Cruise News

If any of you have been wondering about my long absence from this blog site this picture is part of the reason. This ship is called Maasdam and is part of Holland America’s cruise fleet of 14 vessels. By the way, Holland is part of the Carnival conglomerate that also owns several other cruise lines such as Princess, Carnival etc. Marge and I recently spent 14 days aboard the Maasdam as it cruised from Boston to Montreal stopping on the way in Bar Harbor, Halifax, Sydney,Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, and Quebec City. From Montreal we reversed direction and headed back, stopping again at all these ports.

This is the third cruise we’ve taken, all with Holland America. We think Holland America is the cruise for us at our age, no climbing rock walls, surfing down pool waves and late night dance parties. A more sophisticated crowd (but not everyone), but you do have to dodge the wheel chairs, walkers and motorized vehicles carrying people who aren’t quite sure where they’re going.

The Maasdam is an older ship that was built in 1993 and is scheduled for a makeover in spring, 2011. It’s much smaller than the huge new ships they are building, but not small in class or service. Its size also allows it to make some ports that the big boys can’t make. She’s 720 feet long, carries 1258 passengers and a crew of 572. It has its share of amenities, beautiful dining room, casino, computer area, library, pools spa’s etc. Entertainment was phenomenal. Went to the shows every evening and had opportunities to meet a several of the entertainers. I was even part of the act one night, but that’s another story.

Obviously whenever anyone thinks about cruises they think about the food. The Maasdam didn’t disappoint. We had a nice gourmet dinner very night which included Alaskan king crab, Tenderloin, Lobster, Duck, Salmon, Chicken, Pheasant and so on. Appetizers started me off right by offering me Escargot on two occasions and great shrimp on many others. If you didn’t want to be waited on elegantly you could choose to enjoy a buffet type dinner up on what they call the Lido deck. Food was very good up there too, and the view from that top deck was great.

We had the good fortune to meet a great number of very nice and interesting people during the cruise. Trivia was played somewhere every day and we were fortunate to meet and team up with a very nice couple from Wales who were retired doctors. They were pretty sharp and the four of us had about four victories and many, many second places over the fourteen days. Seems we lost by one point almost every day.

Enjoyed the tours we took at the ports and visited many of Canada’s historic places. The excellent tour guides did a super job relating a great deal about Canada’s history, which frankly, I knew nothing about.

I really feel that a cruise is the way to go vacationing. If you want to do nothing you can do nothing. Want to live it up, you can. Want to read a book, grab a deck chair and enjoy the book along with the ocean. Marge and I took advantage of just about everything offered to us, and filled our time between events playing Gin Rummy (often by the way, 44 games in all. Score: Marge 22, Bill 22).

Stopping now because you’re all probably bored and fourteen days creates two many stories to include in a short blog. You’ll have to wait to be bored during a future face to face.

Loved this on our Alaska cruise a few years ago.

Taku Smokeries Famous Pate

1 pound smoked sockeye salmon
16 oz. cream cheese
1 cup mayonnaise
1/2 tablespoon Dijon mustard
1/2 tablespoon lemon juice
1 tsp. dill weed
A few turns of fresh ground pepper

Remove skin and finely shred the smoked salmon. Add softened cream cheese in small chunks. Process all ingredients in food processor. Enjoy on crackers, bagels etc.