Walnut Grove Cruise & Ltd Travel Blog

It’s official. Cruising has returned to ports in the U.S. While many cruise lines have already started sailing with North American guests from offshore ports in the Caribbean and Europe, there’s been no cruising from ports we can drive to. Until now. Between the end of June and the holiday weekend, three ships have set sail from three different American... read more

New Zealand is in celebration mode in July with the arrival of Matariki. It's a constellation of stars that rises in New Zealand skies, shining their brightest in the first week of the month. Known to astronomers as Pleiades or the Seven Sisters, Matariki is believed to have formed more than 100 million years ago, and this pre-historic cluster of... read more

Stay tuned - we will have more information on cruise & destinations for 2022.Click Here to Learn More read more

 In Japan, it’s called the ‘Castle in the Sky’, but international travelers who’ve discovered historic Takeda Castle have compared it to another mountain-top historic ruin half a world away in South America. Peru’s Machu Picchu has made most intrepid travelers’ bucket lists of adventures. But Japan’s Takeda Castle (pronounced: ‘tah-kay-dah’) - that's about the same age as Peru's Machu Picchu... read more

Get out a sharpie – there’s a new ocean to label on your map of the world. Or globe, if you have one. You might have to update your travel bucket list, too. If you’ve already ticked off ‘visit all the oceans of the world’, you’ll have to uncheck that box. Even if you’ve seen, swum in, or sailed upon the... read more

On some islands, they like to tell you how many beaches they have, or days of sunshine. On Nevis, it’s how many different varieties of mangoes they have. The answer? Officially, nearly four dozen – and unofficially, it’s estimated nearly 200 different varieties of mangoes grow on this tiny Caribbean island.Nevis makes up the other part of the twin-island nation... read more

It’s news that marries two of the fastest-growing styles of travel: river cruising and family heritage travel. AmaWaterways has partnered with Ancestry, the company that specializes in genomics and connecting people to their family history. The river cruise line has done family-heritage themed cruises before, but now, you’ll be able to uncover specific details about your own family. That’s because... read more

The leaders of the world’s seven biggest democratic economies are meeting in Cornwall, England, and it’s putting the Southwest region of the country under a spotlight. Maybe you’ve heard of ‘bleisure’ travel? It’s about tacking on a leisure vacation to a business trip. We’re not sure if the leaders of the Western World have the time for a little independent... read more

If you’ve never put the words ‘luxury’ and ‘water park’ together in a sentence before - let alone a vacation - now’s your chance. Baha Mar is a thousand acres of Bahamian paradise on world-famous Cable Beach near Nassau. The exquisite white sands are home to not one, but three luxury beach resorts: Rosewood, SLS and Grand Hyatt. Now, in... read more

“Living well is the best revenge,” said a 16th-century poet, and that line may be the inspiration for one of the latest trends in travel. Over a year of travel shutdowns has reminded us of how precious the privilege to explore the world is – and how we can’t take for granted that the special trips we’ve been dreaming about... read more

This is something we can get on board with! A few years ago, Spain declared the third Thursday of June ‘World Tapas Day,’ which in 2021 falls on June 10. Tapas comes from the Spanish verb ‘tapar’ or to ‘cover’, and story goes that back in the day, ‘tapas’ was simply the piece of bread or maybe meat that you used... read more

Planning travel is fun, and it even gives us a mental health boost by giving us the pleasant anticipation of experiences we love. As the world begins to open again, it’s easy to lose ourselves in the inspiration, novelty, beauty, charm, and excitement of looking forward to travel. The last year has taught us a couple of things about planning travel.First,... read more

Three new resort destinations for the vacation of your dreams in paradise are coming to life in Jamaica. Groundbreaking has begun on a nearly half-billion dollar project that will put Ocho Rios on your ‘ultimate beach holiday’ list beginning late 2022 whether you’re looking for a getaway for grownups, or an island vacation for the family. The famous, Jamaica-based, family-owned... read more

 Some call them ‘sea cows.’ They belong to the family of marine mammals called ‘Sirenia’, after the ‘Sirens’ of Greek mythology: mermaid-style creatures whose irresistible beauty lured sailors to their deaths. Blubbery and be-whiskered, 10-feet long and weighing a thousand pounds, it’s hard to imagine anyone today mistaking a manatee for a seductive woman who just happens to be a... read more

As travel restarts, for many travelers, Europe is calling. We have a lot of catching up to do, and to celebrate the true spirit of travel, luxury hotel chain Four Seasons has developed six new “Scenic Route with Four Seasons” road trips that connect 13 of its landmark European hotels in uniquely curated routes, with castles and wineries, caves and... read more

Colombia is reborn. Named after the 15th-century explorer of the Americas, Colombia stands out as the only nation in South America with coastlines on both the Pacific Ocean and the Caribbean, as well as being the leading source of coffee and emeralds in the world.  Colombia has found new followers among savvy global travellers, who, in survey after survey cited the... read more

If you missed your dose of exotic scenery and culture – or even winter sports adrenaline this year, one country’s desert can feed your travel imagination. The Qatar peninsula juts a hundred miles out from the Arabian Peninsula into the Persian Gulf. Most travellers to the region focus on the thrilling, ultra-modern capital city of Doha. But most of the... read more

There’s a phrase in travel: ‘Multi-modal’. Think of ‘planes, trains and automobiles,’ where you complete your trip via a number of different types of transportation. Multi-modal travel is not new. But one version – larger-than-life journeys combining the romance of both cruise and rail - is picking up steam. Ships and trains are a natural fit, even mirror images of each other:... read more

What’s not to love about May 13th? World Cocktail day has two of my favorite words: world, and cocktail. For those of us who love to travel… and love to get into the ‘spirit’ of the moment with a locally-sourced beverage, cocktail recipes can be some of our most cherished travel souvenirs. And drinks at a smart bar can be... read more

Spring may be the most hopeful season. There is nothing more uplifting than seeing Nature reborn every Spring. It’s like an assurance that life will get better again, no matter how tough the dark days of Winter – or life – have been. Between March’s Spring Equinox and the start of Summer on the Solstice in June, the days get... read more