. This is a country we have long wanted to see; but it’s not really “on the way” to anyplace we’ve been before. We will be traveling with MIR, a travel company based in Seattle that specializes in Eastern Europe, the Baltics, the Balkans, the “Stans”, and Mongolia. They have some truly amazing journies, such as traveling the length of the old Silk Road, even sleeping in yurts in some places. We won’t be doing anything that ambitious. We will fly to the Ukrainian city of Lviv, then on to Kiev, then finishing in Odessa.

We will have a car and driver and/or a guide to show us around. It should be a fascinating look at this country. We’ll then fly to Budapest and spend a week there before the cruise. We are really looking forward to getting to know that city better.

The other trip we began booking today was our Holiday trip. This year we are going someplace cool for a change. Really cool. Cold, even. We are going to cruise with our old friends Seabourn around South America and to Antarctica. The 24-day cruise will leave out of Valparaiso, Chile and sail “around The Horn”, spend 5 days in Antarctic waters, stopping as many places as it can, and then visit South Georgia Island before heading up to Montevideo, Uruguay and finishing in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

We have done this cruise before, many years ago. In fact, it was our first trip with Seabourn. But back then they didn’t sail down to Antarctica at all. We are looking forward to seeing its incredible beauty. Spending the Holidays with Seabourn has become something of a tradition for us. They surpass even their usual outstanding service with extra touches like putting Christmas cookies in the cabins and serving special meals for Christmas and New Year’s Eve. It’s a great way to spend the Holidays, and we’re looking forward to it again this year.