So today is the day we were supposed to get off the MS Amsterdam in Fort Lauderdale. We are currently on day 49 of quarantine. We have been experiencing this “new” lifestyle since arriving back to our home in CA on March 23rd. It has been definitely full of its share of ups and downs. We have been following the ship through the Holland America app and it is currently off the coast of the Philippines waiting to disembark the Filipino crew. 172 crew were already allowed off in Indonesia earlier this month. Our luggage has now traveled over 10,000 additional miles then we have, as it is still onto ship. We therefore, have no souvenirs from our world cruise and we are hoping to see them within the next few months. We have realized the lion’s share of our summer clothes are still on the ship and since it was 80 degrees here last week, we splurged and bought the girls a few new pairs of shorts to boost their spirits. As we were already homeschooling the transitions for education have been seamless for us here. We strive to stay in routines. School work, games, puzzles, crocheting (not as much as on the ship), cooking and baking, arts and craft, walks on the beach and to the tide pools, watching movies and educational programming and some cuddling time on the couch. We have been able to secure some masks and hand sanitizer if we ever get off shelter in place restrictions. We are having our groceries delivered to minimize exposure. They girls have learned a valuable lesson of what is truly important in this world. Food, shelter, clothing and loved ones. We had a hard time adjusting to ship life to quarantine life for sure. We all went through a loss, and it triggered grief, and it brought back a lot of emotional memories about the passing of Don. So we had to go through a period of grief recovery all over again. I have recently started doing some meditation and yoga to try and help me to cope, center myself, and make my mind and body stronger. We are also adjusting to having a boy in the house. My second oldest son who is 22, moved in with us two weeks ago after a difficult time adjusting to this quarantine life as well. It is nice to have another adult in the house and I looking forward to working alongside him to complete many projects around my home. We miss our friends and Amsterdam family immensely. We have touched base with a handful of friends we exchanged contact information with before getting off the ship, but I have sadly not stayed in touch as best as I should. There’s a goal for me for this next week. I am happy to stay I have stayed true to my commitment to staying prioritized on what is important to me emotionally, physically and psychologically. I have not allowed myself to get overwhelmed with the burdens of day to day life, thanks to president Trump and Gavin Newsome. Hard not to keep your family a priority if you are with them 24/7 LOL!! I hope I can stay true to myself and them when some normalcy returns. First stop, if it can’t be Disneyland, will be a weekend away for me solo. It still good to have dreams and goals. But we have learned we need to be flexible as well and to not let disappointment wash us away when things don’t go as we planned. I pray you wonderful Mom’s had a great Mother’s Day. I was sadly not with my mom. She spent two weeks isolated with us upon return to CA and is blissfully back at home with her fur baby. It has been a difficult transition not having her around daily as well. I was blessed to have all four of my children here, please enjoy the photo we took. Sorry, no make up, no fancy attire, but lots of love in that photo. Many of my life’s blessings all in one frame. We look forward to new and exciting adventures when life allows. There is still so much of the world we want to live and share with you so you can live vicariously through me. Sending love and prayers for safety, healthy and peace. Wherever you are right now, choose to feel blessed in it.

It’s been a really long couple of days. From the time we got off the ship till the time we expect to arrive home we are anticipating a total of 69 hours of travel.  I really want to thank everyone who has sent us words or love, prayers and encouragement over the last couple of weeks. Your prayers were felt and I have been generally at peace about each leg of this journey home. As expected the lack of sleep has been taxing on my mind and my body and I look forward to catching up on that in my own bed. We are safely on the ground in California. We are heading to pick up luggage and then the car rental for the four ish hour drive home. Sending you all prayers for health and peace. You know where you will be able to find us for the next two weeks. So overjoyed and blessed to be almost home. 

We are officially home. It’s 3:30am and I can’t sleep because it is 6:00pm to my body. Did some cleaning in the pantry to work off some nervous and anxious energy. I’m heading to bed soon. We have luggage to unpack and settling in to do still. Tomorrow I will start my 14 days of quarantine blog. See, all of life is an adventure. You just have to make the best of the cards you have. I’m with my mom and my girls. Missing my sons immensely, but we’ll see each other in a couple of weeks, we are speaking daily. I’ll say goodnight and good morning to you all. Hugs and health to you all. Debra. 

