Belfast, Northern Ireland UK

Saturday, May 30, 2015

Photo Slideshow

I was up first this morning. There was a crack in the curtains and through it I could see bright light and land! Last night there was nothing but sea, this morning there is Ireland! I was looking Giant’s Causeway. We aren’t there yet, but if visibility is good enough and we are sailing this close at that time, we are on the starboard side and should see something. We won’t get to Belfast until 1pm.

Since we spent 2 nights in Belfast before, we have made no plans here. All aboard is 10:30pm and I guess sunset today is 9:44pm, but still it feels like a half day here to me because I know we won’t stay out past 6pm or so. Originally, I had questioned the judgement of those who booked tours out to Giant’s Causeway today, but if this weather holds today, they will probably have made the wise choice.

There were very few people up in Terrace this morning. We finished breakfast and went up to Horizons to look out while we waited for our cabin to be cleaned. Clay had his tablet GPS tracking all the while. After we got up to Horizons, he turned it off and put in his earbuds and resumed his decades-long rerunning of BBC’s Pride & Prejudice. He had got past Darcy’s proposal to Lizzie and was at the wet shirt scene about the time I started telling him about land on the port side. He told me not now, he’d turned off the GPS. So, we sailed past Dunluce Castle ruins and Giant’s Causeway without even looking for them and without binoculars. It isn’t clear that we could have seen anything, but we weren’t even trying up in Horizons behind glass and with our naked eyes. Anyway, we are now sailing between Northern Ireland and Scotland and it is beautiful. It is rather too cold to sit outside though even with jackets. The high today is forecast to be about 55F and it should not rain until after 6 or 7pm. We’ll hope for a pleasant afternoon in Belfast.

When we drove along this coast on our previous visit to Ireland, it was one of those on a clear day situations. On a clear day, you can see the coast of Scotland. We didn’t ever see it then. Today while it became increasingly cloudy and overcast, we could see both the coasts of Scotland and Ireland. Once again, it was clear that the grass really is greener in Ireland! We could see the demarcated fields with cattle or sheep in them. We saw hillsides of gorse in bloom. It was wonderful. There were colorful little seaside villages. There were sailboats and ferries. We slowed considerably as we made the turn into the mouth of the River Lagan. We had not heard or seen the pilot boat and he has always come up on our side to date. It was about 10 minutes after the time the Captain had said he expected to pick him up before I heard the pilot boat roaring up from behind us. I got out just in time to take his photo and have him wave at me. I waved back so I don’t think I got a photo of him waving!

Since we cleared UK customs and immigration on the first sea day I would expect that as soon as we are docked that the ship should already be cleared, but I guess we’ll find out. We are 6.4 miles (or something else) from Belfast now and it is 11:25am. It looks like we dock out near the Titanic Museum and not in town in Belfast which explains the complimentary shuttle. I am not sure why they think it will take until 1pm. I’ll report back!

It is 20 of 1pm and we’re alongside but not yet docked or cleared. We entered a channel that has the Titanic Experience building at the far end of it. The ship pirouetted around and we backed up on the other side of the channel to what looks like a freight dock. But here we are. We can see the H&W cranes Samson & Goliath. We could see them from our hotel window from in Belfast when we were here before.

We went up for an early lunch at Terrace after entering the channel. The first thing we spotted on the buffet was mushy peas! They had gone all out with a UK lunch. Clay had the fish & chips and pronounced them some of the best he’s had. They big piece of roasted beef of some kind at the carving station and Yorkshire puddings. I had a half ham & cheese sandwich and a slice of cheese pizza. I had a scoop of strawberry cheesecake ice cream. Clay had chocolate fritters (disappointing) with vanilla ice cream, then went back when I told him they had pistachio. I don’t know how he missed it since it was green and covered with nuts.

Julie announced the ship was docked and cleared right around 1pm. We went down and got in line to get a map and shuttle schedule from the onboard destination desk. The shuttles were to start running at 2pm and stop at 5:50pm. We went out and got in a bungled line and around 1:20pm the first shuttle came and we managed to make it onboard. There was another 5 minutes or less behind it, so probably only the first shuttle had a line or a wait. The shuttles were to run every 15 minutes. They were bright pink double deckers so they held a lot of people. They were fully enclosed and very nice buses.

The first shuttle stop was the Visit Belfast Welcome Centre right across the street from City Hall. We got off there. The second shuttle stop was the yellow fountain by Victoria Square Shopping Centre. The 2 stops are only a few blocks apart and all within the Cathedral Quarter. We got off at the first stop because the tourism people onboard told Clay that is where he would find the closest ATM. He did. It was in the front wall of their building, right beside the front door. Clay actually made 2 withdrawals there. I guess there were no fees on the first withdrawal and he figured that he’d get all the pounds we need before we go home from London. The bad news is that after we got back to the ship around 4pm, he studied his money and realized it was all Northern Bank notes and not legal currency in the rest of Great Britain. Oops! I had already gotten undressed from shore clothes by the time he decided to get on the next shuttle and try to get the Visit Belfast Welcome Centre to exchange these Northern Ireland notes for Bank of England notes. So, he is gone! I absolutely do not remember having anything like this problem the last time we were in Belfast and I have to assume it was just the ATM we used. We passed a load of ATMs from international banks that I recognized the brand names, but Northern was the first one we saw since it was in the tourism office’s wall, and that was the one we used. Well, I have my fingers crossed that he gets them exchanged easily somewhere and get back soon.

After the ATM, we went inside the Visit Belfast WC and I found a Belfast patch. Clay paid for it with pound coins he had brought with him as leftover money from the last time we went through London. Then we came out and headed away from the area. There was a large and noisy demonstration of some kind drawing a large crowd in front of City Hall. There were dozens of red jacketed young men in the same block aggressively shilling HOHO bus tickets to the cruise ship passengers being dropped off as well. We really couldn’t get out of there fast enough without even getting our bearings.

I headed us toward the Clock Tower with an idea of walking past it to the River Lagan and along the river to see the artwork I remembered and then over to the yellow fountain and the shopping center. We thought we might stop for a snack somewhere but nowhere appealing presented itself along our route. We went into a Boots, a Pound Plus and a Tesco where we finally bought some crisps, or potato chips. We have been craving potato chips onboard with sandwiches or drinks and all they serve on Marina is these big thick fat French fries! Problem solved now!

We came back on the 3:20pm shuttle and I guess Clay caught 4pm shuttle back into Belfast. The last shuttle at 5:50pm should be leaving town now. I hope Clay is on it! He took his camera, but left his phone, so I have no way to find him! Actually, Currents says the last shuttle back is at 7:35pm, but the timetable from Visit Belfast, shuttle provider says 5:50pm. I have to assume the shuttle provider has the correct information though. Clay is back. He is about as mad as a hornet. Nobody wanted to exchange the NI pounds for British pounds. He got all but about 200 pounds worth exchanged before everything in town shut down for the night and he caught a shuttle bus back. He is trying the onboard currency exchange now even with the 5% fee. This is really on the Visit Belfast tourism people. Clay asked onboard a ship in NI for a half day where to find an ATM and they direct him to one on their building that will dispense money that is not even legal tender here in Belfast? When he went back to the Visit Belfast office (where according to their website they offer currency exchange) they refused to help him at all at first. He learned from a guard on the dock while waiting for a shuttle that they post office was open and would exchange currency. When he asked at VB if that was true they confirmed it and said that Marks & Spencer had a currency exchange too. But, Marks & Spencer wouldn’t accept the NI pounds after he stood in line for over 30 minutes.

We are docked on the port side today. We have a pretty scenic view out the starboard side. There is no actual cruise terminal here. They have a medium sized tent set up out on the pier to function as one. I think this might be the first cruise port since NYC that did not have some kind of permanent structure to serve as a cruise terminal building. I know the crew had to be missing the free wi-fi that has been at every previous port, especially after 3 sea days. There were a ton of people using the wifi in the Visit Belfast WC though!

It is almost 5pm and a large tanker, the Mersey Spirit from Liverpool, just sailed past us, spun around and is now sidling up to our starboard side. I guess we need to bunker fuel. I was a little surprised they didn’t mention anything in Currents or make any announcements about bunkering today after 3 sea days of sailing. I figured we’d need fuel, and they usually issue dire warnings to the smokers on bunkering day. Maybe they figured all guests would be ashore, but they aren’t!

We’re back from dinner and they are still bunkering. In other bad news, we had a letter on the bed informing us that due to adverse weather forecasted for the Irish Sea and English Channel that they are canceling our last 2 ports between Dublin and London. So, instead of Holyhead and St. Peter Port we will be docked in Dublin from 8am on 5/31 to 8pm on 6/1. The other bad news is Marina has been notified that Ireland requires ships to shut off all satellite communications within 12 nautical miles of Dublin, so no Internet and no phones. Don’t worry if I don’t post any new entries for a few days. The other bad news is that we had signed up to join with some Cruise Critic roll call people to do a private excursion in Holyhead. The woman who organized it had to pay in advance and she collected our shares from us a few days out of Montreal. Also, her husband took ill and they left the ship before we started across the Atlantic. So, while we will miss the ports and the excursion, I guess we’ll also miss the money spent. This is always the risk with booking independent cruise excursions especially if you don’t handle the booking yourself or like this you agree to pay up front instead of on arrival. Once again, a calculated risk that went bad. We’ve been hemorrhaging money in Ireland! Gotten nothing for it but our trouble and haven’t enjoyed ourselves here yet! I can only hope things turn around in Dublin though I can’t imagine how they could make up for all we’ve now lost in a city where 2 years ago this month we spent 2 nights.

