Baltic Cruise

We just got back from a wonderful vacation.  We took a 7-night Baltic Cruise on Holland America Cruise Line.  We sailed on the Ryndam.  I have been wanting to take a Baltic Cruise since we moved to Germany.  I am so glad we finally were able to go.  This was the "last" big vacation I had on my list of things to do while we lived in Germany.  This was our second Holland America cruise and mine and Collin's 4th cruise, Caden's 2nd cruise.  We sailed from Rotterdam, The Netherlands.  Before our cruise we spent one night in Delft, The Netherlands, which is about 20 minutes from Rotterdam.  Delft is known for their pottery and we actually were given four Delft pottery coasters for free as a gift from Holland America since we were past guests.

We were blessed with a deluxe suite on this cruise.  We really lucked out as we were upgraded for FREE about a week before our cruise.  We are past guests and did pay for a balcony suite (which on this ship was just a balcony).  So when we were upgraded to a deluxe suite we felt very blessed.  Our room was beautiful and spacious.  I will do a post just on our room with pictures to share.  If you ever get a chance to stay in a suite on a cruise ship, I highly recommend it.  Not only was our room twice the size of the balcony cabins but we had special privileges such as free laundry and dry cleaning throughout our cruise.  We were also able to have special breakfast in the specialty restaurant, priority boarding on and off the ship, a nice lounge just for suite guests, and more.

Holland America, the Ryndam

I will write about each country we visited in a separate post.  As an overview we visted Rotterdam, The Netherlands (which is a beautiful city); Helsingborg, Sweden; Copenhagen, Denmark (where we spent the night); Skagen, Denmark; and Oslo, Norway.  Caden has now been to 17 countries.  Not too bad for someone who is almost 2.  He is becoming a world traveler and picking up new words from different languages all the time.

A neat thing we did before our cruise was visit the Noah's Ark replica in Dordrecht, The Netherlands.  We were hoping that it would be open but it is not quite finished yet.  So we drove by and took some pictures.  It is really neat looking.  The man behind the ark is filling the ark with life-size animals and is going by the measurements used in the Bible.  Once it's finished he is going to sail it around the world so many others can enjoy it.  We hope to go back once it's finished in The Netherlands since it is only about a 5 hour drive for us.  Hopefully by the end of the summer or fall it will be completed.

Noah's Ark is behind a tall fence

I also have to mention that we have some of the best neighbors.  When we arrived home last night they came out and greeted us.  They asked us if we had had dinner.  We had not.  They had made dinner for us and were waiting for our return.  We felt very loved.