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Post by Hobson on May 15, 2023 9:23:19 GMT -5
As I mentioned, Mr. H and I just completed our first cruise and first air travel since before the pandemic. We had not been farther than Scottsdale since 2019. This was also our first ever cruise with Oceania. So it was not only a test of how we feel about airports and planes and cruise ships post-pandemic, but whether Oceania is a good fit for us. It was a 685 passenger ship with only abut 560 passengers on board. We liked it enough to book a cruise around Iceland for next year. Did that while we were on board with a very small refundable deposit.
We chose a 7 day trip along the California coast for this test. Started and ended in San Pedro (L.A). Then had to go to Ensenada, Mexico due to federal requirements for ships that are not U.S. flagged. Supposed to go to Monterey, CA, but the city banned cruise ships a couple of months ago. So we only stopped in San Francisco and Santa Barbara. SF used to be a great place to visit years ago. The ship stayed docked there overnight. The first day we took a bus over to Pier 39. Lots of shops and restaurants and we saw about 100 sea lions. The next day we got off the bus at the Ferry Terminal and walked back after browsing shops and looking at the original terminal building. In Santa Barbara we walked around the pier and walked to downtown.
We took Lyft from LAX to the Crowne Plaza in San Pedro. Not a great hotel, but convenient and they have a shuttle to the cruise terminal for a nominal fee. Had great pizza in Little Italy at Niko's. We took Lyft to the Four Points (Sheraton) LAX, which was very nice and is well set up for people who are awaiting transportation or waiting to check into the hotel. Free hotel shuttle to the airport. Dinner that night was good burgers in the hotel restaurant.
We had cruised 12 times before this. Nine of those were on Holland America. It has changed and we're done with that line. One cruise on Viking and we'll use them again. Oceania turned out to be a good fit. Good music and shows. Enough activities for days at sea. A fitness track that wasn't as boring as we expected. We used treadmills one day when it was too windy for the track. Excellent specialty restaurants and the regular restaurant was also good. We only had one dinner in the cafeteria and the food was good. Breakfasts there were fine. The one breakfast that we had in the regular restaurant did not meet expectations. Eggs Benedict that had everything wrong except for perfectly cooked eggs.
Our flights were on time. I was pleasantly surprised that the TSA agents at LAX treated us like people. Not true before the pandemic. And the TSA pre-check had a very short line, while the regular line snaked around several lanes. It was not a surprise that we had a good experience with TSA in Tucson. Very few people wore masks anywhere. We only wore ours while on the planes. We got back 3 days ago and are still both healthy.
Before this trip I had booked a hotel in San Diego for a few nights for an August escape from the heat. I'm now ready to book air, as we are comfortable with proceeding. Also going to find a new travel agent and try to book another cruise for later this year. We had an agent that retired during the pandemic, got a new one at the same agency who then retired before our cruise, then another one who ignored us until the day before we left when something popped up on her computer. So time to try another agency. I know that lots of people don't bother with a travel agent these days, but a good agent can offer deals and take some of the hassle out of planning.
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Post by majorminor on May 15, 2023 9:58:21 GMT -5
Welcome home!
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Post by Village Idiot on May 15, 2023 10:13:36 GMT -5
It's great to travel, isn't it?
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Post by drlj on May 15, 2023 10:14:37 GMT -5
Our Viking Alaska cruise was cancelled because of covid. We had it planned for 2 years, but we got a refund 24 hours after cancellation and remodeled our bathroom. We call it The Alaska Shower. They also gave us credit toward another cruise so last October we did a 7 day New Orleans to Memphis cruise on the Mississippi River, which was in the middle of historic low water levels. We made it, though, had a great time, had a great room, wonderful food and sightseeing, and cool music on board, so it all worked out ok. We are thinking about one of the Great Lakes cruises now.
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Post by Marshall on May 15, 2023 10:33:26 GMT -5
So, they have horses on board?
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Post by Cosmic Wonder on May 15, 2023 10:51:25 GMT -5
That’s great Renee. Your experience pretty much mirrors our recent trip to Kauai. TSA pre check was a breeze, planes seem mostly full but safe. Pretty much nobody masking. Nita has cruise booked this Sept with crafting gal pals from New York to Nova Scotia and back. We are talking about doing a European river cruise in two years. We’ll see.
Mike
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Post by Rob Hanesworth on May 15, 2023 11:18:43 GMT -5
Our only two cruises were on Holland America, 2017 and 2019. We enjoyed them. How have they degraded?
