Here we go again!

Randy and I are off on another trip next spring: Tucson to Fort Lauderdale (via UAL) to Dover (via the Holland America Ryndam

http://www.hollandamerica.com/find-cruise-vacation/CruiseDetails.action?destCode=E&dateCode=4_2014&flexibleMonths=false&noOfFlexibleMonths=1&pageNumber=1&voyageCode=R430A&webItineraryIdForAudit=ETS427) to Istanbul (via UAL) to Bucharest to Amsterdam (via Uniworld River Princess http://uniworld.com/boutique-river-cruises/europe/grand-european-river-voyage/2014/day-to-day/#istanbul-to-amsterdam) to stay in a houseboat for 4 day (the Prins et Brouwer—we’ve stayed on her before, in 2006) to Tucson (via UAL). So it’s a fly-cruise-fly-cruise-fly trip!

Along the way we’ll pick up our children and their spouses (in Vienna) for part of the river trip. That was the original idea, that we’d have a family vacation in Europe (our son-in-law has never been to Europe). That became a two-week river cruise which became a four-week river cruise for Randy and me (we haven’t found a cruise that’s too long!). And then we had trouble getting a flight to Istanbul using UAL miles so we thought, what the heck, let’s cruise to Europe on the supremely convenient double Ryndam cruise (meaning it is actually two back-to-back cruises, Fort Lauderdale to Barcelona and Barcelona to Dover).

It was much easier to get a flight home FROM Amsterdam than it was to get one TO Istanbul and it was a piece of cake to get a London-Istanbul flight. So there we had it. Almost. We had stayed with Greg and Yolanda (our son and daughter-in-law) on a houseboat in Amsterdam seven years ago so we thought it would be fun to do it again. But I just couldn’t find the right one. I set my wonderful daughter to work on finding the perfect houseboat—and she did: the Prins et Brouwer, moored at the intersection of the Prinsengracht and Brouwersgracht canals, one of the most fabulous locations in Amsterdam. AND we had stayed in that exact houseboat seven years ago. I had been told it was no longer for rent. Wrong! So now Kathy has it reserved for June of 2014.

So, while the trip is still almost seven months away, we have most of the travel plans all squared away (wherever did that expression come from?). I’ve even logged on to the CruiseCritic.com Rollcall for the Ryndam so perhaps we’ll make some more good friends on the ship. There’s  a lot to live up to, however, from the ‘round the world cruise of last year!

Cruise Itinerary for the Holland America Ryndam

River cruise itinerary for the Uniworld River Princess

The ports/stops the Ryndam makes are: Ponta Delgada, Malaga, Cartagena (Spain, not Chile—maybe we’ll get to the Chilean one the following year), Ibiza, Palma de Mallorca, Barcelona (a repeat from the world cruise), Valencia, Alicante, Motril, Gibralter, Cadiz, Lisbon (a repeat from 2006), Bilbao, Portland (England), and Dover. Only two cities we’ve ever visited before! Then the river cruise goes to: Istanbul (a favorite from the world cruise), Bucharest, Giurgiu, Rousse, Vidin, Belgrade, Vukovar, Pécs, Budapest (two days), Bratislava, Vienna (four days), Durnstein, Passau, Regensburg, Nuremburg, Bamburg, Wurzburg (we were there 2005), Miltenberg, Frankfurt (also there in 2005), Rüdesheim, Cologne, and Amsterdam (we’ve been there several times). That’s 37 different cities and only six have we ever visited before!