Travelers R We

Day 60, Saturday, March 17, 2007, Alexandria, Egypt (Port Closed due to High Winds) Well the Commodore has made the final decision. We will not be able to call in Alexandria, Egypt due to the port being closed. The winds have been, and are still very high and no ships are being allowed in. We have been floating around for about four hours now waiting for the winds to die down but unfortunately, they have not. Our tour today to Cairo was a 12 hour one, with three hours to Cairo, and three hours back with about six hours there. The tours there just would not be possible now that it is 10:00 a.m. The buses apparently have to travel in convoy with guards aboard them. We will now be calling in Athens early—1200 tomorrow. We ... read more

Day 59, Friday, March 16, 2007, In the Suez Canal Latitude: 30 degrees, 12.46 minutes N Longitude: 032 degrees 33.74 minutes E WOW! This transit through the Suez Canal has been incredible! We haven’t left our cabin today as our eyes have been glued on the shoreline! We are leading a convoy of thirty ships through the canal! At around 8:00 pm last night we entered the Gulf of Suez from the Red Sea, through the Straits of Gubal. Throughout the evening we continued North West through the Suez traffic lanes and oil fields. At around 2:00 am we reached the approaches of the canal and waited for the second Northbound Convoy to begin at 6:00 am. The Suez Canal pilots boarded our ship very, very early in the morning to get us into position with ... read more

Day 54 - Sunday, March 11, 2007, Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE) I have been meaning to publish this webcam site for some time now. Unfortunately, your views while we are in port may not be so wonderful because we are in container ship areas most often. You can see our beautiful days at sea though. http://webcam.princess.com/webcam/QM_bridge.jpg We arrived in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, very early in the morning, around 4:30 am, on Sunday. We had moved our clocks back yet another hour so it was fairly easy to be up and awake to watch us sail in. It was a rather quiet and uneventful sail in--most likely because we arrived so very early in the morning. Dubai is another of the QM2’s maiden port calls. Our tour was scheduled for very early in the morning—7:15 ... read more

Days 52, At Sea, Enroute to Dubai, United Arab Emirates Latitude: 15 degrees 48.45 minutes N Longitude: 070 degrees 10.08 minutes E Day 53, At Sea, Enroute to Dubai, United Arab Emirates Latitude: 22 degrees 57.97 minutes N Longitude: 060 degrees 52.60 minutes E Tomorrow when we arrive in Dubai, about 1200 passengers will depart the ship. The nationality breakdown for our ship from Sydney to Dubai was as follows: Australia - 1017 UK - 441 US - 353 Germany - 198 New Zealand - 80 China - 72 Canada - 60 France - 34 Singapore - 22 And many other countries to make a total of 2,421 passengers. It will be interesting to see who joins us at this port! We are looking forward to seeing the old and new of Dubai! Our day begins ... read more

Day 50 - Cochin, India, Day 1 Latitude: 09 degrees 58.11 minutes N Longitude: 076 degrees 15.96 minutes E Last night we turned our clocks back by ½ hour! Yes, this does seem strange doesn’t it? We are now 11 1/2 hours (ahead) away from you in CST. It is about 11:00 in the morning and we have slowed down not to a snail’s pace as we come into Cochin or Kochi. In the last two days we have seen the water change from its deep purple to a beautiful emerald green and now to a pond color green as we approach land in India. As we were slowing down, we could see many fishing vessels on the horizon, both large and small. Some even got very close, too close to the ship! One small vessel ... read more

Days 48, At Sea, Enroute to Cochin, India Latitude: 06 degrees 8.61 minutes N Longitude: 95 degrees 12.27 minutes E Day 49, At Sea, Enroute to Cochin, India Latitude: 05 degrees 55.54 minutes N Longitude: 85 degrees 02.44 minutes E We entered into the Indian Ocean after traveling through the Straits of Malacca, the stretch of water that separates Malaysia from the Indonesian Island of Sumatera, when we departed Malaysia. The Indian Ocean is the third-largest body of water in the world, covering about 20% of the Earth’s water surface. It is bounded on the north by southern Asia; on the west by the Arabian Peninsula and Africa; on the east by the Malay Peninsula, the Sunda Islands and Australia; and on the south by the Southern Ocean. We use these sea days to keep up ... read more

Day 47 - Kuala Lumpur Latitude: 2 degrees 59.22 minutes N Longitude: 101 degrees 20.13 minutes E Since the QM2 had to dock in one of Port Kelang’s cargo areas, we had very little time to visit the sites of Kuala Lumpur. The bright sunshine, intense heat, and high humidity (hotter and even more humid than Singapore!) encouraged us to stay inside and explore the tremendous 5 story mall at the base of the Petronas Twin Towers (the world’s tallest freestanding twin towers.) We enjoyed lunch and looking through the shops before boarding our shuttle for the hour and 45 minute trip back to the ship for an early departure of 5:00 pm. ... read more

Day 45, Disneyland, Hong Kong, China The gigantic new Hong Kong International Airport is on Lantau Island, just west of Hong Kong Island. We had several hours before our evening flight to Singapore and considered shopping in the HUNDREDS of stores in the terminal, but the Island is also home to Hong Kong Disneyland, so with a unanimous vote we headed there. After two quick train rides, we entered the Asian home of Mickey and Minnie and were pleased to see all the familiar surroundings, but surprised that it wasn’t crowded with people. We easily made our way to Matt’s favorite ride and helped defeat the evil Emperor Zurg, and since there wasn’t a line when we exited, we went right back in and rode Buzz Lightyear again!!! The park is much, much smaller than ours ... read more