Tuesday, 24^th October, 2017

Land, land!!

Yes, we had finally made it to something solid, good old terra firma, in the shape of Bermuda. All very exciting as this is our first time in the Caribbean (though some might dispute that Bermuda IS in the Caribbean). We glided into our berth in Hamilton with a glorious sunrise – and yes, there are photos, of course. Well, it makes a change from sunsets!

The sun was shining and we set off down the gangplank into the capital, armed with a map and some background information. We walked about Hamilton and made our way to the bus terminal for a bus to the UNESCO World Heritage Site that is the town of St. George. Bermuda is shaped a bit like a large prawn, made up of a number of islands connected by bridges and St. George is in the top eastern end. The islands are divided up into parishes with very British names such as Southampton, Pembroke, Warwick and Devonshire. It is very well-maintained but not cheap! St. George was an absolute delight and we really did feel as though we were stepping back in time. There is a nice pedestrianised area first going down to King’s Square with the town hall complete with a town crier.

You are never far from the sea and there is a fabulous light coming off the water. The roofs on the buildings are a bit different with a sort of stone affair, which is best described by the photos below. Many of the houses date back to the 17^th Century and are lovingly looked after with lots of information about their origins.

We wandered about the town a bit and then waited for our bus to our next destination. Still time for a few more snaps….

We climbed on board the bus and made our way to the Crystal Caves of Bermuda only to discover that most of it was under water due to the high tides, which was a shame in some respects, though at the prices they were asking for admission was also something of a relief (they make the Tower of London seem cheap!). However, a part of the Fantasy Cave was open and we accompanied our guide through the attractive gardens to the entrance.

The inside is very atmospheric with lots of stalactites and stalagmites and even a small lake and a boat that was very reminiscent of the Phantom of the Opera.

We caught the bus back to Hamilton and Val made her way back on board the ship, while I walked around the town, taking in the sights and eventually finding a café to take advantage of the internet and to catch up a bit on the USA blog!

We then steamed out of the port in the evening, passing some impressive and no doubt expensive homes.

Ok, that’s that. Rather more photos this time, which I hope you have enjoyed. Next stop, Port Canaveral and the Kennedy Space Centre.

Tuesday, 17^th to Monday, 23^rd October, 2017

Ok, here we go again. You must have thought Val and had been lost overboard or marooned on some tropical island with no internet and just a stack of records for company, but panic not, it has been a simple case of enjoying our time too much for me to find time to write up this magnus opus that is aka the blog. Indeed, as you will have noticed, I have only just caught up with the USA road trip, so there is a good chance you will get this by Christmas.

Well, we left you last at our port of call in Bilbao. We set off from there for our next destination, Bermuda, by going straight along the north coast of Spain heading due west. I thought it would be fairly sheltered, but I was very wrong and we encountered our first real bit of ‘weather’. It seems I am quite a good sailor (one never quite knows until it happens), but Val sadly confirmed her status as a landlubber and started to feel the effects of the pitching ship. At least they do have stabilisers on these ships these days which help to prevent the ship rolling, but they cannot help with the front and back ends. Val did try some acupuncture but that did not help and eventually she tried some seasick pills (well, anti-seasick pills, more accurately), which definitely did help and happily did not seem to interfere with the myriad Parkinson’s pills she also takes.

The Captain set a course to avoid the worst of the weather, which was the tail ends of various hurricanes and that helped, though it did make the journey somewhat longer. This meant we had a fairly unprecedented 8 sea days, which many veterans of trans-Atlantic crossings on board felt was too long. I am not sure what they thought the Captain could do about it and Val and I thoroughly enjoyed them, even when the going got rough (the rough get going?). Whilst the view did not change a great deal….

There is plenty to do even on such a small ship. So let me give you an overview of life on board. I have mentioned our cabin, which has a balcony and is air-conditioned and whilst necessarily a bit cramped, is comfortable and works well. If you are keen, you can get to the gym at 0700 and exercise or, like us, you can sleep in a bit later and make your way to breakfast either in the dining room where you are served by waiters or you can go to the self-service restaurant and do it yourself. We tended to opt for the former as it just felt a bit bit more civilised. The form is that you are seated at the first available table and then other passengers join you as they come in, which means you do end up chatting to more people, which is good (provided you are up to it at that time of the day!). Most talk is of the voyage, cruising in general, the next port of call and where one lives. Most of our shipmates are serial cruisers and many have been to the Caribbean before, so are useful sources of information. Val and I eat a hearty breakfast, which for me consists of orange juice, porridge, omelette, bacon and sausage plus toast, washed down by a number of cups of coffee. In case you are thinking this is a lot, John, are you sure you should be eating that much, let me add that we skip lunch and go to the gym and there is always the eternal table tennis. Swimming is not going to work off the pounds as you can tell from the photo below!

