Diamond Jubilee of Travel   In 2007/7, I declared a personal Golden Jubilee of Travel on the fiftieth anniversary of my first international trip, when I sailed at the end of June 1957 to France, my first destination outside the US. That experience had been described in Travel Trilogy III (2004/24), and next month that time span will have risen from 50 to 56 years ago.

But that Golden Jubilee was accurate only for international travel. My first major trip ever was a domestic US one also described earlier, in Travel Trilogy I (2004/22), when, at the end of March to early April 1953, my family took a car trip, pre-Interstate on traditional roads, from New York to Chattanooga, exciting for all of us, but seminal for me. I now realize that just a couple of months ago that 1953 trip reached its 60th anniversary, which means that actually, considering all travel that influenced my world outlook and education, I have now celebrated my Diamond Jubilee of Travel.

Fifty Voyages [Updated]   Referring again to that first sailing in 1957, I also mentioned last year that the sailing to Greenland was my fiftieth voyage, and it would seem à propos to elaborate on that. After the first few years of sea travel, I calculated back to the beginning and started maintaining a handwritten log of all overnight voyages, which I've since regularly kept up to date. It was when I thought it was time to type up that log that I decided it could also make a noteworthy posting to summarize "sail" travel. I never kept a log of "rail" trips, but train travel was so frequent in Europe and the US (also elsewhere), even overnight trips, that a log was impractical. The same can be said of car ("trail") travel, but I'll have a summary in the next posting of other travel modes. I now note an unintended result of publishing this list of voyages. Since so many trips over the years included a sea voyage to at least a small part, it in some ways this list can serve as a unintended summary of lifetime travel. It has also allowed me to make some tallies that I had been unaware of.

What's a voyage? The language element coming in here is to determine what "voyage" means, since it's used in English differently from its original use in French. To explain what I mean, I'll use a different example first. When a language has a perfectly good word for a concept, such as "hat", if it borrows the corresponding word from another language, that borrowing will almost always take on, not exactly the same meaning, but a specialized meaning. English has borrowed both "sombrero" from Spanish and "châpeau" from French, and both those words have specialized meanings in English. A sombrero in Spanish is ANY kind of hat (just as "hat" is in English), but in English, a sombrero is limited in meaning to referring to a Mexican, broad-brimmed, traditional, men's hat. Similarly with châpeau, in French it's any hat, but in English it's a delicate ladies' hat, of the Easter bonnet type.

Now, English has a perfectly good word, "trip". The French word for trip is voyage (vwa.YAZH), and it's the general word, so you might have a voyage en train for a train trip, for example. But when the word entered English, in the pronunciation VOY.ij, the meaning was starkly limited to very specifically a trip by sea, that is, a voyage by sea. In English, if someone is about to drive off on a car, train, plane, or bus trip, it's highly unlikely that you'd say "bon voyage" or send a bon voyage card, although you would in French. English has even adopted "bon voyage" as a phrase, but it is in turn limited to ship sailings. In this last case, "voyage" alters its pronunciation away from VOY.ij to voy.AZH, in a lame effort to imitate French vwa.YAZH.

Similarly, a maiden voyage is the first sailing of a ship, not anything else, and a voyager is a person on a sea voyage. But this brings us to a minor exception to the above assertion. Both "voyage" and "voyager" can also refer to space travel, as in "space voyage" or "voyage to the moon", but that exception is not likely to affect anyone's upcoming travel plans.

How does it come to fifty? I have had shipboard discussions in recent years about my almost reaching, and then finally reaching, fifty voyages, and on a couple of occasions have gotten disparaging looks from people who consider themselves established members of the "krewz" set. I suspect said people wouldn't know the difference between an ocean liner and a cruise ship or just what constitutes a passenger ship, yet feel righteous enough to disparage the inclusion of coastal shipping in the form of ferries.

I'll leave those people on their self-satisfied little planet, and explain my view of ocean voyages. It is a traditional one. We have to realize that in the mid-20C there was a sea change (pun intended) in passenger ships, even while cargo continued on as strongly as ever. For centuries, water travel was fundamental, across oceans, up rivers, along coasts. When rail and better roads entered the picture, coastal and river shipping was the first to decline and disappear. You can no longer take a scheduled overnight coastal ship from New York to Boston as you once could, nor a scheduled overnight river steamer up the Hudson to Albany. Mark Twain's (regularly scheduled) Mississippi River steamboats are also a thing of the past. Train and car routes usurped all those short voyages. It happened everywhere. Once the only way to get from Sydney to Brisbane was by ocean steamer, then they built the rail lines and highways . . .

But major routes survived longer than the coastal routes, that is, up until the mid-20C. I like to use as a model the situation in Somerset Maugham's "Rain", as we discussed it in 2009/6. It was 1921 and a network of ship routes connected ports everywhere, on the mainland and to and from every island. Visualize it as a spider web of routes. The five characters, the Macphails, the Davidsons, and Sadie Thompson, are on a passenger ship out of San Francisco, via Honolulu, and have just sailed into Pago Pago (PANG.go PANG.go) on American Samoa. They are planning on changing ships there to go to Apia, on Samoa, but an outbreak of measles on the connecting ship prevents them from leaving for two weeks. The discussion includes trying to decide about going on to Sydney or back to San Francisco. What a different way to travel, both as to the many possibilities of sea connections and as to the laid-back attitude toward time.

Then, as rail and roads killed coastal and river shipping, air travel killed overseas passenger travel in the mid-20C. That network of sea lanes, or shipping lanes, still exists, but, for cargo vessels primarily. This map shows commercial shipping density (Map by Grolltech based on T Hengl) on the world's oceans. The continents are in black, and, while shipping favors the northern hemisphere, where the bulk of the population lies, it not only reaches south but also shows the spider web of sea lanes in the Pacific today, as in the time of "Rain", albeit primarily for cargo.

So what have we today? Regularly scheduled passenger sea travel on set routes (line voyages) is limited today to transatlantic crossings and some regular weekly sailings that cruise lines do, such as round trips between New York and the Bahamas. Otherwise, in place of these line voyages, we have today mostly meandering cruises. It's like with cars. Does anyone still "go for a ride" in a car or "take a ride into the country"? Probably quite rarely, since daily car trips have become ways to get to work and shopping. Yet it's the reverse with ships. In their heyday, they were for transportation, and in addition, once enjoyed the "ride". Now few take ships for transportation (some of us still, do, especially transatlantic), and most take sea voyages primarily for the ride, in the form of cruises. Some even treat transatlantic voyages as cruises.

But what about those coastal voyages? Some still exist! However, they've had to adapt to commercial need. Almost all short, one-night or two-night coastal voyages have adapted to the market by becoming car ferries, with overnight cabins and complete amenities. You can enjoy this sort of overnight trip between Nova Scotia and Newfoundland, Melbourne and Tasmania, Stockholm and Helsinki, and many more. And I have.

We mentioned regularly scheduled line voyages. Any passenger or cargo system of travel or transportation over agreed routes is a line, and the company running it is also called a line, such as the Cunard Line. The ships running line routes are called liners (so THAT'S where that word comes from!). Ocean liners are by definition built more solidly, with thicker hulls, to withstand the rigors of crossings. They have always had amenities, although in competition with cruise ships, the amenities have increased. A cruise ship on the other hand does not have the strength of an ocean liner, particularly in the hull, but is conversely built to emphasize resort-like amenities. The amenities most visible from the outside are myriad balconies for cabins. With the shift from liners to cruise ships, the main area of activity has also moved from the North Atlantic to the Caribbean.

By definition, a passenger ship is a merchant ship meant to carry passengers. It does not include cargo ships such as freighters, which traditionally were allowed to carry twelve passengers. Ocean liners have traditionally also carried freight, including mail and packages, but that has been reduced if not eliminated, again in competition with cruise ships, which carry no freight.

The definition of passenger ships includes (1) liners, (2)cruise ships, and (3) (coastal) ferries, for short sea trips. These exist for day trips, which I do not record or count in my totals, and for overnight trips, which I most certainly do. Within my total of 50 voyages, I also include two river cruises, on the Columbia and on the Mosel/Moselle, and one canal cruise, on the Göta Kanal.

