Pre-cruise obsession

Obsession

I’ve been thinking about obsession, specifically my fixation—and that of my fellow CruiseCritic members—on our upcoming world cruise. The dictionary defines obsession as (this worries me just a tiny bit) “a persistent disturbing [!] preoccupation with an often unreasonable idea or feeling.” Another dictionary defines it thus: “the act of an evil spirit [!] in possessing or ruling a person or such a persistent idea, desire, emotion that cannot be gotten rid of by reasoning.”

Hmmhhh. So maybe I’d rather use a different word to describe my fixation, fascination, passion, fancy, craze, delusion, mania, infatuation, fixed idea, compulsion, fetish, bee in one's bonnet, hang-up, or—neurosis. I’ll have to think about that.

I was reading on a blog that there might be a martini demonstration. Randy & I will have to be front and center for THAT!

We are now down to 30 days until we leave our house, about (I don’t have a countdown for this which means I actually have to subtract!) eight days before we fly to Oz. I think it’s eight days, we lose a day so that makes the subtraction more difficult. Anyway we leave the US on May 8th, 2012 and arrive in SYD on May 10th.

I am shamelessly cribbing from Joanne’s blog:

"Just a reminder if you are reading this blog please click on the follow button at the top of the page or the subscribe to button at the bottom of the page.... the more the merrier ....this will be my incentive to be very diligent to keep the blogs going on a regular basis... I work better under pressure....

"I have added a flag counter on the blog site too... thought it would be exciting to see where everyone who reads this comes from...

"For those who want to be alerted every time a new post is made , click in follow by email  at the right side of the page & add your email address....this sends you and email when and only when I post."

I get SO many great ideas from others’ blogs, like this one about how to handle a looooong cruise:

1. To be successful, it requires effort and commitment. If you are traveling with a partner or spouse, make sure you both have the same level of commitment. Compromise might work for a 7-day cruise, but not for over 3 months.
2. Do breakfasts in the dining room. The omelets are to die for.
3. Avoid the laundry. It’s a hotbed of unfounded rumour and discontent!
4. Talk to the crew as equals, and get to know them. They are lovely people, and over time you will hear some amazing stories.
5. Try to make friends with people who are different to your friends back home. This will enrich your experience.
6. Take some tours from the ship where they are the best option, but do your own thing sometimes too. Do your homework before you leave so you know what you want to see and do.
7. Chill. You’re on a cruise ship, and at sea. Shit will happen, as it would in the same period of time at home. And once you start moaning, it’s a downhill spiral…
8. And if you do need to complain about something, do it with a smile and you may well find you get a better result.

Packing? I don’t need no stinking packing!

At least not yet. But I’m thinking about it. Boy am I thinking about it!

There is a great website, the http://www.independenttraveler.com/, that has all kinds of packing advice. Which I would take except that Randy, my husband, is a fabulous packer. My favorite story about how great a packer he is: We took our (then teen-aged) children on an airplane trip to Hong Kong (in the summer there) and Australia  and New Zealand (winter) with a stop in Honolulu. Hong Kong was great, it was warm, we didn’t need a lot of clothes but we did buy a few things. Did I mention we only had carry-on bags? One carry-on each and my daughter and I had a purse each. But we also had makeup and “stuff” that teen-aged girls (and their mothers) have to have.

When we got to New Zealand my daughter fell in love with some fleece lined, knee-high, leather boots. I said no initially because I could not believe that they would fit in her suitcase. Did I mention it was a carry-on?

Well, Randy managed to fit those two boots in. As he said, “Piece of cake!”

So I have my very own packer. 

But I still read the packing advice and, as someone who has always before this trip only had carry-on sized bags—in fact, we don’t even own a bigger bag than that. We don’t even own more than two carry-ons—I am seriously thinking about how we are going to pack for 104 days. Maybe more like 124 days as we are now considering staying in Australia a few more weeks to go on a trip with Outback Spirit, the Cape York Wilderness Adventure. 

Our transportation, a 4WD Mercedes Benz

After dinner in the campground

Before getting the tents up...

...and after getting the tents up!

We went with them once before, a somewhat adventurous tour in 2008, 19 days of camping (12 nights) and hotels (7 nights) from Darwin to Alice via Kimberly, Broome, the Bungle Bungles, and the Tanami Desert. This year’s  tour is a bit longer as it goes to the Mitchell Plateau in addition, but is otherwise the same one we did in ‘08.

We tried to show the Aussies how to make 'SMores

Our home

So we know the tour company well, we just have to decide if we want to tack on another  12 days to our 104 days (plus the week before the cruise). We did spend some time in Daintree a few years back right after one of the biggest Wets in a while. But we have always wanted to see the Cape York area. It seems to be the right time of year for it, I just have to convince Randy that two more weeks would be worth it!

Still months and months away

But planning is more than half the fun!

I should put in some of the details here: We are departing Sydney (SYD) on 16 May 2012 on the Sun Princess but we will leave the US before that First Class (!) on United Airlines to SYD.

Among other things, our 50th anniversary is right before we get on the ship so I want to find something to do on the 12, 13, 14 of May. Something spectacular and really romantic. Not to mention wanting to give Randy something to commemorate our spending 50 years together! Guys are NOT easy to buy for, however, so I will have to think about this for the next few months.

I also have to think about getting our reservations back home from SYD!

It may even be time to start some of our checklists. The one thing I'm sort of worried about is visas. We need visas for many, many countries. So I have to look into how to do that in a timely manner.