Since my last post our lives have been turned upside down more time then we can count but I will try to summarize as positively as possible. Moments after I posted last, an announcement was made that everyone planning on spending the night at a hotel prior to our flights in Perth could not. We were told the Australian government had issued a new stipulation that we could only be taken directly to the airport on the 22^nd and that if anyone tried to go to a hotel, Air B&B, VRBO they would be fined $50,000.00. So re planned accordingly to spend the night at the airport and we cancelled our hotel reservation. About an hour later we were then told that we could now go to a hotel, but there were possibly no taxis or ubers to get us there. So we booked the ship bus to the airport with plan “A” to move to a hotel or plan “B” to spend the night at the airport. We finished up our packing and waited for our turn to disembark into the vast unknown on the 22^nd. I find this emotionally difficult to even type. As we disembarked we had to say our goodbyes. As we feared our next chapter, we cried for those we were saying goodbye to. Our friends that we had made in the passengers on the ship and the friends we had made in the crew that are still on the ship. The crew was all at the gangway giving us hugs and wishing us safe travels. They are all still on the ship at this time. Unsure of where they are going and how long they will be at sea. We kinda held our breaths as we stepped onto land to see how we would be greeted. No health screening was done, but we have only been in Australia since March 7^th, so I believe they felt at peace with us. We found a wonderful porter to help us with our luggage and he sweetly assisted us to the bus to transport us to the airport. There were two taxis at the port transporting passengers, and the line of passengers waiting was so long we were grateful for that decision. Once at the airport we inquired as to whether or not we’d be allowed to stay the night at the airport and we were told they close and lock the doors at midnight and we’d be required to leave. So we went to he taxi line, and by line I mean of taxis, not of guests. We grabbed the first one and went to a nearby hotel that had an airport shuttle that would transport us back in the morning just in case taxis decided to stop running. We were greeted sweetly. They inquired where we had come from (ship) and where we had been in the last 14 days (Australia) and deemed we did not need to quarantine. Such a relief, we were able to cuddle into a room for the night. We went to the hotel restaurant and had a nice lunch and then napped till 5:00pm. We are all SO exhausted. I have not slept well in I can’t remember how long and it will be a couple more days before I will. We ordered in room service for dinner, showered and then got to sleep early. We are all checked in for our flights, seats are assigned and now we pray that we can get to the end of our road as planned. The world is shutting down just behind us. Qantas is cancelling flights, Hawaii is shutting resorts, including the Aulani where we were supposed to be going up until just a few days ago, and everywhere is going to shelter in place requirements. We desperately want to be home. But I am also emotionally prepared to be stopped anywhere along this way and stay where required. We are on our first flight of three and we have a goal in sight. We have people praying for us and I am praying for you all as well.   For your health and safety and well-being. We will be in touch again soon. Love and Hugs, Debra

P.S. Made it through screening and all in Sydney. This morning we left Perth all the lounges were open there and here in Sydney. At noon new guidelines went into affect and by the time we arrived here, they are all closed. We are squeaking out people!!