Photo Slideshow

Sea Day 3

Friday, May 29, 2015

Sea Day 3. I woke up late again. I didn’t wake up until Clay got back from the gym. We went to a very empty Terrace. Maybe more people went to GDR on deck 5 since it was so rocky overnight and now. The sun is shining, the water and air are warmer, the wind has died down and there is no fog or haze. Unfortunately, we seem to have traded it all for large rolling swells coming from the port to the starboard side which is causing Marina to sway or wallow. Everyone is having a problem walking in a straight line at any rate.

So, the mandatory life boat drill was the same as the past 2 with the exception that it was at least 15 minutes shorter. Since everyone is certainly onboard and everyone boarded at least in Montreal where they were last compelled to attend, it was surprising that we still had to sit for several minutes while a number of names and cabin numbers were recited. I guess 25 to 30 minutes is the quickest we can muster. God help us in the event of an actual emergency.

Lisa, the social hostess, has held needlepoint each of the 3 sea days. She said today that she did not plan another during this cruise. That seems reasonable. I have a little supply of work ahead so I am fine with it. My work improved greatly from my first project to my second.

There is another cooking demonstration this morning with the Exec Chef, Alexis Quaretti and Red Ginger chef Wang Enmin. I think I will pass today. I think I handle the motion better in my own room than in the theater even though it is 2 decks lower. There is another popcorn movie in the theater this afternoon but it is The Imitation Game again. Clay declares he will go get popcorn and come watch something in the cabin. We’ll see. I expect I will have a long nap sometime today. The Exec Chef had previously announced at one of his earlier cooking demos that he would hold a Gala Tea since this was a crossing (as well as Indian Dinner and Country Fair). There is no Gala Tea on the schedule today and there was none on the previous 2 sea days, so while I have never been up to any of the tea times, I have to assume that this Trans-Atlantic sailing is not getting a Gala Tea. Dr. Paula Smith is giving another lecture at 1pm on Dublin. She has family ties there and is very familiar with the city and country of Ireland, so we’ll like to go. Lunch today in Terrace is an Asian Buffet. Hopefully, we’ll be able to find seats in there today to have lunch. Part of the problem yesterday was the number of Waves Grill orders being delivered inside to Terrace. It is nicer outside today, so hopefully all those people who want to eat from Waves will stay there. Back and they did not. We wandered and wandered like lost souls before Clay finally approached a woman eating soup and asked if we could sit with them. After all that, I found the Asian buffet to be quite disappointing. Clay may disagree as they not one, but two, whole roast suckling pigs on the carving stations. They did have good chicken dumplings cooked like potstickers. Clay liked the mango rice pudding, but he may have had that before served cold instead of hot though. I will continue to look forward to Polo tonight.

I napped after the Dublin lecture and probably could have skipped it without missing anything. Clay has been trying to balcony-sit for hours which is his favorite cruise activity. It has just been to ugly out. With the sun today, he thought he could do it. Not on the balcony, even in a fleece jacket and with our Canadian lap blanket. He spent most of the morning on the big covered loungers where we sat yesterday. He had on the fleece and used 2 of their lap blankets and said it had to do with the glass between him and the sea in order to block the wind, but he really wanted the sun. Also, all that glass blocks the sound of the sea, but I pointed out it was replaced by the sound of the swimming pool sloshing in and out.

The Oceania Club cocktail party is this evening. We’ve been invited again and unless conditions get worse, I assume we’ll attend. We have our Polo reservations tonight at 6:30pm. This is to replace the evening I was too seasick from puffin-watching in St. John’s. The show tonight is Salute to Broadway featuring vocalist Lawrence Cummings. He is a very good singer, but I’m not sure we’ll go. There is also a late night cabaret with Mark Newsome. (I still have no idea who he is.) I think they said they had the same amount (about 800) past repeat cruisers. The longest term cruisers were the same Canadian couple as before who boarded in February in Papeete, they will leave in Southampton in a few days. Clay said we each drank $16 worth of onboard wine. So, there’s that. We enjoyed Polo again. Clay ordered the whole Maine lobster and said he wouldn’t do it again. He said it wasn’t as good as the whole lobster he ate in Cheticamp! We really like the little fruit jellies they give at the end of the meal. Clay had the brownie with ice cream. The brownie had nuts and he said the Tahitian vanilla ice cream was much better than that served elsewhere onboard. He liked it. I had double handmade vanilla marshmallows in a trilogy of sauces.

The big rolling swells have continued throughout the day and I decided I’d had enough after dinner and we did not go to the show. The Currents for tomorrow says the port will provide a complimentary shuttle to and from central Belfast. We’ll hope for the best. These port shuttles have been a mixed bag, though the port provided ones have been infinitely better than O provided ones. So fingers crossed. Otherwise, we’ve probably done justice to Belfast in the past and there is nothing left on to do list there.

Sea Day 2

Thursday, May 28, 2015

Sea Day 2. Nothing to do and all day to do it. Woke up to fog and haze and moderate seas again. It is actually raining out this morning. Clay was off to the gym by 6am again and took his keycard today. I slept in until quarter of 7am. Terrace didn’t start serving breakfast until 7:30am and there was hardly anyone in there when we got up there at 8am. Marina has a lot planned today that mostly does not have an extra charge. There is an indoor country fair from 10:30 to 11:30am on decks 5 & 6 and decks 14 & 15. No idea what is involved. Needlepoint again at 9:30am today, didn’t go. There is an Indian Dinner Buffet at Terrace tonight. The executive chef talked this up at the last cooking demo we attended and it is evidently a special event reserved for crossings. I guess 3 consecutive sea days and officially we are crossing. He also said he would have a Gala Tea but I guess they must be saving that for tomorrow.

Clay is at a lecture this morning. Dr. Roger Cartwright on Ships of State. It sounded interesting and I haven’t been to one of his lectures yet. But, I skipped it to answer some Cruise Critic roll call questions. They are showing The Shipping News as an afternoon popcorn movie in the theater at 2pm and we’ll plan to be there. It is set in Newfoundland, which we’ve just left. We have seen it before and I’ve read it. I recall it being rather bleak and depressing, but I should see it with new eyes today. Clay has no recollection, so unless he sleeps through it again he may see something new too. Well, the movie certainly looked like the sail in to Corner Brook. It was not as bleak as I remembered. I enjoyed it.

So, we went to the Country Fair this morning. They had a very good turnout. It was a bunch of stations where you tried to win raffle tickets. Martinis had the bar staff with a ring toss. The pursers had a ball toss in the atrium. The shops had a teddy bear toss in the atrium. Destinations had a match photos with places contest. The spa had acupuncture trivia. The electricians had an Operation-type game. The deck hands had knot tying. (Clay’s big ticket score.) The entertainment staff had line dancing. (That was the easiest big ticket score for me.) Housekeeping had a contest of fastest pillow casing. Waiters had a contest of 2 couple carrying a lime between their foreheads. Bar staff had a drop coins into a glass in a bucket of water. Chefs had a blind identification of spices. We thought we had a bunch of tickets between us but we didn’t win anything.  The raffle ticket drawings ended at noon and the entire ship headed to lunch! We wound up eating outside at Waves because there were no seats to be found in Terrace. It was fine.

Today we saw a lot more of the birds we had spotted yesterday. They seem like small birds to be living out here hundreds of miles from land in the North Atlantic. Clay got some photos today and thinks he matched images via Google and that most of the birds we’ve been seeing are fulmars.

Clay finally opened his bottle of Belfast Bay McGovern’s Oatmeal Stout from Portland, Maine and he says it tastes and smells like cigarette butts at the bottom of an old beer bottle. I won’t say what it makes his breath smell like. I implored him to just dump it out and open another. Half way through it, he finally got up and went in the bathroom where I heard him call out OMG. He made me come in to see the stains it left in the sink. I won’t share anymore. He just stuck an Alligash White in the ice bucket. It should be very different. In fact, I think he has already had one or more of them.

We had the Indian buffet at Terrace. It was pretty awesome. We both only ate from one area and there was so much selection that we were too full to go to the other stations. We were both a little disappointed not to find our favorite desserts. Kulfi for Clay and gulab jamon for me, but Clay really liked the mango yogurt and we both liked some kind of noodley pudding that I can’t tell you the name of it.

The show tonight is a repeat of One More for the Road, which was a Vegas theme. It was our least favorite of the Jean Ann Ryan productions so we will skip it. We put the clocks forward one hour again tonight. I wish I could say we had nothing pressing to do tomorrow but there is a mandatory life boat drill at 10:15am. I realize emergency procedures are important but when is enough, enough?

