Tag: South America Adventure

Construction of Marina began in August 2008 in Genoa Italy and was completed and placed in service in January 2011.  Coming in at 66,000 tons carrying 1,250 guests, it is a wonderful place to call home during our month-long voyage.   

Once we got on board, we found our way to our cabin, started to put stuff away and then wandered around to get some feel of the place.    

While wandering around I saw this picture of Mary Hart, from Entertainment Tonight Fame, she is the godmother of Marina.

There is a fitness center (yes, I’ve actually seen it!), a full spa treatment facility (Janeen has already had a mani-pedi) and various pools to relax in.  As yet we haven’t donned our bathing suits, but there is still time for sure.  There is a miniature golf course, shuffle board, paddle tennis, card games, bean bag toss along with various quiz events and scavenger hunt opportunities too.  Needless to say, lots of other things to occupy your time.  In the evenings there is usually some sort of diversion in the Marina Lounge – singers, dancers, magic shows and entertainment.  Yes, there is a casino but can only be open when we are out cruising the South Atlantic (not that I need to go in and lose any money).

One of the first enrichment programs we attended was by Captain Tom Anderson (USN Retired) in the Marina Lounge. He speaks periodically over the cruise.  The basic premise of his presentation was how much the geography of South America has influenced development.  For example, on the west coast, Chile is bounded by the Andes which run north to south and make it virtually impossible to cross west to east between Chile and Argentina.  

Thus, concentration of development is therefore restricted to the coastline.  Similar geography on the eastern side of the continent exists with mountains which restricted the expansion of various cities.  Rio de Janeiro is a good example.  Restricted on the west by mountains, the city is locked in, making expansion of the city virtually impossible.  These cities, while strong and doing well, are not really interlinked, thus making the transportation of goods and services difficult.  It was an interesting perspective of how South American has not had the kind of development similar to North America.  

As Oceania makes a big deal about it having “The Finest Cuisine at Sea” there are a variety of culinary opportunities – 4 specialty restaurants along with cooking classes.  Recently we participated in one of the cooking classes – “Pucker Up: Love and Lemons”.  

Joining with 24 fellow passengers we met in the Culinary Center with Chef Leah and began our preparations for a limoncello cake, risotto and escalloped chicken with capers and preserved lemon.  Risotto was prepared in stages teaching us the “secret” of creamy rice which absorbs the added flavorings as it slowly releases the starch crema.  We added lemon zest, preserved lemon (instead of salt) fresh peas and grated parmesan to our final dish. Meanwhile, our scone-like cakes were baking filled with air pockets and crunchy outer layer to absorb the lemon simple syrup later.  

Sou chefs measured the oils into our skillets and presented us with marinated, pre breaded chicken cutlets which we browned (80/20) removed to plate and fried capers to add to the plate before squeezing lemon juice over the meat.  Leah shared limoncello and sparkling wine flutes to drink with our chicken and risotto. The cakes having soaked up the syrup, we were ready to top them with lemon gelato prepared for us by sou chef Michelle. Recipe sheets were given out to make notes on for preparing at home.

On our second night, on the ship, it was Janeen’s birthday and we celebrated at the French specialty Restaurant – Jacques.  

This was a wonderful meal with truly a French character.  At the end of the meal, instead of offering us dessert, the staff arrived with a birthday cake for Janeen and proceeded to sing the Happy Birthday Song!  It was quite a wonderful surprise.

The Grand Dining Room is large with views off the stern of the ship.  

We have eaten there several times and always had attentive service and good food.  They do have a dress code – well, it is really ‘resort casual’,  no sandals for men.  The Terrace Dining Room is a buffet style but with lots of choices and attentive staff.  The do make a point that the guest doesn’t reach for the food, the staff places it on the plate for you.  Another dining option is Waves, located next to the pool on the 12^th deck, it offers burgers to order and other taste treats including ice cream and smoothies.  However, the place we go first, in the morning, and back throughout the day, is Baristas.  

This is first a coffee bar and second (later in the day) a drinks bar.  Pablo, who anchors the place, makes really nice lattes and cappuccinos to order.  

Of course, there is a library cozy with chairs to browse with lots of books, a puzzle table. .  Hidden away are various places to sit and read, relax and just take in the day.  At the top of the forward part of the ship is Horizons – with sweeping views ahead and a full-service bar.  It is also the spot for the Captain’s introduction of his team on one of the first nights.

Of course, there are Future Cruise Consultants on board ready to book your next adventure.  Since I already knew I was going to do that, I wandered in to meet with Cecelia to discuss what options there would be.  

