It's Friday night, tomorrow we leave on another journey, this time literally into the wild blue yonder. We've done this before as you can witness in a different Transatlantic cruise. We are hopeful we get the same weather—perfect—from the last voayge from Florida to Rome, with stops in Portugal and Spain.

This time we are back on the MS Koningsdam, a ship we had the luxury of being on for its maiden voyage.

As a personal refresher I watched a video. There is nothing better than being on the newest, most beautiful, ship of the fleet on a slow float across the ocean.

Which brings me to a discovery. When you go searching for a cruise quote it ends up being about Tom Cruise. Like this insight from Tom: "I love kids. I was a kid myself once." Um...yeah...

I did however find this one:

"Man cannot discover new oceans unless he has the courage to lose sight of the shore." Trust me when I say we lose sight of the shore, and everything else for that matter. I love it.

See you at sea.

A month ago we were complaining to ourselves that we had no real trip planned. Usually we have a spring cruise set up, and happily I have had a few birthdays in really interesting places. For instance Shanghai. But this year? Nothing. Until now...

Now we have three. The first is a Transatlantic cruise aboard the Holland America ship the Koningsdam, a brand new ship we were on for her first tour of duty. That happens April 2. No real time to plan which is fine. And we will be in Rome for Easter Sunday, near the Vatican actually. So we may send a note to the Pope and ask if he'd like to join us for a glass of wine. He does like his wine.


Next we are going to Hawaii in August. I have never been, and I have to admit it has never been on my radar since I've been obsessed with Europe.

Then an Asian cruise at Christmas with the extended family which will be great. I will finally see Hong Kong, and perhaps King Kong. So from nothing to the busiest year we have on record.

So stay tuned for our trip blog in the not so distant future.