Sea Day 1

Wednesday, May 27, 2015

Clay got up and went to the gym to walk on the treadmill at his usual time. I heard him but was still struggling and laid abed until about 6:45am. I must have been in the bathroom when he came back and tapped on the door because I didn’t hear it. He had forgotten his keycard and was worried about waking me or the neighbors.

I am up and around and eating today, but I haven’t gotten back my self-confidence about my equilibrium/balance and queasiness. So, I am just tried to move slowly. It has been very foggy all day so while there are lots of breaking waves and over 10-foot rolling swells, we can’t really see them just feel the ship wobbling and swaying.

Clay stayed in Horizons this morning for Needlepoint and picked up an extra kit for me. We laid on some big double wide loungers under a shelter behind glass on the 14^th deck. They had blue lap blankets out there and we had it mostly to ourselves. Clay slept some then decided to go get some of the stash of dark chocolate bed candies he had stashed and walk across to Baristas and make submarinos-style hot chocolates. He did and brought them back and they were pretty good. Eventually it was time for us to go to the Belfast Immigration clearance in Red Ginger. There was a long, zigzagging line. They had taken all the tables out of Red Ginger and formed the zig-zag lines with chairs. There were a man and a woman interviewing every couple about their plans after arriving in London. He asked when our return date home was and Clay told him July 21, he wanted to know if we were spending all that time in the UK I just said we were staying onboard until Stockholm and he let us go. He stamped our passports with Belfast. Though we’ve been to Belfast, we didn’t get stamped there before.

Before lunch, Julie James the cruise director came on the intercom to inform us that the ship had passed the 2% limit of passengers and crew with acute gastro-enteritis and the CDC had been informed. She told us new cleanliness and sanitation procedures were now in place and to wash our hands. She asked everyone who had symptoms to go to the medical clinic where they were no waiving fees. We had been in the elevator earlier with a couple coming up from the medical center talking about now was a good time to be sick and carrying their bags of medications. Knock on wood, we’ve been OK. Though Clay set off a momentary red alert last night when he told the assistant cabin stewardess they couldn’t come in for turn down service last night because I was ill. I heard him and told him to go right back out and explain I had gone out on a small boat and gotten very sea-sick! He did and she laughed with relief but still gave him a bottle of hand sanitizer that she had already fetched. I figured she had already reported me and my cabin number to the medical officer and I’d find myself summoned down there today. But, I guess it didn’t get that far and she saw me this morning up and about. Anyway, at least Marina had the segment from NYC to Montreal outbreak free, but its back now.

We spent the afternoon napping and watching a movie, Clay went to a lecture about the John Paul Jones and the formation of the American Navy and another on Cabot and the founding of Newfoundland.

Dinner at Terrace. We saw a bunch of birds flying close to the water. They are hundreds of miles from any land! Clay had paella and declared it very good. We both had some Oceania signature cream puff looking thing that was filled with chocolate cream. It was delicious but the reason I got them was because they had tiny chocolate macarons sitting on top. Clay declared that if they could make them perfectly that small then they needed to have them in Baristas with the madeleines and caneles.

We moved the clocks ahead an hour tonight. Two sea days left.

St. John's, Newfoundland

Tuesday, May 26, 2015

Photo Slideshow

We arrived on time in St. John’s, Newfoundland for our very short day here today. We were docked from 8am to 1:30pm. At 2pm, we were sailing away. It is an interesting sail in. We had the land side. Those on the sea side got to see an iceberg!  It looks like a very nice town to visit. But since our stay here was so short we didn’t get to visit the city. We had opted to join some people from our Cruise Critic roll call on a Gatherall’s Puffin & Whale Watch at Witless Bay Ecological Reserve. It is the largest breeding colony in North America. Gatherall’s is known for its high speed catamaran which is the smooth ride available out there. It was still a risky proposition, but I decided to take a chance and hope for the best. Our organizer got us a special rate of $75 pp which included transportation to and from Bay Bulls to their pier. It was about a 30 minute drive out and a bit longer on the scenic route back. Oceania offered what sounded like the same tour, without listing the vessel. Oceania charged $249 pp for the same excursion on an unknown boat!

The catamaran appeared to be faster and more stable than the smaller tour boats we saw out there, but I confess that was small comfort. The ride was still a horror show. There were at least 12 foot rolling swells as we left the protected harbor on a boat that was only about 15 feet tall. We climbed up, had a few seconds of hang time and then fell down the other side. Then they claimed they sighted a minke whale, so even though they are very hard to sight in good conditions, the captain stopped the boat and we sat right there at that breaking point and bobbed and rotated for a good 15 minutes with the minke being spotted again. That just about did me in. But, I kept my seat outside, in front of the wheel house until we made it to Gull Island. They said they have at least 180,000 (either birds or breeding pairs) of puffins! I am sure I must have seen at least 100,000. I had taken 2 meclizine 2 hours before boarding, I had on my Relief Band at the highest zap setting and I applied Motion Ease 3 times. I was losing though. When I spotted the humpback whale, I was done. We hit a calm spot as everyone moved into position to whale watch and I made a dash for the bench indoors one deck below. I made it and laid down in private. I managed to fall asleep and only woke up to sit up and vomit up raspberries on the trip back in. I am very upset as I still feel bad and we have 3 days of Trans-Atlantic sailing now. I had been doing a really good job on only 1 to 1.5 meclizine a day. I could feel that I was able to ignore the wacky signals from my ears and yet still function with just proprioception. I could feel that I was doing something very right to function and enjoy myself and eat on the high decks and all with very little queasiness. But, I hadn’t been able to figure out what I was doing or how and now it is gone. I had actually thought that it was because of the progression of the Meniere’s Disease, that I had finally reached a stage where there was a benefit, no seasickness at sea. But I was clearly wrong. Fingers crossed I find my way back to coping tomorrow. The puffins were amazing and we will absolutely never seen anything like that again!

Tonight I am staying in. We will miss A Celebration of Music with Siglo, pianist Tim Kruse and Ginger String Quartet with Jean Ann Ryan Company. Tonight we move the clocks forward 30 minutes. Tomorrow we move them forward one hour. Tomorrow morning, our deck 7 has the last slot at 11:30am to 1pm to clear UK Immigration. I guess we picked up the immigration officials today in St. John’s and they are onboard with us until at least Belfast, our first UK port.

Photo Slideshow

Saint-Pierre, Saint-Pierre & Miquelon, France

Monday, May 25, 2015

Photo Slideshow

Today is Memorial Day. Somewhere else, not here. Today we are in Saint-Pierre, Saint-Pierre & Miquelon, France. It is a small island, next to another small island, off the coast of the larger island of Newfoundland. This is a very remote place!

We are not docked in town, but out of town, by an old abandoned wreck of a concrete building. The local tourism people though provided pretty good coverage with shuttle buses for the less than 10 minute ride to and from Saint-Pierre proper.

We had very rough seas again last night. I had to wake Clay up to secure his drawer of beers that were rolling and banging back and forth. I guess his snoring kept him from hearing it. He thought the previous night was so rough it was keeping him awake, but I didn’t hear those beers rolling and banging the previous night so I think last night was even rougher. He just must have been more tired.

Today was a walking/hiking day much like yesterday was in Corner Brook, Newfoundland. How, you might be asking yourself, am I doing all these long hours of walking? Well, I’ll tell you that I have been taking an Aleve every day since NYC!

It was pretty cloudy, windy and cold when we arrived and weather.com predicted rain. I wore my waterproof pants again since they serve as a wind-blocking, insulating layer as well. It did not rain and the sun was mostly out all day after we arrived.

We were scheduled to be here at 8am. I think we were close, but the ship was not cleared until after 9am. We were downstairs in the atrium waiting and were in the first dozen or so people out and on the first shuttle bus. The wind was brutal but the local tourism people bravely handed out maps in English as well as French flags. We were stopped by another woman just off the bus stop with more maps who wanted to help us. We knew where the post office and ATMs were and those were our main goals. We just asked here if the poste was open. She assured us that at 9:45am on Monday it absolutely was. Guess what? Though the posted hours for Monday were 8am to noon, it was locked up tight and no one was inside at the counter. It doesn’t really matter, we just hoped to get our passports stamped. We found the ATM and Clay loaded up on Euros since it did not charge a fee. Everything in town was still closed, though we passed a woman just unlocking a souvenir shop and sweeping her stoop. We decided to walk to the 2 belvederes or lookouts on the map. The first one was 70m elevation above town and overseen by a statue of St-Pierre. The other was about half way down. We went straight up first and over the other side and back down through town. It was brutally cold and windy, though as we noted the wind was out of the south so God help them when it blows from the North! We stopped at every patisserie/coffee shop shown on the map coming back down. We were really hoping for a hot chocolate break and to sit for a spell out of the wind and to use the bathroom. Again, even though the signs posted on the doors indicated they were now open, they were locked up tight and no one was inside. By the time, we got back where we started, the few shops that were there were open. We both wound up finding and buying something in the first shop where we had seen the woman unlocking and sweeping. You’d have thought from the turnout of welcoming people and the free shuttles that the local businesses would have been happy for the infusion of cash but I guess not. We were happy to give at least some money to someone who turned up to make some. We had planned to shop for French wine at this stop and I am happy to report that we easily found both stores in town and they were open. But, I haven’t finished my first 4-bottle box yet, so I didn’t think I needed any more French wine. They had a big selection of the same size boxes here as I bought in NYC. I did not price compare since I didn’t need any. Clay looked at beers, but oddly they were all Mexican or Heineken. We checked the poste again between 11:30am and noon, still not open, and then walked out along the shore to the cannons and light house. Then we caught the next shuttle bus back to the ship. They were running 2 buses to start. Each time we saw one inbound or outbound, it was full. We noticed a lot of people walking rather than riding and later we saw only one white bus and one or more school buses, so there may have been a problem with buses some time mid-morning but we were unaffected.  

