My husband and I are regular cruisers. We love the convenience of unpacking only once and visiting different ports of call. This trip was special because of Solstice’s Master, Captain Tasos Kafetzis. He was a hoot! I don’t think we ever encountered such an engaging captain in all our years of cruising! What a funny guy! We were glad that we caught his last sailing before he left for vacation. The other people who made this cruise special were the naturalist, Brent Nixon (a former green beret instructor) and his cultural historian wife, Miss Amanda (Mary Amanda Fairchild). Both lecturers were informative and interesting. We learned a lot on this trip, not just about the Alaskan wild life (both man and nature alike), but also about the Titanic’s sinking and the significance of the last song that was played before it sank (and why so many people got it wrong). Who knew we’d be learning so much while on a cruise?

EMBARKATION:

We took the first flight out of New York to Seattle on the day of embarkation and will never do it again. The weather forecast was severe thunderstorm for that morning. That’s when we learned that Delta charged $200 pp to change a flight. We were lucky. Not only did our plane left on time, but we also arrived 30 minutes early. Read more