Viking

Return to International Travel – Introduction

Posted on March 17, 2023 by 2btravel

Return to International Travel – Introduction
Review: SWISS A340-300 ORD-ZRH and Marhaba Lounge ZRH
Lodging Review: Sina Villa Medici, Florence, Italy
Our Time In Florence, Part 1
Our Time In Florence, Part 2
Lodging Review: Park Hyatt Vendome, Paris, France
Our Time In Paris, Part 1 (Louvre, Sainte-Chappelle, Arc, Eiffel Tower)
Our Time In Paris, Part 2 (Versailles)
Our Time In Paris, Part 3 (Catacombs, Musee d’Orsay)
Viking Kari and an Afternoon in Montmartre
Our Time in La Roche-Guyon and Vernon/Giverny
Our Time on the Normandy Beaches
Our Time in Les Andelys and Le Pecq
Lodging Review: Renaissance Republique, Paris, France
Review: Air France A350 CDG-ORD

After two years without an international trip I was thrilled to finally be able to travel internationally again. I researched Viking River Cruises that we had not yet taken and was excited to see that an extension on the Seine Cruise was a visit to Highclere Castle (aka Downton Abbey). As a relatively new fan of the show and films that would be something I’d love to see. However we like to cruise in October and not only did that particular extension package end in September, that extension was sold out for all but about two dates during the summer. So we decided to do something different.

In 2008 we had taken a Western Mediterranean cruise where in a single day we visited Pisa in the morning and Florence in the afternoon. We had a whirlwind tour of Florence, just enough for the famous museums and monuments to be pointed out to us but not enough time to get to explore any of them. So we decided to do a few days in Florence before flying to Paris to take a cruise on the Seine out to the beaches of Normandy and back. While the river cruise would start on Wednesday, we flew to Paris the Saturday before and had several days to explore things at our leisure as the mood struck us.

Red: Memphis-Chicago-Zurich-Florence (United and SWISS) Green: Florence-Paris (Air France) Blue: Paris-Chicago (Air France)
Maps generated by the Great Circle Mapper – copyright © Karl L. Swartz

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Categories: Air France, Autograph Collection, Award Travel, Cruises, Europe, France, Hyatt, Italy, Marriott, Renaissance, River Cruise, SkyTeam, Star Alliance, SWISS, Tours, Trip Report, Viking | Tags: Air France, Autograph Collection, Award Travel, Europe, France, Hyatt, Italy, Marriott, Park Hyatt, Renaissance, River Cruise, SkyTeam, Star Alliance, SWISS, Tours, Trip Report, Viking | Leave a comment

Mt. Fuji and Hakone Tour Returning by Shinkansen

Posted on June 11, 2018 by 2btravel

Exploring Asia Overview
Cathay Pacific B777-300ER Business Class San Francisco to Hong Kong
Cathay Pacific Lounge Review: The Cabin at HKG
Cathay Dragon A330-300 Business Class Hong Kong to Beijing
Lodging Review: Regent Beijing Hotel
Beijing: Dongcheng District
Beijing: The Great Wall
Beijing: Run-ze Jade Garden
Beijing: The Sacred Way of the Ming Tombs
Beijing: The Legend of Kung Fu
Beijing: Tiananmen Square
Beijing: The Forbidden City
Beijing: Hutong Tour via Rickshaw, Tea Tasting, Flying to Xi’an
Lodging Review: Hotel Shangri-La Xi’an
Xi’an: Qing Dynasty Terra Cotta Warriors
Xi’an: Tang Dynasty Dinner and Show
Xi’an Wrap-Up, Flying to Lhasa, Lhasa Home Visit
Lodging Review: Shangri-La Hotel Lhasa
Lhasa: Jokhang Temple and Barkhor Market
Lhasa: Canggu Nunnery and Sera Monastery
Lhasa: Potala Palace
Leaving Lhasa and Flying to Chongqing
Viking Emerald
Shibaozhai Temple
Cruising the Three Gorges
Three Gorges Dam
Jingzhou City Walls Tour
Wuhan: Hubei Bells Performance and Provincial Museum
Shanghai: Shanghai Museum
Lodging Review: Fairmont Peace Hotel, Shanghai
Shanghai: Old Shanghai and Yuyan Gardens
Lodging Review: The New Otani Tokyo Hotel
Tokyo: City Tour
Mt. Fuji and Hakone Tour Returning by Shinkansen
ANA Suites Lounge Review, Tokyo Narita
All Nippon Airways B777-300ER First Class Tokyo Narita to Houston

On our final day, Viking had contracted with another company for a tour out to Mt. Fuji and Hakone National Park. While we had the option to return on the bus, almost everyone opted to pay the few extra dollars to return via Shinkansen, the high-speed bullet train.