This very well may be my last post from the MS Amsterdam. I apologize for not posting the last couple of days. We are under a great deal of stress and anxiety and we are trying to stay positive and I am trying to be of help to those who need it. Both my sons have been amazing as I have wifi called them multiple times over the last couple of days as we tried to help passengers with reservations and communication back home. Even our own plans have changed almost daily. We arrived in Fremantle this morning, a day ahead of schedule and some people were able to move up flights. We were not. We plan to spend tonight on the ship, tomorrow in a hotel, and then onto a flight the next morning. Unfortunately, people trying to catch flights today are now worried because they delayed our disembarkation because another ship got in at 5:30am this morning and immigration is disembarking them first. In the last couple of days we learned the Aulani closed its resteraunts, so we planned to go to Maui for a couple of months. Then we learned this morning that Hawaii is discouraging all visitors and closing resorts so we don’t want to be stuck there. So currently we hope to fly home to Oakland directly from Honolulu. My son is currently at my home stocking it up for the four of us to quarantine when we get home, get our car rental in Oakland, and drive straight to home. We are all very tired and not sleeping well. We are almost all packed. Our luggage goes out at midnight tonight and we should get off around 9:00am tomorrow. We even had some additional chaos last night. A passenger fell ill yesterday and had to be airlifted off the ship around 6:30pm last night. We had to get within 60 miles of Geraldton so they could fly a helicopter to the ship. The girls are keeping their chins up and have been amazing despite so many changes and uncertainty these last couple of weeks. Currently the girls are swimming to the pool with their friends. I am going to make sure we are ready to step off this ship at a moments notice this afternoon in case immigration says we must go. I’ll sleep at the airport if I have to. Just desire to be on US soil more then anything else. Please keep our travels in your prayers. I don’t even care if they lose my luggage, just get me home. Love and Hugs…Debra

This is not my shirt, but it did make me laugh!  Trying to keep spirits up.

Good morning from somewhere off the coast of Australia. Today is project Linus day. They pulled out and display they over 320 blankets that have been completed to date. They had them all laid out around the area where we sat and crocheted them and then they took a picture with all the blanket makers in it. It was a blessed sight to see all these blankets that were created to go to such a great cause. The captain made an announcement today basically stating that now, if you did not make your flight arrangements through Holland America, they would start helping passengers who still needed assistance to do so. Then it was back to the room for more packing and organizing. I am struggling with taking too much, not enough, everything…. I don’t anticipate getting my suitcase back for months, I don’t know how long we will be in Hawaii, I don’t know what we will have access to when we are there. I do feel some peace after having my son call the Aulani this morning and they told him they currently have no plans to close at this time. Also, all resteraunts are currently open for business on the property as well.   Hoping we can relax to some point while we are there. Then the stress level of several passengers went through the roof. Many passengers received a notification that their flight home got cancelled. It was almost the straw that broke the camels back. Guest service got bombarded with passengers (again) as people panicked about how they are getting home. There was a strong security presence today near guest services. It got pretty loud and my understanding is there was an escalating tension that was calmed down and handled exceptionally by staff. To date it looks like Qantas Airlines is ceasing service on March 30^th. Blessedly our flights are on the 23^rd and I am so prayerful that we get to Hawaii without incident. We are expecting extensive health checks and I am not excited about stepping out of our bubble into the reality of exposure to germs. But we have no other choice. Tonight Holland America celebrated it’s 147^th birthday in the dining room. It was all things orange, as that is one of Holland America’s signature colors. It was also the opportunity for the choir, which Valerie is a part of, to perform in the dining room for all the guests. They performed at 5:30 and then again at 8:30. Valerie was beaming and smiled and was so excited to be able to be in her performance element. I am an incredibly proud mommy, I videoed it for those who wish to see it later. We had also pre ordered a special meal. Don’s absolute favorite cut of meat was a tomahawk chop steak. We had planned to order them for his birthday celebration on April 11^th, but seeing as we won’t be here, we had it early. Two of the largest steaks I have ever seen were served to and then cut and served tableside to mom, the girls and I. It was so delicious. We have some great pictures I will get posted once we land somewhere as internet is so slow right now. So the girls are off enjoying time being kids. I am exhausted. I have hardly slept in four days. The boys are doing so great at home and we are keeping in close touch. Please keep these upcoming days in your prayers for our travel. We are praying for you all, primarily for you to stay healthy, for you to stay sane, and for us all to remember to just breathe!! Love and Hugs. Debra