We got back and turned our passports in before the 6pm deadline and went to Terrace for lunch. Clay wanted to get ice but forgot to bring our water bottles, so while we went downstairs after lunch, I went to Baristas and got a decaf, skim milk cappuccino. Clay brought a bed chocolate for me to make a mocha submarine! We went back in Terrace to fill our bottles with ice but both ice dispensers had run out of ice! But, we found a new treat to make with bed chocolates in Baristas.

The afternoon popcorn movie today is Mr. Turner. Neither of us would watch it again, even free and with free popcorn unless it was at gunpoint. So, here I am and Clay is snoring on the loveseat. There was nothing we wanted to watch on TV either. We got our Hurtigruten final documents by email today and there is a document they say they require you to print and bring. Oceania charges either 25 or 50 cents per page for printing, so we hoped to avoid that but since it is not clear when or where else we might have access, we’ll do it here today after 4pm when the computer guy comes back on duty. We don’t want to go up to his computer lab where we’ve seen the printer and not be able to use it but incur charges anyway somehow. I guess we are at about the half-way point on this first Oceania Marina cruise. We’ve been gone 21 days on a 41-day cruise.

Tomorrow is the first of the private Cruise Critic excursions we have joined. We met the organizer for lunch out of NYC. The excursion tomorrow is on Gatherall’s catamaran to Witless Bay Ecological Preserve. I have my fingers crossed for smooth seas and easy sailing and lots of puffins. We are expected to see icebergs and whales as well, but the visit is to the largest puffin breeding colony in North America and it is their breeding season now. The port is St. John’s, Newfoundland.

The show tonight is a JAR repeat of Malibu Waves, so we won’t go. I am sure we’ll return to Terrace for dinner. So, I’ll just end here for today.

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Return to Sydney, Nova Scotia

Sunday, May 24, 2015

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It was very rough sailing last night. Even the wait staff in Terrace this morning were complaining about how little sleep they got last night. We were up by 6am. Clay must have been earlier because he said the fitness center was opened early. We had breakfast in Terrace. I had blintzes since it is Sunday morning and my weekend splurge. I weighed myself last night before dinner and according to the scales I weigh the same as I did when we left NYC. I guess that’s the best I can hope for.

So since we were here in Sydney on the 13^th, we thought we had everything checked out and in order for our visit today. But, man plans and God chuckles. The weather is much nicer here today than a week and a half ago. We got sleeted on that morning. Today the wind is still cutting, but the sun is shining, the temps were in the 40Fs when we arrived on time at 8am and the high is expected to reach 60F or so. The 60ft. tall, world’s largest, fiddle is uncovered and on display at the cruise terminal today, so that was one goal accomplished. They had fixed the video playing in the little lighthouse inside the terminal today. So, we learned the fiddle has a sound system installed that should play a local fiddle medley of tunes. We went back outside to recheck but the fiddle was silent both times we checked it. Maybe they are still working on it. So, our plans. When last here we met a young tourism woman at a couple of places in Sydney and she made some phone calls to find out if the museum would be open for the summer (it was closed the day we were here before) and she called 2 cab companies and got rate quotes for the trip to Glace Bay and return. So, what could go wrong?  The first City Wide cab driver we spoke to outside the port quoted us $45 to take us over to Glace Bay. We told him no we just wanted a ride to the Miners Museum, not a tour. He stood firm on his $45 for a one way trip. Since we had her notes saying 2 different cab companies including City Wide had told her the one way fare was $25, we walked away and he didn’t stop us. We walked down to St. Patricks church museum which was one of the places we had met the young woman before. I went in and there were 2 different young women today, but when I told them what had happened they agreed the one way fare should be $25 with any of the cab companies. She went and called City Wide and they told her the cabbie on the street out front misunderstood us and was quoting us a wait for us fare with return. (That would have been cheaper than advertised if so and we should have taken him up on it! But I don’t think we misunderstood him since he started at $150 for a 4-hour tour and we worked our way down to what we wanted to do.) Anyway, she had them send another cab to pick us up out front and we’d call for a return from Glace Bay when we were ready and pay $25 each way. A van pulled up right as we walked out and we were on our way. We arrived at minutes after 10am when it should have opened. It was locked up, there was not a car in the lot and they had a sign on the door saying they were closed for the winter. We all felt bad and a little ridiculous for not calling ahead beforehand to reconfirm. We got out and looked around at the outdoor exhibits and at Glace Bay. Then he took us down to the fish house/fish dock area and we got out and looked around again, then we drove back. So, as he said, now you’ve been to Glace Bay and not to feel too bad because he lives here and he had never been to the Miners Museum either. Some things are just not meant to be. We paid him $60 for his trouble on a $50 fare. We he dropped us off, I went back inside the church museum to let those girls know in case anyone else asked that the Miners Museum was closed. They were shocked and appalled that they had not thought to call ahead when we came in the first time. They said cruise season was well underway now and they would never have imagined that the museum was not open. I agreed with all they said, we understood it would be open at 10am 7 days a week by the time we returned but we should have called ahead to confirm it a day in advance or at least before driving over. Live and learn. I just wanted them to know in case anyone else asked them about it. We walked through the cruise terminal museum which was a well done Cape Breton highlights in a nutshell. We walked through the cruise terminal marketplace and saw a couple of new vendors. I bought a small seascape from a textile artist’s booth whose work I had admired when we were here before. She is Lynn Moore and she does some amazing work with a sewing machine and cut fabric that looks almost 3D photographic quality. I had wanted a $10 bookmark, but none of them really spoke to me though they were very impressive. I found what I liked in a 5x7 matted seascape.

So, anyway now we are back aboard after our morning’s adventure. I am fine with it. Clay is a little more upset. I put it in the category of all those things that are not meant to be. These things just happen and it was one random thing that we have missed every time we have been through here. Marina is having an afternoon popcorn movie at 2pm. I have been wanting to do one of these for a while, but the timing or the film have not suited. Today is The Hundred-Foot Journey. We did see this before but it was long enough ago and I enjoyed it enough before to see it again. I had been a little disappointed that they were finally playing a film I would like to see on a big screen at a time when I would probably miss it. Now, I can go. So, it all works out perfectly in the end.

There were a lot more people at the 2pm popcorn movie than expected for a shore day. The popcorn was only so-so, but I was happy to have popcorn anyway. We hurried back to the room to watch the movie Into the Woods on TV. We had never seen it. I liked it.

We’ll go to dinner tonight at Terrace again. The show tonight is Mark Newsome again. I am certain we won’t go.

This afternoon when we came back aboard and as we returned to the cabin after lunch we found the next 3 cabins forward of ours undergoing some kind of hazmat quality cleaning. There were a lot of workers wearing masks, carrying buckets, spray bottles and brushes and cloths. There was a uniformed officer or two as well. We have no idea what was going on. We didn’t smell anything but the cleaning chemicals. We hope no one is/was sick or that whatever was going on will cause us any problems. Clay spends a lot of time on the balcony and says someone forward of us has been smoking on the balcony or in the cabin with the door open since Montreal. I don’t see how it could be 3 cabins. Maybe someone complained and the smoker’s cabin and adjoining cabins got a special cleaning. But Clay had smelled it and said nothing. He assumed it was from right next door. Oh well, if we learn what was going on, I’ll report here.

It is 6pm and time for us to be sailing, but we aren’t moving yet. We haven’t heard any names broadcast, so it is not clear why. The shore people starting removing our ropes just after 6pm, so maybe it was union rules or port rules or something. Certainly, we have left other ports early when everyone was aboard already. We were late leaving here last time because a single passenger was late and we waited for him.

Oh, btw after today we have all new ports without repeats! Keep an eye on my Trip Advisor Travel Map at the bottom of the page for new map pins to appear.

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Corner Brook, Newfoundland and Labrador

Saturday, May 23, 2015

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Last night after dinner, I checked my email and had one from Susan, our travel agent at Keene Luxury Travel, offering us a complimentary upgrade to one of 2 A3 Concierge level cabins on our July 7 cruise. We looked around and decided to accept. Both were on the other side of the ship just as 7090, our originally assigned cabin was, so there wasn’t much of a downside. The one we got, 9040, is on the other side, up 2 decks and about as many cabins forward of the front elevators as we are behind them now. So, while this is higher and further away from center than we would usually select, we haven’t had any problems anywhere on the ship so far and we thought it was a larger cabin, so we are taking the chance. So, we’ll see if we think there is any justification for the usual large price difference! It turns out the concierge cabin and the one we are in now are exactly the same size. It just comes with a list of amenities that we don’t have (and don’t need at the extra price, if I may say so!).