We were blessed with a beautifully sunny day which made the drive out to Mt. Fuji more enjoyable. We stopped along the way near Lake Kawaguchi-ko for a traditional Japanese lunch at a local restaurant. There was a wide variety of foods so even if you didn’t like everything that was offered there was certainly something else you would like.

Our lunch had lots of dishes!

What lurks beneath all the covers!

From the restaurant we could see Mt. Fuji in the distance. The rain that we’d endured the day before had brought the first snow of the season to the mountain, giving it a gorgeous topping.

Mt Fuji from Lake Kawaguchi-ko

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Categories: Asia, Japan, Tours, UNESCO World Heritage Site, Viking | Tags: Asia, Japan, Tours, UNESCO World Heritage Site, Viking | Leave a comment

Tokyo: City Tour

Posted on June 9, 2018 by 2btravel

The Tokyo City Tour was, frankly, a bit of a letdown. Perhaps it was that we’d been traveling for two weeks at this point but the tours from the Viking staff were just better than the ones on this extension. The guide didn’t have a microphone and we didn’t have headsets. Granted, the group was smaller but there’s just so much more you can learn if you can wander a little bit but still hear the guide’s spiel. I will definitely think hard before paying for another Viking extension.

Sensō-ji

Our first stop was not far from the hotel. We were let out near the Sensō-ji, an ancient Buddhist temple. It’s actually just one of several buildings on the grounds and there’s the Nakamise shopping street leading up to the grounds. Since we were just let out near the site, we didn’t really know what we were looking for or looking at which was disappointing after being spoon-fed during the previous two weeks.

The first temple on this site dates back to 645 AD after a sacred statue was found in a nearby river. This is the oldest temple in Tokyo.

Sensō-ji Temple

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Categories: Asia, Japan, Tours, Viking | Tags: Asia, Japan, Tours, Viking | Leave a comment

Shanghai: Old Shanghai and Yuyan Gardens

Posted on June 5, 2018 by 2btravel

Yuyuan Garden

The final day of the main part of the Roof of the World Tour began bright and early as we walked through sections of Old Shanghai on our way to the Yuyuan Garden. This garden dates back to the Ming Dynasty when it was first built in 1559 as a retirement gift from a son to his father. But before it was completed the son was appointed governor of Sichuan and that postponed further construction until 1577. At the time this was the largest and most prestigious garden in the city though its expense eventually ruined the family that built it.

By the 1700s the gardens had fallen into disrepair and a group of merchants purchased it and in 1780 the West Garden was opened to the general public. During parts of the next two centuries some of the buildings were used as headquarters by invaders or leaders of rebellions and the original structures inside the garden walls had nearly been destroyed. In the late 1950s the government appointed someone to restore the buildings. The gardens were fully opened to the public in 1961 and declared a national monument in 1982.

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Categories: Asia, China, Cruises, Tours, Viking | Tags: Asia, China, Cruise, Tours, Viking | Leave a comment

Lodging Review: Fairmont Peace Hotel, Shanghai

Posted on June 3, 2018 by 2btravel

We had chosen this Top of the World tour in the Beijing to Shanghai direction because you get to do the rickshaw tour of the hutong and you don’t if you take the tour in the Shanghai to Beijing direction. But we came to realize we were fortunate to have done the tour that way for a couple of other reasons. First, after being on tours or traveling every day for a week, by the time we got on the boat we really enjoyed having a few afternoons with nothing to do but nap and watch the scenery. The other reason was that had we stayed at the Fairmont Peace Hotel first, we might have been disappointed with the other hotels on our tour.

The Peace Hotel was orignally called Sassoon House and was built by Sir Victor Sassoon in the late 1920s. It’s a beautiful art deco building that was closed for three years for renovations and reopened in 2010 when Fairmont took over running it. Continue reading →

Categories: Asia, China, Cruises, Fairmont, Hotel, River Cruise, Viking | Tags: Asia, China, Fairmont, Lodging Review, Shanghai | Leave a comment

Shanghai: Shanghai Museum

Posted on June 1, 2018 by 2btravel

We left Wuhan and flew to Shanghai on Sunday. Our schedule got re-arranged a bit as we were scheduled to see the Shanghai Museum the next day but since it was closed on Mondays we stopped by before we even went to the hotel. I was floored by the line to get in. Pro tip: go as part of a group so you can use the group entrance!

