October 10, 2025

Cebu greeted our Ship with a big warm welcome, despite having just been rocked by a major Earthquake, days before our arrival. The Minister of Tourism arrived with a motorcade and she proceeded to chat with the residents and thank us, for all our support.

Our residents rallied to contribute in a variety of ways i.e. cash donations, volunteer work, prayers and spending lots of dollars in Port, to support the local economy. I went to a local college and volunteered my time, with several other residents,  to help with emergency provisions any way we could. Our Ship's Purser was able to procure a truck load of food staples and we were able to sort them into care packages, for the affected families.

Above some photos of our volunteer groups. Some cut tarps and rolled into useable bundles. We packed bags with water, bug repellent, blankets and sanitary products. We chatted with the local college students who organized things in their main building. World Central Kitchen, had volunteers on site to coordinate food efforts. We formed a large human chain to get all the organized supplies off the 2nd floor, down to the waiting trucks. It felt good to help in any way they needed!


Afterwards we went to the Mega Mall near the Port and did some shopping and was so excited to find our favorite dumpling restaurant to have a great dinner. We thought we had said goodbye to DIN TAI FUNG in Taiwan, but Hooray, they have tons of locations!

HONG KONG

By Pat Patrick • September 3, 2026
So excited to get out and explore this huge city. Our Port is attached to a huge shopping mall - so it is a bit of a hike before we even get outside. When we do the heat hits us like a brick wall! There are typhoons, in the area and according to a local, when the storms come in, they first bring a wave of fog, heat and humidity to Hong Kong .

ENTERING HONG KONG HARBOR

By Pat Patrick • September 1, 2026
On Saturday August 29, 2026 we achieved another historic milestone on this circumnavigation of the World , we cruised into Hong Kong Harbor. Hong Kong is a special administrative region of China. The land encompassed by Hong Kong is confusing. It includes part of the southern coast of mainland China, just below Shenzhen, Hong Kong Island, Kowloon and the New Territories . Looking at a map helps, but the rules changed so many times! I asked my buddy Chat several times, to tell me if what I was looking at was the Hong Kong that the British had owned for years. The answer was never straight forward!

HA LONG BAY, VIETNAM

By Pat Patrick • August 31, 2026
Ha Long Bay in Vietnam is one of those bucket list places I have had in my sights for years. It's the iconic picture in my mind's eye, whenever I think of Vietnam . We had made plans to go with 8 others on a brand new, swanky Red Dragon Junk boat for a harbor cruise and overnight stay, but sadly the weather did not cooperate the whole 4 days we were in port. No ships were permitted to sail, per the local government. Many of us were bummed! This is typhoon session and there was a lot of rain and high winds our first couple of days - we were hoping it would blow out the last day and we could at least do a day trip but no luck!