Fifty Voyages: 1957-2012   The overnight voyages I've taken are numbered below, and listed chronologically by year. The name of the ship follows (the names of some ferries are not known), with the name of the line, if appropriate. Finally comes the route designation and its end points or major stops, and finally commentary.

I've recently commented on a major shift of personal outlook over the years. I've always liked the flashy, dress-up aspects of upscale voyages, particularly on Cunard and its reserved seating for dinner. I bought my tuxedo specially for these occasions. But for me, even on Cunard the dress-up and fuss has become less important, well below the enjoyment of simply being at sea on a nice, quiet, restful voyage, enjoying the sea air and watching the ocean. What cruises and even some liner voyages add to that experience is to me now just razzmatazz and razzle-dazzle that makes a voyage into an oceangoing resort experience. Remove the cheap tinsel from that kind of a trip and you'll find below it the fun sea voyage. I've reviewed my list, and learned quite a bit while doing so. I've decided I have three favorite voyages that stand out in my mind, which I'll describe as we reach them in sequence. I was amazed to realize that the three trips all took place in the same year. They are each unique in their own way, and, as it turns out, none of them is a cruise, or even an ocean liner voyage, although I'll never lose my enjoyment of the elegance of those ships. One of them is even a coastal voyage on a ferry. My one trip on a freighter is described as a unique event of particular interest.

On the eastbound voyage, after Cherbourg the ship went on to Southampton, as was common in those days. It had been launched in 1938 as a sister ship to the Queen Mary, but saw first use as a troopship in WWII. Only in 1946 did it become a passenger liner. It was decommissioned in 1968 and burned in the 1970's.

Throughout Junior High School I had always been "travel-struck" by the fact that my friend Sol and his parents regularly sailed to Europe every summer, since his father was an importer-exporter and they had family there. Sol and I both went on to Brooklyn Tech, and when we had to choose a language, since their family background was German, that's why I also chose German as my language. In 1957, Sol wanted to strike off on his own without his parents after arrival, but they insisted he do so not alone, but with at least one friend. Other friends considered going with us, but I was the only one who ended up going with Sol. In this way, Sol and his folks were not only (German) language mentors, but also travel mentors to me, showing that "real people" actually crossed the Atlantic and traveled in Europe. The return sailing that summer was just days after I'd turned 18 in London.

Beverly and I did the same number of voyages, with just the first two having been done separately, before we met. Her first two voyages were in 1958 on the Ryndam, an EB Atlantic Crossing from Montréal to Rotterdam, and the return, a WB Atlantic Crossing from Rotterdam to Montréal.

The Liberté had been built in 1928 for Norddeutscher Lloyd as the Europa, and after WWII was turned over to France as war reparations. She sailed under her new name in 1950. I was blissfully unaware for many years of the wartime history of the first two ships I ever sailed on, the Queen Elizabeth and the (Europa)/Liberté. It's odd to think that the Queen Elizabeth had been a passenger ship for only 11 years at the time, and that the Liberté had sailed under that name, also for only 11 years. Most shocking of all was when I found out many years later from friend Paul that we were among the last passengers on the Liberté. We got off the ship on 6 October, and on 30 January she sailed to Italy to be scrapped.

This was the first time Beverly and I sailed together, to study for a year in Mainz. Our return trip to the US after that year's study, in August 1962 to get married, was my first flight ever, by Icelandair, as described recently in 2012/21.

I now discover online that the Hellas I'd known had actually been built in 1934 in Glasgow as an Australian transport ship named the Taroona, after a place in Tasmania. It served to cross the Bass Strait between Melbourne and Devonport in Tasmania, but became a troop transport ship in the War. From 1946-1959 she went back to service on the Bass Strait route, but was then replaced by a ship that could carry more motor cars, since she could only take 30, and they had to be winched on board. I find this particularly interesting, since it goes along with my contention that coastal shipping is the forebear of coastal ferries, which had to adapt to the automobile age. The Taroona was then sold to Typaldos Lines, renamed the Hellas ("Greece") converted to a cruise ship, and serviced the eastern Mediterranean until 1966, only one year after we sailed on her, a situation similar to that with the Liberté. She was scrapped in 1989.

The 1965 summer trip to Europe was one in which we packed a huge amount of travel, but it was our first time back to Europe since Mainz and we had a lot more we wanted to see. We allowed 9 ½ weeks for it, which was often typical in those years for us as travel time. After flying to Portugal and Spain and visiting many cities, we made our way by land to Venice to board the Hellas to visit Greek Islands and then, out of Alexandria, we made a side trip to Egypt. We did this while the ship went on elsewhere, and reboarded her when she was back in Alexandria to go back to Athens. This is a prime example of using a ship for transportation as well as pleasure, using it when and where you need it. From Athens we then flew to Istanbul, Beirut (with Damascus), and Jerusalem.

The Bilu got us back from Israel to France to fly home. This was a nice ship and a very nice voyage, but there is absolutely minimal information about her online. She was built in 1963 in Belgium, so was quite new when we took her. She operated under four different names after "Bilu" in the eastern Mediterranean until 1998, and was scrapped in 2001.

The Wickersham was acquired in 1968 (built 1967) from the Stena Line, where she had been the Stena Britannica on the Kiel/Gothenburg route. Since it was an oceangoing vessel, it allowed the extension of the Alaska Marine Highway's southern terminus beyond Alaska's Inside Passage down to Seattle, with a stop in Prince Rupert in between. In 1974 it was sold to Britain's Sally Line as the Viking 6, for service on the Stockholm/Helsinki route. As I elaborate on this tally and discover the history of the ships, it amazes me how they were traded between Europe, North America, and Australia.

After touring the US and Canada in our VW Camper in 1968 and 1969, we'd been to all Canadian provinces, and to all US states except the two newest ones, Alaska and Hawaii. We took the Canadian to Jasper and the Skeena to Prince Rupert, where we boarded the Wickersham for two nights to get us to Alaska and around Alaska's Inside Passage. We extended this via day trips on the Inside Passage. We later flew from Anchorage (via Seattle) to Honolulu to finish our visit of all 50 states.

The France was launched in 1962 as a replacement for aging ships, including the Liberté. The Norwegian Cruise Line purchased the France in 1979 and converted it into the Norway, which was eventually scrapped in 2008.

There was a decade between our year in Mainz in 1961-1962 and our joint sabbatical leave from teaching during 1971-1972. During that decade we got married, got jobs, and settled down. This crossing on the France began the first four months in Europe in 1971 of our joint sabbatical, returning on the Tuhobić, a freighter. However, after the winter studying in New York, for our second four months in Europe in 1972, we flew Icelandair both ways (2012/21). Times, they were a-changin', from transatlantic ships to transatlantic planes.

As for the name of the ship, in Croatian, while č is a regular CH, ć is merely similar to a CH, but still, let's consider Tuhobić to be approximately TU.ho.bich. I'd forgotten the name of the line, but present online research (the wonders of the internet!) now brings back to me that the freighter line was the Jugolinija, and I also find out that it was established in 1947 in Rijeka, the Croatian port where it was based. I also see that Jugolinija became the Croatia Line in 1992 at the time of Croatia's independence from Yugoslavia, but it was in financial difficulties by late 1999 and does not appear to have survived.

At the time, we took this somewhat unusual voyage absolutely in stride ("Sure, we're coming back by freighter!"), but in retrospect over four decades later, it was a rather unique trip. Well, both European parts of the sabbatical trip were rather unique, too. It is now beyond me how, pre-internet, we'd found this freighter connection in advance before we left, and booked it. I have no idea how we arranged it. The two four-month European parts of the sabbatical involved study and driving through Eastern Europe (on the second one, to Moscow). But on this first part in 1971, we had picked up our car near Paris, a leased, brand-new-yet-rattletrap Simca (see 2005/16), studied French in Pau, and drove extensively through southeastern Europe, hoping that that piece of junk of a car would get us back to Nice, where we were to turn it in. While in Yugoslavia, we did stop in the port of Rijeka (ri.YÉ.ka), also known by its Italian name Fiume (both names mean "river"). I remember that many buildings in Rijeka retained their old Austro-Hungarian look, and we were well aware that the Tuhobić would be originating in Rijeka when it came to get us in Genoa some time later.