·        Priority Noon ship embarkation with priority luggage delivery

·        Exclusive card-only access to private Concierge Lounge staffed by a dedicated Concierge, featuring complimentary soft drinks, coffees and snacks throughout the day

·        Complimentary welcome bottle of Champagne

·        Priority online specialty restaurant reservations

·        Unlimited access to Canyon Ranch SpaClub^® private Spa Terrace

·        Laptop computer with wireless Internet access

·        iPad^® upon request+

·        Exclusive discounts on Internet usage plans

·        Variety of Bulgari amenities

·        Complimentary Oceania Cruises logo tote bag

·        Cashmere lap blankets, perfect for relaxing on your veranda

·        Complimentary shoe shine service

·        Complimentary pressing of garments upon embarkation++

+Limited availability
++Certain limitations apply

So, we actually have Bulgari toiletries in out cheap cabin now. Today was the first day that our cabin category as originally booked could make specialty dining reservations, so we’ve already done that. We’ve walked by that Concierge Lounge and it is an interior room. We would never want to sit in a room without windows. We would like to have a lap blanket in the room, in fact, we’d like to have one each. But, the kind on the pool deck would be fine with us. I doubt we’d use the private Spa Terrace, but I guess we’ll find out since it is hard to find a good forward view. It looks like it would be the same problem as all the public decks though blocked by tall tinted glass. So, you can’t take photos. We’ll see. It is not supposed to cost us anything. I’ve just checked the O website and today the price difference between the B3 cabin we booked and the A3 concierge cabin we’ve been complimentarily upgraded to is $300pp or $600 total. We would never pay hundreds extra for the extra amenities listed. Not to mention that we prefer in general to be lower and more mid-ship!  I just asked Clay if he would pay $600 more for the cruise if the Concierge Lounge had an ice machine in it. He got excited and asked if I thought there was one. I said probably not, but assume there is, would that make you pay extra and he frowned and answered no, absolutely not plus it is higher and who wants more movement. Exactly. I will say that we’ll have to use the laundry room on that last O cruise as it is not included on that one, nor our independent travels in Norway. The one real upside is that all the laundry rooms are on the port side and forward, so we’ll be closer to the laundry room. Bonus!

It was a stunning sail in Corner Brook. We were entering, I don’t know if it is a fjord, as we woke up around 5 to 5:30am. If it isn’t a fjord, it felt like one. There were snow-capped mountains behind the closer green ones. Corner Brook appeared at the end of the navigable waterway with a big steaming pulp plant looming. We arrived on time, docked and were cleared within 20 minutes of the announced time. Marina had 2 gangways open so we did not see any backups. The info sheet Marina handed out said they would have local tourism people onboard. We saw them walk down the dock and enter the ship. We saw them wander the atrium and get in line at reception to find out where their table was. It showed up about 20 minutes after they did and then there was a wait for the chairs and the tablecloth. WTH? They put out literature the night before about this so why wasn’t the table already set up. We just wanted to get some local advice. I had looked online and the big thing to do here was walk their trails. But, the consensus was that it was difficult to find the trail to get started. It was, it is. The part of the trail between the dock and the pulp mill is practically nonexistent. You just have to be willing to walk across a muddy gravel lot to a gravel road to dirt path. There is a complicated set of highway interchanges between here and downtown that are avoided by the path, but in front of the pulp mill it is literally just a mud beaten track. The trails in town and up on the hill are well signed and maintained but you still need a map to get from one to the other. So, we confirmed that my printed online map was good. There was a free shuttle to downtown that we actually walked right on and got on and there were at least 2 buses running continuously. The only problem was the weather. It was cold and windy and threatening rain or raining most of the day. It was probably in 40Fs and we got rained on between 1 and 3pm. So, we dressed to keep warm and dry and we set off. Took the bus downtown. Took off walking on the Glynmill Inn Pond Trail. We saw a salmon ladder and 2 mute swans. We saw a sign at the marsh about 3 birds to look for here (Yellow Warbler, Northern Waterthrush and American Bittern) and we eventually saw 2 of them, but not the American Bittern. That was a 2 km walk. From there we passed a Tim Horton’s and tried to take a break but they did not have any maple doughnuts and they were out of dark hot chocolate. OK, I used their restroom and we left. There were no empty seats in there anyway. We walked on to the Three Bear Mountain Trail. The hardest part was getting up the hill to the trail. It was a 1km loop trail. There were some spectacular vistas up there looking out over the pulp mill and the town. We just beat the weather. We walked down through town and stopped in 2 stores looking for a watch band for Clay. I don’t know when it happened but the $15 Mickey Mouse watch he is wearing on this trip has cracked its leather (?) band and he’s afraid it will break entirely. We couldn’t find a band but found a $10 watch and he bought that. The other thing we had picked up from the tourism ladies (who btw were also at a hut on the dock with the same literature and giveaway pins and candies) was a Newfoundland Cuisine in Corner Brook pamphlet. You might expect it was mostly fish and you’d be right. However, under a place called Aromas Plus they had listed for Saturday only baked beans and toutons. I asked and toutons are fried bread dough usually served with something sweet like molasses. I wanted to have that. So, it was in Valley Mall which we could see from the bus on the way in and from the viewpoint on the hilltop trail. The women in the first store we stopped and asked about watch bands told us how to get there confirming what we had on the maps. We walked down through town and turned left on Main Street which was a steep downhill for us. We passed lots of people hauling back up the hill to the shuttle bus stop. Clay said he would rather just walk back to the ship than go back up that hill. On the way down the hill, we found $5.99 T-shirts with puffins on them and so had to get them. Eventually, we found Aromas Plus after 12pm. They did not have baked beans and toutons on the menu. She did not list them as being on the buffet line. I showed her the brochure and told her I had come for that. She thought they had sold out! What is it a hangover cure locally? Why would it be sold out by noon on the one day it is offered? I don’t know. She came back and said the kitchen informed her they could prepare exactly 2 servings then they were out. Clay backed out and got fish and chips. He said it was very good. He asked for a local beer and got a Black Horse which he liked. We could have gotten one order of baked beans and toutons and shared it and been full. I am literally full of beans. The toutons were not beignets! They were heavy and hefty and yeasty. They were good with the beans and molasses but the beans alone were not that good. They just tasted like hot canned pork and beans. They weren’t delicious like the Durgin-Park Boston baked beans. I told Clay that they tasted like I imagined the B&M canned baked beans from Portland, ME would have tasted and we both agreed that B&M is an unfortunate name for canned baked beans. We asked where Clay could buy some of the Black Horse beer and it was at the Alberts gas station between the Valley Mall and the ship. That decided that we would follow the path. We checked the trail map posted at the shelter at the Rotary trail head and still it was almost impossible to find though we followed the route from the map and found the markers so we were on the path. It was a good day. We were comfortable even in the bad weather.

One of the women that we joined a tour with in Holyhead, Wales is having to leave the ship in Sydney tomorrow morning due to her husband’s health. Better now than during 3 days in the Atlantic, but it still must be very upsetting. We wish them well. But, luckily I was here to answer the phone when she called to arrange to get paid by us to reimburse her what she already paid the tour operator.

Tomorrow we are back in Sydney and still plan to take a taxi to the Cape Breton Coal Miners Museum. So, we won’t worry about the weather.

Tonight we have 6:30pm dinner reservations in Toscana. Clay has been talking about but avoiding eating pasta for the past 2 days in anticipation. I really hope he eats some pasta tonight. The show tonight is Edward Garth “Anecdotes from my time on boats”. I have no idea who he is or why we’d listen to his anecdotes in a theater. I suspect Clay has no plans to do so. We turn the clocks back a half hour tonight. Since the day after tomorrow we are back in Newfoundland, I bet we’ll turn them ahead again tomorrow night. That will mess with you!

We are sailing away from Corner Brook. We left at least 20 minutes early. I guess everyone was aboard already!

We enjoyed Toscana again. We had different things this time. It was a different experience as well but still good. We sat at the very back of the ship and it was very rough up there, but no problems. Clay has decided to watch This is War on TV tonight. I love this film, but I’m sure this is the 3^rd or 4^th time we’ve seen it. He doesn’t remember it at all. There was a form on the bed tonight for 3 days where you could have 20 pieces of laundry for $24.95. We sent in a small bag twice with nowhere near 20 pieces each time and our bill was over $50. They haven’t sent us anymore laundry bills after that so we hope that got that whole free laundry deal worked out. We moved the clock back 30 minutes tonight on our way to Sydney, NS.

