Another bucket list item taken care off.

Well one month from tomorrow I head out the door to the Via rail station here in Vancouver to board the Amtrak train to Seattle and then start the 4 day cross country trek to Fort Lauderdale via Chicago and Washington DC - with both Christmas and the cruise to plan for I have been trying to juggle the planning of the two events - one will be over with in less than a week but I haven't forgotten some of the items on the cruise bucket list.

I wear prescription glasses and the ones that I have are called transitonals - meaning that they darken when exposed to light - while they are okay for general sunny scenes but don't do a great job in extremely bright or glaring sunshine. while I could get proper prescription sunglasses that might be counter productive because cataracts are starting to form in both eyes and after the surgery my eyesight could be different.

So in conjunction with my optometrist I elected to buy a pair of sunglasses that fit fully over my regular glasses. They are called Cocoons and while there is much sunshine in these parts right now - actually it has been snowing most of day but just switched over to rain - they have a demo screen in their office and it make a bi difference. They weren't cheap - around $80.00 but because I am using them in lieu of a prescription pair they were sales tax exempt - I can also claim some of the cost back under my extended health plan.

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The other area that I am just about finished is excursions - only have Antigua and Cabo left to do and since I have been to both more than once they aren't a priority.

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An area of concern that is appearing and being discussed is the growing conflict between Argentina and the Falklands Islands and how Argentina is starting to block access to some of their ports if a ship visits the Falklands especially if the ship is British registered which the Grand Princess is - while it doesn't affect me directly they are many people who are to disembark in Buenos Aires who might have to change plans.

So far Princess hasn't indicated what it's plan are - if they decide to skip the Falklands I can live with that but if they opt to visit the Falklands we might be denied access to Puerto Madryn and Ushuaia as well - the latter is at the tip of South America - last town/city at the end of the world and one that I want to visit because of the scenery etc.

Will just have to wait and see what happens.

Cheers