Once we dropped off the car in Nice, we took the train eastward along the coast to Genova (Genoa) on 1 November, planning on sailing the next day. Well, people conform to freighter schedules, not vice versa, and we found out that the ship had been delayed and wouldn't arrive for three more days. The story we heard was that there was one of those proverbial strikes in Italy, this time of longshoremen, that had caused the delay. We took it in stride, and, although Genova doesn't have the attractions that many other Italian cities do, we found places to go and things to do to keep us entertained.

But what is it that "language people" do to pass the time? They learn a language. We stopped in a bookstore and picked up a little volume in English that taught Italian, and spent time in and around Genova studying, as well as on the ship later. I remember that Genova is located on steep hills around the port, and I remember sitting on a park bench in the warm sun in a garden looking down over the port as we studied. Our travel diary says that that was the garden of the Parco Villetta di Negro (Photo by Ilaria Camprincoli, CC-BY-SA), and, while this picture I found online doesn't show the view we enjoyed, steeply downward to the port, it's nevertheless my link to the memories of our stay in Genova. We've taken quite a number of courses in several languages in Europe, but never in Italy. Still, I suppose I can say we "studied Italian in Italy", based on our sitting on that park bench, an image that grows more idyllic in my mind the more I think about it.

Finally, on Friday, 5 November, we boarded the Tuhobić. The atmosphere was laid back and peaceful. I remember the superstructure housing the cabins (and probably the crew area) off on the port (left) side of the deck, to allow more room for cargo, in addition to cargo in the hold. We had a spacious, modern cabin, and I remember a lounge somewhere. I remember meals being served on a long table with benches, something like a picnic table. Only in retrospect do I suppose it was the same mess hall that the crew used at other times. The dozen passengers broke down easily into at least two groups. Half of them consisted of three, rather loud American couples from Florida, who were also loudly dressed. They were traveling together, and always seemed to have a drink in their hands, apparently from their own supply. We had little to do with them. "Our six" consisted of a young man traveling solo that I don't remember very well, and a young woman traveling solo that was something of a hippie type. She had a huge steamer trunk with her, since she was in the business of selling trinkets of some sort. Then, in addition to us, there were the Pennybakers, who I described more extensively in 2003/11. Since Beverly and I were in our low thirties at the time, we admired the stamina of the "elderly" Pennybakers for their extensive freighter travel around the world. However, given the clarity of hindsight, they were probably the same age I am now. (But I do admit to being "an older person", or, according to Gilles Lafleur, une personne agée--see 2013/6.)

In retrospect, I suppose I can say this trip is one that seemed to be the traditional, non-touristy kind of voyage typified to me by Maugham's "Rain", particularly when I think of that cast of characters and our own cast of "characters". It was later seasickness that took some of the fun edge off this voyage, so that I consider it very memorable, but not one of the three favorites.

Saturday we sailed across the Western Mediterranean toward Gibraltar. Use this map (click on "Zoom Map") to follow along. Find Rijeka in Croatia, the Tuhobić's home port, where she started out. Her ports of call, according to current online information, would have been Venezia (Venice) and Napoli (Naples), so she was circumnavigating Italy before picking us up in Genova (Genoa). You can also see the location of Nice, where we had been before Genova. By Sunday, we were passing the Balearic Islands (Baleares), and a note in the travel diary says that on Monday, we could see on the horizon the snow-capped peaks of the Sierra Nevada on the mainland of Spain. We passed the Rock of Gibraltar and sailed through the Strait of Gibraltar, the only time we ever did. We then stopped on the only port of call for us of the trip, in Tangier (note also Casablanca on the map). Tangier is on the Atlantic side of the Strait.

Tuesday, while cargo was being transferred, we had a full day in Tangier in northern Morocco, which is historically also referred to as Tangiers. I see from the online schedule of this ship that Casablanca, where I have never been, would have been the usual stop, with Tangier being an optional alternative (so was Lisbon). Reflecting on Tangier and Casablanca brings a number of thoughts to mind.

I mentioned my friend Sol and his parents on my first two voyages above. In Junior High, our circle of friends had always known that Sol had been born in Tangier, and he further explained that the reason why that happened was that his parents, as Jews, were fleeing Germany, specifically Berlin, for the US. I'm sorry I never thought in those years to ask his parents for more details. Doing so by a teenager might have been presumptive. But I can now formulate some questions I could have asked and try to extrapolate some facts. I was born on 1 September 1939, the day WWII was declared. If Sol was in my class, he had to have been born a few months before or after me, which means that it had to have been 1939 that his parents were in Tangier. Why had they waited so long before they left? Maybe they didn't have any choice, but no one would plan fleeing a country during a pregnancy. How did they get to Tangier? Usually by ship in those years. Lisbon was a common route. By any chance could they have sailed from Genoa, as I just had? Then the 1943 film "Casablanca" comes to mind, just down the coast from Tangier, where the story is filled with refugees from Europe, each looking for passage across the Atlantic. Might Sol's parents have found a ship to the US, or even a plane, as in the movie? Would either a plane or a ship have stopped in, say, the Azores, where I just was last year? These events had taken place just 32 years before the time our ship was in Tangier, and yet they seemed very real.

Leaving Tangier on Wednesday, we were now out in the open North Atlantic, and I have since learned why people say one should not cross the Atlantic at that time of the year. The skies turned gray, and remained so the rest of the voyage. The ship was without stabilizers, and was affected by all sorts of motion. Pitch is front-to-back rocking. We had that. Rolling is the side-to-side rocking. We had that. Yaw is the bow moving one way and the stern the other, like you were pivoting—and then moving back. We had that. There have only been two times in my life when I felt seasick. One was on a day ferry from Naples to Capri, and we bought pills on the way back. And the other time was intermittently on the Tuhobić. We found that the sick feeling relented almost completely when we lay down, so we spent a lot of time lying on the bed that first day on the open seas, and when we got up, never strayed far from the bed. I remember looking out the porthole and seeing the view aimed down at water, then horizon, then sky, then horizon, then water again. I remember a chair sliding across the cabin. They brought us a sandwich.

Thursday we studied Italian, and went to meals. Friday we sat on deck reading and studying. Saturday and Sunday we were well enough to play Scrabble and cards. Monday and Tuesday were in-bed days, except we did go to meals. Wednesday was rough weather, but then it calmed down. Thursday it had calmed down as we docked in Boston harbor. Although we were scheduled to go to New York, there was also a longshoremen's strike there (as in Italy), so we were to be bused from Boston to New York. Friday, 19 November we disembarked and boarded a small bus for New York. Then we got off the bus again, since it was too small to carry the steamer trunk of our hippie passenger, and they provided a larger bus. On a dinner stop in Connecticut, we called friends to meet us in Goldens Bridge, in Westchester County where we lived, with our car. We managed to talk the bus driver to letting us off before New York, and it worked. We always joked then that this voyage had been from Genoa to Goldens Bridge.

All in all, it says in our diary we each read seven books from the ship's library in this period of time over the two-week voyage, which I'm sure is a personal record, but that typifies what I mean about this sort of a voyage. If it hadn't been a freighter, there would have been more passengers, but the style of the trip, in my mind, was similar to "Rain".

In retrospect, and I only think of this now while making this summary, if we put together the 1965 trips to the Eastern Mediterranean on the Hellas (Venice/Alexandria) and Bilu (Haifa/Nice) with the first part of the 1971 sailing on the Tuhobić (Genoa/Tangier), I find I have sailed from one end of the Mediterranean to the other, Haifa to Tangier, the two end points having the common mid-point of Italy.

The Finnhansa entered service in 1966 and was at the time the largest ferry on the Baltic. To maintain that distinction, she was purposely built 10 cm (4 in) longer than her sister ship, the Finnpartner. She was sold in 1977 and served under three other names, including being reoutfitted as a Mediterranean cruise ship, until being scrapped in 2008. Finnlines launched another ship named Finnhansa in 1994.