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Cruising out the St. Lawrence

Friday, May 22, 2015

I don’t know what time Clay got up but I didn’t wake up until he started making a lot of noise at 7am. I guess he figured I’d slept long enough. It wasn’t that long because we lost an hour last night. We lose another half hour tonight! The good news is that we are just sailing the St. Lawrence all day. By the time I checked the location map on the TV we were already in the big part by Anticosti Island. We saw a lot of wind farms and snowcapped mountains behind them on the shore today. I guess when we came through here the first time all we saw was Anticosti Island on our side. I was watching the bridge cam in the cabin that day, but I guess I never saw what was off to the side. The water has been pretty rough and it is very cold and windy. It rained this morning but by afternoon was partly cloudy. A pretty good sailing day.

We went up to breakfast at Terrace. Clay had his usual. I had a yogurt parfait and 3 Swedish pancakes. Our cabin wasn’t ready so we went up to Horizons and got comfortable chairs in the front windows and enjoyed the view through the rain-spattered windows. I brought my needlepoint and Clay was downloading an audiobook. 9:30am was the next needlepoint meeting and the first one of them on this cruise segment. I guess because technically this is a crossing (with all of 3 sea days!) that are a lot more crafters onboard. There must have been 50 women there and it was a mob scene. While the last 2 sessions have been mostly just kit handouts, today was a loud and raucous craft session. People brought up all kinds of projects and saw and talked while working or not. I stayed until 10am because I had told Clay I would meet him in the theater for the lecture. It was Dr. Paula Smith on Closing the Circle-The Story of Vikings in North America. Now I wish we stopped L’Anse de Meadows. We decided to just keep our seats and stay for the cooking demonstration with Exec Chef Alexis Quaretti and Chef de Cuisine Biagio Gallo. Then it was lunch time! We finally made our way back to the cabin where we found a Canadian customs form which we filled out and returned it to reception. We went up to Terrace for lunch. We found a very cold 2-top near the door. It was very busy in there. I guess no one could eat at Waves outside, but it still seemed very crowded today. It turned out Terrace was serving a Mexican buffet today and our first one onboard, so I was definitely not giving up and going down to the GDR. We both liked all the dishes we had. Our favorite, after a couple of sorry dessert days, was buenelos de san somebody. I don’t remember who. But they were like small warm raspberry filled doughnuts. I had 2!

We spent the rest of the afternoon in the quiet of our cabin. The people onboard this segment seem to be louder and ruder than those on the last one and maybe there are a lot more of them or else it just feels that way. We watched a movie, Elsa and Fred and napped as well as watched out the sliding doors. We decided to skip the Captain’s welcome cocktail party this time around.

I have never liked being around a lot of people and it seems that is growing into a stronger tendency as I age. I used to love cities. Now I notice I don’t care for them that much anymore. As I think about our recent travel, we have been doing more nature, landscape and wildlife travel and enjoying it more. The capitals of Europe coming up are weighing heavy on me right now. I will hope for the best. We have a lot to see and a lot of ground to cover. Fingers crossed.

A note about the cabin, 7055. We like the location about 4 cabins from the forward elevator and 6 from the stairwell. The deck location is good for us. But, as a couple we had lunch with who had a similar location out of NYC and got moved after 2 days complained, it is noisy. It was an unexpected reason and as I pointed out to him, you couldn’t know it from the deck plan. Directly across the hall from us is an interior door marked staff only. There are several of these along the halls. I am not sure what happens at all of them, but ours is very busy. They haul the steward service carts in and out of there, they deliver ice to the ice chests each steward station in our area uses, they deliver linens there and they stand out there folding them properly for use and chatting. Now, as I also pointed out to him, when he told us to demand to be moved that I could hear it all, but it wasn’t really bothering me. Mostly the noise is when I shouldn’t or wouldn’t be trying to sleep and it is a necessary activity that takes place in every hotel, motel, inn or ship with cabins. I wouldn’t complain about it. But after a few weeks, I can see his point. It was marring his expected luxury experience. He had paid a lot for it and he didn’t think he had paid a discounted rate for a cheap seat so to speak. I understand now. For those sensitive to noise, avoid 7055. I don’t know if the cabins on either side of us can hear what we can hear or not, but it is very obvious from where I sit now at the desk and it has awoken me on mornings like disembarkation day.

After our nap, it was raining again. Definitely, a good sea day. We went to the Terrace and had it almost all to ourselves as everyone was in the bars enjoying the free booze from 5:45pm to 8pm as the Captain’s welcome. Clay made the right call when he said we should avoid it. I wanted to go to the gym and weigh myself before dinner and we used the elevator up and tons of people were in them, some with drinks, complaining they couldn’t find a seat in the bars that they were a zoo. They certainly weren’t in Terrace. Since Waves was closed they shut down the auto doors there and it was no where near as cold as it had been at lunch. We both had good desserts again.

Clay watched a Nichols Sparks movie last night and tonight he is watching A Most Violent Year. The show tonight in the theater is a repeat of Backstage Pass, the Broadway one. We enjoyed it, but once was enough. We move the clocks ahead again tonight. Only by a half hour this time. Tomorrow we move them back a half hour. Weird and annoying.

Clay says he has no photos today. I took some, but I guess he didn’t and mine evidently don’t count!

Return to Saguenay, Quebec

Thursday, May 21, 2015

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We were both up very early this morning. It is very disappointing that Oceania is completely ignoring that magnificent fjord. People travel to Alaska, Chile, Norway and other far-flung places to cruise fjords and here we have one and O have scheduled to sneak in and out of Saguenay mostly under cover of darkness. Not to disrespect Saguenay as they have cruise tourism down to a fine art, but the fjord is the draw in my mind. There could and should have been enrichment lectures about it and it should have been a cruising feature. We arrived 2 hours later today so there were a lot more people in Horizons Lounge trying to see and enjoy it than on our first pass. We were up at 4:30am and it was already light and we were already well into the fjord. There is supposed to be a line where the waters from the fjord and the St. Lawrence mix where that is visible and which attracts a large population of beluga whales. Tonight, we’ll have sailed through there 4 times and all of them will have basically been in the dead of night. I mean as far as I know, in Canada anyway, here and Churchill are the places to come to see beluga whales and we totally ignore it. I am mystified and stunned and quite disappointed. All we can figure out is it is the Always Be Closing mentality/experience onboard Oceania. They have seriously overpriced excursions to sell in Saguenay and there is no new profit to be made by sailing the fjord as a tourist experience. Very badly done Oceania.

So, rant paused for now. We were up very early because even though we don’t dock until 10am, we wanted to see more of the fjord and this was our last best chance. We did finally see the Madonna statue that the locals keep telling us about. It is quite beautiful and very remote. It is Notre-Dame-du-Saguenay and has been there since 1881. I can’t imagine how they got it up there. We passed the Madonna statue between 6:30 and 7am. Maybe 30-50 people on this ship saw it quite by accident. The rest heard about it in town today from guides and locals and tourism people. They will have heard to look for it tonight, but we never saw it sailing out at night last time, so clearly it is not illuminated and invisible in full dark.

We had breakfast in Terrace about 7:45am. We went back up to Horizons after and stayed until after we arrived and were cleared in Saguenay. We arrived a full hour before we were docked and cleared and there were no people on the dock this time during that period like there were last time. I guess they learned their lesson. One of the bus guides today said we were the 3^rd ship of the season and then corrected that we were the 1^st and the 3^rd. He did not hear or did not answer who was the 2^nd ship. Anyway, they had stopped dancing by the time we got off but all the costumed characters were there. Clay had me get a slice of blueberry pie for me this time, because it was that good. He also had me get him a chocolate blueberry cordial candy as we left for the same reason. By the way, the pie, juice and maple taffy people are gone when you return to the port to leave, so get what you want and extras before you leave ‘cause that’s it!

Today, we planned to do the HOHO buses. We had heard good things, but after the nightmare experience at Trois-Rivieres and the less than optimal experience in Quebec City we were dubious. Saguenay is doing it right! For $20 pp you have access to 2 routes and 8 attractions. The downtown circuit takes 75 minutes if you don’t get off. The Fjord Museum circuit takes 60 minutes. They run a bus by each stop every 20 minutes or so. Some of the stops are within walking distance of one another. We never ran into a situation where you couldn’t get on a bus. You could always hear the guides. There were also guides at every stop to answer questions. I don’t know how they could have done a better job. Kudos Saguenay! We took the Downtown circuit first. Clay wanted to duplicate the photo on the front of the Currents of Saguenay. We had not seen anything like it here. We asked and were told it was the 4^th stop of that circuit. Well, it was and it wasn’t. There was water in the waterway when that photo was taken and there was no water today. I warned him that in Saint John Currents had photos of Flowerpot Rocks and I believe they were over 80 miles away and O did not even run the previously advertised tour out there that day. Here at least you could get there easily for a nominal cost to be disappointed. So, we are in Saguenay but it is consolidated out of 5 or 6 earlier, smaller town and is very spread out. We are docked in La Baie. The HOHO bus today drove as I recollect from the posted sign 28 km to get to the main part of Saguenay called Chicoutimi. We got off and visited the Cathedral and walked down Racine Street to the next stop at the tourism office where I got an apron because it had tourtiere on it. We got off again at Sacre Coeur Church and the little white house that survived the flood for Clay’s photo. We decided not to get off at La Pulperie even though it was very scenic because we had done the paper mill museum in Trois-Riviere already. We came on back to the ship after sharing a protein bar for lunch. We immediately got on the other bus loop to the Fjord Museum. First it drove, as I recall again from the signs, 15 km to get out to the Bagotville Air Defense Museum. It is an active Canadian Air Force base and we saw fighter jets flying around on both visits to Saguenay. We had 8 minutes to get off and just see their collection of outdoor displayed aircraft and then the bus left for the 15 km or so ride back. We had decided that if we did a museum today, it would be the Fjord Museum. It was interesting but weird. It was $23 for the 2 of us. It has a small section of the history of the area settlers. It has a small aquarium with a small selection of marine animals from the fjord. It has a small section of insects from the region. The main attraction is a very strange multi-media experience of being on a space and time traveling vehicle to visit the fjord through time, from space and from above and from under water. It seemed like a huge waste of money for what could have been a very well done and informative 20 minute film. Oh well, maybe some people love it, but I don’t see how. I was worried it would make me motion sick but it didn’t. It was sophisticated enough to actually be a simulation. That was it for us. We could see Marina as it sat docked a 3 mile walk away. There is a nice level paved 2-way bike path along the water all the way and bike rentals or Segway tours seem to be the only tourism opportunity really missed in Saguenay.