Happy Saint Patrick Day everyone. As I write this you are all waking up to the holiday as I am saying good night to it. We are now officially eight hours apart in time (technically though we are 16 hours a head). It was a stressful day as we began the daunting task of packing up everything we brought with us, have made, acquired or have purchased since we began this adventure 73 days ago. There is a lot of stress around the ship. Elderly passengers are struggling to utilize the internet and get travel plans booked. Holland America’s current stance is that if you didn’t book your return flights from Fort Lauderdale with them, you are on your own for booking you our arrangements home from Australia. It has left a bad taste in the mouth of many technologically challenged passengers. So staff has begun lending a hand as they have time, I even assisted some passengers today. We booked with Cruise Specialists and they have been amazing taking care of their clients, but we still picked up the ball the ball Holland America dropped into our laps and ran with it on our own. Now everyone is crossing fingers we do not have any additional issues, delays or changes thrown our way. New motto, hoping for the best and expecting the worst. I saw big changes in the girls today. Megan is angry, but that is how she process grief and stress, and Valerie cries a lot. We did take break for about an hour today and went and socialized at our crochet class. We also had a wonderful meal in the main dining room tonight. Tensions are high, as the crew does not even know what the future holds for them. Rumor circulate quicker then you can believe. Being St. Patrick’s Day mom and I sent the girls “home” for an evening in as mom and I joined many crew and about 25 passengers on a bar crawl tonight. We visited four bars around the ship where a previously prepared drink was served to us and then 15 minutes later we wandered onto the next bar. We had an opportunity to see some “Cocktail” style drink mixing, did a beer drinking game, and then ended the evening with Jagerbombs. It was exactly what the doctor ordered with all the stress everyone is under. When I got home the girls were still awake, happy to see mom and needing some cuddle time. Anxiety is high and we are trying to keep spirits high too. We are counting our blessings that we didn’t get off the ship for the four night overland tour that departed when we were at our last port. They were supposed to get back on the ship in Darwin, but we never wound up stopping there. Those 17 passengers and one crewmember have already returned back to the states. At least they didn’t have to pack; crew members have to do it for them. Pray for some normalcy to return to our lives sooner rather than later. Love and Hugs, Debra

O.K. it is very late here and I am very tired after a couple of stress filled days. But I must update you all on the events of today. When the 9:30am announcement was made nothing was mentioned about our situation so mom and I proceeded to our previously scheduled 10:00 massage appointments thinking the next announcement would be made at noon as usual. Well, we were close to that assumption. We were at the tail end of our massages, still on the table, when the captain came on the P.A. system. I have never gotten up and dressed so quickly off the massage table. The captain informed us that we were going to be required to get off the ship in Perth on March 22^nd and if we had booked our flight through Holland America (we did not) they were working on scheduling those passengers’ flights. If you did not, like us, we were told we were on our own to make arrangements to get ourselves home. I will keep opinions on this to myself at the time and stick to the facts. So we raced back to our cabins, to begin our work. The Internet doesn’t work very well on the ship and now everyone is trying to do what we are doing at the same time. Not a good combination. I was on my phone, mom’s phone, my computer and my son was on his computer and phone in California all at the same time. Stars aligned and I was blessed to get a representative from American Express Travel on the phone and she was a gem getting us booked a room the night we dock, a flight the 23^rd – from Perth, to Sydney, to Honolulu, and accommodations in Honolulu. I will say Holland America’s delay in notification cause the flight prices to increase by 25% from the time I started looking and we were told to wait to make a purchase. By 1:00pm we had everything reserved and we are praying for no addition changes, but the times we live in right now means every day is a moment-by-moment situation. Mom and I went directly to bar, we did not stop, we did not pass go, …. Two days of stress and anxiety and now everything is set into motion. Suitcases even started to arrive after dinner this evening. So our plan for tomorrow it to pack everything in one suitcase each to take off the ship with us with what we will need for our time in Hawaii. Everything else gets packed up and left in our room for shipment back to our home at a later date. Probably when the ship gets back to the U.S. So who knows when we’ll see them again? We have been offered a generous refund and/or opportunity for a future cruise credit. We have been told that everything we prepaid for will be reimbursed to us in time. We will be given reimbursement for travel out of Perth, to a point. Lots of apologies and explanations why they are justifying not taking us back to Florida. They were supposed to get us a letter from corporate by the end of the day putting everything they promised in writing, but we haven’t seen it yet. I am just happy we have a place to lay our head the night we get off the ship, a plane ticket out of the country, and a game plan to get back to the U.S.A. Time will tell how it all works out. At happy hour this evening the ship consoled us with complimentary liquor and everyone seemed in better spirits tonight, except the staff as they are all awaiting to be told what they have to do; stay on the ship, get off and wait, get off and go home… So I am going to sleep, happy to be with my family, happy to have a plan of action, and stressed about packing, but it will be there for tomorrow. I love you all and will keep you in the loop. Hugs! Debra

