brittany12

I just don't get saying the Yacht Club makes for a great sailing experience for a person who also likes Oceania. I understand its exclusiveness for this group of 200-250. You may not have to hang out with the hoi poloi for meals and pool but you are are on a 5,000 passenger behemoth. Don't you see those climbing wall? the Waterfalls? All the noise from around the ship? When you get to a desination, don't you get off with the invasion of 5000 others to occupy any port? And embark with them? Just a mystery.

SS yesterday advised passengers on my May 2024 Transpacific on the Muse from Tokyo that it was cancelling the scheduled stop in Petropavlosk. They added another Japan port instead before beginning the long hike back to the US. Citing the reason as the continuing Russian war against the Ukraine, it's a good thing they did or else we would have cancelled the cruise on our own. We had been waiting, but this is two years out! So this is really serious stuff. I'm sure the SS Baltic '24 cruises will be changed when that schedule comes out. Russia is now an international criminal nation and no one we know wants to go there. And it isn't safe anymore for Americans. Thank God we got to SPburg twice in earlier, friendlier times.

I found the Montreal to Boston Fall foliage cruise a bit boring. Ports are nowhere like European ports with exception of Quebec City. Has not everyone been to Boston by now in their lives? Waters not always predicable as we enter the fall hurricane season. Not much foliage to see from out at sea and only good when entering and in ports, if before Columbus Day.

SB as well as SS seems to believe that the Russian-Ukrainian war will be over by next year and Russia will be welcomed back into the family of civilized nations. St. Petersburg is either back on or bender left their 2023 sailing schedules. All forgiven. Not true for Oceania and others. Personally, I won't forget and would not go there under any circumstances, even if the US allowed, considering what its criminal government has done not just to its next door neighbor, the harm it has inflicted on the rest of the world, and the irreparable damage it has done to international law. Cruise travel to welcoming and safe nations will never be the same.