It was awful out when we left this morning. The coldest it has been with quite literally gale force winds. I saw the TV channel displaying conditions change from wind speed to the word gale. We layered up but it took your breath away out on the dock. Inland though it was better and through the day the wind calmed down, the sun came out and I am sure it got warmer than the predicted 58F.

When we got to the ship, it was around 3:30 to 4pm. I guess it was the last run of that bus because they told a woman who wanted to stay on that she couldn’t because they were finished. So, they ran the HOHO buses from 10am to 4pm. It was a good value that they delivered. I would recommend anyone coming to Saguenay use the HOHO buses. Bring a protein bar or something because to see the most possible, you can’t sit for an hour eating lunch somewhere.

We walked back down to Boivin Fromagerie to get some more cheese curds for our refrigerator. On the way, Clay spotted a big Airedale Terrier with a man sitting on a bench in front of the chocolate & gelato place. I had to walk over. He was a cutie and very friendly. He bit Bob. Not hard, you know, just a friendly getting to know you mouthing. I got one too. The man told him, in French, to behave and you will never guess the Airedale’s name! Bobby! A French Canadian Airedale Terrier named Bobby!

Tonight at 6pm we have the formal Cruise Critic meet and greet that we got an invitation for. There are 2 couples we need to look for because we are sharing private excursions with them and need to be able to recognize them. I may be back later to add more before posting.

Back. It was very loud and crowded in Horizons tonight. Go Next was having a cocktail party too. We met both parties that we need to recognize and spent some time talking with some other Cruise Critic people from our online Roll Call.

We went up to dinner in Terrace again. It was a mixed bag. We skipped dessert so you know it wasn’t great. We don’t need to eat 3 course every night anyway. Tonight the clocks move ahead one hour and we have already had a long day. Tomorrow is a cruising day down the St. Lawrence River. Since we cruised up earlier, I don’t think there is anything for us to be on the lookout for. We didn’t notice anything going up anyway. Maybe I will finally get a nap! A girl can hope.

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Return to Quebec City

Wednesday, May 20, 2015

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Clay was up very early this morning. It has turned cold again too. So, for some reason rather than waiting for 6am and the treadmill, he headed to the outdoor fitness track in 39F windy conditions. He claimed it wasn’t that cold out, but I had checked the weather and when he came back it was only 46F. He didn’t believe that either so I had to verify with weather.com and the ship had it right. The temperature today is only supposed to reach 60F or so and be cloudy all day. No sunscreen for me again.

Today we have a tour booked from our last stop here. We are on Tours Vieux Quebec’s Countryside Tour. It cost us $49.95 + taxes pp. It should last 4.5 hours approximately. It should take us out of the city today. We should drive 40 km on the Chemin du Roy, stop Albert Gilles’ copper museum, stop at Marie’s traditional bakery, visit the Ste-Anne-de-Beaupre Basilica Shrine, stop at Montmorency Falls (1.5 x higher than Niagara), visit Ile d’Orleans and stop at the island’s chocolate factory. I believe all entrance fees are included and they are scheduled to pick us up at the Civilization Museum across the street at 10am.

Breakfast started at 6:30am this morning. We got to Terrace after 7am. It wasn’t too busy. I hope we both ate a substantial enough breakfast because it is not clear what our lunch opportunities will be. There is nothing about lunch or a stop for it on the tour brochure listing. So, we’ll take protein bars and Nabs just in case.

Tonight we have nothing planned. There is a new male entertainer onboard, Mark Newsome from Wales. I assume Marina is taking him back home and he is performing tonight. We don’t plan to go. Last night we watched the movie Wild Card on TV. It had Jason Statham, who I love, and we enjoyed the film. We got to eat dinner out on the back deck of Terrace last night and that was a first and enjoyable. They were stir frying fish and seafood at the wok station last night and repeating the Canadian beef and bacon stew. So while I liked the stew, I didn’t want it again and I had pizza and pasta.

The ship arrived in Quebec City about 7am this morning, but we weren’t docked and cleared to disembark until right after 8am. (That was an hour after the time posted in the Currents. But was the original posted arrival time.) We are docked on the port side today, so they get the million dollar Frontenac view today and we get a nice view across the river. Clay saw us arrive around the cliff and said it was a dramatic entry. I’m sorry I was in the shower! We learned when we were here before that Quebec was a Native American word meaning a high place where the river narrows. It was very desirable, because whoever controlled the cliff top controlled access to the Great Lakes through the St. Lawrence River. Clay said it was much clearer to see that on the approach from up river than from down river or from the land including from the fort up top.

I had the TV on the cams channel when I got in the shower and when I got out I thought I saw the St. Laurent on our aft cam. Shortly after we arrived at the dock and I was dressed. I opened the drapes just in time to see St. Laurent cruise very close by our starboard side. They docked right in front of us. They only arrived in Trois-Rivieres after 5pm and like us must have sailed to QC overnight. They were literally in our wake when I first saw the aft cam! I think this was the furthest east point of the current cruise according to the itinerary maps the port of Trois-Rivieres had posted for Marina and St. Laurent. It has been cool to see her. Yesterday, we checked our invoices and her deck plans and then went and checked out where our cabin windows are. I was OK with the location still, Clay was dubious. We’ll see. I also checked our invoice for our Marina 7/7 to 7/21 cruise Stockholm to Southampton and found that we will be in cabin 7090. That should really mess us up! Instead of slightly forward and starboard, we’ll be slightly aft and port! At least we will still be on the same deck, so it could be worse.

We are back from a cold and blustery day! We went out an hour before we had to catch the bus and walked in a different direction than we had last trip to Quebec City. We headed for the lower ramparts and the lower section of the old quarter of town. This is right below the Dufferin Terrace that we toured last visit. It is where the lower terminal of the funicular is. It was not as busy today. Everything was closed early this morning and the narrow lanes were filled with trucks making deliveries. We found a Beavertail shop though for later per Clay.

We were in a large crowd at the Civilization Museum bus stop today unlike last time. Half the crowd got on the red double-decker HOHO bus. The other half got on a normal bus that was going to do a city tour after he dropped transfers up at the Place d’Armes. The bus driver exchanged our receipt for a boarding pass and the driver of bus 41 took that and let us board. I would guess it was a 50 passenger bus and was just about full. We went first to Ile d’Orleans and the Chocolaterie de l’ile. It was a bit of a disappointment. It was not a factory as described. It was a shop and café. I had high hopes for an excellent hot chocolate, but it was not to be they were dispensing them from a machine like a truck stop. We used the rest rooms. We got to see 100’s of snow geese along the way though so that was a bonus. The chocolate stop was in Ste. Petronille. There a half dozen or so small villages on the island and it has a microclimate so it has almost always been all agricultural. Next stop was Montmorency Falls. If you wanted to take the cable car to the top and back it was an extra $13pp. Otherwise it was 500 stairs up and then back down. We only had 1 hour there and we barely got it down riding the cable car! The guide/bus driver gave us all coupons for about $3 off the price of the cable car tickets which covered a little more than the taxes that would be added to the $13 ticket, so it was still $13. Next stop was in Chateau-Richer at Albert Gilles’ copper museum which was a family owned copper art producer/shop. It included a tour and history and a demonstration followed by the shop. We used the restrooms. We would see the families work again later in the Ste-Anne-de-Beaupre Basilica. It was impressive work. The next stop along the Chemin du Roy on the Cote-du-Beaupre was Chez Marie. It was a house in Marie’s family since the 1600’s and they have baked bread and sold it to pilgrims to the St. Anne shrine all along. The guide pointed out the traditional architecture with stuccoed stone house with curved roofs. He also pointed out the ice houses, root cellars and wood ovens. Chez Marie also had an old iron stove inside like we saw at the bakery on the Saguenay tour. A sample slice of bread with maple butter at Chez Marie was not included but was an extra $1.50pp. We had eaten Nabs/protein bar and some Oreos and maple candies by then, but were feeling a little puckish, so we each got one. I liked it. Clay didn’t think it was special. He wants a beavertail now! Our very last stop at the furthest point out was the Ste-Anne-de-Beaupre Basilica. It was huge and beautifully detailed and impressive. It is the 5^th church built on this site since 1658. We got back to the Civilization Museum about 3:15pm. We got off the bus and walked right to Queues de Castor and got beavertails again. I gave up on poutine some time again and I really didn’t need another beavertail, but I took one for the team. I switch to a No. 1 butter and cinnamon sugar while Clay got the maple. The guy put so much maple on his that it was running off and pooling on the wrapper. So I still got maple! Bonus. We wandered in the tiny old town section as we made our way back to the ship.

