bbaydude

There is a fresh water shower located on the path leading to the 1st beach.

My wife & I looked carefully over all the options, and chose to take a cab. The local driver spoke perfect English, and told us all about the area on the way there. We asked him if he would also pick us up at an appointed time which he did. Price was about 45 Euros each way. BTW Bruges was one of our favorite ports. We did a canal ride, brewery, chocolatier, and had a local raspberry beer and French fries at a table on the main square. Fun!

There is so much to do in & around SF - depends on your tastes.

The CA Academy of Science is a fantastic natural history museum that can be combined with the Japanese Tea Garden, the De Young Art Museum, and the Botanical Gardens, or do any combination of those.

Take a stroll thru Chinatown with a dim sum lunch, and then walk over to North Beach for a Italian coffee and pastry.

If you like beer there are a number of breweries, or if you are more adventurous take a beer tour up to Sonoma County - lot's of fun.

Shopping on Union Square with High Tea at the Fairmont.

Wineries in Sonoma County are open all year, and less crowded in Jan.

Visit the Redwoods at Armstrong Grove in Guerneville, and then take the cave tour at Korbel Winery.

Visit Muir Woods & Stinson Beach.

We just got back from PV. Las Caletas was awesome! Very friendly staff, lots of water sports, very good food, unlimited booze, cooking classes, great beach.

Just emailed you - thanks!

It is like this on all the ships. Only our cabin did not smell of smoke.

We were on the Island Princess, and the smoking issue was mitigated by the location of the Casino, and the different layout of the ship.

I'm not a rabid anti-smoking nutcase, but this ship's a floating ashtray! Specifically, our room (as all are now) is non smoking, however this policy was only recently changed, and our room reeked of stale smoke. And no, we could not change because the ship was full. My wife had to get up numerous times during the night to get fresh air. We asked the steward to help, and he did spray some chemicals, but these wore off within a few hours. We even found a cigarette but on our balcony, so we know it was used as a smoking room previously. Secondly, you must walk through the casino to pass fore or aft on that level which means you must walk through the cigarette smoke whenever you need to pass. Also, the doors to the casino are left open, so the entire Piazza, and certainly Crooners bar reeks of smoke. The aft bar also allows smoking , so once again you are inhaling it. Lastly, the outdoor exercise area where you can walk around the ship allows smoking, so if you want to walk around or exercise to get some fresh air you are out of luck, because Princess allows smoking there also! So many people were complaining about the smoke - stay off this ship!