This was the only sea voyage we took in 1972 on the second half of our joint sabbatical. We took Russian language courses in Austria for three weeks and drove extensively through the northern part of Eastern Europe, ending with our drive in our VW Beetle from Vienna to Moscow to Helsinki. We took the car on the Finnhansa to from there to Germany, where we shipped it to New York while we flew home.

It was two full days on the ship, with only one overnight. We stopped in Slite, on the Swedish island of Gotland, and in Rønne, on the Danish island of Bornholm. The food was served as a smörgåsbord; we went dancing; we read on deck. It was quite enjoyable, and had that same feeling of old time non-touristy sea travel that the Tuhobić did, but the 2nd Baltic Crossing I did in 2006 on this same route, but non-stop and over two nights, was even better and wins the prize (see below).

The Stena Line is now one of the world's largest ferry operators and the largest privately-owned shipping company in the world. It was started in 1962 in Göteborg (Gothenburg) Sweden, directly across the Kattegat from Frederikshavn, Denmark, with a ferry line between the two, as shown on this route map. However, on this 1973 drive through all of Scandinavia, we took it on a one-night crossing from Frederikshavn to Oslo, the only direct connection we ever made between the two countries.

From Oslo, on that same trip, we drove to Bergen and its area, then up to Trondheim. Although the entire standard Norwegian Coastal Route (Map by Aldebaran) is actually a round trip out of Bergen, since we'd known we'd already be driving around the Bergen area, we instead planned on continuing further north and had booked it as an eight-night round trip out of Trondheim, where we parked our rental car in a garage. We'd be going all the way up the Norwegian coast, past the North Cape, to Kirkenes, facing Russia, then back to Trondheim, making numerous stops along the way. After Norway we proceeded to Sweden, where we took a three-week course in intermediate Swedish at Göteborgs Universitet, the University of Gothenburg.

Hurtig+rute+n is literally "Express+route+the". It's a passenger and freight line that was established in 1893 by government contract to improve communication to the otherwise poorly served coastal communities, including mail delivery. Today, each of the 34 ports (from Bergen north; again, our trip started in Trondheim) is visited twice a day, 365 days a year, once northbound and once southbound by 11 ships. The feel on the ship was relaxed as on earlier ships, with passengers watching cargo being loaded and unloaded. One memorable sight was seeing a coffin hanging from a crane. We couldn't tell if it was empty or not. I now read that beginning in the 1980's government subsidies were gradually phased out and the tourist market was pursued even more. Newer ships were made more cruise-ship-like, which I suppose is a sign of the times. The company has expanded, and offers trips to Greenland, South America, and Antarctica.

Only Norwegian Wikipedia had information on the ship (believe me, knowledge of Swedish helps). The Håkon Jarl was built in 1952 and was in a regular rotation on the Hurtigruten until 1982. Today it's a hotel ship in Antwerp called the Diamond Princess. "Jarl" means "Earl" and the Håkon Jarl was named after the ruler of Norway from 970-995, Håkon Sigurdsson.

This ship, launched in 1959, was the fifth to bear this name, and was retired in 2000. There is now a sixth Rotterdam active. This was a two-week voyage over Christmas and New Year's.

This year we decided to do an extended visit by car to Atlantic Canada and New England, which included three voyages. The first was an overnight crossing of the Gulf of Maine, near the Bay of Fundy, from Maine to Nova Scotia, sailing between Portland and Yarmouth, (Yarmouth not named on map). The service had existed since 1970, but at that time was run by Prince of Fundy Cruises, who acquired the Stena Olympica and renamed it the Scotia Prince. Another company took over in 2000, and the service ceased in 2004, although there is frequent talk of having someone start it up again.

After a couple of days crossing Nova Scotia, we took the overnight ferry across the Cabot Strait from North Sydney to Argentia (Map by Yug), on the far side of Newfoundland. After about a week in Newfoundland, we returned on a shorter day ferry from Port aux Basques, on the closer side of Newfoundland, to North Sydney.

We usually did one or two voyages within a calendar year, but this Atlantic Canada/New England trip by itself required three almost in a row. The third voyage of this trip took place after we meandered back south in New England to Connecticut, and was longer, lasting a week. American Cruise Lines has had its troubles, and even went out of business later, but was reestablished in 1991 and now has six small ships carrying between 49 and 120 passengers. I find nothing online today about the Savannah, but know it was about the same small size as the present ships. The intimacy of such a small ship as it hugged the South Coast of three New England states was definitely in the spirit of traditional coastal ship connections. It was particularly pleasant boarding the ship on the Connecticut River in the little town of East Haddam (home of the Goodspeed Opera House) and sailing downriver, and later, back up it.

This river voyage, the first we ever took, was part of a revisit to Germany, which included a train through East Germany to attend a German language conference in West Berlin. After revisiting Mainz, we worked our way up to Koblenz on the Rhine, where we spent three nights on the Europa sailing upstream on the German (north) end of the Mosel River. Going from Koblenz to Trier, we went through four locks the first day, then passed such well-known wine villages as Cochem, Zell, Kröv, and Bernkastel-Kues--click to enlarge to inspect river cruise ships (Photo by Berthold Werner). The river comes down to this point from France via Luxemburg, but from Trier we took the train to Luxemburg (City) to fly home on Icelandic.

In April we flew to connect to this one-week small-ship tour of the inland waterway, once again on American Cruise Lines. Sailing north, we always had the mainland on our left, and barrier islands and inlets on our right. The ship was petite and relaxing. It was a beautiful route through the historic South, and our new discovery was Fernandina Beach with its Victorian houses, which we came back to visit on another occasion.

That July we took Amtrak from New York to San Francisco to Portland to sail on the Columbia River, only the second river voyage we've taken, after the Mosel. This route has now been taken over by American Cruise Lines, who does it one-way, but we did it round trip out of Portland. We went upstream as far as the Snake River in Idaho, where we took a jet boat through Hell's Canyon, the deepest gorge in North America, and then went way downstream to Astoria, the Lewis and Clark area. We went through many locks, including those at the Bonneville Dam. We then took Amtrak back east.

The Nordic Empress bore that name from 1990 to 2004, when, since the other ships in the fleet ended with "of the Seas", she was renamed Empress of the Seas. After 2008 she was just the Empress, under a subsidiary owner. It was only in 1999, the year we sailed on her, that she took on the Bermuda route.

We had not traveled internationally, only domestically, for the entire 1990's due to several major factors, including Beverly's illness. The one-week trip on the Nordic Empress was the test to see if we could attempt international travel again, now with a wheelchair. It was a success. I rarely have shipboard pictures taken, but I do have on my dresser a picture of Beverly and me, all dressed up, standing at the foot of the Grand Staircase of the Nordic Empress. Because of Beverly's Swedish background, I joked at the time that the Nordic Empress was named in her honor.

The QE2 was in service, both as an ocean liner and cruise ship, from 1969 to 2008. Based on our Nordic Empress experience, I felt it would be much wiser to cross the Atlantic with a wheelchair by using a ship, not a plane (planes worked out quite well later on, after I got used to things). Not having crossed the Atlantic on a ship for 29 years, since the Tuhobić in 1971, the QE2 seemed like a wonderful choice, which it was. This was the trip where we met friends Michael and Christine, who regularly did crossings, since Christine had family in France, and they became our mentors for frequent transatlantic ship travel, which we, then I, did every year from 2000 to 2008, many round trip, some one-way. They were also the ones who taught us to ask to sit at a hosted table, specifically the Engineers' table, a delightful custom we followed for many years, but which now Cunard has dropped. Still, it was great while it lasted. The 2000 trip was the one where we returned to Europe by visiting Germany first, now reunited, and had old German friends, one couple from the northwest and one from the south, meet us in Berlin for a Wiedersehen.