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Post by Hobson on May 15, 2023 13:26:26 GMT -5
Holland America no longer has good entertainment. Also very little to do on sea days. Food not as good as it was. Our last cruise with them was in February 2019. Bigger ships now. They sold the Prinsendam, our favorite. They started charging for all kinds of things that used to be included. Still a better overall price than Oceania or Viking, depending on your needs and wants. So many options for cruise lines and HAL is obviously good for a lot of people.
We had an Alaska cruise booked with Oceania for 2020, It got cancelled, of course.
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Dub
Administrator
I'm gettin' so the past is the only thing I can remember.
Posts: 19,910
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Post by Dub on May 15, 2023 13:30:00 GMT -5
…HAL is obviously good for a lot of people. HAL wasn’t great for Dave.
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Post by billhammond on May 15, 2023 13:37:32 GMT -5
…HAL is obviously good for a lot of people. HAL wasn’t great for Dave. Dub -- Trivia question: Why were those letters used for the HAL computer?
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Post by Hobson on May 15, 2023 13:41:22 GMT -5
I know the answer to the trivia question, but I'll wait.
I learned something about the Soundhole on this trip. Mr. H set up VPN on our phones and laptop. The Soundhole was the only site that I tried that denied access with VPN. Not a complaint. It keeps out the riff-raff.
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Dub
Administrator
I'm gettin' so the past is the only thing I can remember.
Posts: 19,910
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Post by Dub on May 15, 2023 14:19:27 GMT -5
HAL wasn’t great for Dave. Dub -- Trivia question: Why were those letters used for the HAL computer? The letters are one character away from IBM.
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Post by John B on May 15, 2023 14:21:28 GMT -5
And what a character HAL was!
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Dub
Administrator
I'm gettin' so the past is the only thing I can remember.
Posts: 19,910
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Post by Dub on May 15, 2023 14:23:33 GMT -5
I know the answer to the trivia question, but I'll wait. I learned something about the Soundhole on this trip. Mr. H set up VPN on our phones and laptop. The Soundhole was the only site that I tried that denied access with VPN. Not a complaint. It keeps out the riff-raff. I think that happens only when the server is in certain countries. I access the SoundHole through NordVPN fairly often. You can often choose which server you’d like to use.
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Post by billhammond on May 15, 2023 14:33:46 GMT -5
Dub -- Trivia question: Why were those letters used for the HAL computer? The letters are one character away from IBM. Took you a long time to Google that!
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Post by Hobson on May 15, 2023 15:41:47 GMT -5
I know the answer to the trivia question, but I'll wait. I learned something about the Soundhole on this trip. Mr. H set up VPN on our phones and laptop. The Soundhole was the only site that I tried that denied access with VPN. Not a complaint. It keeps out the riff-raff. I think that happens only when the server is in certain countries. I access the SoundHole through NordVPN fairly often. You can often choose which server you’d like to use. Nope. We selected Los Angeles. We used Mozilla VPN. The error message was something about an IP address that begins with 10.something. I don't remember any digits beyond the 10.
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Post by Marty on May 15, 2023 18:01:53 GMT -5
I grew up in Long Beach and spent time at the Navy Base on Terminal Island. During WWII there were more gun emplacements around that area than there were around San Diego or Pearl Harbor put together. Terminal was not only a repair station but it was a huge weapons station. I never saw it in the 40s but Dad showed me how to spot the old gun emplacements, it was amazing.
I think you meant Pier 73 in San Pedro Renee, we just called it Ports O Call back in the 50s-60s. But Yes lots of shops and decent seafood places. And sea lions.
I don't think we'll be taking any cruises but a trip back to Key West would be just fine, we loved it.
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Post by jdd2 on May 15, 2023 18:32:20 GMT -5
When/where I started uni there were protests against Illiac. Today everyone has more 'computer' in their cell phones.
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Post by Marshall on May 15, 2023 19:42:10 GMT -5
Dub -- Trivia question: Why were those letters used for the HAL computer? The letters are one character away from IBM. Yup, and HAL was born in the Center for Advance Computation at U of Illinois in Urbana, IL.
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Post by billhammond on May 15, 2023 21:36:42 GMT -5
Yup, and HAL was born in the Center for Advanced Computation at U of Illinois in Urbana, Ill. What do you mean? The center was a consultant for the film? They built the film's HAL hardware? What? (Please.)
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