Doug's Photos

Friday, May 3, 2024

Eastern Europe Capitals - Danube River Cruise

In April and May 2024 we took a Vikikng Danube River Eastern European Capitals cruise with a pre-cruise extension in Prague and a post-cruise extension in Türkiye.

Click here to see some of the best pictures from this trip, or click one of the pictures below to see more pictures from that part of the trip.

Below is the map showing where we took photos. Click the picture to see an interactive map. Click any of the pins in the interactive map to see more details on that photo and a link to the blog entry.

April 2024 Danube River Eastern European Capitals Cruise

April 11 to 13, 2024 - Prague

As part of the Danube River cruise, taking us to Eastern Europen Capitals, we'd booked a precruise extension of 3 nights in Prague.

This is where the "real" Budweiser beer was brewed in the Czech town of České Budějovice which has the German name Budweis. Brewed for hundreds of years before Anheuser-Busch started using the name in 1876, which resulted in a global legal battle. Due to that, this beer is sold in the US under the name Czechvar. It's actually a pretty good beer!

2024-04-13 Terezen

April 14, 2024 - Prague to Vienna

April 15, 2024 - Vienna

Schonbrunn Palace was the main summer residence of the Habsburgs who ruled up to 30% to 40% of Europe between 1273 to 1918.

April 16, 2024 - Salzburg & Lake Region

We did a day trip tour from Vienna to Salzburg, the birthplace of Mozart. On the way to Salzburg we stopped this church near Mondsee Lake.

Mirabell Palace and Gardens is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. In the background you can see the medieval Hohensalzburg Fortress.

Our day trip to Salzburg was 3.5 hours each way and we returned late at night to find our ship was no longer where we'd left it! Since we'd left early that morning we'd missed the announcement that our boat would be moving to be behind another boat. It took us a while to find which boat our boat was now behind and gave us a scare.

April 17, 2024 - Bratslava, Slovak Republic

Our walking tour of Bratslava took us to a scenic view of Michael's Gate, built around 1300.

April 18 to 19, 2024 - Budapest, Hungary

We spent the next two nights in Budapest Hungary. Originally two cities, Buda and Pest, where Buda was the richer side and home to the Royal Palace. During the Industrial Revolution the Pest side grew exponentially becoming a commercial powerhouse. They were merged after Hungary gained greater autonomy in 1873 and made their capital Budapest.

Before becoming the capital, the combined city was usually referred to as Pest-Buda, since by that time Pest had become the more prosperous. But Budapest was smoother to pronounce in Hungarian.

Below is the site of the one of the worst atrocities of World War II. In the winter of 1944 - 1945, a Nazi-collaborating militia rounded up thousands of Hungarian citizens, primarily Jewish men, woman and children. Brought to the edge of the freezing river they were ordered to take off their shoes, a valuable commodity, so the militia could keep or resell them. They were then shot so the river current could carry away the bodies.

April 20, 2024 - Mohacs, Hungary

Our tour today took us to the nearby city of Pecs.

April 21, 2024 - Vukovar, Croatia

Our day trip took us to the nearby town of Pecs.

Church of the Transfiguration of Our Lord

April 22, 2024 - Novi Sad, Serbia

Our tour today took us to the nearby town of Novi Sad.

April 23, 2024 - Belgrade, Serbia

Today we had a walking tour of Belgrade. One of our stops was at the Kalemgdan, a large park featuring an historic fortress, museum, walking path and scenic river views.

Saint Sava is the first Serbian archbishop and Serbia's patron saint. The Saint Sava Church is the fourth largest Eastern Orthodox church in the world per Wikipedia.

April 24, 2024 - Donji Milanovac, Serbia

These locks lowered our boat 45 feet to go past the Iron Gate Hydroelectric Dam. Click the picture below to see what the other side of the dam looked like.

April 25, 2024 Vidin, Bulgaria

This waterfront fortress dates to the 10th century. It was built on the site of an even more ancient Roman fortress Bononia built in the 1st century AD and whose ruins still exist in the foundation and walls.

April 26, 2024 - Pleven Bulgaria

Today we had a walking tour of Pleven Bulgaria.This included a stop at a temple dedicated to St. Nicholas the Wonderworker who is revered as a patron of sailors, travelers, bankers, and families. In case you hadn't heard of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker, he's better known in the west as St. Nick, or Santa Claus.