She put together a nice package and helped us to book our shore excursions too.   We will be back on- board Marina in October for a Mediterranean adventure starting in Malta visiting Montenegro, Croatia, Greece and ending in Rome Italy.  Yes, there will be a blog when this happens.

There is lots more to come about the our adventure in South America – we still have another 2 weeks to go!

Founded in 1565 by the Portuguese, Rio de Janeiro was a domain of the Portuguese Empire. In 1763, it became the capital of the State of Brazil, and in 1808, the Portuguese Royal Court moved to Brazil, Rio de Janeiro became the seat of the court of Queen Maria I of Portugal. She subsequently, under the leadership of her son the prince regent John VI of Portugal, raised Brazil to the dignity of a kingdom, within the United Kingdom of Portugal, Brazil. Rio remained as the capital of the pluricontinental monarchy until 1822, when the Brazilian War of Independence began. Rio de Janeiro   served as the capital of the independent monarchy, the Empire of Brazil, until 1889, and then the capital of a republican Brazil until 1960 when the capital was transferred to Brasília.

Over the years we have all heard about Rio de Janeiro what with the beautiful beaches, the annual Carnival and of course the statue – Christ the Redeemer on the mountaintop.   Our visit was only for a day and we had booked a jeep tour taking us to Tijuca National Park and the Botanical Garden along with a motor trip through the City, past stadiums used for the 2016 Summer Olympics and along the vast beaches.

The Tijuca National Park is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and is an urban national park in the mountains that ring the city of Rio de Janeiro. The park is part of the Atlantic Forest Biosphere Preserve, and claims to be the world’s largest urban forest covering some 15.28 square miles.  With several beautiful waterfalls and an abundance of birds and other wildlife it was a beautiful spot to visit. The mountain air and the sounds of nature filled Janeen with good chi, she said. 

The views during our visit to the Tijuca National Park were wonderful. It truly was a beautiful day to visit this area of Rio.

We stopped at the Chinese Overlook – so named in order to honor the Chinese who brought the cultivation of tea to Brazil in the nineteenth century.  The gazebo was built in the early 1900’s in an oriental style and is strategically located in a clearing some 1250 feet high above the City.

While we were off “jeeping”, Sally was taking the Sugerloaf Mountain Cable Car.  The Cable Car is said to be the third-oldest cable car and goes to the top of the 1300 feet high mountain.  She took a couple of nice shots for sure.

Our adventure in Rio was only one day, there is so many beautiful pictures that I will continue our trip on the next blog.  

Once we left the Tijuca National Park we headed towards the Botanical Gardens.  As I may have mentioned in the past, whenever there is a Garden option for a tour, I have to sign us up as Janeen LOVES to visit gardens.  This place did not disappoint.

Founded in the early 1800’s the garden was opened to the public in 1822.  Covering about 350 acres, the park lies at the foot of the Corovado Mountain and contains more than 6,000 different species of tropical and subtropical plants and trees including 900 varieties of palm trees (no, I didn’t count all the ones we saw but we did see a lot of them).  With all the plants, naturally there are a bunch of birds – some 140 species of birds call the place home.  

Our guide seemed to know a lot about virtually everything in the Park and kept picking fruit off the various plants for us to sample.  

Back in the jeep we headed towards the water and drove past some of the most famous beaches in the world.  Sure, everyone has heard of Copacabana and Ipanema but there are several others of note – Joatinga, Barra da Tijuca and Flamengo to name a few.  

Many areas of the beaches are blocked off by the Hotels across the street and have umbrella’s ready for their guests, plus of course services available.  One of the interesting things we saw was the use of watering hoses to keep a pathway cool for walking from the pavement to the water.  

While I don’t normally do this, I would suggest reaching out to his tour company Jeep Tour Brasil should you see yourself in Rio de Janeiro 

Our time in Rio was limited but we packed a lot of sigh seeing into our day for sure. There is a good deal of wealth in the city but an equal amount of poverty too making the contrast between sections of the city very apparent. Given the opportunity we would certainly return to this place for more exploration.

Armação dos Búzios (or Búzios) was our stop on day 10 along our adventure.  Búzios is a Brazilian resort set on an ocean peninsula east of Rio de Janeiro. It’s known as an upscale vacation destination with numerous beaches. However, it has a long history going back to 1000 CE when the first indigenous population settled and created a small community.  In the 16^thcentury, the first Europeans arrived.  The next several hundred years had fisherman, pirates, African slaves, and various Porgugues, French, English, Spanish making inroads to the area.

