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Epligue: Final Thoughts
Random notes:
Strange detail on ship: In the publc restrooms, they had speakers playing bird calls/jungle noises.
In a sense, the highlights of the trip "bookended" the trip: Two of the biggest highlights (at least for me) was spending a day wandering through Venice and having dinner with Gail and Russel.
My record is unbroken. The only cruise where I didn't come down with a cold was the first one. On that trip, I got Covid instead.
Overall, we thought we preferred the river cruises. There aren't as many ammenities, but you were typically closer to the center of town, and you got to meet people more easily. On the ocean cruise, we would typically dock at an industrial port, and then you needed a bus to get to the city center.
On this cruise, we would occasionaly run into people at dinner we vaguely knew, but that was about it.
It was interesting having a choice of restraurants, but the main restaurant was more than fine. The Chef's table was OK for a change, but we didn't care for the Italian restaurant. The World Cafe was good when we were in a rush (e.g. most breakfasts). In my view, the main restaurant was the equivalent of a fancy restaurant back home, so I couldn't see why people would eat dinner (when we weren't under time pressure) at the World Cafe instead of at the main restaurant.
Overall, we scheduled too many and too long of excursions. A slower pace would have been better.
On the river cruises, soda seemed to be free, but on the ocean cruise, one apparently needed the beverage package for soda, or pay for it directly.
Next time, we should do the extension and flghts on our own. That is, plan to fly out a bit early or fly back a bit late, and arrange for our own hotel. That way, we could pick our own flight times, and the extension would be a lot cheaper.
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