It’s been another roller coaster of a day. Do we pack, do we book flights, do we book a hotel in Fremantle before they are all booked up…? There are two ship supposed to arrive in Fremantle before us on prematurely ended cruises as well. Such a stressful time. Phone calls to Holland America corporate office, our travel agency and the front desk all tell us to “wait till we are told what to do”. Continuous lessons in waiting, I do not want, but maybe I needed. So at noon the captain announced they are working on resolutions for the passengers and that by this evening we should have some clarification on what the company has decided. Do we have to get off, are they taking us back to Florida, are we going to be quarantined…so many unknowns and piles of speculations by the guests onboard. So we resumed life as possible, we went to crocheting where they told us we have five days to finish any projects we are working on, and then to Sunday brunch. It has become one of our favorite days on the ship. Tiny food, tiny portions, two for one mimosas and lots of variety. And then the next bomb of the week was dropped. Australia’s Prime Minister announced that they are no longer allowing any cruise ships into their ports. So as things stand at this very moment, they cancelled our port of call in Darwin tomorrow. There is supposedly a call with corporate representatives and Australian officials sometime this evening and we will learn of those results tomorrow. I believe they are still trying to ascertain if we can still disembark in Fremantle or not. There are no so many airlines that have cancelled flights to and from Australia; I am prayerful that that does not happen. We have been at sea for three days now, no one is sick on this ship (that we know of), so many passengers are elderly and can not fly for health reasons, and we are so worried about not being let off on U.S. soil, be it Hawaii, Florida or California. We really hope Holland America just decides it is in our best interest to just allow us to sail home, to anywhere in the U.S. I believe it would take a minimum of 14 days to get there, which I would pray would equate to any quarantine required and we could arrive and disembark. So much not known and so many changes in such a short period of time. It is wearing on our nerves, our patience and our peace of mind. I ask you to continue to pray for us as we try so hard to dwell on being in a healthy place where all our basic necessities are being met, which is so much more then many in the states. We are incredibly blessed in this global chaos, as we are safe and healthy. I pray for the girls to understand the alternative reality they are living and to appreciate what we have right here. You are all in our continued prayers and thoughts. We are halfway around the world and missing friends and families immensely. I am with you in spirit and encouraging you all to keep your chins up from across the miles. We got this!! Be kind to on another. To be continued…Love and Hugs, Debra

Can we go back to this morning and erase today please? It is with great sadness, uncertainty and positiveness that I type this post. We were having a normal day today until noon when the captain came on and made an announcement, he started by saying he needed to end any rumors going around before they got too far:

Effective March 24^th our World cruise is coming to an end. They are going to require us to disembark the ship that day in Fremantle, Australia.