Whales were also hunted to extract their oil, which was used both for lighting the city of Rio de Janeiro and for export. The bones of the captured animals were buried on a beach located next to Praia da Armação and has become one of the most famous beaches in Búzios today. Later, the area was used for farming and cattle raising as fishing has been prohibited on this stretch of coast. After prohibition ended, the local economy remained based on fishing and small-scale agriculture for a long period, until the middle of the 20th century when a famous actress, model and activist who started her career as a model, Brigitte Bardot took refuge in Búzios to get away from all the paparazzi who followed her everywhere.  

Búzios was a perfect spot to get away from them and while she had a very enjoyable stay, her presence soon spread around the world and tourism began to become the most important economic activity in the region.

Today Búzios has a stable population of about 30,000 but during summer the population more than triples.  It’s not easy to get to the area as you have to fly into Rio De Janeiro and transfer to the city. 

 Our ship was anchored off the city so our first views were of the beach areas and lovely city as it moved up the hillside.  Once ashore, we joined our tour group for a bus tour of the area with stops at various pictures spots and lots of information from our guide as we travelled along.

Santos, our port of call on day seven.  As we cruised into the dock, it was very clear this is a port with lots of shipping going on.  There were a number of freight terminals, what appeared to be grain towers and lots of ships waiting to get in and unload. 

Founded in 1546 by the Portuguese nobleman Brás Cubas, it is located mostly on the island of São Vicente, which is harbor to both the city of Santos and the city of São Vicente, and partially on the mainland. It has a population is 433,656.  

Before we event started our scheduled adventure, which was after lunch, we decided to go ashore and take the shuttle bus to the Praiamar Mall.  This shopping mall is huge and not unlike any other big mall we have been in over the years.  

Of course, there was a Starbucks and a Calvin Klein, Sleep Doctor, IPlace (really an Apple store) Lacoste, Levis and many more.  Our goal was to find some band aides for Janeen and a computer cable for David.   Without a location map and anyone speaking English it was a challenge but we were able to accomplish both tasks and get back to the Ship for lunch.  

After lunch we walked of the ship, found our way through the dockside throng of people and finally boarded our bus for the afternoon excursion.  Our guide Bianca gave some highlights about the city – seems all the grain silos we could see were for soy beans and a very large refrigerated building was for orange juice!  Santos is one of the largest shipping ports for coffee and there is a long history of coffee production and sales going back several hundred years.  The orange juice just struck me as being strange – large tanker trucks and ships are specifically designed to support the transportation of this juice from inland to the harbor.

Our first stop was to the Coffee Museum.  The Coffee Museum is housed in what used to be the Coffee Stock Exchange, where Brazilian coffee was weighed and traded before being sent through the Santos Port and overseas.  

The museum was Inaugurated in 1998 and quickly became one of the main touristic attractions of the City.  The concept was to preserve and make known the history of coffee in Brazil and in the world. Originally the building was the main auction house for coffee beans that would be shipped around the world.  

The evolution of the coffee culture and the political, economic and cultural development of the country are closely connected to coffee since the second half of the 18th century and up to current time.  Our group of  explored the  building at our leisure and of course had the opportunity to purchase coffee and other items at the end of the tour.

After the Coffee Museum, we walked through the old section of the City – many of the buildings having been abandoned and left to ruin – while others are being restored maintaining the historic fronts and building all new structures inside.  Our next stop was The Pele Museum.

One of the most highly regarded football players (soccer) know around the world is Pele.  It seems he has a connection to Santos and said if they (the city) would create a museum in his honor, he would donate all of his vast collection of all things football.  Opened in 2014, the site aims to highlight the success and the memory of the ” king of football.” For this, it exhibits a collection of items that tell Pele’s history.  The museum is filled with photos and various trophies and cups of the football star.  

After our visit to the Pele Museum we went to the botanical gardens which are located in the center of Santos.  This botanical garden covers more than 22 acres and has more than 300 catalogued plant species, divided into 20 botanical collections, such as Amazon and Atlantic Forest, hardwood, 65 species of palm trees and endangered species.  Work on the park began in 1925 in the old Municipal Nursery Gardens, located beside Santa Casa hospital, where City Hall gardeners planted the first seedlings and cuttings. In 1973, this work began to be carried out in the current grounds, in Bom Retiro, which then became the Botanical Gardens in 1994, when it started to offer conservation programs, especially for native Atlantic Forest species.  

Along with the various plants, there were a number of enclosures of various animals. While there were not many orchids in bloom, we did find a couple that were very beautiful.  

On the way back to the ship, we drove by the vast beach area – covering some 3 or 4 miles with various parks and biking paths.   According to the Guinness Book, Santos has the longest beach garden in the world.  It was a beautiful day and there were lots of people enjoying the beach and the various attractions along the way. During the summer season, Santos population increases by thousands because of their beautiful, well maintained beaches.