There are a number of things to do on a sea day from lectures on dolphins or trans-Atlantic airplane flights through reading, bridge, whist, line dancing, quizzes, craft making, a choir, classical concerts to the many physical pursuits such at TT, deck quoits, shuffleboard or walking round the track on deck. And, of course there is the spa (VERY, VERY overpriced) or a class at the gym. Alternatively you can exercise at your own pace in the gym. As most of you will be aware, Val is superb in the latter, but I too have now got into the swing of it and am usually found on a bike doing a good 20 to 30 kilometres. The good thing is that I can both listen to my music and read my book whilst pedalling my way to fitness. They even have sudoku games you can do on the machine.

Val and I usually take part in the table tennis competition every day at 1600 where we and our fellow players became a very happy, though quite competitive band of brothers and sisters. It is outside, but quite sheltered though it was certainly challenging when the ship was going up and down and a storm was blowing, but we carried on regardless. It made for a good excuse when you hit a bad shot.

Of course, if you want to take it somewhat easier, you can always lounge by the pool soaking up the sun (yes, we have had some sun!), reading your book/iPad/Kindle, though Val and I have never really been sun-worshippers – let’s face it, Val does not really need it and I generally just turn red. There are plenty of people broiling themselves – I can see them from where I am typing this, in the shade. I hate to think what the skin cancer bill will be, but I think it may be a race for many between that and the heart disease and diabetes. Not a pretty sight, sadly, for probably the majority on board and a sad indictment of modern life. Their choice I suppose…..

They do have an excellent library on board, very well stocked and quiet and comfortable and much frequented by those on board. There are also shops selling a range of goods and endless food and drink. No wifi though unless you are feeling well-heeled enough to pay for it. Most seem to wait for a port and find a free connection.

Evenings are split into two sittings in the restaurant with ours being the first, at 6.30pm. As I think I mentioned in the first post of this blog, we are on a table of eight which means there is plenty of varied conversation, albeit in a strong (to us) Scottish accent for the first three weeks. I get the feeling that Brits are slow to warm up, but we did become a very happy table, with lots of banter, jokes and chat – for which my thanks to our fellow-diners should they ever read this. I feel we have done much to improve Anglo-Scottish relations! I would add that the food is first class with a lot of choice and thankfully sensible proportions. Dress is either smart casual or black tie (on specific evenings), so all very civilised. This is a photo, first of the dining room without diners and then of the help-yourself buffet.

After dinner, we would repair to the theatre (the Curzon Lounge) for the evening’s entertainment. This varies from the on-board artistes (the Adonia Theatre Company) to one-night performers who join the ship at various points on the voyage. Of the latter we have had comedians (some excellent, some a little less so), a ventriloquist (good ventriloquism, less so on the comedy), two magicians (both excellent and very funny), a number of singers from the Opera Boys to tribute acts to Tom Jones and Adele and even the current lead singer of the Hollies (yes, they are still performing, though obviously not with the full original line up) to a classical guitarist.

The ship’s entertainers are certainly versatile and extremely keen and put a great deal of enthusiastic professionalism into their performances, which range from song and dance routines to a couple of plays. Ok, the singing could be a bit better, but they carry you along with their dedication and joi de vivre as well as a suitably picked repertoire suited to a passenger company whose average age must be at least the upper sixties.

And finally we would retire to the Crow’s Nest for a quiz/game show (worth a bottle of wine if you win….oooohhhh!) and/or more music and dancing. I even had a go at some karaoke without emptying the room.

Some nights we have repaired to the bar, where there is also music and we have had some entertaining games of Crazy Whist.

So that gives you some idea of the trials and tribulations we have been struggling with. It has, for the most part been warm and sunny, though with a few days where it has been a bit grey. And for those of you wondering how we have survived with one suitcase each, there is a launderette on board in which I have become an expert and have even been able to impart advice to fellow passengers. One lady asked me if I had been in the military as I scrupulously ironed a shirt! I can’t say I have seen many other men in there!

Ok, time to post this (I am actually back in Blighty!) and to set to on the next thrilling instalment – the beautiful island of Bermuda, our first brush with the Caribbean (though technically not actually in it). Back soon.

