WARNING: the theme of the first three paragraphs of this post is “a little–well, a lot–of disappointment goes a long way.” Bypass them as you wish.
My travel agent had strongly encouraged me to select off-ship excursions through the cruise line because the line would then be responsible for any incidents related to those excursions. I followed her advice except for two activities. The one that applied here I scheduled through an outside vendor because they advertised that they could accommodate those with accessibility needs for a sunrise visit to Haleakalā National Park. The cruise line specifically indicated that they could not provide accommodations, so that choice was my only option. I will not use space here to describe what happened, but the result was that I was unable to make the trip and, thus, missed the national park. The only positive from the situation was that I got a couple of pictures standing by the bow of the ship.
The next day was supposed to be my chance to visit the second national park in Hawai’i, Volcanoes National Park on the Big Island. Short and simply, the bus that was to take us there started having problems that delayed our departure from the dock, then broke down completely about 20 minutes away from the park entrance. By the time it was fixed, it was too late to drive to the park and be certain we would make it back before the ship was scheduled to depart.
It’s an inevitable part of traveling–just like in life overall– that **** happens. Fortunately, it’s hard to stay pissed too long when you are cruising through Hawai’i.
On Monday, since I had no other excursions planned that day, I got some make-up sleep (I’d gotten up at 3 a.m. for the failed sunrise excursion), then I availed myself of several of the services onboard ship, including my ongoing effort to try every non-alcoholic drink I could and to take photos of Maui, including this panoramic shot:
We left Maui that evening, and I found a great spot on Deck Five to see how the ship would maneuver out of the seemingly narrow harbor where she was docked–video one shows how narrow the gap was. I’m going to share two of the series of short videos I took:
The rest of the video clips are at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHri1-C0QC6OV0gGxJuqKyQ, and the pictures from Tuesday are located at http://singin1.pics/piwigo/index.php?/category/Hawaiian-Cruise-2024-Day-5.
We spent Tuesday in Hilo. We were able to visit a store and see some of the Big Island town before the bus broke down the second time. I’ve posted a few pictures below:
The repaired bus got us back to the ship with about 30 minutes to spare. Since the excursion was organized through the cruise line, I got a full refund plus a $50 credit that could be used for any services onboard before the cruise ended (more about what I did in a later post) and a delicious “so sorry” message of dark chocolate-covered pineapple slices delivered to my room. I’m going to find a recipe for it and experiment once I get home.
The pictures from the day are available at http://singin1.pics/piwigo/index.php?/category/Hawaiian-Cruise-2024-Day-6.
I originally have two excursions scheduled for Wednesday, but the cruise staff informed me that I might be unable to access the tender ships that would be used only that day to shuttle guests from the ship to Kona on the Big Island. I had to commit in advance either to cancel both excursions in order to get a full refund or take a chance of being unable to reach the tender ships, missing the excursions, and losing several hundred dollars in fees. I obviously chose to cancel.
On that Wednesday, I observed the process and concluded that I would be able to reach the tender ships and climb aboard with limited assistance.While I was walking about the ship, though, I saw a phenomenon in the waters of Kailua Bay that I am still curious about. I captured it in the video below for further investigation:
I waited until the maddening crowd had left the ship, then I took a leisurely ride to shore with the careful and courteous assistance of ship’s crew. While on shore, I marveled at the clarity of the water and wished I had been able to go on the glass-bottomed boat ride that I cancelled. Still, I caught a hula show, which I’ve posted a short video of the dancers below:
There was a restaurant across the way that offered a wide-ranging seafood menu. I decided on a very tasty mahi-mahi and shrimp combination platter for lunch. Yummy!
I wanted to get back before the pre-launch mad rush began, so I got a picture of Pride of America and various scenes in the area then caught a tender ship back.
It was a lovely, warm day, and I had a good time despite missing the excursions.
All of the pictures from this day are available at: http://singin1.pics/piwigo/index.php?/category/Hawaiian-Cruise-2024-Day-Hawaiian-Cruise-2024-Day-7.