Tuesday, August 4, 2015
We slept better last night. Lake Erie was a bit calmer than
Lake Ontario had been. The waves were smaller in any event. We woke up to
arrive at breakfast shortly after it started. Edgar was looking for us and
pulled out the chair I usually sit in when he spotted us. This morning we
finally found the chink in Edgar’s armor. Somehow he confuses English Muffins
and bagels. I ordered a toasted English Muffin before and he kept telling me he
would bring my bagel. I kept correcting him that it was not a bagel I wanted. When
he finally brought it, it was an English Muffin. Today I ordered the chef’s
special of Eggs Benedict, so I didn’t need anything else. Clay had determined
to eat from the buffet. He ordered a toasted bagel. Edgar did not understand. I
switched the words and told him a bagel, toasted. He seemed to get that and repeated
it. Clay went up and got lox, cream cheese, capers, onions, etc. Edgar returned
with my Eggs Benedict and Edgar ignored Clay. Clay flagged him down and asked
again for a toasted bagel, a bagel toasted and Edgar again acted confused by
the request. Clay indicated the collection of things on his plate and mimed
placing them on a bagel, toasted. Edgar acted like he understood finally and left.
When he came back it was with a toasted English Muffin. Clay was furious. I was
amused. I was ready to try again with Edgar to get the toasted bagel, but Clay
just waved me off and acted grateful to Edgar and thanked him. Then fumed and
bitched while he had his muffin and cream cheese and lox. He told me that surely
they must have bagels aboard. I agreed with all the cold buffet accoutrements
that they must. I pointed out that it seemed like Edgar might think they were
the same thing given my experience the day before. Oh, well. Clay says he just
won’t try again. Shoot, I hope I don’t come down with a craving for a toasted bagel
with cream cheese now!
We went to the morning port talk by Ken, the CD. He told us
what to expect today going ashore in Windsor, ON. We are sailing until about
1pm. (Oh, for some reason the bar did not open at 9am or so today. I don’t know
why since we are here. This is bad news for me because no ice. I had to take
warm water in my bottle yesterday too because the bar was closed. I could
understand that because we left around 7am. The program said it would open at
3:30pm today as it did yesterday. Neither of which made any sense since we were
mostly all off the boat at that time. Anyway, they finally opened it after 10am
because people were complaining so much about not being able to get a cold
drink. Even in the restaurant when you order ice water to drink, they don’t
serve ice there. I don’t know if you can get ice anywhere other than a bar. I
don’t remember if I mentioned it yesterday, but we were thrilled to find that
when we returned shortly before 7pm that our turndown service had happened and
our ice bucket was filled! That is the only time that has happened!) Back to
the port talk. We should be called to
disembark by bus colors. Onboard the bus we will get our passports. It should
take us about 45 minutes to drive to Windsor, ON to the Henry Ford Museum in
Dearborn or the reverse. That will include a border crossing each way, hence
the passports. We will return the passports when we leave the buses to reboard
the ship in Windsor. Saint Laurent will remain docked while we are gone today. We
will divide into smaller groups for an hour guided tour of the museum. Then we
will have 90 minutes of free time there. We should be back to the ship in time
for dinner at 7pm. We have our reservations tonight at the outdoor aft Rock Cliff
Grille with the hot lava rocks. We’ll see.
BTW this morning aboard, Clay has posted and linked his
photos for the first 3 days of this trip.
Clay decided since we were outside watching the sail in to
Detroit that we should eat outside on the aft deck 4 at Cliff Rock for lunch.
That worked out nicely for him. He had a cold beer and fish and chips. No idea
what they served in the dining room, but I have to wonder if the hot dish and soup
served on the buffet only back there aren’t the same as the soup and chef’s
special in the dining room. Cold food was a pasta salad and salmon wrap and
cold cut finger sandwiches. I could stand to skip a couple meals anyway.
So, we were tied up alongside a park on the Detroit River by
1pm. Unfortunately, it took until 2pm to
get the gangway attached. Evidently the last time they were here they docked in
Detroit and this was an unforeseen downside of the stated goal of keeping the
ship in Canada until Sault Ste. Marie. I’m not sure what they’ll do here in the
future. If there is another place to dock here that would work better. The
thing was that they put up a fence and it enclosed a small area of trees and
park benches that blocked the lowering and placing of the gangway. The other problem
was that they had to get the gangway attached high on the ship to clear the railing
that runs along the waterfront walkway. Anyway all that took most of our free
time here. Then once in the bus, we took the tunnel right to the Detroit Port anyway
where we had to all file off the bus and through the border patrol station and
bag check and back onto the bus. It was after 3pm when we arrived at the Henry
Ford Museum for our tour. It closed at 5pm. We were on the way back to the ship
before 5:30pm. The trip back was quicker. We took the Ambassador Bridge and Canadian
border patrol sent an agent onto the bus instead of us through a line. The
local guide sent us off the bus with word about what we could do until 10pm
when we sail. That was the first time we heard anything about not sailing as
soon as we got back. We’ll see. The Henry Ford Museum was eclectic. Even though
we had a guided 1-hour tour I am not sure I understood the mission or even the history
of the museum. Our blue bus group was a bit smaller than yesterday but still
probably over 30 people and they did not subdivide us into smaller groups as announced.
So, most of the time we couldn’t hear our docent. I think they were just
disorganized and flustered because we were so late and we all more or less
arrived at the same time. We were meant to leave the ship staggered, but I
guess the people in the first 2 buses called didn’t get that because when our
bus was called 3rd their buses were still standing. Of course, it
didn’t help that no one from Go Next or Saint Laurent never asked people who
were opting out of the tour to let them know. So, they found out when they had
passports unclaimed and had to come back to the ship with them to find out
where the people were and some of them had already just gone ashore
independently. Another reason it would have been a good idea to put the all
aboard and departure times in the daily program. Anyway, we enjoyed what we had
of the planned excursion and we’re back. We’re assuming the worst that the ship
will actually sail when everyone is back aboard, whenever that happens to be and
staying put. We have our outdoor dining cook it yourself on hot lava rocks
dining reservation at 7pm anyway. I’ll post this now and assume nothing else
newsworthy will happen today.
Tomorrow is a sailing day. No stops for us tomorrow in Lake Huron. That may mean some periods of no Internet. I will post tomorrow's entry asap. Fingers crossed that Lake Huron has the smallest waves of all the Great Lakes!
Tomorrow is a sailing day. No stops for us tomorrow in Lake Huron. That may mean some periods of no Internet. I will post tomorrow's entry asap. Fingers crossed that Lake Huron has the smallest waves of all the Great Lakes!
