Our Eclipse Cruise Plans

Dear Family and Friends,

For those of you who are interested I will share more information about our trip to China. The whole purpose of this trip is to view the total eclipse of the sun. As you can see we will actually be spending very little time in China.


We are flying from Seattle to Beijing on Monday (arriving in China on Tuesday). We are going directly from Beijing to Tianjin. Tianjin is the port from where our cruise ships sails. We will have a couple of days to shop and get over jet lag. We actually sail on Friday, July 17th.

On Sunday we will spend the day in Cheju, South Korea. It is an island south off the mainland. On Monday, July 20th we will arrive in Kagoshima, Japan. This city is in the southern part of Japan.

Then on Wednesday, July 22nd we will be almost to Iwo Jima. This is the day our cruise ship will park itself so that we will be directly under the noon day sun to view the eclipse. It will be visible in Pakistan, India, China, Japanese islands and the South Pacific Ocean, but we will be directly under the midday sun to afford us the longest amount of total darkness. The amount of totality will be over six minutes long. This will be the longest amount of totality in this century. Chuck and I have been planning on this event for over 2 years and now the time is almost here.

This is not our first eclipse cruise. We cruised the Black Sea in 1999 to view a total eclipse and we saw a total eclipse from the Mediterranean Sea in 2006. But this will be the longest amount of totality we have ever witnessed.

After viewing the eclipse the ship will turn and head back to China, stopping in Kobe, Japan for two days. We will arrive back in Tainjin, China on Tuesday, July 28th.

We will be sailing on the same ship we sailed in 2006. It is the Costa Classica, an Italian cruise line. We thoroughly enjoyed that cruise and look forward to this one. Here is a video clip of people dancing through the dining room on our last night cruising in 2006.




Chuck and I will depart from China on Saturday, August 1st and arrive in Seattle at noon on August 2nd. I will fly (6:00am) from Seattle to Quito on August 3rd and on August 4th I will fly to Cuenca.

Chuck will remain in the U.S. until August 18th.

This pretty much sums up what we will be doing for the next month. I doubt that I will be able to post our trip on the blog until after I return to Cuenca.

Stay at peace, keep smiling and know that we care about you.

Nancy and Chuck