When the Nordic Empress docked in Midtown Manhattan the previous summer, while we were waiting for luggage in the shed, I looked out the window over the pier roof and spotted on the other side the upper part of a ship beyond, where a sign topside said "Deutschland", as shown on this picture with original livery (Photo by Gulp-GFDL). I was unaware of any German ships at that time, but knew that the QE2 and the Deutschland, which I found had just been launched in 1998, was my choices for the following summer's return to Europe. This return voyage left from Cuxhaven, on the German coast west of Hamburg. It was on this voyage that I first met ship historian Bill Miller, who lectured onboard (in English, to a German audience) about early 20C European emigration via Hamburg, and explained that, for speedier service, they started to sail from Cuxhaven, since it was closer to North America. (!!!)

On this two-week crossing, we did act a bit like a cruise ship, making stops on both sides of the Atlantic. We first stopped in England, at Plymouth, then in Ireland, at Waterford, where we bought four goblets of Waterford crystal, in commemoration for returning to Europe. We then crossed the North Atlantic from Ireland to Newfoundland, the crossing was particularly short, about three nights, because of the relative closeness of those two islands. We then made four stops in Canada before reaching New York.

Right after arrival, we heard of the crash of the Concorde in Paris, which eventually led to the demise of that plane service. However, that flight was a charter by Deilmann, and all 100 passengers that died were some of those that were due to take our places on the Deutschland when it continued on out of New York to Panama.

It was at our assigned dinner table on the Deutschland on that trip where we met friend Jürgen and his wife and two daughters. We got to know each other quite well, and they stopped in our apartment in New York for a visit and we went out to dinner. Jürgen has been generous will gifts he's sent me, and he actually became another travel mentor. He traveled extensively professionally, was the one who told me he'd taken the Transsiberian rail route across Eurasia. He also told me about the Silk Road rail service. His introducing me to the Transsiberian resulted later in my traveling that route, and extending my outlook beyond Europe and North America to other continents.

In addition, when Beverly passed away in 2004, Jürgen sent me a series of appropriate passages in German. I read these (with written English translations for listeners), along with an English passage from sister Chris, at Beverly's memorial service/dinner for relatives and friends in Minnesota, her memorial dinner for friends in Florida, and for the burial of her ashes at sea (actually in the bay inside a barrier island inlet) with family present (see 2004/6.3). Burial was near where we had sailed outbound to Europe on the Liberté in 1961, and inbound on her last voyage on the QM2 in 2004. The whole burial at sea was voyage-related.

After the 2000 return to Europe, our next trip back was an extensive drive throughout Great Britain and Ireland, this time with round-trip voyages on the QE2.

Continuing with our catch-up revisits of areas of Europe after a long decade, we then visited northern Italy and southern France.

We then continued by visiting southern Italy and Paris.

The above crossing was our seventh and last trip on the QE2.

This was our longest time ever on a ship, seven weeks in January-February-March. The identity of the ship causes confusion. She was built in 1973 for the Norwegian America Line as the Vistafjord, then was sold to Cunard in 1983, retaining its name. But in 1999, Cunard renamed it the Caronia, which was its name when we sailed on her in 2004. Then, on another one of those après moi, le déluge situations, eight months after our trip, in November 2004, Cunard sold her to Saga Cruises and she became the Saga Ruby, which is the name she bears on the accompanying picture.

It was a long, relaxing trip. We played Team Trivia, and were occasionally on the winning team. But there was approximately a 30% German contingent on the trip, and some evenings we went to German Team Trivia. That we were once or twice on a winning team there shocked me more than anyone, since so much trivia involves cultural information and has little to do with knowledge of a language. One of the excursions we took was out of Punta Arenas, Chile, which was an overflight of the Antarctic Peninsula, which was partially successful, since we did manage to see a bit through the clouds. Yet that was just another impetus for my later wanting to sail to Antarctica. When we sailed around Cape Horn the water was as smooth as glass, which surprised even the captain. We docked back in Fort Lauderdale on 12 March, which was Beverly's 67th birthday, and her last. That summer we'd have one last trip to Europe.

While on the Caronia, we'd spotted the QM2 in the harbor at Rio, and managed to get a tour. We followed up by taking a round-trip to Europe on her that summer. The trip had two parts. We started with "The Ghost-Country: Old Austria-Hungary" as we made our way from Prague to Vienna to Budapest, then took the train over to "Dutch-Land", visiting both the Netherlands and Flanders, the Dutch-speaking part of Belgium. Beverly was already failing as we boarded the QM2 to go home, and spent the entire trip, her 15th Atlantic Crossing, in the ship's hospital. In New York, she never went home again, but went from the hospital on the QM2 to a local hospital, then to a nursing home, where she survived until October 9.

This was my first solo voyage. It was my second cruise exclusively in the Caribbean after the Rotterdam, although other trips had stopped at various Caribbean islands on the way. This was also in December, but before the holidays, unlike on the Rotterdam. Over the years, the most voyages done in one calendar year was either one or two until 1984, when we did three. This year, with this trip, I reached four voyages in one calendar year.

This year, as part of my Round-the-World by Rail trip, I flew the Pacific and took the QM2 one-way across the Atlantic, completing the circle.

I flew to Juneau and did a fast-ferry day trip to Skagway. Afterward, I took this one-night voyage to Sitka, then flew back east.

Since the 1980's, car ferries that carry more than 500 passengers have been referred to as cruiseferries, since they often add many resort amenities to make them like cruise ships, which is just what ocean liners have been doing. Many passengers use these ships just for the cruise experience. The Color Fantasy, built in 2004, carries 2750 passengers, and is the world's second largest cruiseferry, only surpassed by her sister ship on the same route, the Color Magic. The ship had a lot of amenities, but there was too much partying going on in smoky nightclubs for my taste on this one-night crossing.

I had earlier flown into Oslo to begin a major revisit to Scandinavia and Finland. Now that I review my route, I've found I surprised myself. So far, the only time I ended up traveling on as many as three ships in one year was in 1984, and in 2004, that went up to four. I now see that just on this summer trip alone I was on six different ships overnight, and when I add the winter trip later on in the year, I find I was on seven different ships in the calendar year 2006 alone, a personal record I never had realized I'd made. It even amazed me more that my three uniquely favorite voyages of all time all fell in 2006.

Plotting the schedules of six water routes on this trip to Northern Europe was tricky, but the most satisfying result came about when it worked out that the Color Fantasy, which runs daily, could be made to connect in Kiel with the once-a-year Deutschland trip to Spitsbergen. It seemed to be like a traditional transfer of ships, just like today we change trains, subways, planes, or buses, and was similar to what the plan was to do in "Rain", when the ship docked in Pago Pago, ready to transfer passengers to Apia, but the connecting ship was laid up with a measles outbreak. In Kiel, the Color Fantasy pulled in in the morning, I walked a few steps to the Deutschland which, although not ready to board passengers until the afternoon, accepted my bag while I spent the day going off on a train ride to Rendsburg to see the Kiel Canal. It was as smooth a transfer of ships as I could have hoped for.

It was then rather fun when the Deutschland backtracked the Color Fantasy's route along the Great Belt, Kattegat, and Skagerrak up to the Norwegian Coast, and then, quite uniquely, all the way up to Spitsbergen in the Arctic, where we reached, at Moffen Island on the north coast, my furthest-north point on the Earth's surface ever at 80°N.

Not counting transiting the Panama Canal, this is the only canal trip I've taken so far. It also turns out to be one of my three favorite voyages of all time, and I'm ranking this particular one in second place. The voyage was described in greater detail in 2006/8.

The Göta (YÖ.ta) Canal was opened in 1832 to connect the east and west coasts of Sweden. This map, from the website of Euro River Cruises. shows the full length of the Göta Canal System. It connects Stockholm on the Baltic via the Baltic itself, plus a number of rivers and lakes, including the very large Vättern and Vänern, with Sweden's second city in the east, Göteborg (Gothenburg) on the Kattegat (opposite Frederikshavn, see 1973 voyage 10 above). The entire waterway, all of which is now referred to as the Göta Canal, is 614 km (382 mi) long. But since a large part of the route near Stockholm is actually on the open Baltic, technically, the canal itself starts only after one re-enters the mainland and is 190 km (118 mi) long. 87 km (54 mi) of that was dug out and blasted.

