General Itinerary and overview
In recent years we have taken ships several times across the oceans, in part to avoid long distance air travel. We love it. As we approach 70 (though not there for a couple of years), it seemed like now was the time to attempt a more complex travel experience - while we still can. Maybe next time we'll just get on a ship and stay there :-).
We will fly to SFO, then board Cunard's Queen Elizabeth to sail to Sydney. We've done this once before (see blog from 2015). Our South Pacific ports are different this time - three stops in Tahiti instead of Samoa, Tonga, etc. We will see friends in Honolulu as well as Auckland.
We will disembark the QE in Sydney after only 21 days (very short) in order to spend a month in Australia, mostly visiting friends from previous cruises and seeing a bit of Australia from their perspective. We'll also do our own touring of the Blue Mountains and the Great Ocean Road (Uluru will have to wait for another trip). Ultimately we will spend our last week in Western Australia and fly from there to Singapore.
After 4 days in Singapore, we will again board the Queen Elizabeth and sail to Cape Town. This segment of the world cruise is all new ports for us. We're excited to see the western Indian ocean islands this time around. After only 19 days, we will arrive in Cape Town and, once again, disembark.
After several days in the Cape Town area we will fly to Johannesburg and drive to Kruger National Park. This is the beginning of a very new adventure for us. While we have been really close to Africa a couple of different times - through the Strait of Gibraltar and the Suez Canal, we have never had even a port stop there. We will have a rental car for 2 weeks, most of the time in Kruger Park and in a couple of towns just outside. We've been reading lots of blogs on the SANPark website and are are really excited to explore and see as much as possible - and just absorb the sights and sounds.
By the middle of May we will return to Johannesburg to join an Overseas Adventure Travel small group safari - Ultimate Africa. As independent travelers who rarely even take a ship's excursion, much less a bus tour, this will be very different for us. The Ultimate Safari trip goes to Zimbabwe, Zambia and Botswana. After two weeks, we'll return to Johannesburg.
We will return to our same AirBnb lodging in Johannesburg for a couple of nights and to retrieve our extra luggage. After a couple of days we'll fly to Munich - layover in a small town just outside the airport, figuring a couple of days relaxing in Bavaria between two really long flights will be nice.
I've been wanting to do a trip like this since visiting with folks on the QE in 2015. They had a much more complex itinerary after they left the ship in Sydney, but just following their blog has inspired me to do a simpler version.
I hope you'll follow along (maybe in bits and pieces) as we travel.
Stan and Karen
Kahtrav
We will fly to SFO, then board Cunard's Queen Elizabeth to sail to Sydney. We've done this once before (see blog from 2015). Our South Pacific ports are different this time - three stops in Tahiti instead of Samoa, Tonga, etc. We will see friends in Honolulu as well as Auckland.
We will disembark the QE in Sydney after only 21 days (very short) in order to spend a month in Australia, mostly visiting friends from previous cruises and seeing a bit of Australia from their perspective. We'll also do our own touring of the Blue Mountains and the Great Ocean Road (Uluru will have to wait for another trip). Ultimately we will spend our last week in Western Australia and fly from there to Singapore.
After 4 days in Singapore, we will again board the Queen Elizabeth and sail to Cape Town. This segment of the world cruise is all new ports for us. We're excited to see the western Indian ocean islands this time around. After only 19 days, we will arrive in Cape Town and, once again, disembark.
After several days in the Cape Town area we will fly to Johannesburg and drive to Kruger National Park. This is the beginning of a very new adventure for us. While we have been really close to Africa a couple of different times - through the Strait of Gibraltar and the Suez Canal, we have never had even a port stop there. We will have a rental car for 2 weeks, most of the time in Kruger Park and in a couple of towns just outside. We've been reading lots of blogs on the SANPark website and are are really excited to explore and see as much as possible - and just absorb the sights and sounds.
By the middle of May we will return to Johannesburg to join an Overseas Adventure Travel small group safari - Ultimate Africa. As independent travelers who rarely even take a ship's excursion, much less a bus tour, this will be very different for us. The Ultimate Safari trip goes to Zimbabwe, Zambia and Botswana. After two weeks, we'll return to Johannesburg.
We will return to our same AirBnb lodging in Johannesburg for a couple of nights and to retrieve our extra luggage. After a couple of days we'll fly to Munich - layover in a small town just outside the airport, figuring a couple of days relaxing in Bavaria between two really long flights will be nice.
I've been wanting to do a trip like this since visiting with folks on the QE in 2015. They had a much more complex itinerary after they left the ship in Sydney, but just following their blog has inspired me to do a simpler version.
I hope you'll follow along (maybe in bits and pieces) as we travel.
Stan and Karen
Kahtrav
So excited that you will be keeping a blog again. I can't wait to follow along with you.
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ReplyDeleteWe will embark with you in San Francisco but only going as far as Auckland. I can't wait to read about your adventures, especially the safaris!
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