The Shanghai Museum

The museum was founded in 1952 and the current location was opened in 1996. There are over 120,000 pieces in its collection. The building has four or five levels and it has eleven permanent galleries and three temporary ones:

Gallery of Ancient Chinese Bronze
Gallery of Ancient Chinese Sculpture
Gallery of Ancient Chinese Ceramics
Gallery of Ancient Chinese Jades
Gallery of Ancient Chinese Paintings
Gallery of Ancient Chinese Calligraphy
Gallery of Ancient Chinese Seals
Gallery of Ancient Chinese Numismatics
Gallery of Chinese furniture in Ming and Qing dynasties
Gallery of Arts and Crafts by Chinese Minorities

Atrium of the Shanghai Museum

Here are just a few items that I found interesting.

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Categories: Asia, China, Cruises, Tours, Viking | Tags: Asia, China, River Cruise, Tours, Viking | Leave a comment

Wuhan: Hubei Bells Performance and Provincial Museum

Posted on May 31, 2018 by 2btravel

The next morning, a Saturday, we awoke in Wuhan, the capital of the Hubei province and the most populous city in Central China with over 10.5M residents in the city itself and over 19M in the metro area. That’s roughly 3200 people per square mile.

Hubei Provincial Museum

Bells Performance

Our first stop for the day was the auditorium at the Hubei Provincial Museum where we would be treated to a bell performance. That doesn’t sound all that exciting but was actually pretty cool. I had visions of a number of different hand bells but this was different. These 65 bells were uncovered in the tomb of Marquis Yi who died approximately 430 BC. He was the ruler of Zeng, a minor state in what is now Hubei province.

These are zhong bells which means they are made of bronze and cast in a lens shape (think of two circles slightly intersecting) rather than a circular shape. The mouth of the bells also has a “cutaway” profile and on the outer surface there are 36 studs placed symmetrically on it. This allows these bells to produce two different tones, depending on what part of the bell is struck. The bells uncovered in the Marquis Yi tomb are still playable though the concert was performed on replicas.

There were six musicians, two on zither-like instruments, two on woodwinds and two playing the bells.

Musicians for the Bells Performance

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Categories: Asia, China, Cruises, River Cruise, Tours, Viking | Tags: Asia, China, River Cruise, Tours, Viking | Leave a comment

Jingzhou City Walls Tour

Posted on May 29, 2018 by 2btravel

Our stop the next day was in Jingzhou (jing – zhō) where we could choose to go visit an elementary school that Viking helps support or we could go visit the ancient city walls. Of our immediate group of 12, 7 went to the school while the other 5 of us went to the city walls.

Today Jingzhou has just under 6M inhabitants but “only” about 1.2 live in what we’d consider the metro area. Due to being situated right on the river the city has been a transportation hub and distribution center for 6000 years.

Our bus took us to the visitor’s center and we began the easy walk toward the city walls. On the way there we stopped to look at this picturesque bridge.

Bridge in a Jingzhou park

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Categories: Asia, China, Cruises, River Cruise, Tours, Viking | Tags: Asia, China, River Cruise, Tours | Leave a comment

Three Gorges Dam

Posted on May 27, 2018 by 2btravel

When we awakened the next morning we found that overnight we’d been through a series of locks and were now moored just downstream from the Three Gorges Dam. The dam is the world’s largest power station as far as installed capacity, meaning how many megawatts it can sustainably generate. The dam opened in 2009 but wasn’t fully functional until July 2012. The locks, which are off to the side were completed a bit later.

The government set up an excellent tour program for the dam. Our bus driver took us to the welcome center where we all checked in and then were put on one of the buses specifically for the tour. That dropped us off at the foot of a hill that had a series of escalators to take us to the upper-most viewing area.

Escalating up to the Observation Plaza

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Categories: Asia, China, Cruises, River Cruise, Tours, Viking | Tags: Asia, China, River Cruise, Tours, Viking | Leave a comment

Cruising the Three Gorges

Posted on May 25, 2018 by 2btravel

After leaving Shibozhai, we had the remainder of the day to ourselves aboard the boat. It was terrific to be able to recharge our batteries a bit and there was always interesting scenery outside our balconies.

Our next day was spent sailing through two of the three gorges of the Yangtze. We entered the Qutang Gorge first. It’s the shortest, narrowest and (according to the literature) the most spectacular of the three.

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Categories: Asia, China, Cruises, River Cruise, Tours, Viking | Tags: Asia, China, River Cruise, Tours, Viking | Leave a comment

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Viking

Return to International Travel – Introduction

Mt. Fuji and Hakone Tour Returning by Shinkansen

Tokyo: City Tour

Sensō-ji

Shanghai: Old Shanghai and Yuyan Gardens

Yuyuan Garden

Lodging Review: Fairmont Peace Hotel, Shanghai

Shanghai: Shanghai Museum

Wuhan: Hubei Bells Performance and Provincial Museum

Hubei Provincial Museum

Bells Performance

Jingzhou City Walls Tour

Three Gorges Dam

Cruising the Three Gorges

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