Again, it was a lot of work planning things to work out with other voyages on this trip, but I got just the trip I wanted. There are three historic vessels that make this trip, all of which have declared historic monuments. Oldest is the Juno (Photo by Ulf Klingström) from 1874, shown here approaching Göteborg. Next is the Wilhelm Tham (Photo by Boberger) from 1912, shown here with the Diana on Skeppsbron, the historic docking area in Gamla Stan (Old Town) in Stockholm. When I boarded my ship, my hotel was literally across the street. It was the shortest walk I ever took to board a ship. Finally, there's the Diana (Photo by Arild Vågen) from 1931, shown here at the dock in Göteborg.

Of course, I wanted to be on the oldest one, the Juno, and that's just what I was able to work out. I never got to see the Diana, and saw the Wilhelm Tham as we passed it at midnight in Lake Vänern. While I was pleased that I had ridden on an 1874 vessel, which was certainly the oldest ship I'd ever taken an overnight trip on, only now do I find out more, and I had to dig beyond English Wikipedia to Swedish Wikipedia to find it out, which is also where I could find the only pictures of the ships. It said that the Juno "är idag världens äldsta registrerade fartyg med övernattningsmöjligheter, och därmed troligen världens äldsta kryssningsfartyg." My translation is that the Juno "is today the world's oldest registered vessel with overnight facilities, and is therefore probably the world's oldest cruise vessel." That alone would have made this trip something special, but there was a lot more along the way.

The canal has 58 locks, which makes for a nice, slow journey. As a matter of fact, at one point where two locks were perhaps only a kilometer apart, a group of passengers interested in hiking were told by the cruise director to exit the ship before the first lock and to start hiking along the canal. By the time the Juno went through the first lock, sailed to the second, and passed through the second, the hiking group had caught up to us and rejoined the Juno. This is the Diana in the Forsvik lock (Photo by TS Eriksson) and the Wilhelm Tham entering a lock (Photo by Katarina Pernes). The locks raise or lower vessels just a few meters/yards at a time. This is "my" Juno descending the famous flight (chain) of seven locks at Berg (Photo by Lars Aronsson). As you can judge from the photos, the canal's width varies between 7 and 14 m (23 and 46 ft), and its maximum depth is 3 meters/yards. While some parts of the canal are still used to transport cargo, it is now primarily for recreational use, and a tourist attraction. About two million people ride on the canal each year. While there are quickie trips possible, just on the most interesting central part, I wanted the full four days and three nights to see it all, and that was a smart move.

Take a look at the Juno again (Photo by Clemensfranz) when it's docked, with the gangway set up. This picture seems to be on the Skeppsbron in Stockholm across from my hotel. Not only was I lucky enough to get the ship and travel time slot I wanted, I got the kind of cabin I wanted.

There are three decks. The so-called Main Deck is the lower one, with many cabins, with portholes (click to enlarge to inspect). The cabins here open onto a proper corridor. The Bridge Deck is the upper one. It had my type of cabin, but was more expensive and up a narrow flight of stairs. You can also see the outdoor seating on this deck. I got a cabin on the Shelter Deck in the middle, in practice actually the main deck, which also had the lounge and the dining room. The cabin I got was perfectly located (for me), right in the center starboard, which is what we're looking at, and literally opposite the gangway, three steps away. I'd point out the exact door except because of the angle, it's hard to tell where the gangway is pointing.

The cabins on these two upper decks did not open onto a corridor, but directly onto the open deck, which was quite narrow. As you can imagine, on any of the historic ships, the bathroom is down the hall, or in the case of the two upper decks, down the open deck. In my case the bathroom and shower was right next door, which was quite convenient. The cabins were delightfully miniscule, which I loved. They were the size of a train sleeper. I used the lower of two bunk beds to the right, and the remaining floor space to the left of the bed also the size of a bed, except that where the pillow would have been there was a washstand. I had to sit on the bed with the laptop on my knees, close to the opposite wall. It was great.

There were 54 passengers on board. Breakfast was a buffet, and there was a 2-course fixed lunch and a 3-course fixed dinner. It was all excellent and one wondered how they prepared so much good food in what must have been a tiny galley located on the "Main" deck, below. Of the four days, the first was boarding and crossing the Baltic, the second was on the canal, the third day we crossed Lake Vättern early, and reached Vänern at midnight, where we had that quick rendezvous with the Wilhelm Fram, and signaled it, but where we also pulled up in the dark of midnight on black open waters to get a view from the lake up to of Baroque Läckö Slott / Läckö Castle (Photo by Wigulf), whose earliest foundations date from 1298. The fourth day ended in our arrival in Göteborg, where I took a high-speed train back to Stockholm for the night.

As for the nights on the Juno, we just pulled up at a convenient spot, such as here in Motala (with the Diana) (Photo by Artifex) and spent the night, including a walk around town and possibly other visits. By morning, we'd already be underway, which brings me back to my favorite experience. It was our first full day after the Baltic, so we woke up physically on the Canal. The cabin doors opened outward, and could catch in the open position, for ventilation. There also was a heavy privacy drape in the doorway, and people kept their doors open even when sleeping, with the drape pulled closed.

Three senses were involved in this wake-up image that stays with me still. First it was the smell of freshly mown hay (think of mowing a lawn) that filled the room. Then there was the sound of cowbells and mooing. Curious, and still in the bunk bed, I pulled the drape aside for the most idyllic of pastoral visions, of cows in a field chewing their cud under a sunny blue sky. The Göta Canal picture I find online that reminds me best of that pastoral scene is this one (Photo by Ot). However, they could be as rustic (Photo by [WT-shared] Riggwelter) as this one near Motala. Still, most was your average canal scenery (Photo by Gus CC-BY-SA-2.5,2.0,1.0) such as here, where you should click to enlarge to inspect on the right the car leaving a tunnel under the canal.

I like two Göta Canal videos on YouTube. This first, more general one is about sailing on the Diana on the Göta Kanal.

1:26 – Diana descends the flight (chain) of seven locks at Berg and into Lake Roxen
2:14 – this cabin on the Diana, with a side window, is a little more luxurious than mine on the Juno but has the same layout; perhaps it's upper deck
3:25 – this was the width of the deck outside my cabin on the Juno

This next video shows the passage of the Juno. There was so much pleasure and enjoyment on this trip, and so many memories, that I have to class it among my three top voyages, in second place.

After the Juno and one night in Stockholm, I boarded the Gabriella on a one-night crossing to Helsinki. The Gabriella is a cruiseferry built in 1992 that operated earlier in the Western Baltic under two other names, including Silja Scandinavia. It was later outfitted with cruise amenities and in 1997 became the Gabriella. The call at Mariehamn was added to maintain tax-free status of shops on board. It carries 2420 passengers in 2402 berths, and 400 cars. I liked the ship, although there were more partygoers onboard than I cared to see.

After some time in Finland, I took the fifth vessel of this Northern Europe trip, the Finnmaid, which apparently had been delivered in 2006, so it was quite new. Maybe that's part of what added to its attractiveness. It carried only 500 passengers, so perhaps that was a slight relief from larger ships as well. We boarded and left Helsinki before dinner, resulting in two nights at sea crossing the Baltic to Travemünde, and made no stops at all, which perhaps added to making it even more pleasant than when we did the same route on the Finnhansa in 1972 (trip 9 above).

These might all be factors why I described this trip to friends shortly afterward that it was a favorite. I've since decided it was one of my three favorites of all time, in third place after the Juno. It didn't have touristy glitz, and reminded me of traditional ship travel, even more than some others did. The mood on board (Photo by Roquai) was pleasant and quiet. Meals were served smörgåsbord style in a quiet dining room (Photo by Roquai). Walking around on deck (Photo by Roquai) to a pleasant Baltic breeze was refreshing. This is the Sun Deck (Photo by Smiley.toerist). My cabin was large, way forward and rather high up, with a nice view (check the view of the superstructure on the above picture; also note the trucks on the open back deck). I just remember so clearly enjoying the trip even as I lived it.

