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Good grief!! I thought we were going cruise crazy with 3 on the books.....2 of them bucket listers! All I can say is HAVE FUN!! We will!!

I applied for a new passport at the post office, my wife applied for a renewal. Hers was processed quickly and she received it in about 3 weeks. Mine is a different story. They (State Dept.) want the "Long Form" birth certificate with a "raised seal". I'm in the third cycle of this adventure and beginning to lose my patience. My best advice is allow plenty of time! The swamp is in no hurry.....

ANOTHER around the world cruise. My first was compliments of Uncle Sam and took 10 months to complete....8 of those months was Vietnam.

My thoughts, exactly. Once you have been to sea, it gets in your blood. Enjoy the Caribbean! It's a wonderful part of the world.

Wow! They certainly are and will be useful! This is a treasure trove of useful information for us. I commend you for knowing and remembering the names of all the locations! (Until very recently I didn't have a clue where Civitavecchia was) Thank you very much!

That's what I just told my wife.....no way we can do excursions at each of the ports! Not enough energy OR money to do that. Probably get some good R&R on the balcony!

Sorry.....left this thread and saw your post on the other thread with the ports you were going to make. Looks like a busy and fun schedule!

I think I saw a mention of your upcoming Greek Isle cruise....what is the itinerary?

Wow! That was quite a cruise.....those are some BIG names!

Well, I thought we had booked our bucket list cruise a few months ago when my wife said she wanted to see the Hawaiian Islands. So I made it happen for this August. Then......friends enlisted us into a Greek Isles cruise for next June. Is it ok to have two buckets on your list?

Thanks to all for your good advice and input! As our plans started firming up, one in the group had a scheduling conflict and we had to "tweak" our itinerary. We will still be on Explorer, still embark and disembark from Rome, but the date changed about a month to June 5. And it's a 9 day instead of a 10 day cruise. The ports we will visit changed a bit, also. Cruise Itinerary: Civitavecchia (Rome), Italy (05 Jun d1700); Chania, Crete (07 Jun 1100-2000);Mykonos, Greece (08 Jun 0700-1900); Santorini, Greece (09 Jun 0700-1900); Kusadasi (Ephesus), Turkey (10 Jun 0700-1730); Piraeus (Athens), Greece (11 Jun 0600-1800); Naples, Italy (13 Jun 0700-1800); Civitavecchia (Rome), Italy (14 Jun a0500) I don't know much about any of these ports.....the comments about Ephesus, Turkey were noted and I'm glad it is on our itinerary. Anyone who can offer advice on excursions at any of these ports would really be appreciated!!

Hope you have a great time! We will do a birthday/Christmas cruise on Liberty this year and really looking forward to it!

Seasickness is awful....and when the seas are real rough, there is nowhere on the ship to get relief from it. You just gotta be sick.

My first cruise was a shakedown cruise on a brand new warship, USS Biddle (DLG/CG 34)

Thanks for your points and advice! One of our ports will be Naples, so we might try Capri. This cruise will be early May.....wonder what to expect as far as temperature? Our itinerary is: THU, MAY 7 Civitavecchia, Italy (Rome) 5:00PM FRI, MAY 8 Messina, Sicily 10:00AM 6:00PM SAT, MAY 9 Valletta, Malta 7:00AM 7:00PM SUN, MAY 10 At Sea MON, MAY 11 Santorini, Greece 7:00AM 7:00PM TUE, MAY 12 Ephesus, Turkey 7:00AM 7:00PM WED, MAY 13 Mykonos, Greece 7:00AM 7:00PM THU, MAY 14 Athens, Greece 6:00AM 6:00PM FRI, MAY 15 At Sea SAT, MAY 16 Naples, Italy 7:00AM 6:00PM SUN, MAY 17 Civitavecchia, Italy (Rome) 5:00AM

Anyone been on this cruise?

I had this sign made for my wife's upcoming birthday cruise. She intercepted it when it came in the mail so it is currently on our refrigerator until cruise time.....then it will be on our cabin door.

Have you been on this cruise? It leaves and returns to Civitavecchia and we are in with a group that is looking hard at it for May, 2020. I'm just looking for advice, impressions, warnings, anything you have to say about this cruise. Thanks!

This is pretty much the way I see it. One more thought..... If a woman wears a 2 piece swim suit into the MDR, I'm not going to say anything. But my wife will.....to me. Like it's my fault she's there.... ?

I bet if you supplied a bartender with a jar of pickled onions and a nice tip, he would have the gin and vermouth. Have fun on Liberty! We will be there Christmas....

We currently have 2 cruises booked for the rest of this year. The first was my idea....a birthday cruise for her which happens to also be a Christmas cruise. I'm doing all the planning for it and so far everything is working out. She is aware of details but hasn't jumped in. The second.....a bucket list thing.....came about out of the clear blue one day when we were talking about planning a trip to Vegas. She said, "I sure would like to see Hawaii". I told her it looked to me like the best way to see the most of Hawaii was to fly out there and take a cruise ship that went to multiple Islands. (We had planned a Hawaii trip in the past but had to scrub it when the stock market crashed). I had been to Oahu three times thanks to Uncle Sam but all I saw was Pearl Harbor and Oahu. So it went from there and she has been very involved in the details and planning. So.....I guess we have both assumed the lead in a cruise each and so far it is working out good. We are in the early stages of planning a group cruise in 2020 to "Scandinavia or Mediterranean" and it looks like a friend is going to be the planner-organizer-lead person. That's fine with me after seeing the kind of details just me and my wife got into on these cruises this year. Whew!

Great! I'll find my beach out on my balcony! ?

I'm still trying to figure out how to get MY mini fridge stocked with Coronas!

I got into a similar situation applying for my passport. Fortunately there is enough time to get it done. What State Dept. wants is what Texas Bureau of Vital Statistics calls the "Long Form". What I sent them was the "Short Form". The long form contains a lot more info about your birth than the short form is all. I'm playing the game....hope I get it by December.

This is good info! thx