A self confessed Cruiseaholic…… with barely enough funds to support his passion!
Today, NCL’s newest ship was floated out of the shed at the Meyer Werft ship yard in Germany. There are a couple significant things about today’s float out, firstly at 146,600-tonnes she is the largest cruise ship to ever be built in Germany and secondly she is the first to be floated out bow first.
Not long now until we do our one night cruise on her from Rotterdam.
Sadly I have just learnt that there has been an itinerary change to our Celebrity Eclipse Christmas cruise. St. Thomas has been substituted with Labadee which means that Christmas day is now going to be a sea day and Boxing day will be at the revised port.
I am not too surprised that this has happened given the amount of ships that were due to be in St. Thomas on Christmas day but do admit to being disappointed at the decision to go to Labadee. We were last there in November 2010 and were not too impressed with the beaches, I know there has been a lot of work done since and hopefully it will all be for the good.
| DAY | DATE | PORT | ARRIVE | DEPART | |
| Sat | Dec | 14 | Fort Lauderdale, USA | 4:30pm | |
| Sun | Dec | 15 | At Sea | ||
| Mon | Dec | 16 | At Sea | ||
| Tue | Dec | 17 | Oranjestad, Aruba | 8:00am | 8:00pm |
| Wed | Dec | 18 | Willemstad, Curacao | 7:00am | 5:00pm |
| Thur | Dec | 19 | At Sea | ||
| Fri | Dec | 20 | St. George’s, Grenada | 8:00am | 5:00pm |
| Sat | Dec | 21 | Bridgetown, Barbados | 8:00am | 5:00pm |
| Sun | Dec | 22 | Castries, St. Lucia | 8:00am | 5:00pm |
| Mon | Dec | 23 | St. Johns, Antigua | 8:00am | 5:00pm |
| Tue | Dec | 24 | Philipsburg, St. Maarten | 8:00am | 5:00pm |
| Wed | Dec | 25 | At Sea | ||
| Thur | Dec | 26 | Labadee, Haiti | 8:00am | 5:00pm |
| Fri | Dec | 27 | At Sea | ||
| Sat | Dec | 28 | Fort Lauderdale, USA | 7:00am | |
Labadee November 2010 – Just above the Zip line landing area
Labadee November 2010 viewed from the ship
The time is fast approaching when the Norwegian Breakaway will leave the shed at the Meyer-Werft shipyard in Papenburg. Final preparations to the hull art are nearly complete and she is starting to look like the artists renderings. Looking at the photo, I wonder how many will call her the “Peter Max”?
Norwegian Breakaway’s hull art nears completion at the Meyer-Werft shipyard in Papenburg. Photo courtesy of Norwegian Cruise Line
Having booked our transatlantic flights earlier this week due to the 330 day window opening for flights within our required dates, my thoughts soon turned to booking the over night accommodation in Fort Lauderdale. I had spent many hours researching different alternatives and eventually decided upon the Hilton Fort Lauderdale Marina.
Photos from http://www.fortlauderdalemarinahotel.com
It is close to Port Everglades and has rooms facing the Intracoastal Waterway so we will hopefully be able to watch the ships coming in on the day of our departure.
We have also taken advantage of the hotels cruise package which includes in the price