It's a sea day with no plans to do anything. Well, almost no plans. We need to drop off our passports at 11:30am with Holland America. They will handle the immigration requirements for us in Iceland and Greenland. We also signed up for a wine tasting class at 2pm and we'll see how that goes. Today I'm not feeling my best. I'm not up for much of a breakfast. I return to the room for a nap about 10am while Karen runs around the ship. That's not ...

The Shetland Islands are a part of Scotland and I understand that I have some Scottish heritage in my family history along with English and Swedish. Today we have a Shetland Island private tour with David Malcolm. I signed up with him back in February along with another couple from San Leandro. He's a retired doctor living in Scalloway for over 30 years. He emailed us a week ago saying he will be on the dock at 9am looking for us and holding a sign with a puf...

I can feel the ship's engines shuddering and revving as I slowly awaken in the morning. It's almost 8am and the Rotterdam is making final maneuvers in the docking process at Bergen. We have no major plans for the day so there is no rush this morning. While most of the people are making their way off the ship, we enjoy a leisurely breakfast upstairs. I grab a couple of milks and return to the stateroom to stash them in the refer, then meet Karen and we dis...

A sea day is always welcome. While maybe not generating the most exciting stories, it allows us to regenerate ourselves from the demands of excursions and dinner dates. Today, however, we have a Meet & Greet scheduled for 11am. I had volunteered to set it up with our Cruise Critic group and made the arrangements with Holland America months ago. We have about 80 people signed up to attend. After breakfast this morning, I go upstairs to the Crow's Nest bar and ...

We get up for the final time before moving to the ship. Mom's excited about not having to move the suitcases around anymore. She's excited? I'm ecstatic! Karen has a hard time pushing hers around. It gets caught on cobblestones, curbs and train tracks. I tell her to push it at the bottom with her foot but she struggles. I'm glad to see them go. We get our free hotel breakfast, pack our things and check out of the hotel. The reception calls a taxi ...