To more easily follow these first five voyages of 2006, we have this map of Northern Europe (Map by NormanEinstein). Click to enlarge to see how (1) the Color Fantasy went from Oslo to Kiel; (2) the Deutschland went from Kiel to Norway to Kiel; (3) the Juno went from Stockholm to Göteborg, which would be near the K in Kattegat; (4) the Gabriella went from Stockholm via the Åland Islands to Helsinki; (5) the Finnmaid went from Helsinki to Travemünde, which would be in the next large bay southwest of Kiel. Note Swedish Gotland and Danish Bornholm, where the Finnhansa had stopped in 1972, but the Finnmaid did not, since it made no stops at all.

I enjoyed leaving on the QM2 from Hamburg this time. This was one of those several trips where I found that friends Michael and Christine were on board. Added to the five shorter voyages just completed in Northern Europe, this crossing was the sixth voyage of 2006.

I've now decided that this trip is not only one of my three favorite voyages, I've put it in first place. When I planned, long in advance, this trip later in 2006 to supplement the trip to Northern Europe earlier that year, there were two things I honestly didn't realize. Only now, as I elaborate on this summary do I realize that it adds one sea voyage to the already voyage-heavy earlier trip, making it a total of 7 ships I traveled on overnight all in one year. Earlier highs were 3 in 1984 and 4 in 2004. Other than that, both before and to the date of this writing, were 1-2, if that.

While I did realize I'd be achieving my southernmost point on the earth's surface on this trip (see below), I also didn't realize until later on that it would end up in the same year that I'd reached my northernmost point in Spitsbergen. Things like these just seem to happen after-the-fact.

There was also some confusion in my mind about the identity of the ship and of the line. I was aware onboard from directional signs in German that that the Explorer II had a split personality, masquerading part of the year elsewhere with a German name, but until now, I didn't realize just how many names the ship has had, and only now have I found out what cruise line we were with. Here's the story.

Ships change ownership and names like people change cars. The Liberté had been the Europa, the France became the Norway, the Nordic Empress became the Empress of the Seas, the Caronia had been the Vistafjord and became the Saga Ruby—you know the drill. The Explorer II was built in 1989 as a Soviet research vessel, (1) the Okean ("Ocean"), but the deal fell through. She was then purchased by the British line, Swan Hellenic, and entered service in 1996, renamed the (2) Minerva. But over time, ownership of Swan Hellenic had its ups and downs, as did the Minerva (no pun intended), and a period of leasing and chartering of the Minerva began. In 2003, the Minerva was leased by Saga Cruises as the (3) Saga Pearl, but kept this name only for the summer of 2003. At that point, the Minerva was charted each year, from December to April, to Abercrombie & Kent, a major international travel company, with offices in London, Oak Brook, Illinois USA, and Melbourne (which accounted for the large number of people of these three nationalities on board) for sailing to Antarctica as the (4) Explorer II (2003-2008). Then, starting in 2005, from May to November, she was chartered by the German company Phoenix Reisen as the (5) Alexander von Humboldt (2005-2008) for use in the Baltic, and the Minerva maintained its double life, with annual regularity, for these years. But this alter-ego personality continued only for two years after our group sailed on the Explorer II. That was when a relaunched Swan Hellenic took back the ship in 2008 and returned to the name (8 [=2]) Minerva, which it still maintains. If this is confusing, welcome to the world of ship renamings.

And repaintings. This is the modern Minerva (Photo by BobiMpower) in Greece in 2009, where the name of the Greek goddess is particularly appropriate. Notice the ship's name, the marking "Swan Hellenic", and the dark blue stack with the white logo of a swan, which I can only assume was the original livery color until 2003. Now, this is the Minerva as the Saga Pearl (Photo by Stan Shebs) in Estonia in 2003. The name has been altered and the stack repainted, now in gold livery. I'll copy here again the introductory picture above of the Minerva masquerading as the Explorer II (Photo by Markabq). It was taken in November 2007, at anchor at Grytviken on South Georgia, exactly one year to the month when we were there. Click to read the repainted name, and note that the stack, while dark blue again, has no swan logo. And finally, this is the Minerva as the Explorer II's alter ego, the Alexander von Humboldt (Photo by VollwertBIT) in Kiel in 2007. Click to check that the name has again been altered, and note the turquoise livery and logo of Phoenix Reisen. During this dual period, these repaintings were done annually. Whew!

The entire trip out of Ushuaia, Argentina, is posted in 2006/15, where there are many details of interest that I won't repeat here, but this map (Map by Geo Swan) shows our route. Ushuaia is at the southern tip of South America on the left, near the 70°W line, from where we went clockwise to the pair of Falkland Islands at the 60°W line, then to long, narrow South Georgia beyond the 40°W line. We then swung around to visit a number of islands right along the Antarctic Peninsula, then the Peninsula itself, before returning to Ushuaia. Note the 65°S meridian, which is the southernmost point the ship reached, and therefore my southernmost point.

I always knew I'd had a marvelous time on this trip, but only now can I pinpoint just what made this voyage so special that I put it in first place. We have to differentiate between (1) the zodiac landings and (2) life on the ship, which actually constituted the voyage per se.

Zodiac Landings Only now do I learn that these inflatable boats are called zodiacs (Photo by Rootology) because they're made by a French company that uses a name in English, Zodiac Marine and Pool. They seat about 6-8 people, plus the driver, who ran the outboard motor. They were almost always used to make "wet landings" on beaches. Sometimes the front of the zodiac would rest on the beach, as in the picture, for an easy dismount, but almost always the zodiac was just very close to the beach, in shallow water, and, since everyone was provided with boots, that was not a problem. Staff members who had arrived on an earlier zodiac would assist the dismount. The zodiacs on the Explorer II were, as I recall, bright orange-red (Photo by Jebulon) in color, for easy visibility in icy waters, similar to this one, and approximately matched in color the heavy coats we were issued as part of the trip (which I still wear in New York, but only on the coldest winter days). This picture (Photo by Liam Quinn) was taken on South Georgia, but shows another ship that uses black zodiacs. Still, click to enlarge to see the zodiac on the right being lowered into the water while two others await passengers that will shortly be using that gangway. By the way, although the Minerva can carry 398 passengers, when it was the Explorer II the total was limited to 199, classifying it small enough to be a Category 1 ship, allowed to make all landings in Antarctica.

The landings were what we were here for, where we saw much more on South Georgia than on the Atlantic Peninsula and adjacent islands themselves. While the largest penguin is the emperor penguin, located in inland Antarctica, we saw the second largest, at 0.94 m (37 in), the king penguin (Photo by Liam Quinn), shown here on the Salisbury Plain, a broad, coastal plain on the west end of the north coast of South Georgia. There were numerous juvenile king penguins (Photo by Liam Quinn), easily spotted by their brown coat. This is because South Georgia has over 100,000 breeding pairs (Photo by Pismire), and a view like this was quite common. But we also saw gentoo penguins (Photo by Liam Quinn) with the characteristic white ring around the eye, chinstrap penguins (Photo by Gilad Rom), whose name is obvious, and even better seen here (Photo by Jerzy Strzelecki).

We had to step lively around the many Antarctic fur seals on the beaches (note the teeth), which are large, and can be vicious. The largest animals we saw were quite a few southern elephant seals (Photo by B.navez). Only the male, as here, has the elephant-like proboscis, and also the elephantine size, since males typically reach a length of 4.9 m (16 ft) and a weight of 3,000 kg (6,600 lb). I walked warily by some of these of this size. I also saw the much more petite females, which reach a length of only 3 m (10 ft) and 910 kg (2,000 lb)—and who don't have the proboscis.

Another favorite of the several landings on South Georgia was at Gold Harbour, a small bay at the far eastern end of the island. The name has nothing to do with minerals, but because of the bay's location, the sun's rays make the cliffs yellow in the morning—but also in the evening. Since we were to land early in the day, we ended up landing REALLY early in the day, and had to be ready to board the zodiacs at 4 AM. This YouTube video shows the landing and wildlife at Gold Harbour.

