New Zealand is a country that drives on the left side of the road. I've done this several times in the past without incident but it's been quite a few years and the brain doesn't tell the body what to do quite as fast. It was about a 3.5 hour drive and to the best of my knowledge no man or sheep was harmed.
Before we left many people questioned our sanity for wanting to be on a cruise ship for 33 days. Looking back the first thought that comes to mind is "that was the fastest 33 days ever".
While cruising may not be everyone's cup of tea and the length of this one may scare away even some experienced cruisers for us there is so much to love. In addition to the unique places we visited we didn't have a problem with;
Someone fixing our meals and doing the dishes and clean up afterwards. The food was really good and there was plenty of options as to where to eat and what to eat. Ice Cream and cookies readily available doesn't hurt either.
The Noordam crew. We were visiting with one of the entertainers early in the cruise who told us that the crew were well taken care of and happy which was very obvious. The "hellos", "good mornings", "have a good day", etc. were genuine. As we'd leave the dining room after the evening meal Andi would be standing at the door smiling and ready to hand us our after dinner mints.
Two of the friendliest room stewards (August & GeDe) keeping our cabin spotless, making the bed every morning and leaving chocolates and very creative towel animals on the bed or in the room every night. We asked August how many different animals he could make and he proudly told us he could do forty! There was a contest held on board that passengers could vote on the best/most creative towel animals. Out of about 30 entries August was first and GeDe was third!
Our port side balcony offered great views as we sailed in and out of interesting harbors as well as cruising close to shore around Australia into Fiordland National Park and New Zealand.
We'd sleep with the curtains open since the risk of peeping toms was pretty low and be treated to spectacular sunrises and sunsets as well as being able to view more stars than you can imagine.
Entertainment, interesting guest lecturer's, hot tubs, great people watching opportunities and so much more. It's hard to pack it all into 33 days!
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| One of August's Creations-We Had A Different One Every Night |
