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Jeffrey G. Carlen
Senior Member
Username: Jcarlen
Post Number: 192
Registered: 06-2003
| | Posted on Friday, June 09, 2006 - 10:08 pm: | |
So glad you enjoyed your cruise. We took the same ship/cruise a few years ago and it turned into the "Norwegian Nightmare"! It was too early in the season, the Gulf of Finland was still frozen and we could not go to Tallinn, St. Petersburg and Helsinki. The cruise line knew this before we boarded but waited until the actiual boarding to tell us and offer to let us quit. After our bags were aboard, of course.
Lots of very unhappy passengers including a group of dissidents who badgered the Captain into a meeting and he was pretty hot too. They threatened lawsuits, etc but nothing ever came of it. All in all the whole thing was managed pretty badly by NCL-the missed ports, the stonewalling by the staff, the cruise director on his first run who knew NOTHING about the ports and the generally poor cleanliness of the ship; we will never sail on Norwegian again.
They did add Bergen (which we really liked) and Amsterdam as well as cruise up the Hardangerfjord as substitutes. We thought the Kiel Canal was really neat too. |
Barton Pepper
Senior Member
Username: Barpep
Post Number: 431
Registered: 01-2004
| | Posted on Monday, June 05, 2006 - 04:56 pm: | |
Allan: Thanks for the great report on your cruise. The information was very good and using many paragraph breaks makes it so easy to read! We hope to go through the Panama Canal on our next cruise. I'll always be a sailor at heart! |
ALLAN JESKA
Intermediate Member
Username: Jeskaa1
Post Number: 153
Registered: 06-2003
| | Posted on Friday, June 02, 2006 - 03:59 pm: | |
2006 Cruise Report - Norwegian Dream - 12-Day Baltic Tour
We just returned (25May06)from a great cruise and would like to share it with you.
On May 9th, we flew from Portland, OR, to San Francisco on Horizon Airlines where we transferred to our British Air flight to Heathrow, London , U.K. The flight was 10 hours and was full, but service was great. We used 131,000 frequent flyer miles for the flights. Upon landing, MaryAnn’s bag was AWOL, so that took and hour to institute a search and we then caught the National Express bus an hour late which put us into the terrible London evening traffic. I’m sure we saw every red double-decker bus in London on our way south to Dover. On Old Kent Road in southern London, the bus brake-warning buzzer came on and another two hours were spent until a later Dover-bound bus could pick us up. We arrived at Dover Station just before 10:00PM and walked a couple of block to our B&B.
Margaret, the owner of the B&B, was gracious and we had a good stay and great English breakfast before exploring the nearby center of Dover. MaryAnn’s errant bag showed up about noon and later we caught a cab to the Norwegian Dream and boarded with no problems. Our outside stateroom was nice and roomy and on the promenade deck #7. We were very pleased with it and the room stewards were the best ever.
Our Arizona friends, Craig and Nancy Cummins, had been on the ship since it started out in Houston, so they knew every nook and cranny on the ship and were great at getting us settled in and comfy.
We cruised overnight to the Kiel Canal in Germany. Allan has always wanted to transit the Kiel Canal since grade school days and this is the LARGEST cruise ship able to transit the canal. The Norwegian Dream is able to “flip” its stack and communication towers hydraulically to enable it to clear the many low bridges. It was a daylight, 8-hour passage, and there were hundreds, perhaps thousands, of Germans lining the canal waving to us as we sailed through the farmland.
The next morning we arrived at Warnemunde, Germany, and went ashore and shopped and explored. Allan went ashore after lunch again to ride the local bus system around the town and mail some postcards. This region is the old East Germany and is certainly poorer than in the West. Unemployment varies from 20 to 40% and the birth rate is very low.
The next day found us in Tallin, Estonia, where we grabbed a cab with the Cummins and went into the center of the Old City. MaryAnn was able to find her amber jewelry there and we climbed up to the Upper City and couldn’t find our way back down. We had to retrace our steps… something Allan just hates to do.
Next was a sailing day and on into St. Petersburg, Russia. This city is very busy and interesting, while being dark and dirty. You can’t explore Russia without a visa, unless you do excursions, so off we went to visit Catherine the Great Summer Palace outside the city. We saw most of St, Petersburg on the trip and many western companies were visible… yep McDonald’s too. The palace was located in a complex of palaces and was HUGE. We saw it all and then walked down to a restaurant that featured Russian food and folk dancing. It was a good show and fine meal. In the afternoon we continued on back through town to The Hermitage and quickly sped through Rembrandts, Monets, Rodins, and Picassos, as well as the throne rooms of the Winter Palace of the Czars. You could spend a LOT of time there. Our guide was very good and did the fast MaryAnn tour of the central main treasures of the museum.
The next day we took the afternoon boat trip along the Neva. It was fine, except we had seen much of that portion of the river, as we transited the day before on the bus. We did get close to the Russian warship, Aurora, where the shot was fired that started the Russian Revolution of 1917. The port was very busy and LOTS of steel (coiled, wire, and plate) was being exported, along with huge anodes of aluminum.
Next came Helsinki, Finland, where we took an interesting and cool boat excursion of the city. The town is made up of many islands, so we got to see a lot of it from the water. This town is very clean and the Finns seem hard working and industrious.
Copenhagen, Denmark, was our last country to visit. We had been there before for a NATO Reserve Officers’ Meeting, so we chose to explore the area near the ship’s docks. A nice stroll took us to the Little Mermaid of Hans Christian Anderson fame. Later that evening, a Danish folk group presented a fine presentation of Hans Christian Anderson and his many tales.
Another sea day en route to Dover, and the going got a little rough when we got out into the North Sea. Upon reaching Dover, we caught a cab to the Ferry Station where our National Express bus wished us off to Victoria Station in London. Our Comfort Inn lodging was within two long blocks of the station and very central to everything. We had lunch and wandered back into the station to find “The Tube.” We took the underground/subway to Westminster Station, walked across the Thames on a “London Bridge,” and Allan found out that we could ride the “Millennium Wheel,” so up we went… high over Big Ben, Parliament, and the Thames. The pods on the wheel hold about 20 folks and it was not crowded and a great view.
We just missed the rain en route back to the hotel and Allan went out to find a computer to print our boarding passes. Later we had a fine “pub dinner” nearby. MaryAnn had fish and chips and Allan had steak and ale… good English foods.
The next morning, we hoofed our baggage down to the bus station and boarded our bus to Heathrow Airport. It is a huge affair, with lots of construction all over. Our plane was held up for half and hour due to a weather hold and off we went on another fine flight on British Air. Again, good service and nine hours in the air to Seattle, WA.
Upon clearing customs in Seattle, we had all our bags, but two never made it to Portland. They were delivered to us after midnight. The trip was tiring, but we enjoyed all the places we went and the Norwegian Dream is a fine smaller ship with a great crew and staff. The food was fine and we didn’t gain our usual “cruise weight.”
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