Cruise November 2007 in the Caribbean

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For the 4th year in a row I’ve been on a Caribbean cruise at the beginning of the cold winter in Denmark.

*) For only 2,850DKR ($560) you can get an inside cabin, and the ticket to Miami will cost you around $787 (3,998 DKR) making a total of just under 7,112DKR ($1,400.)

Just imagine being spoiled on holiday with your friends, in a perfect climate, and being waited upon on a luxury ship!!
This could be YOU in November 2008
For ONLY $560 *)

At this insanely low price you get a whole week's luxury cruise to the 4 exotic countries of the Caribbean. It includes all the great food which is available day and night, swimming pools, saunas, dance, Karaoke and top quality entertainment in the evening - yes - all that the heart desires.

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There are no commitments on this cruise. You can have fun, you can relax, you can experience new things - it’s entirely up to you.

It's a floating hotel with unlimited room service.

You wake up in a new town every day and, since the ship is your hotel, you need only pack your suitcase once!

Read about my experiences in 2007 and, if you want, you can click on 2004, 2005 and 2006 to read about previous years.

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In 2006 only one Dane, Bettina, travelled with me. The year after, she and nine others accompanied me. My plan for 2008 is that we are at least 100 Danes - off to amuse ourselves, to enjoy life and to charge our batteries in preparation for the winter in Denmark.

It won’t be the price which deters you! A week's luxury holiday is less than 10,000 DKR including spending money (around $2,000) What do you think? !!!

The 2007-trip
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Together with my girlfriend, Pernille, and my 80 year old father, I flew to New Orleans some days before we had to be on board. The last time I was in this town was about 25 years ago, so I wanted to see what hurricane ‘Katrina’ had destroyed.

On Saturday six of us, all Danes, went sight-seeing around New Orleans. We’d all visited three times before so knew it well.

I was very touched! The entire French quarter with its typical balconies were all intact. By contrast, it was only some of the larger residential areas which had been totally destroyed - and they were still not yet rebuilt..

It was rather scary to see houses that had moved 15 meters and, in many places, you could see where the water had risen, in a month, all the way up to more than four meters high.

New houses are now built on columns to hopefully avoid another disaster.

In the evening we were in the very poetic and closely packed Bourbon Street in New Orleans, but to our disappointment there were only a few jazz places.

On Sunday we boarded the ‘Norwegian Spirit’.

"Norwegian Spirit"
Length	300 m
Width	35 m
Depth	9 m
Speed	24 knots 13 km/h
Number of passengers	1,966
Crew	882

Every week this ship leaves for the same round trip from New Orleans to Honduras, Guatemala, Mexico and back to New Orleans.

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Pernille and I had a cabin with a balcony. Every evening before dinner we took cocktails with the other 9 Danes on board.

On Monday we sailed south all day in fine weather.

Nobody needs to be bored as there’s lots of entertainment. There are nine bars with different themes, a couple of swimming pools, five jacuzzis on the dæk, Spa & Fitness Centres, hairdressers, video cafe, childcare, an internet cafe, a casino, an auditorium and a library – all distributed throughout the 13 decks.

The food on board is a whole chapter in itself. There are 11 different restaurants and most of the food is included in the price for the stay.

260 You can choose to sit in a beautiful restaurant situated in an enormous room with large windows, in the buffet restaurant on the upper deck where you can choose what you want from about 100 different dishes, or at the outdoor lunch restaurant by the swimming pool.

In spite of the fact that we were so many passengers on board there were seldom queues anywhere.

Consumption on a week:
Beef frozen	5 tons
Chicken	4.5 tons
Pork	2 tons
Lamb	400 kgs
Frozen fish	4.5 tons
Eggs	3000 dozens = 36,000
Yogurt	3500
Cheeses	750 kgs
Ice creams	450 gallon = 2,000 litres
Fresh milk	2,000 gallon = 9,000 litres
Flour	6 tons
Chocolate coating	500 kgs
Cereals for breakfast	7,500 packages
Teas	4,500 pieces
Oil cooking	500 gallon = 2,250 litres
Juice	1,200 litres
Fresh vegetables	9 tons
Fresh fruits	11 tons

Every evening there were different forms of entertainment in the large, 1,000 seat auditorium. There were comedians, conjurers, artists and singers and dancers, and all were very competent performers.

One evening there was a beer party on the upper deck in lovely weather. There were 80 different brands of beer on board, and there was a competition to guess which brand of beer you were drinking – while blindfolded.

We also went to karaoke bars where we sang a couple of songs. Lots of life and happy days ... :-D

The service on board
The service on board was formidable.

496 When we left our cabin for breakfast in the morning it was cleaned and tidied.

In the evening while we were eating, lights were put on, the bedspread was removed, and a piece of chocolate was placed on the pillow.

Our two Philippine cabin staff always greeted us using our names and making a happy remark.

Why go on a cruise?
The reason that holidays like these are so popular is probably that most Americans only have two weeks holiday a year! TWO WEEKS!!! I don’t grasp that people would care to work as hard as that. MOST of their life is filled with work. But that's probably the reason why, when they’re finally on their holidays, it has to be good!

I prefer my own way of working where I do exclusively what's best for me - and where I also help other people to do a lot more of what they want to do – for example, going on a cruise - one of the many holidays I take during the year ...

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Itinery:

	Saturday we visited New Orleans all day.
	We were sailing the whole of Monday .
	On Tuesday we went to Honduras. Here there were lots of activities on offer. We chose an excursion where we could swim with the dolphins. The instructor controlled the dolphins with his gestures and a flute. For example, he had one floating on its back and coming up on its tail fin. The weather was lovely with hot water and soft sand.
	We went to Guatemala on Wednesday. It was dry although it had rained the day before. We drove up through the dense rain forest to an area with lakes and waterfalls. Here we bathed in the cool water.
	On Thursday we were in Belize which was a very friendly town. We anchored about 10 kms from the coast and every 15 minutes a large speedboat provided passengers with a shuttle service to the town. We strolled around and, among other things, we bought a fresh coconut which had been drilled, so we could drink the coconut milk then eat the coconut. My father was with some of the other Danes visiting some Maya-pyramids, so he got a little cultural input. I was in Belize four years ago and it appears that nothing has changed in the meantime.
	On Friday we arrived at the island of Cozumel in Mexico. On my last visit just two years ago, a hurricane had ravaged the island three weeks earlier. EVERYTHING had been destroyed. Not one single building at that time was intact, and the rain forest was completely destroyed and was brown instead of green. In one day the hurricane had sucked out lots of salt water and thrown it over the rain forest, killing all the vegetation. Now, two years later, most was put in order again and the rain forest was fresh and green. It’s fantastic how quickly everything can grow back again. We drove out to a lovely beach where we rented diving equipment and passed half a day in the heat of the sun.
	The last day, Saturday, was a sailing day, before arriving again in New Orleans on Sunday.

Sunday was disembarking day. Quietly we went ashore and took a taxi to a hotel where we dropped off our luggage. We strolled around for some hours in the lovely weather before going to the airport and flying home to Copenhagen.

A fantastic week!

Click at http://picasaweb.google.com/fusima to watch Mehdi & Lisbeth's pictures from the trip.

Do you want to be with us in November 2008?

Click here to read more about it.

For only 2,850 DKR ($560) + 3.998 DKR ($787) for the flight, you can be spoiled for a week on a luxury cruise, in great company.
You deserve to have a good time.

Click here to watch the pictures from 2007