600 Days to Go!

While only three days remain before we depart for our France’s Finest cruise, I happened to notice that we now have 600 days to go before boarding our Viking World Voyage. That seems like a very long time to wait!

600 Days!

The good news is that the buyers for my condo in Miami have secured their financing, so the closing should happen quite soon, and I’ll be able to sever my last ties to Miami (except for my friends, of course). Once that happens, the funds for our world cruise will be in place.

Final Documents Received

We received our final documents today, exactly two weeks before we board our ship in Avignon. The countdown has begun.

Almost Ready to Go

Making a List and Checking It Twice

I’m a list maker, and I always seem to make a list, or two, before each trip. There always seems to be a dozen or more things on my “to-do” list, and I get a bit of satisfaction in crossing each one off. Many of the items have nothing to do with the trip – they’re just necessary chores that must be completed prior to departure.

Hopefully, a few things on my list that I’ve already crossed off will make our lives easier while we’re away. Since we’ll only be gone for three weeks, Tim and I decided to have the post office hold our mail. I then signed up for Informed Delivery to see photos of our mail before it arrives. We now get a Daily Digest email that shows these photos. This service is free.

I also signed up for Mobile Passport Control, which allows eligible travelers to submit their passport and customs declaration information through a free, secure app on their smartphone. Since we have TSA PreCheck, but not Global Entry, this app should streamline our entry process into the United States by reducing passport control inspection time and overall wait time.

So Many Things to Check Off the List (And I Keep Adding More)

I must admit that preparing for a cruise, or most vacations for that matter, is a great excuse for me to go shopping. Unlike when I lived in Miami, I rarely shop now for anything except our day-to-day needs. Before a trip, however, I do like to purchase a few new clothes, shoes, etc. For me, it’s part of the fun, but I try not to go overboard. I think I’ve been pretty restrained this time. Tim is even less of a shopper than I am, but he did buy a new pair of shoes.

The preparations for this cruise are certainly easier this time given our experience in preparing for our cruise last year. I have a much better idea of what to take and what we can leave at home. Since we plan to travel only with carry-on bags this time, deciding what to take is a little trickier. I’m still working on our packing list.

Tim and I have also been looking at the shore excursions we previously booked. Viking cancelled one excursion in Paris, and we decided to cancel another all-day tour earlier in the cruise. We will have three full days of touring during our pre-cruise WOW trip to the French Riviera, and we don’t want to wear ourselves out.

We got our teeth cleaned, and we also decided to get another COVID-19 bivalent booster once a second dose was made available to people 65 or older. 

Tim has been working furiously to complete his assignments for his GIS class, since he will miss the last session. I can’t believe that he will have the presentation for his final project on the night before we leave for the airport. Thankfully, we don’t have an early flight.

A Few Facts About our France’s Finest Cruise

On May 7, 2023, we will embark on our France’s Finest river cruise. We are finalizing our preparations for our departure, but I’ll write about those in another post. Today, I want to introduce you to a few facts about our first river cruise with Viking.

France’s Finest is a 15-day journey that combines the Lyon & Provence and the Paris & the Heart of Normandy cruises into one “tour de force,” as Viking likes to describe it. We embark in Avignon and spend seven days on the Rhône River, ending in Lyon. From Lyon, we travel by TGV, France’s high-speed train, to Paris, where we board our second ship. From Paris, we travel for seven days on the Seine River as far as Rouen, our jumping-off port for tours to the D-Day beaches of Normandy. We then return to Paris where we disembark.

The Map of Our Cruise - Two Longboats and a Train

The two Viking Longships that we will travel in, the Buri and the Fjorgyn, feature similar design elements, but the Fjorgyn is a bit shorter with customized hulls and engines specifically built to navigate the historic Seine River. This design also allows the ship to dock just a few blocks from the Eifel Tower. The Fjorgyn carries 168 guests, while the Buri carries 190.

Viking Buri - Our Ship from Avignon to Lyon - Our Cabin Is Circled in Black

Viking Fjorgyn - Our Ship from Paris to Paris - Our Cabin Is Circled in Black

Our cabins on both ships are identical and are in similar locations on the middle deck. As I mentioned in an earlier post, we are in a Veranda B stateroom. These staterooms are 205 square feet with a small balcony. In comparison, our cabin on our ocean cruise last year was 270 square feet. There is plenty of storage space, although the bathroom is a bit smaller. We think it will work just fine for us, and we even want to check out the smaller cabins to see if we might be happy in one of those on a future cruise. Based on everything I have read, we likely won’t be spending much time in the cabin anyway.

Our Cabin Layout

It's time now to get back to finishing all those last minute tasks before we can fly to France.

The Blog Is Now Up To Date

I have been making periodic posts about my progress in bringing this blog up to date. I’m thrilled to report that I finished the final backdated post today! There’s not much more to say, so I’ll leave it at that.

My challenge now is to keep the blog up to date. That might be easier said than done.