Around The World In 80 Cruise Ships

Home Is Where The Ship Is

2018 Cunard QM2 World Cruise

What a Voyage!

2011 Crystal World Cruise

Ill take things that I know for $20,000 Alex

2015 Holland America World Voyage

The Med, Norway And Beyond

2016 Seaborn The Mediterranean

So Much To sea

Suez Canal Crossing

Suez Spelt Backwards IS Zeus

-*

Wednesday, December 25, 2013

Reeling in The (New) Years'

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Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards

The Panama Canal Cruise was a highlight
Nevertheless, Next time, I'll live life backwards, start out dead, and get that out of the way, then finish with the fireworks.Why wait for 2020 to have perfect vision...

Some of the highlights of 2013

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Friday, December 20, 2013

Arabian-Horse of a Different Color

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A year ago today I was riding a horse in the Caribbean living my dream, 
now I'm in Saudi Arabia living my backup plan-Cha Ching


I have lived and worked in Jeddah (2002-03) and Riyadh (2008-09); and now find The Eastern Province the most agreeable. One thing I can say  with certainty, The Dessert Is Clean

 I will have spent three Christmas' working here. Here are some of my previous posts on  The Kingdom with links:

I have been doing a Newsletter called 
The NoMad Teacher Report 
Click the link  above to see the Pdf
 in Google docs
The NoMad*
Click the link  above to see the Pdf
 in Google docs


From Art Dealer to The Art of War

From Ships to Planes



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Wednesday, December 4, 2013

Finding The Travel Molecule

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Travel can alter perceptions and may even rewire your brain. Novelty and unique one-of-a-kind experiences raise dopamine levels, the chemical in your head that gives you optimism, curiosity and creativity.

This gift of pure attention is harder to achieve when your brain is ON French Fries--the default American mode, when your "chi" or energy is Velcro for negative experiences, but Teflon for positive ones.




State It Then Create It 

Before you can take your path you must live it in thought.



My thought makes me travel and create archives of experience and expectation where I incinerate negativity and have a mindfulness of pure attention, without advice, without judgments-When I'm traveling, I am what I am right there and like some Starfleet Commander- I endorse Captain Kirk's recommended policy of non-interference with the internal development of alien civilizations. I must say, some of these places I visit, at least on the surface, look a bit like Mars. 



Freedom is what you do to what has been done to you-even if what has been done is being born in America, the cultural equivalent of the geographically-desirable-places-to-live-on-the-planet lottery. So why squander your inheritance and live in The United States of Unconsciousness.



Wired Verses Tired-Grey Matters


The Earth was made round so that we would not see too far down the road but Neurons That Wire Together Fire Together and the best way to predict the future is to INVENT it. There is no absolute grid  I  live in where things occur independent of my  own thinking about them. In the 70's The ME Generation was Old school selfishness--- I am the center of the world. That's tired. My New Wor(l)d Order says, I create the world...and more importantly my thoughts do too. Change your thoughts, change your world. That's Wired Thinking. 


The 3 P's-Practice.Practice. Practice. 

The hardest arithmetic I've had to master is the one which enables me to count my blessings. It requires a long apprenticeship (Think Gladwell's 10,000 Hours of practice rule or 10 years) Cruising around the world, provides a legitimate short cut for taking things with gratitude instead of for granted.

Despite the spectacular sceneries and itineraries. The universe is in our head,and not out there separate from us. In actuality, a world of our own making. We are co-creators of our world, and we can effect that world and the world of others, even at a distance.What the bleep? Read more HERE
The Persistence Of Norway

As the brain changes the mind changes, in practical terms  each time you repeat a particular thought or action, and "use your marbles", you strengthen the connection between a set of brain cells or neurons. 

Consequently, neurons that wire apart fire apart, and different thoughts create different pathways-.It has been over 60 days "vacation"  from blue ocean cruising and the urge to sail  remains.   How do I explain this  habit: Use it or lose it.




Traveling = f(dopamine flow); Money= happiness

"Money can't buy happiness, but it can buy travel and new experiences, which is kinda the same thing" 


The need to break free and sail away is ancient, enduring and incessant. Voyages  trigger a concept called   psychological distance: Something about the experience of leaving your place  creates a shock and awe, a pathway  into a new perspective that floods the brain with ideas. For me, this shift in perspective starts as soon as I'm on  a cruise ship . Ships are weirdly the most lucid part of my life. Every cruise I take somehow changes my life in some way.

"The cure for anything is salt water: sweat, tears or the sea."-Karen Blixen (Out of Africa)


The actual cruise  might be four days or a week, the anticipation of   Norwegian Fjords cruise, for instance was months  and the memory will probably  last for years or forever. So, while I   focus  on the joy of the doing the cruise  there is  joy or anticipation and the joy of  THE memory of it all the time.

Rudyard Kipling wrote "Milford Sound  is the eighth wonder of the world.".  National Geographic Traveler Magazine  selected Norway as  The Top Natural Tourist Attraction in the World. After visiting both, Norway in 2010, and New Zealand in 2011, I didn't need a second chance for 2012 SE Alaska Fjords to make a first impression--It has brought me back  again to a  place I have never been before...



I used to think working on cruise ships was bad, but I stopped thinking- I guess I have ship for brains!

You are HERE. Travel with ME...

The experiences at sea turned my can’t into cans and leveraged my Adventures (which was nothing more than bad planning) into serendipity a thousand unseen helping hands of  allies, synchronicity, and the Michelangelo effect


#8



#9 I am adding:Alaska The Great Land-Action Plan to the list







1. Santorini, Greece

Let The Orinoco Flow




2.Maldives, Islands

Consciousness Is Wireless

3. Bora Bora

Tahiti-Stopover In Paradise

4. The Fjords of Norway
 

Mother Nature and Father Time Are Effin Special


5. The Fjords of New Zealand

Milford Sound-Are We There Yet?

6.Full World Cruise

L.A.To London in 110 Days



7. The Oasis Of The Seas

Game Changer- The Ship IS the destination. Remarkable. This  225,282-ton, 5,400-passenger colossus that cost Royal Caribbean $1.4 billion. 


 It only ends once-anything before that is just progress
Too much cruise ship? Quantity is its own kind of quality.

Go BIG or Go HOME

8. Honorable Mention-The Hawaiian Islands
1994-My First Ship -
A Rust Bucket- SS Constitution(a glorified ferry) with a lot of heart
known  as "American Hawaii Cruises"

The Hawaiian Islands



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