January 2, 2016 -- Looking Forward

Welcome to our blog – a diary of our grand adventure, as we sail on Crystal Cruise’s World Cruise for 2016. We plan to update this blog, whenever Internet connections are possible along the way, to describe what we’re seeing and doing.

We will be aboard Crystal Serenity as she departs on January 25, 2016, round-trip from San Francisco, on what is being called the Grand Pacific Panorama World Cruise. We will be onboard for the entire 102-day journey, returning to San Francisco on May 6th.

We’ve been thinking about and planning for this trip over the past 18 months and can’t believe that the departure date is almost here - now only three weeks away. We have all our travel documents in hand, including cruise tickets and visas; we have all the necessary immunizations; and we’ve signed up for some of the excursions we will experience in the early part of our trip around what’s called the Pacific Rim.

Shown below is an overly simplified depiction of our intended route.

Although not shown in the map above, there are actually 48 port calls scheduled in 19 different countries. Most exciting are some of these highlights – six two-night stays in Sydney, Bali, Singapore, Ho Chi Minh City, Shanghai, and Beijing; four single-night stays in Honolulu, Kuala Lumpur, Hong Kong, and Tokyo; full-cruise passengers (that’s us) will go on a “complimentary” 3-day overland Beijing tour to see the Forbidden City, Temple of Heaven, Tiananmen Square, Great Wall and more (including hotel accommodations, meals, transportation, admissions, etc.).

A trip of this length requires quite a packing job, considering the broad range of temperatures we will experience crossing the equator twice, and going from 30° South latitude, to 60° North, where it will probably be below freezing for our visits in April.  We contracted with Luggage Concierge -- a company recommended by Crystal Cruises -- to transport the biggest part of our luggage from our home to the ship, with a pickup date of January 8th. If all goes according to plan, the luggage should be in our cabin when we board the ship on January 24th. We think they’re shipping the luggage across the country – from Florida to California – by truck in the middle of winter; that’s why the pickup is two weeks before being needed in San Francisco. Crystal will reimburse us for the cost of shipping the luggage (up to $500 per person).

This is our second World Cruise. Back in 2013 we sailed fully around-the world on Holland America Line’s ms Amsterdam and had a wonderful, once-in-a-lifetime, experience that we thought could never be repeated. But then we saw the itinerary of this 2016 Crystal World Cruise and decided to spend more time on the open seas. We look forward to experiencing many new ports.

We’ll add to this blog at least once more before leaving for San Francisco. As for now, we’d better start packing.

Jim & Ginny