We aren't doing anything anywhere on the ship this evening and it is too cold to be outside without bundling back up. So, I guess it is early to bed because there aren't any movies on TV we want to watch either.

We went to Terrace for dinner again. They had a selection of 6 Quebec cheeses tonight. That was a new and welcome feature. They had the tourtiere again and I liked it before but I didn't want it again. They had lamb at the wok station and I had pasta last night. I had 2 slices of meat pizza and iceberg lettuce for the 1st time. Clay had iceberg lettuce then he had shrimp and spanakopita. He had ice cream, still a waste of milk and sugar. I had the awful chocolate of the chocolate fountain with marshmallows and pastry puffs.

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Trois-Rivieres, Quebec

Tuesday, May 19, 2015

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For some reason, I was up early this morning. I don’t know why. We left Montreal last night on schedule at 1am as far as we know. We were asleep and didn’t hear a thing, slept right through which is a good thing. We only had 68 nautical miles to sail down river and you’d have thought we had to run in reverse to take from 1am to 8am to do that. I can’t explain it. We seemed to arrive early again but then take a very long time to get docked and set up. Julie announce the ship cleared at 8:10am. They only have one gangway again today but we weren’t in a hurry to get ashore, so we didn’t see it crowded. The Go Next group onboard has their own Oceania excursion groups with their own Marina Lounge departure point so that can’t be helping anything.

Trois-Rivieres is a misnomer. There are only 2 rivers. The St. Lawrence or St. Laurent and the Maurice. But there are 2 islands at the intersection so that when it was mapped they thought it was an intersection of 3 rivers. The name stuck. We learned that the people of Trois-Rivieres are called Trifluvians which is even funnier than people from Halifax being called Haligonians.

When we got ashore we found a sign about Marina’s visit and on the other side was about St. Laurent. That is the ship that we will be traveling on the Great Lakes in August with Go Next.

We are docked a very long walk down the waterfront from the security tent and the information tent. We were given maple candies and a free postage postcard to mail when we got there. There were vendor selling other things like jams, maple syrup and coffee beans. You have to wonder how much of that kind of thing they can sell. I mean you don’t need anything to eat on a cruise ship and it is too heavy and fragile to pack home.

We picked up Trois-Rivieres new season brochure. Evidently even though we were not in any hurry we must have been some of the first people off the ship. We were shown how to use the brochure for a self-guided Heritage walking tour. I asked about some kind of overview tour and she sold us tickets 1 and 2 of the HOHO bus. They were $15pp.  It was a pretty awful operation as these things tend to be. There was one 25-seat city bus with no microphone or sound system for the guide and visibility was not very good. As well, there was only the one bus which would make 6 one-hour long circuits with 8 stops. So, while they called it hop on hop off that was pretty much just in theory, as tends to be the case with these things. We took the walking tour which was interesting and we came back and waited where we were told the bus would start running at 10am. As we sat on the edge of a brick tulip planter, a man approached us speaking French, Clay said hi to him and he asked if we spoke English. Yes. He told us he was a reporter and asked if he could interview us and he did. Since we had only been here an hour, we didn't have much to report. They took our pictures. (This is a French language newspaper. If you right click in the text, you should get an option to translate the page.) That was new. I think they wound up with 24 people on the bus’ first round so everyone had a seat and could almost always hear the guide. We decided to stay on for a full circuit to make sure we’d at least know what there was to see at all the stops. When we got back to the pier there must have been at least 50 people waiting for the HOHO bus. Of course, only a fraction of them could get on and it was standing room only. I guess many of those people had been standing out there waiting almost the full hour and they were livid when they found they couldn’t see anything (sitting in the HC seats facing into the bus at the front which was also filled with standers). Also, when they found out the guide was speaking next to the driver and no one could hear me because now there were just too many people all complaining loudly. Clay and I had decided that we would stay on until the 3^rd stop and visit the Borealis, a paper factory museum. The guide told us each time we stopped there to go in and tell them we were on the HOHO bus and they would give us a compressed tour to catch the bus on its next round. A couple got off there on the first stop and were anxiously waiting for us as we stopped the second time. I don’t know how or if that worked for them. When we got there to buy tickets, Clay was told that the next tour was not until 12:20pm (it was 11:15am) but that he could take the self-guided audiotour instead. We did only to learn midway through that our tour did not include making your own paper. I pouted and the woman gave me a sheet of English language instructions for making your own paper. Step one was 1^st you tear your paper into little pieces and soak them in warm water for an hour. Um… that seems a waste of time. If I have paper to start, why don’t I just leave it whole and use it? Oh, well. It was interesting. According to the brochure, I picked up there was supposed to be a price difference between the full, guided tour and ours, but Clay thought he had paid the higher price. I was in the bathroom then so I don’t know what he paid and he either didn’t get or didn’t keep the receipt. Clay refused to try to get back on the HOHO bus. We and another couple from the ship walked back. It would have been an easy 15-20 minute walk except that there was a huge construction site between here and there and it was a rutted muddy trail over railroad tracks to find our way back. At least we didn’t have to face the bus again. It had to be better than Oceania’ grossly marked up tours. Today they had 5 tours running. The closest to the Heritage Walking Tour we did from the free brochure was $59pp for 2.5 hours. It took longer because it included the option of a visit to the Old Prison Museum with the entrance fee not included. We ran into 2 of those tours as we were doing ours and I honestly did not see $59 of value added.

On a related note was the number of SAQ (state controlled liquor store) bags we saw coming back to the ship. If Oceania did not so seriously mark up their wine prices, they might see an uptick in the volume of sales instead of so severely gouging a willing few. The lucky thing is that so far Oceania allows guests to bring on alcoholic beverages for consumption in cabin. The bad news is the number of drinks we see every night leaving cabins for public spaces around dinner time. It is clear they are drinks they poured for themselves in their cabins. You know that as the number of people doing that increase, that it is only a matter of time before O limits or denies alcohol to be brought aboard.

Which reminds me of seeing the stacks of blue lap blankets out on the pool deck this morning next to stacks of towels. Yet to get a lap blanket furnished with your stateroom, you have to go up to Concierge level at least. That is worth thousands of dollars difference on this cruise and even though that is a cashmere blanket and not acrylic, who cares because they aren’t giving it to you!

We came back to the ship and had lunch at Waves outside. Clay had Kobe beef burger without truffle sauce and we discussed how neither of us like the taste of Kobe beef so it is wasted on us. I had the Q-ban sandwich again, but could only eat half of it this time. Clay suggested I order only a half next time, but we don’t know if that is an option. We headed back out again since the sun had finally come out and it didn’t look like it might rain at any second now. Clay was after Molson beer. Since downtown was so close here we thought we’d find some. We asked the same woman who helped us this morning and she came up with a convenience store about a block up the hill from her tent. Clay got Molson plus some.

So, the sun stayed out all afternoon and only the morning was gray and threatening. We went out early hoping to beat the rain and instead we beat the sun. Just as well since I didn’t have to wear sunscreen!

Tonight we have nothing planned. The show tonight is Lovena Fox, a young woman singer who has been on since at least NYC. We won’t go again. I will assume that we’ll go to Terrace tonight for dinner again since it seems to be the most versatile and therefore our favorite of the places to eat. I will go ahead and post this without talking about tonight here. Unless something extraordinary happens and then I’ll just write about it in the morning.

Oh, I forgot to mention that when we boarded I took everything out of the fridge that we wouldn’t want. I asked for Caffeine-Free Diet Cokes and Coke Zero if they had them, otherwise just water. Clay’s CF Diet Cokes appeared within hours not days and in Montreal the first Coke Zero appeared. I have so many options for good cappuccinos onboard that I will probably never need the extra caffeine of a Coke Zero in the cabin. But it was nice to get it.

Oh, I tried to Google the reporter and newspaper that interviewed us and I found him and it but there was nothing about him interviewing passengers. It said that today was the opening of cruise season in Trois-Rivieres and Marina is the first ship of the season. It also said that the St. Laurent would be docking late this afternoon. Since we’ll be on there in August, we were hoping to see it, but it hasn't come yet. It may have been a Google translation problem since it was in French. We thought if true that it might explain why Marina docked so far back from the gate area. Well, St. Laurent is just now arriving. Very exciting for the town and for us! I guess we'll go out and have a closer look at it.

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