0:08 – several naturalists always guide landings and beach walks
0:17 – that's not a boulder, but a male elephant seal; more follow
0:35 – a (black) zodiac makes a wet landing, assisted by naturalists and crew who arrived earlier; note the ship in the distance
1:03 – fur seals show teeth

But it was more than animals. Very enjoyable is the visit to the abandoned whaling station of Grytviken (Map by Apcbg) on the north shore of South Georgia. Visiting ships regularly stop in its harbor (Photo by Lexaxis7) to see the ghost town, including the fenced-in cemetery at the bottom that includes the grave of explorer Ernest Shackleton. This is a panorama of Grytviken (Photo by Jens Bludau). Click to enlarge to inspect the church in the center and pink-roofed museum on the right, all of which were described in much greater detail back in 2006/15.

But the most impressive stop, the one that remains strongest in my memory, was when we went by zodiac into a bay filled with icebergs and growlers. We were the first zodiac to arrive, so we had no noise interference from others. The driver cut the motor and told us to listen, while looking at the sea of very white ice in the sunshine, under a blue sky. In the primeval silence first we heard the cracking of ice, which in itself was phenomenal. And then, because it was so quiet, we could hear our own heartbeat. This was one of the highlights of the trip. To give a feeling of the event, I'll use this illustration (Photo by Woodwalker). It's accurate in that the people are wearing the red jackets, are admiring an iceberg and are surrounded by tiny growlers in the water. However—full disclosure--it's just meant to illustrate, because the zodiacs are black, not orange-red, and it's actually taken in Spitsbergen.

The Voyage Per Se But those were all excursions, and tell little about the ship voyage itself. What I liked was that there was such interest on the part of the passengers. Everyone showed up to the lectures by the naturalists, everyone was in the appropriate line for zodiac excursions, all ready to go. It was more like an academic experience at a university, where everyone was interested in learning and experiencing. I never saw anything like it, certainly not on touristy cruises I've taken. People were particularly friendly, and I met my group of five Australian friends there, Ruth & Neil, Janet & Peter, and John, who I still keep in touch with.

But there was not only cameraderie among passengers and with the naturalists. I've never been on a ship where there was such cameraderie between passengers and ship's officers. (Exception: I got to know a lot of Cunard engineers when I sat for dinner at the table hosted by engineers, but that was just for dinner and was more social in nature.) This cameraderie was typified this way. On most ships, passengers would love to visit the bridge and watch the ship being navigated, but that's possible only in rare circumstances, for a momentary quick visit. On the Explorer II, it was announced early on that passengers were not supposed to visit the bridge. But that was said with a wink. It was made clear that, as long as the door to the bridge was open, anyone could visit as often as they liked. I went daily, sometimes several times a day, and very rarely was the door closed. Keeping out of the way, people would watch the dials, talk to the navigator, and fully enjoy the experience. Friendliest of all was the Staff Captain, Giovanni Biasutti, who continued sending for a couple of years afterward holiday emails to some passengers he'd gotten to know.

But the culmination of the on-board experience, and one reason I put this as my number one favorite voyage is the night we reached our southernmost point. Those who were interested were told to be on the bridge at 3:00, and a group of us showed up to watch our route in the Antarctic twilight. We'd been visiting the Antarctic Islands off the Antarctic Peninsula (Map edited by Apcbg), where we'd also made a stop, and were coming down the Gerlache Strait (disregard red dot) to the Lemaire Channel (not shown on map) and approaching 65°S. A full description is at 2006/15, but I'll add here that, as we approached our southernmost point, carefully moving very slowly between bergs and bergy bits, the officers finally wondered out loud to those assembled that probably this was as far as we should go. I looked at the dial, and it read something like 64.8°S. I asked Giovanni if we couldn't go just a little bit further to even it out, and he agreed. In a short while, it reached 64.9°S, then clicked to 65.0°S. In other words, I felt that I was the one who got us that last little bit to literally reach our numeric goal. Can you imagine that happening on any other ship?

As a connection between my rail visit to Portugal and northern Spain and my rail visit to southeastern England, I wanted to sail across the Bay of Biscay (Map by Norman Einstein), since this was a major gap in my piecemeal circumnavigation of Europe. On the map, Bilbao is on the northern coast of Spain, close to France, and Portsmouth is on the south coast of England, just east of the Isle of Wight, visible in the English Channel on the map. It was a one-night crossing, and the ship was a cruiseferry, that catered to partygoers for short "mini-cruises", so it was a bit noisy.

It's the same story. Built in 1986 as the Olympia, it became the Pride of Bilbao in 1993. But that ended in 2010, when the Bilbao-to-Portsmouth route was closed down because it wasn't making money, even with the "mini-cruise" ploy, and the ship became the Princess Anastasia of the Saint Peter Line, and now runs on the Saint Petersburg to Stockholm route.

This concluded the Portugal-Spain-England trip of 2007.

Following the Africa trip this year and my touring of Switzerland by rail, I took the overnight train to Hamburg to meet the QM2. On boarding the ship, I first met and got to know friends Paul and Marya. Now that I've been calculating these figures, I'm surprised I've made as many as 19 Atlantic Crossings, and that doesn't count flights. I'll discuss that in the next posting.

This is an interesting 3-D perspective of the Hawaiian Islands showing how they are the tops of hidden massive volcanoes. The deepest waters are shaded violet. Historical lava flows are in red. We sailed from Honolulu, on the south coast of Oahu (second large island from left) to the north coast of Maui (second island from right) to both the east and west coasts of the Big Island, to Kauai (the first large island from the left), and back to Honolulu.

I made a couple of friends on this trip, too, Neil and Joe, with whom I still keep in touch. At Los Angeles, this trip continued, mostly by air, as the South Pacific and New Zealand trip. The Queen Victoria is not outfitted as an ocean liner, but as a cruise ship. She is the smallest of Cunard's current fleet, although only slightly smaller than the new Queen Elizabeth of 2010.

The South Pacific trip out of Los Angeles was mostly by air, this embedded sea voyage being the only exception. The Paul Gauguin was completed in 1997. It was taken over by Paul Gauguin Cruises in 2010. On this map of the Society Islands (Map by Keith Pickering), click to find Papéété on the northwest coast of Tahiti. We then crossed over to historic Raiatea and magnificent Bora Bora, then stopping in Moorea on the way back to Tahiti.

This pair of crossings was the only sea voyages on the trip to Australia, which was in turn part of the second round-the-world trip, this time by air. I was pleased that I was able to make connections both ways from Melbourne to the dock by tram. The Spirit of Tasmania I was built in 1998 under another name for a Greek line for service in Greece, but after 2002, she and the Sprit of Tasmania II have sailed on this route for the TT-Line. That company was separated from the department of Transport Tasmania in 1993 to become instead a private company, although wholly owned by the Tasmanian government.

This is a particularly interesting map of the Bass Strait, since it shows four different major infrastructure connections between Victoria and Tasmania. From the right, they're for electricity, gas, fiber-optic communication, and surface transportation, the ferry, in green. Note how the ferry route leaving Melbourne has to cross the bay before reaching Bass Strait on its diagonal route to Devonport.

I'll also now refer back to the Hellas in trip #4 above, which had crossed this route as the Taroona before and after WWII. She was a regular coastal ship, but had to be replaced as cars became more common and she couldn't carry enough. Thus another regular coastal route became a coastal ferry to adapt to changing times.

The ship was built in 1998 under another name, and was named the Regatta in 2003. The round trip on the Amazon was extraordinary, and our team for team trivia was fun, some of whom I still keep in touch with. In the Caribbean, I only got excited about Saint Barts, maybe Trinidad, and it was nice to go back to Nassau in the Bahamas (2011/12-13-14).

This was the 50th Voyage, last year, described in 2012/17-25. It was not an Atlantic Crossing, although the argument can be made that if Greenland really is part of North America, perhaps it should be. But that's a weak argument, since traditional Atlantic Crossings run much further south, and this trip ended back-tracking to Iceland, anyway.

Update on Later Voyages    To keep this list up-to-date, below are cross references to future postings of voyages beyond the 50th. Ship photos will be at the cross reference.