No sooner has one blog ended than the next one begins. This one is a little different in that we are on a cruise. However, it is not that different as I am way behind in putting e-pen to e-paper and Val and I have already sailed across the Atlantic, been to Florida and are now on our way to St. Kitts – or are we? For this has been a rather unusual voyage in many ways….
Let me explain.

First of all, we were meant to be sailing for 65 days round South America from 3rd January, 2018, but surprise, surprise, Caroline (our youngest for the uninitiated) and her partner Nick (you remember, in the other blogs) are only expecting their first child and more significantly for us, our first grandchild on or about 20th January. So there was no way we were going to miss that, so a change was needed. We managed to swap our cruise for two cruises, the one we are on and another one next year.

So that was the first change, but more was to come. Remember Hurricane Irma? Well it seemed to have booked much the same itinerary as our cruise so even before arriving at Southampton we were already rescheduled with Dominica, Tortola and the British and US Virgin Islands suffering too much for us even to be able to dock.

Anyway, we did make it to Southampton and boarded the P and O cruise liner, Adonia. And so our story begins….

Saturday, 14th October, 2017

The ship is very nice, being the smallest in the P&O fleet with 710 passengers (almost exclusively British) and about 350 crew. This means that it maybe does not have quite as much in the way of facilities as some of the bigger ship, but not surprisingly it is a bit more intimate and you do start to get to recognise many of the other guests and staff. It is also easier to find your way about though there is still the odd occasion when you head aft instead of forward. Note my expanding nautical terminology!

More on our daily life soon. First, we came on board very smoothly (nod and thanks to Chris for the lift to Southampton) and were delighted to discover that we had been upgraded to a cabin with a balcony, which was a nice surprise. The cabins are cleverly designed and there is a surprisingly large amount of storage and whilst I do have to step out of the bathroom to dry my hair, we have settled in well.

We went on deck for the sail-away with flags and music and made our way out slowly through the Southampton Roads and past the Isle of Wight and on our way to the Atlantic and our voyage to the Caribbean.

Now, I mentioned that this trip has had its ups and downs and we discovered almost immediately that there was to be a change in itinerary due to the weather and that our visit to Horta in the Azores had had to be cancelled and that instead we would call in to Bilbao in northern Spain. This was a shame, but such is the nature of cruising and I for one was keen to see Bilbao. We made our way through the Bay of Biscay, thankfully relatively calm considering it is a notorious body of water that always seems to feature heavily in all the nautical tales I have read.

Before we reached Bilbao, we settled in to our onboard routine. If you have read the blog before you will know that a table tennis table is an absolute necessity to any of our holidays and we were pleased to find two on board. We soon found other enthusiasts and have become keen participants in the daily doubles competition. An alternative is to lounge by the pool…….

Another significant moment in a cruise is the moment you discover who your dinner companions are for the next few weeks. You have a choice of going to the cafeteria/buffet or the sit-down more formal dinner in the dining room. We opted for the latter, first sitting of two and arrived in our smart casual clothes (the required dress code) at our table of 8 and met the first couple, who hailed from Scotland. A few minutes later, we met the next couple, also from…….Scotland. The fourth couple weren’t there on the first evening, but did appear on the second and, yes, you guessed it, they too were from Scotland. You can almost feel evolution at work as our ears become attuned to the accents, some of which are pretty strong, but we are coping well and have become a very happy band of dining brothers and sisters.

Monday, 16th October, 2017

More on life on board in due course, but first our day in Bilbao.

We docked and made our way ashore with our first stop the Guggenheim gallery. Unfortunately, the cruise being what it is, this was Monday, so it was, of course shut! Still, it is very impressive from the outside and we walked round it snapping away, including the large floral dog out the front.

The city itself is very attractive with some fine old buildings most with a solar or mirador (is that the right word?) and some nice pedestrian only streets and a nice looking river.

The cathedral was also worth a visit with some lovely cloisters.

And the Piazza Nueva was also very attractive with some great eateries where we sampled some tapas-like delicacies.

And the theatre and even the railway station were impressive.

All in all a very pleasant visit. I can recommend it.

Right, to confuse you yet further, I am now typing this in a restaurant in Grenada (as in Grenayda) in the Caribbean on Sunday, 6th November. CORRECTION, I am now typing this in St Kitts on our second visit and it is 10th November! That is how far I am behind with the blog, but I will try to catch up soon, promise. Anyway, I will publish this now to get the ball rolling.