So that was at noon. It is now nine o’clock. I have been through every emotion possible today. I have comforted my daughters many times as they cried their eyes out and have had a good cry of my own, more then once. We know nothing else. Now, I understand the captain needed to tell us this before the media grabbed on to the corporate announcement telling us the cruise was being cancelled, BUT, his announcement would’ve been so very greatly appreciated had it been followed by,  “We (Holland America) are working on accommodations and plane tickets to get you safely back home.” I believe that is what they are doing, but it hasn’t been said. Everyone went into panic, do we need to book a hotel, do we need to book our own plane tickets, are we going to be reimbursed for travel, for the unused portion of the trip……on and on and on. NO answers have been provided to us. We have been asked to wait and we will be told what we need to do when we need to it. Now I am putting great faith in Holland America as a company that they have a wonderful reputation for taking care of their cruise guests. They call us family and I believe they are going to make sure we are well taken care of. We may be in Fremantle for a while waiting on a flight and we may not even choose to go directly home anyway. We have two more moths of vacation we were planning to have and I have all the schoolwork the girls need for the rest of the school year so we can do it anywhere, sadly we are extremely limited on where we can go. So needless to say the morale on the ship is quite strained right now. We will have to start packing. I can only assume Fedex will take care of our luggage as was previously arranged prior to boarding the ship, but we don’t know. There is a petition on the common bulletin board on the ship asking people to sign demanding Holland America to take us back to Fort Lauderdale. I love that it is a little therapeutic to have signed it and feel like I had a say in any of this. But I am not optimistic that anything is going to change from it. But it was a good example to the girls how to go about asking for change in a peaceful and organized way. Flight to Fort Lauderdale = 17 hours, flight to Maui = 14 hours. Makes you think…hmmmm. So after the announcement mom and I poured ourselves two strong cocktails (one for each of us) and went to the pool to soak up some rays and drown our sorrows. Tonight was also a Gala, an under the sea theme. But even the staff seemed stressed and on edge tonight making it feel a little uncomfortable. My understanding is even the staff is going to be required to leave the ship too. That’s about 2,000 people that need a lift home. Come on Holland America don’t let me down. I am putting my faith in you to do right by us and take care of us. I am going to try and get some rest, I have a feeling tomorrow will be a packing day. I am going to stay positive, even in our uncertainty, as we have new adventures ahead. We are still together, we are still safe and we are all healthy. I will keep you all updated as I hear anything. Please keep our travels and us in your prayers. Also, praying for you and your families as you are all being required to stay home and schools are being cancelled and your lives are being turned upside down too. Stay positive and find the blessing in the moment. Love and Hugs, Debra.

So, what a morning to wake up to. It is as if so many things fell apart while we slept last night. Princess Cruises is shutting down for 60 days, Viking Cruises is shutting down, Disneyland is closed and shortly thereafter Disneyworld and Disneyland Paris. Every scheduled public event is getting cancelled. Even our little town of 2500 people has cancelled one of our biggest events of the year, the Sea Glass Festival and postponed another, the Masquerade Ball. Now I am excited I will get to attend the ball now, but I feel horrible for everyone who has put so much time, energy, money and effort into making these events successful. NBA, NFL, Baseball spring training, everything sport related temporarily suspended. O.K., I know you know the list goes on and on. It is very surreal being out here floating around while all this is going on back at home. It’s like the first part of our trip everyone was worried about us and what we would get exposed to, and now we are all fearful for you. We are praying for you as we try and stay hopeful about our future as well. The captain made an eloquent announcement this afternoon putting some fears to peace as he informed us that per Holland America Corporate office, they have no intentions of cancelling operations at this time. But fear is escalating about who will even let us into port, where will get supplies and fuel, etc… All those things that we have had to put complete faith and trust in the powers that be because those things are completely out of our control. Those of you, who really know me well, know that is a very unsettling thing for me to let the control go.   Part of me wants to be home, stocked up, cuddled in and available to help others in need. But I am here on this glorious vacation with many things to look forward to and feeling very well taken care of at this point. So I stay positive and hopeful and pray about the right now. It is all we can do. So today was a normal day for us here at sea. Crocheting class, arts and crafts, tutoring, schoolwork, music trivia and gym time. Today mom and I sprinkled in some time to relax in the sun poolside and enjoy the beauty of where we are. Then it was off to dinner and then back to the cabin for some time in tonight. Geoffrey isn’t feeling 100% and we are going to love and respect his need for some rest and relaxation and give him a night off. It is also the conclusion of another “leg” of this trip so we had the opportunity to show a little love through tipping our beloved staff members that take such great care of us day in and day out. Makes us happy to bless others and it is a great example to the girls. We also got excursion options from Holland America for our upcoming ports that we added to next week’s itinerary. Some fun and exciting things that we have never done before, but you will have to wait to hear about them when we get to do them. We talked through them at dinner and were able to get them booked through the app before we left the dinner table. Gotta love technology!! O.K. off to spend some cuddle time, to get some good rest, and see what the day holds for us tomorrow. Please take a deep breath everyone. I know these are crazy and stressful times. Love each other and show the compassion to others you would like shown to you. Love, Hugs and Prayers…Debra