Return to Cruising

 Thursday, April 28 - Cruise Eve

It is the night before our cruise and I'm trying to decide if I should be excited that we are flying to Seattle tomorrow to board a ship...OR...wondering what in the world was I thinking when I booked this trip!

A couple of months ago covid cases were dropping drastically. With cruises requiring passengers to be fully vaccinated, tested, and masked onboard I thought the time was finally right to get back to cruising. Now the night before our cruise I'm reading of drastically relaxed policies onboard and massive covid outbreaks on ships. This past week the mask mandate was also dropped for airline passengers. I will admit my anxiety level is on the rise.

The red tape to get ready for this trip has proven interesting...and often frustrating. Three different apps had to be downloaded onto our phones, each requiring different documentation proving that we are healthy and inoculated. I've about drained the ink from my printer cartridge copying anything and everything that we might possibly have to present at embarkation.

Tomorrow morning we will load up the car and drive the three hours to Minneapolis to catch a 4:00 pm flight to Seattle. The last time we flew anywhere was in November 2019, nearly 2 1/2 years ago! The airlines destroyed my luggage on that flight and the new luggage I bought on a Black Friday special is finally taking its inaugural journey!

We will be sailing on the Holland America Eurodam. At capacity, the ship carries 2,104 passengers but I've heard our cruise will have about 1700 passengers onboard. This is less than capacity, but many more than have been on the ship recently. The week-long cruise to Alaska will be the first of the season following a trip through the Panama Canal to reposition the ship from Florida to its summer homeport of Seattle. 

This will be our third cruise to Alaska, but the first on Holland America. Previous cruises were a 7-day on Princess and a 14-day on Norwegian. The ports are all repeats for us and and in my opinion the stops are all too brief for a trip to Alaska. But that is OK. The goal for this week is to test the waters (no pun intended) to see what it is like to cruise during a pandemic. Alaska seemed like a good choice for our first cruise. The private sale rate we booked under was less than half of what we have paid in the past. Seattle seemed like a better choice than dealing with Canadian rules governing cruises out of Vancouver although the latter is definitely a more scenic route. And lastly, I anticipate many hours of balcony sitting with binoculars in hand and camera ready...the perfect way to enjoy the scenery and wildlife while keeping socially distant at the same time! 

So come along for the ride (or sail) and see how our first cruise back pans out. 

Disclaimer: The dates on these blog posts follow the itinerary but are being uploaded a couple of weeks later to allow time for me to sort and edit my photos.