We had an invite today to the Cruise Critic meet and greet meeting at 9.00am this morning. Unfortunately, with all the recent time changes, it was 8.30 before we got up so we decided to give it a miss. We managed to get about an hours sun before our appointment on the North Star ride. This looks like fun. The group of us in the capsule this time were about 10 and all but 2 people were friendly and chatty during the journey. Some were a little scared when the arm went out over the sea. It was nice to get a look down on the balconies of the suites and see how the upper class other half were living on board. All in all, a great experience that we shall try to do again before ... read more

As Spectrum of the Seas is a brand new ship, this is it´s first visit to Muscat. When it arrived, the port authority had laid on a special presentation for the captain to welcome him and his ship. Unfortunately, they would not release the ship for the passengers to leave until this was finished, so we were half an hour later leaving the ship than anticipated. Muscat is not really a passenger port, it is more commercial. So they lay on buses and everyone has to be transported to the port entrance. At 8.00am they started giving out numbers for the port buses. When we got there at 8.30am they were already up to number 13. This gave us plenty of time to catch breakfast before our number was called for the bus out of the ... read more

We had a good first night on the ship. It was just strange not to have it rocking as it was still docked in Dubai. After a leisurely breakfast, we had a wander around the ship to familiarize ourselves and get our bearings. This is one really huge ship. It looks like most of the restaurants are at the back and our cabin is nearer the front. Think we may be doing a lot of walking in the next 14 days. We also stopped off for a short presentation on Muscat, Oman in preparation for our visit tomorrow. On walking around we made mental notes of some of the things that we wanted to do or see during our voyage. At 1.30pm we had the muster safety drill. This was done by way of a video. ... read more

We decided on an adhoc day for today, as we were waning slightly from always running around. We walked the couple of kilometres from our hotel along the creek to the souks. It was interesting seeing all the different dinner boats parked up. Later along the creek were all the shipping dhows. These are wooden boats used to ship supplies to places like India. They will ship everything by this method. We saw air conditioning units, fridges and freezers, tyres, cans on juice and fabric on our short walk past their boats. On our last visit to the souks we were a bit overwhelmed by people always trying to sell us items. It was no different today. A very hard sell which is off putting but bartering paradise if you have the required techniques. We did ... read more

First stop today is to the Dubai Frame. Again, the metro does not go too near, so we had a ten minute walk. George needed to use the bathroom and we learnt from our visit to the coffee shop on Saturday that most of them do not provide this facility. We did pass a mosque though and they were more than happy to help. Another truly unusual experience. The Dubai frame was built between old Dubai and new Dubai and inside has areas to show off the past and the future. A very worthwhile place to visit. Once at the top, a section of the floor is made of glass, so you can see back down to ground level. We got strict instructions though not to sit or lie on it. Walking across it is permitted. ... read more