Medieval Orthodox Temple of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker

This mausoleum honors the thousands of Russian and Romanians who died during the Russo-Turkish war in 1877 to 1878.

Chapel-mausoleum "St. George the Victorious"

Pleven Panorama is famous for its panorama depicting the liberation of Pleven in 1877. This bloody siege resulted in the surrender of Ottoman forces to the Russian-Romanian army on December 10, 1877, paving the way for Bulgarian indedepence from the Ottoman Empire after centuries of rule.

April 27, 2024 Constanta, Romania

Our river cruise ended with a day trip to Consta, Romania before flying us to Bucharest the next day.

Roman Ruins in Front of Saints Peter and Paul Church

April 28 to 29, 2024 - Bucharest, Romania

Senate Chambers in the Palace of Parliment

April 30 to May 2, 2024 - Istanbul Turkey

We'd booked a tour extension for three days in Istanbul. The first night there we had a non-Viking food tour which took us across the Bosporus from the European side of Istanbul to the Asian side.

It was a good thing we'd taken a tour the night before because all of our May 1 tours were canceled due to security concerns. May 1 in Istanbul is Labor and Solidarity Day, an official public holiday characterized by severe localized disruptions, massive police deployments, and transit lockdowns.

The next day, May 2 was super busy as we made up for lost time!

Click this link to see the top pictures from this trip or click one of the pictures above to see more pictures from that day.

Saturday, March 9, 2024

Back to San Francisco

After 16 days with stops in Kauai, Oahu, Kona, Hilo and Ensenada we returned to San Francisco.

Click the picture below to see a photo album with some of the best photos from this trip. The album has a summary slide show or you can click any photo in the album and scroll through the pictures manually. The manual review displays a description for each picture. For more detailed information including date and location, click ⓘ or ⋮ during the manual review.

Click this link to see more pictures in the Back to San Francisco photo album.

Thursday, March 7, 2024

Ensenada

After five days at sea we reached Ensenada Mexico. Hawaii cruises from San Francisco have to visit at least one foreign port before returning to San Francisco. In most cases that is Ensenada.

We'd been to Ensenada before and had considered not even getting off the ship. But Elizabeth found what turned out to be an excellent beer tasting tour. We lucked out even more by being the only two people on this tour, so we had a private tour for the price of a group tour. One other perk we ended up having was having pretty much the entire tasting area to ourselves since our tour started before many of the places we went to even opened. I hadn't realized how vibrant the craft beer culture is in Ensenada. They even have a beer festival once a year.

Our first stop was at Cardera and Bruer Tasting Room. Although it normally doesn't open until 1pm we were there around 11am. This tasting room is actually for two breweries, Cardera and Bruer. Their beers have won many awards and they were excellent. They were also brewing some barrel aged beers for the upcoming beer fest, but we weren't able to taste those.

Our second stop was at Chikilla craft beer. They also had an excellent selection of beers including one they don't normally serve, which was made from distilled beer. They used a beer that didn't quite turn out as they wanted, so they distilled it. Talk about turning lemons into lemonade!

The beer mugs you see in the picture above are owned by regular customers. For a small price you can have your own beer mug. And of course, you get a discount if you own one. According to the website they have "18 regular beers, 14 seasonal beers and more than 10 special beers." Although the first stop had slightly better beers, if you're going to one place I'd definitely recommend this place! The first beer tasting room did probably have almost as many different beers since it was two colocated breweries, but the second stop had the advantage of being colocated with a sushi restaurant.

Our third stop was actually at a deli to taste the beer of another brewer, Wendlandt Brewing, which doesn't open until 5pm, after our ship leaves. Regardless, we still tasted a Wendlandt beer at the deli and Elizabeth was able to get a cheese and meat plate to tide her over.

Click this link or one of the pictures above to see more pictures in the Ensenada photo album.

Friday, March 1, 2024

Hilo Hawaii

We hadn't booked any excursions for Hilo so we decided to walk 1.5 miles to Liliʻuokalani Gardens, with a stop at Coconut Island. On the way there we saw a turtle swimming in Reeds Bay near the shore.

Coconut Island is a small island park accessible via a short pedestrian bridge from Liliʻuokalani Gardens. If you look closely in the picture below you can see our ship in the distance.

