VWU 2022 in review
Coming into 2022 we really weren’t sure if travel would get anywhere back to normal after the restrictions of 2020 and 2021. Over the holiday period we had a couple of cruises cancelled and had very little planned for the upcoming year, but we held out hope that things would improve and thankfully we were proved right, with 2022 proving to be our most diverse and exciting year of travel to date. So here is our summary of the year and some of our highlights with helpful links to related blog posts and YouTube videos.
After a dreary January in a wintery UK our first cruise was a last minute invitation through our trusted travel partners, Panache cruises, by Uniworld to experience the River Nile in Egypt with a week long cruise on the SS Sphinx along the Nile starting and ending in Luxor, sandwiched between a stay at the gorgeous Four Seasons Nile Plaza and land tours in Cairo. This proved itself to be one of our most heart-rending and enlightening cruises of the year, immersing us in incredible ancient history but also some of the most harrowing poverty we’ve ever seen. Despite the sometimes challenging conditions encountered on this tour it really was a once in a lifetime trip.
Home for just over two weeks we then set off on another Panache partnership cruise to our furthest ever trip, taking British Airways longest flight from London to Santiago in Chile for a three week Chilean land tour and Antarctica cruise with Aurora Expeditions. Starting the trip in the lovely city of Punta Arenas we avoided the Drake passage by flying Antarctica Airways to King George island to meet the MV Greg Mortimer for a week sailing around Antarctica. Despite some unfavourable weather conditions restricting some of our expeditions we managed a number of landings and zodiac cruises taking in the fantastic wildlife and scenery of Antarctica. Never before, and likely never again, have we been on such a remote and unique expedition with this winning the award for our most extraordinary cruise of the year.
No trip to Antarctica would be complete without experiencing the Drake passage and our trip back to Chile meant we can now say we know all about the Drake shake! An extremely windy sail down the Beagle Passage in Chile and we were back on dry land. From Punta Arenas we travelled inland a bit to the stunning Torres del Paine National Park for a hosted four night stay at the luxurious Rio Serrano Hotel and Spa. This proved to be a highlight of our time in Chile, especially horse-riding along the Rio river with the amazing Grand Paine as a backdrop. Though this land tour was secondary to our Antarctica cruise, we are so pleased we did it, Chile is such an amazing country and our stay at the Rio Serrano the best hotel experience we have ever had. We finished our three week tour with three nights at the elegant Mandarin Oriental, Santiago, a highlight for Rich especially, as we were then the Lollalapooza music festival was taking place with many of the musicians staying at our hotel.
With Spring approaching back at home in the UK, in mid April we again headed off on another long haul flight to Los Angeles starting with stay at the iconic Beverly Hills hotel before joining the Discovery Princess on her third ever cruise sailing along the Californian coast. Having never been to the west coast of the US this proved to be a nostalgic trip for us, with us meeting up in Los Angeles with Rich’s best man who we hadn’t seen in over 30 years since he had relocated to LA. A week on the lovely new Discovery Princess visiting some of the iconic cites of California gave us time to acclimatise to the time difference before flying Air Tahiti Nui to our next destination, Tahiti.
Another eight hour flight and we landed very late at night in Papeete for a four night stay at the jaw-dropping Intercontinental Tahiti where we immediately fell in love with French Polynesia and its gorgeous people. But our journey didn’t end there, we then joined the magnificent tall ship, the Wind Spirit, for a week long cruise around the Society Islands of French Polynesia. 2022 marked Wind Spirit sailing for 35 years in this region and we felt extremely blessed to be invited by Windstar cruises and Panache to sail on her around paradise. Of all the trips we took in 2022, Tahiti and the Wind Spirit was the favourite for both of us, a real bucket list trip.
A last minute invitation to a taster cruise on Ponant’s Le Bellot proved too difficult to refuse, especially as it was sailing from Tower Bridge in London along the river Thames finishing up in Honfleur for its naming ceremony. Despite it only being a one night cruise we adored our time on board this gorgeous little superyacht, especially as we were given one of the amazing Owners suites to enjoy for our only too brief visit.
It wasn’t long before we were back off on another cruise to celebrate Helen’s birthday at the end of May, having been invited by AmaWaterways and Panache to join the AmaKristina in Provence, one of Helen’s favourite regions in one of her favourite countries. Starting in Lyon we spent a glorious week sailing along the Rhone finishing off in the historic city of Avignon, drinking French wine, visiting quaint little villages and towns along the way and eating delicious cuisine. Slowly cruising through the French countryside in early summer was the much needed restful tonic we both needed at that point in our travels.
