cruising on the Ocean Princess

This is my overview of the ship and our Sea Days. We were on the Ocean Princess, which is one of their smaller ships. It takes about 660 passengers, but there was only about 520 on board this trip. I heard a lot had cancelled because of the change to itinerary and the Japan situation.

sunset from our balcony

Me on the balcony of our cabin.

Our room was smallish, but we did okay. The bathroom was a typical cruise ship bathroom where you could touch all walls without really extending your arms much. We had two twin beds, a small desk, small night stands, a loveseat, and a small end table also very little other floor space. Very "cosy, but we did fine as long as we took turns going around the bed.

The captain and myself at one of the parties

Me with peanuts at the Captain's party. Mom and Holly won a magnum of Champagne and took it to dinner to share with their table mates. First Holly won a day pass to Hong Kong, then she and Mom get this. They really would like to win something that is more of use to one of them. As they already had tickets to Hong Kong Disney and neither is much of a champagne drinker.

They had this cool rum punch at the captain's party. The bartender put a lot of rum in mine, so it was only sipped a little.

At dinner with Holly on the last formal night.

Mostly on the ship we relaxed. Mom and Holly spent some time in the Hot Tub and loads of time in the spa. They probable spent more on treatments than on the cruise itself, but they had such a yummy time. A lot of reading got done also. Watched some moving on the television also. We had gotten their drink passes so we had a lot of hot chocolate, juices, and virgin drinks. Favorite was the raspberry frozen drink. We had a couple of rock and roll times on the ship, but none of us got sea sick. All in all a good experience.

Some of the Staff on board ship. I think they were all party of the cruise directors staff.

One of our tablemates, she and her husband were from Panama. We had a few in depth conversation. She was trying to teach us some spanish.We have more pictures that we bought from the cruise photographer, but need to get home to scan them in.

This was the other couple from our table. We stared on two different tables, but we consoladated into one. So glad we did. Alan and I became quite good mates. They were from England.

Mom, Holly and Myself at the last formal dinner.

From Disneyland to Ship

Holly and Me on train

I am finally able to  put some things up. This was our ride from Disney Hong Kong to the main rail line.

Disney train to main Hong Kong system

Pretty spiffy, huh? It was really nice. Of course our train ride on this one was pretty short then we on a regular train/light rail type system. It still went okay clear up until the time after we got off and were making our way out of the underground station. We did not find lifts and ended up carrying our luggage up a flight of stairs. What a mess, a girl helped Terry, but Holly had to do it all on her own. painful!

Then we walked the .5 miles about to the terminal for the cruise ship. That was hard to find as it was inside the largest shopping mall I had ever seen (at Least 10 times the size of University mall and it was on five levels). It was not marked well and we were frustrated by the time we finally found where we needed to be. But all that aside we made it fine and got upgraded to a balcony room. We did not go out again on this day, we just got our way around ship down. More to come on each port and the ship.

Hong Kong Disney, second day here

Me on the lawn of our hotel

This morning we woke up early, but stayed in the room until almost 11am. The girls talked first, then sat down to read (Holly) and work on the computer (Mom). Her games needed tending. The park did not open until 10:30am anyway. We relaxed on the grounds, before we walked on the sea-walk to disney.

Sitting on the seawall by our hotel

Disney has a really cool walkway from the sea walk up to the park itself.

The entrance to the walkway to disney

Topiaries on the walk way

coming up on the parks entry

These are a few pictures from the start of the day. We took over 150 pictures today and I am tired. I will try to get some more up in the morning if we get up in time. Really a very pretty day. Sunny and nice temps. Holly got more sun than Terry as she forgot sun screen today.

Transcribed by Terry

Airport Yesterday and Hong Kong Wednesday March 30th

This was me as we waited, in the United red carpet room, for our flight to board yesterday. It was nice since we had a 5 hour layover in San Francisco.

We did not take terry's camera today, We will tomorrow. These are off Terry's Iphone. Holly took a few with her camera, but they have not been downloaded yet. She is sleeping right now.

Disney Hong Kong as we were leaving

Lion King play at Disney Hong Kong

Holly as we were leaving tonight

It was a fun day today even though we were a little jet-lagged yet, we think. We did not take a lot of pictures today as it was rainy and overcast, but we all had umbrella's and it was light rain, so we did fine. Tomorrow we hope to have no rain. We plan to take more pictures then. I should be in a lot of them then, but I just did not want to get wet today. They have several of the same rides here as in the states, but some have different twist. Jungle cruise has fire and you get sprayed with a tiny amount of water. The park is smaller and was not very crowded today, so we even got onto the Dumbo and Winnie the Pooh rides. Well, I have a few things to do and then I am off to bed. Hope all is going well for our friends everywhere.


Transcribed by Terry for Ted

Long flight

We made it, though I stayed in the carry-on suit case the whole way. Boo and Terry were in bulkhead seats and we all decided that it was safer for me to stay resting in the suitcase. They had four movies on the plane. We saw Gulliver's Travels (the newer one), The Tourist, The Kings Speech, and True grit. Napped in between the shows. It was an okay flight, but loooooooooooooong! When we finally got through customs and got our bag, then we had to decide on our transportation from the airport to the hotel. We choose a shuttle service and were the first to be dropped off. We pointed out our bags and went in and got checked in. We are on the top floor (9th) with a nice view of the pool and Hong Kong Bay. While Holly's showered I grabbed my suitcase to unpack and realized that it wasn't mine! So, spent awhile tracking down mine and arranging to get it and have them pick up the one I had. I did have to pay another ride charge, but it was our fault, so I can't complain too much. I will be heading to bed soon, as it has been a long day.

It has began

We are sitting in San Francisco airport at United's red carpet lounge waiting for our flight for Hong Kong, which will board in about two hours. 3:30 am came very early this morning, but Boo, Terry, and I all made it to the airport in time for our 6:30 am flight, thanks to Dad driving us. We meet our friends Ed and Lynn at the SFO airport. They were on their way to Hawaii for a week, then Holly and Mom (Terry) got breakfast, as I am stuffed I didn't need to eat. I am hoping to get out of the carry-on bag again, some, on our 14 hour flight to Hong Kong. I will try to blog tonight after we get into our hotel, hopefully we will have internet.
Transcribed by Terry for Ted.