Cruising with Jane McDonald

Joined by just six other passengers on what is easily her smallest ever cruise, Jane enjoys unseasonably good weather as she visits the puffin-packed Treshnish Islands, and Fingals Cave on Staffa, which inspired Mendelssohns Hebrides Overture.

Starting in Vancouver, Jane cruises around Alaska, enjoying a dog sledding adventure on an ice field, visiting the Glacier Bay National Park, meeting the cast of the nightly onboard musicals and taking a cooking lesson from ships executive chef en route.

Jane stops off at the Sagrada Familia in Barcelona, catches the Tour de France in Marseilles and hits the Italian Riviera in Genoa.

Starting and finishing in Havana, Jane takes a trip round Cuba where she falls for the people, the buildings, the music and the 50s cars. She has lunch on the floating Rasta Raft, and enjoys a salsa session before gate-crashing a house party where she discovers no-one parties like Cubans party!

From Reykjavik, Jane boards the former ferry Ocean Diamond for a voyage around Icelands rugged shorelines. Highlights include hot geysers, the aurora borealis, whale watching, a dip in a lagoon, a visit to a puffin rescue centre and joining in a rettir (rounding up sheep from the mountains).

Jane gets a feel for New Orleans before boarding the worlds oldest steamboat for a trip along the Mississippi. On board there are sing-along piano bars and a theatre, and excursions include a trip to a former plantation, and the Louisiana State Penitentiary.

Jane continues her cruise to the North Island, including a trip to capital city Wellington, quad-biking 900m above sea level, meeting a traditional Maori tribe and a helicopter tour over Auckland, before finally heading back to Australia to climb all 1,438 steps of the Sydney Harbour Bridge.

In Argentina, Jane visits Puerto Madryn in Patagonia, the largest Welsh settlement outside Wales, and Eva Perons famous balcony and tomb in Buenos Aires. In Uruguay, she goes shopping in Punta Del Este, the Monte Carlo of South America. She ends her cruise in Montevideo, Uruguays capital, where she visits one of the countrys oldest wineries.

In Kolkata, Jane visits the colourful chaos amid the largest flower market in Asia before setting sail on the Ganges River. Stop-offs include the temple of Kalna, and Murshidabad where she explores the grand palaces of the city and discovers a religion close to her heart, before going off the beaten track to see some local artisans at work.

Jane uncovers a little-known cruise route in the Great Lakes of America and Canada, where she jet-boats across the perilous rapids outside Montreal.

Starting in photogenic Budapest, Jane rides a sumptuous steam train built at the peak of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, boards a luxury river ship to the blossoming post-communist cities of Bratislava and Belgrade, and visits Draculas castle.

The singer returns to embark on more voyages around the world, beginning with the first of two programmes charting a trip to the Caribbean aboard a new luxury liner. The first leg takes her south-east from Fort Lauderdale in Florida toward the private resort of Princess Cays on the island of Eleuthera, and from there she continues along to the Virgin Isles and St Thomas, ending on the island of St Martin.

Jane books a four-berth private luxury river cruiser to travel along the Thames from Hampton Court to Henley-on-Thames to celebrate the 70th birthdays of her good friends Sue and Olwen. At Shepperton Lock, where they meet lock-keeper Steve Newman, who shares his 46 years of knowledge of with Jane, before heading for Windsor.