Liliʻuokalani Gardens is a 24 acre park with scenic Japanese gardens.

We also visited Hilo Brewing Company but didn't take any pictures. Unfortunately when we were there they had been experiencing some equipment failures and didn't have any of their beers available. They did have four guest beers which were actually pretty good. They also had a separate area that sold some food. The tacos sold there were excellent!

A word of warning. Although Hilo Brewing was only a 1.5 mile walk from Liliʻuokalani Gardens, once you get away from the shoreline Hilo isn't a very walkable city due to the lack of sidewalks, narrow streets and sometimes heavy traffic. We took a Lyft from there back to the ship and if we had it to do over again, I think we would have taken one from Liliʻuokalani Gardens to the brewing company instead of walking.

Click this link or one of the pictures above to see more pictures in the Hilo photo album

Thursday, February 29, 2024

Kona

Our next stop was Kona on the big island of Hawaii. We walked a bit over a mile to the Old Kona Airport Beach, a beach visited mainly by locals. I was hoping to find at least some snorkeling, but it turned out not to be a very good place for that. Still, it turned out to be a fairly uncrowded beach with scenic views. Although it's not too far from the tender boat docks, the heat and humidity made it a bit of a slog.

The above picture is a panorama best viewed in Google Photos. To do that, click on the picture which will take you to the album with the picture. Then click on the picture within the album and click on it again to enter viewing mode.

Next we headed to the Kona Brewing Company, not too far from the ship tender boat dock. Because the cruise ship was in port that day, they were very busy. We were lucky to get one of the first come, first served tables in the bar area. A restaurant table would have been a 45 minute wait. The food was pretty good, but the beer was even better. I tried a couple of their standard beers and a couple of the limited edition beers, all very good.

There were a couple of small beaches next to the pier where our tender boat docked. The larger of the two, suitable for sunbathing and offering beach chairs and umbrellas for rent, was very crowded. But on the other side of the pier was a very small spit of sand with a roped off swimming area. That turned out to be a nice place to snorkel. Since there weren't very many other swimmers it was also a nice place to get photos of a variety of fish.

Click this link or one of the pictures above to see more pictures in the Kona photo album.

Wednesday, February 28, 2024

Oahu

I always try to get up early enough to see us pull into Oahu harbor to get a shot of Diamondhead and the sunrise. Although I like the photo below, it wasn't quite as impressive as the last time we visited Oahu.

We'd booked a snorkeling trip that day. Elizabeth, who books most of our tours, is always great about booking snorkeling and beer tasting tours for us, even though she doesn't swim or drink alcohol. This tour took us to Turtle Canyon, just off the shore from Waikiki.

This was a nice tour, the captain and crew were great, but the area was pretty crowded with our group as well as other groups. It was a challenge to get pictures without random body parts from other snorkelers.

The snorkeling trip left from a dock about a mile from where our ship docked, so we walked there from the ship. Our ship wasn't leaving until later that evening so we had plenty of time to visit a nearby brewpub and brewery.

Our first stop was at Off the Wall, a brewpub with a nice selection of local beers. At this brewpub it's easy to sample as many beers as you want. You get a card which you then put in a slot above one of the beer taps and your account is charged by the ounce as you pour beer. It was a great place to sample a lot of different beers 4 to 5 ounces at a time from a variety of local breweries. I tried a few of the Belgian and IPAs as well as a pilsner.

At Off the Wall brewpub I'd avoided any of the Aloha Beer Company beers since I knew we'd be heading there next. It's tough to beat a flight of super fresh IPAs right from the source, and probably fresh from the brewing vat. You also get to taste some of the limited editions as well and the Froot Lupes was one of my favorite tastes of the day. They were all very good and, of course, super fresh.

Click this link or one of the pictures above to see more pictures in the Oahu photo album

Tuesday, February 27, 2024

Kauai

After four days at sea we arrived in Nawiliwili Kauai. As you can see in the photo below, the view going into the harbor was beautiful!

We hadn't booked any tours that day. Last time we'd done the helicopter tour, expensive but worth it. This time we chose to walk to the nearby Kalapaki Beach and just enjoy the view. There's a Duke's Kauai there as well, so we sat and I enjoyed a couple of Kona draft beers.

Heading out of the bay was also scenic. And after what seemed like too short of a stay, we were on our way to Oahu.

