#183 Nomad Diary. 20-26 April 2024. Honolulu Sunday-Monday. Last Full Week on the Ship. 4 Sea Days Sailing to San Francisco (27th).
 |
| My Ship Buffet Lunch of Lentil Soup, Salad, Guacamole and Chips |
 |
| A Picture from Brazil. Our Son Jeremy with Our Grandson Quinn, 3 yrs + 7 months. Saturday. 20. Sea day. Daily schedule of getting up as early as 5am and doing our regular daily floor routine workout (DDP Yoga). Sometimes we can be on our ship balcony with nice weather like today! After that we go down to the International Cafe and get coffee; go for breakfast. 9am Bible class. Mid-morning tea and visit someone. Computer work in our room. Lunch at 12ish. Back to room for duolingo, time resting and reading. Afternoon activities or lectures or a nap. 4pm trivia, 5pm dinner in the dining room. 730 show in the theater, 9pm Bedtime, crossword together. |
 |
| Arriving at Church in Waipahu,Hawaii. A Bus Ride and a Walk. |
 |
| After Church and Lunch in Waipahu, Hawaii. Waiting at the Bus Stop to Ride Back to Honolulu |
 |
| Sidewalk Between Ala Moana Blvd and Park |
 |
| View of Large Banyan Tree in Ala Moana Park. Looking Toward the Ocean. |
 |
| Taking a Sit Down Break on This Hot Day in Honolulu Beside Ala Moana Park |
 |
| View of The Aloha Tower with Lights. Built in 1926. From Our Ship We Also See Another Ship |
 |
| Honolulu Street |
 |
| Aloha Tower |
 |
| Nice Tree in Ala Moana Park |
 |
| Ate at This Taco Stand on Queen Street, A Couple Blocks from Ala Moana Park |
 |
| Very Delicious Tacos from Stand |
 |
| Walking Back to Our Ship in Background. Also a View of the Aloha Tower. Sunday. 21. Arrived Honolulu. We got an immigration appointment for 7:30 am. We got through the line and walked to the 7/11 convenience store where we could purchase a city bus HOLO card. We got our cards after getting cash from the ATM machine because they only take cash for these cards. We walked to the bus stop, waited to get our bus and rode 30 minutes to Waipau. We arrived and walked about 10 minutes to the church. We were there for Bible study and worship. Then we walked to a Filipino restaurant for lunch. We ordered way too much food! It was delicious but we couldn’t eat it all. We walked back to the bus stop and rode back to Honolulu. We walked to Moana Mall and shopped there and also at Walmart. We walked back to the ship. It was a beautiful and tiring day! Monday. 22. Left Honolulu around 5pm. At nighttime we put our clocks forward one hour. We have two more forward hours on sea days on our way to California. |
 |
| Cindy and John from Chicago at Daily Trivia |
 |
| Selfie with Me, Darrell, Antoinette and Nick from Australia. Regular Bible Class Participants |
 |
| Darrell and Kathryn from Alberta, Canada in Bible Class |
 |
| Another Beautiful Sunset at Sea |
 |
| Video Call From The Ship With Daughter-In-Law Erin and Grand Esther |
Tuesday. 23. Traveling 4 sea days to San Francisco, California. It’s cooler with breezes and weather. I shopped online for a new swimsuit. I like Lands End brand because I can get ‘board shorts’ that cover my thighs. My current swimsuit is quite old and falling apart! Lol! I get into pools mostly on cruise ships. I’ll see how long the next one lasts!
Wednesday. 24. Sea Day.
Thursday. 25. Sea Day. Meeting with friends on board. Talking long after our 45 minute Bible class time together. Sharing contact information and getting pictures with my newest friends.
Friday. 26. Our final day is for last visits with friends onboard, settling our account, and getting packed to leave the ship in the morning. After dinner on the last night of the cruise, we pack everything into our suitcases except our clothes and toiletries that we need for this night and the morning and a backpack each to carry off the ship. The luggage goes outside our rooms to be moved off the ship first thing in our San Francisco port. When we leave the ship we go through the luggage area and collect our bags as we go on to our airport transport. In this case we are taking a prearranged bus transfer to the airport.
Nomad Notes.
Questions that have come up recently from other cruisers:
1. How did you downsize your things? Answered in some of my first blogs.
2. What about the cost of living the Nomad life compared to living in a fixed residence? Does it cost more? Do you eat out a lot? Great questions. Long answers exist. lol. Short answer is we have been spending less than we budgeted for living this way. We spend less than owning and maintaining a house and going on vacation travel. Our budget in either lifestyle is a fixed amount based on our retirement plan. Our daily costs vary widely from a few dollars when we house sit, stay with friends and family or travel by cruise.
3. What about health insurance? We have a federal government employees plan that covers us around the world. We also have a membership in Medjet for any possible extreme situation that this insurance would not cover.
4. What about your mail? We have a Personal Mail Box service in South Dakota called America’s Mailbox. We also became South Dakota state residents in June 2023. Our oldest son holds access to our personal papers in a small fireproof safe as well as other information access.
5. What are your top 2 favorite and top 2 least favorite travel destinations? Different for Darrell and me. Me: Rome for 5-7 days! It really lights me up to be in Rome. We both loved Machu Picchu when we took a 6 day tour (Peru for Less) with a group of 12 family and work friends of mine. These were both pre-retirement travel for me. Traveling now is not the same as a vacation was away from work and going back to work. Now, I have enjoyed spending a month near Newcastle, England on the coast of the North Sea. I liked the spring weather, our coastal walks, our nice apartment, church friends, and more.
6. How far in advance do you book Airbnb or Booking.com reservations? For Yellowstone National Park we booked 8 months out. For small-town US we can book anywhere from 3 months to 3 days out.
7. How does house sitting work? We have profile on trustedhousesitters.com that Darrell maintains and does all of the managing. For New Zealand, he discovered about 6 months ahead of our travels there that they have their own in-country house sitting companies. We used a NZ company for NZ house sits. Darrell managed that too.
8. How long will you be doing this kind of living? Not sure how long. For now this is our mode.
9. Do you have an RV? No.
10. What’s your next adventure? Brazil June 11th to visit our son Jeremy’s family.
Comments
Post a Comment