Next up was our third river cruise of the year, this time on what must be one of the most unusual river cruises in the world, sailing along the Mississippi on an iconic paddle steamer, the American Queen from Memphis to New Orleans. Invited to join this cruise by American Queen Voyages, we started this trip with a two night stay at the legendary Peabody hotel, home to the world famous duck parade. Soaking ourselves in Memphis’ music scene we visited Sun studios and Graceland before boarding the American Queen for a week of immersion in Southern US culture and history. What better way to see this part of the US, once the richest part of the country, steeped in antebellum history and adorned with lavish plantation houses.
Eight ships in five months later we made a conscious decision to stay at home in July and August spending some time with family. However, family time to us is not complete without a cruise holiday so in late August we headed off to Barcelona with our children for a Mediterranean cruise on Celebrity Beyond. Although this was supposed to be a proper vacation we couldn’t resist reviewing it for the VWU channel and very much enjoyed the challenge of trying out all of the dining venues possible on our nine day cruise for a complete dining guide. This had to be our most entertaining cruise of the year, with every evening jam-packed with delicious dining, incredible shows, talented live music, martini flair shows and dancing at silent discos.
September saw us back on one of our favourite cruise lines for the first time in over four years, celebrating Rich’s birthday on the same ship we had done five years previously, the Seabourn Encore. We were invited by Seabourn and Panache to join the Encore for a week sailing from Istanbul to Athens, which included our first ever visit to the photographic Santorini. You can read our Seabourn Dining Guide here. Having never been to Istanbul before we elongated our week long cruise with a two night stay in the surprisingly lovely city of Istanbul and a post cruise stay in one of our favourite European cities and one of our favourite luxury boutique city hotels, the Electra Metropolis in Athens.
Home for just over a week, October saw us experiencing a new cruise line, Oceania cruises, sailing from Lisbon to Rome on an eleven night cruise on the Riviera at the invitation of Oceania and Panache staying in one of their spacious and beautifully appointed Penthouse suites. As foodies we were super excited as Oceania are known for their cuisine and it didn’t disappoint - we had great fun researching all of the dining venues for our complete Dining Guide. With Helen immersing herself in the complimentary art classes on board and Rich making the most of the very well equipped gym we fell in love with this perfectly sized (in our opinion) ship and cant wait to try Oceania again.
Although we couldn’t fit a cruise into November we were delighted to have our first ship visit post pandemic, again with a cruise line we had no experience of, Carnival cruises. Invited by Carnival cruises, we travelled to Southampton to meet some of our fellow cruise bloggers and vloggers to be one of the first people ever to board the brand new Carnival Celebration. This turned out to be the biggest ship we went on this year and though we thoroughly enjoyed our day on board and it looked like an incredibly fun ship to cruise on we felt it was a little too big for us.
With the year nearly over, we were delighted to be invited back onto a Ponant ship, Le Dumont d-Urville, sister to Le Bellot, this time somewhere a little more glamorous than the river Thames on a wet and grey May day. Flying for the first time on AirFrance via Paris we landed in Martinique for a 12 night ‘Essential of the Caribbean’ cruise which included some zodiac wet landing to remote or deserted islands as well as some better know Caribbean stops. this being only our second ever visit to this region of the Caribbean it couldn’t have been a better way to end the year, returning back home just in time for a lovely family Christmas. Make sure you subscribe to our YouTube channel and sign up to our newsletters below so you can be notified when the blogs and videos are released on this voyage.
The gorgeous Durmont d’Urville in the Caribbean.
Finishing 2022 with 12 cruises spanning over more than 120 nights experiencing six new cruise lines and a ship visit to the largest ship we’ve ever set foot on, it ended up being a pretty good year for Visit With Us. Our travels took us to a variety of places across the world from the remoteness of Antarctica, to ancient Egypt, beautiful Tahiti, the iconic Mississippi and the perennial favourite, the Caribbean. We were blessed to be able to tick off many of our bucket list places in once in a lifetime trips, with the hope that some of them (Tahiti especially) will not be once in a lifetime visits.
A very special thank you to our preferred travel partners Panache cruises who, in association with Uniworld, Aurora Expeditions, Windstar cruises, AmaWaterways, Seabourn Cruises and Oceania Cruises, were responsible for the invitations to go on many of the cruises listed above. Many thanks also to Princess cruises for inviting us on the California coast cruise, to Rio Serrano Hotel and Spa for inviting us to stay at their hotel, to Ponant cruises for inviting us to experience both Le Bellot and Le Dumont d-Urville and to American Queen Voyages for inviting us on the Mississippi cruise. For more information on the funding of these cruises please see the specific blog post for the cruises linked within this blog post. Please note that although we were hosted on many of these cruises, neither the cruise line or Panache cruises had any editorial control over any of our content, either before, during our after our voyage.
If you are interested in booking a cruise with these or any other luxury cruise lines then we would recommend contacting a connoisseur at our trusted cruise partners Panache cruises - please mention that you have been referred to them through Visit With Us to receive a £100 voucher.
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