Click this link or one of the pictures above to see more pictures in the Kauai photo album.

Monday, February 26, 2024

At Sea

Fourth and last day at sea before reaching Hawaii.

Click this link or one of the pictures above to see more pictures in the At Sea photo album.

Friday, February 23, 2024

At Sea

Second day of cruise and first of four at sea days before we reach Hawaii. There are a lot of at sea days on this cruise, but once you get used to them you actually enjoy them. Especially if you're retired and not worrying about work. The weather is pretty rough but it helps to see a rainbow, especially the rare double rainbow shown below.

Click this link or one of the pictures above to see more pictures in the At Sea photo album.

Thursday, February 22, 2024

Hawaii Cruise - Leaving San Francisco

Our first day aboard the Crown Princess cruise ship for a 16 day cruise to Hawaii, with a stop in Ensenada Mexico. In case you didn't know, most cruise ships have to have a stop in at least one foreign port if they leave and return to an American port. That's why Hawaii cruises have a single stop in Mexico and most Alaska cruises have a single stop in Canada. When cruises to Alaska resumed in 2021 after the COVID shutdown, Canadian ports were not yet open and so congress passed a temporary law allowing cruise ships to go to and from Alaska without stopping in Canada.

Here we are looking out over San Francisco from our cabin balcony. You can see Coit Tower in the upper left of the picture. We were lucky to have a larger than usual balcony, though it didn't make a lot of difference. To tell you the truth, we rarely were on the balcony anyway. That's why we often stick with an ocean view cabin and use the money we save to book an extra cruise. Still, it was nice to have a ceiling to floor wall to wall window view of the outside world.

Princess cruise lines no longer specifies a boarding time and boarding group for passengers. Instead you can board anytime between 11am and 2pm, though that time may vary depending on when your ship arrives and departs. Nobody really paid attention to that boarding time anyway. In any case, it is usually a zoo when you arrive, especially in San Francisco. First you wait in a long line to drop off your luggage. Then you wait in another long line to go through security, get your medallion and board the ship. If you pay an extra $10 for shipping, Princess will mail you the medallion ahead of time, saving you some time. But to save even more time, arrive at around 1pm after the rush and you'll practically walk on without much of a wait. The only downside is that you have to settle for a late lunch or eat before boarding the ship.

Soon we were on our way, with scenic views of San Francisco, Alcatraz and of course, the Golden Gate Bridge.

Click this link or one of the pictures above to see more pictures in the Leaving San Francisco photo album.

Friday, February 2, 2024

Back in San Francisco

Back home in San Francisco! I woke up early enough to get a picture just after we'd passed under the Golden Gate Bridge. The picture from last year was better though.

Back home in Port of San Francisco after an enjoyable 10 day cruise in Mexico!

Click this link or one of the pictures above to see more pictures in the Back in San Francisco photo album.

Thursday, February 1, 2024

At Sea

Our last days on the cruise and we were going through a part of the Pacific Ocean that, in my experience, often seems to be unsettled. In this case the ship was rocking enough to cause some very big waves in the pool, even though it was partially empty. They were actually in the process of emptying all of the water out of it for safety reasons.

The ship also had a "cooking" show, which was more of a comedy show, the last day at sea. That was followed by a parade of the wait staff and cooks coming on stage. This is all part of encouraging people to give the staff a good rating on the surveys that are sent out on the day you arrive home.

The Princess Theater stage show was followed by a parade around the Piazza, on a low mid-ship deck, where the staff waved flags indicating their home country. There were quite a variety of countries represented.

One of the main points of this show was to get people to provide high ratings for the cruise in general and also indicate one or more people who you think provided exceptional service. We generally keep track of the names of the people who we think provided great service. This in general includes our room steward, the wait staff, and often the hostesses. I know our cruise was off to a rocky start with blaring music in the hallways at 6:30am on the first morning of the cruise, and chaos in the dining room waiting area the first two nights. But they more than compensated for that during the remainder of the cruise and by the end of the cruise we had an assigned table and the hostess for the dining room remembered our names, which I find impressive given how many people are aboard and how frequently they get an entire new shipload of passengers. The crew really do work hard and the pay is not the best. Good recommendations can provide them with some perks, one being they're more likely to be rehired on future cruises.

Click this link or one of the pictures above to see more pictures in the At Sea photo album.