Category: Transatlantic Treasures
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Farewell, Insignia
The real world is approaching on the horizon. We won’t be in NYC until Saturday, but proximity to home is evident: we have started packing, settling accounts, filling out surveys and departure forms. Meanwhile, our email is reminding us of home tasks we’ve put off. It will be good to…
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Time… it’s all relative
The time is 3:15am at home in Kennett Square according to my Fitbit whose time change technology has overwhelmed me. The bedside clock which our cabin steward usually sets for us says 8:15am which maybe means she forgot to set it last night, because my phone says it is 7:15am…
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Life at Sea
We are getting closer to home; ship staff want our departure information, clocks are spinning backwards at a dizzying speed and the ship is speeding along at 18 knots. We are scheduled to arrive in NYC on time Saturday. Here’s how I spent my Sunday. It’s a good time to…
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Lisbon: We hardly knew you
Sadly, our visit with Lisbon didn’t give us opportunity to fall in love with it. Our ship was in Lisbon only from 7 until 2:30; traffic, crowds were terrible; and our tour guide was adamant that we visit the iconic sights. I did enjoy the Lisbon sights which reminded me…
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Porto City, Portugal – One of tomorrow’s top ten cities?
It would be sooo easy to write the marketing copy for Porto City (as the locals call Oporto). First, I must acknowledge that I know nothing about Portuguese economy or politics…but all of the ingredients for a favored tourist spot are already in place: Great historical attractions: Forts in beachfront…
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Ferrol, Spain – A break before the final push
I chose not to visit this medium-size Spanish town, whose primary tourist attraction is its naval base, huge shipyard and proximity to the Camino de Santiago walk. Instead, I enjoyed total solitude on our sunlit deck, listening to gulls and watching small single-person rowboats quietly fishing for squid. Bob checked…
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Le Havre: a UNESCO Heritage Site?
Le Havre is the port via which most cruise ships access Normandy, France. As we arrived, it looked functional and unappealing. I didn’t even take a picture, which would have shown cranes for lifting cargo, huge gas storage tanks, and a refinery. The city was faintly visible from the upper…
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We did Paris!
Sunday, virtually no traffic, a warm sunny day….almost 3 hours of driving to get there, and another three back…but we had a good four hours of seeing the sights. Again, click for a larger picture. I don’t think most need captions… We people watched while eating in an outdoor cafe…
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With apologies to Ghent, Belgium
Today’s trip to Ghent, Belgium totally changed my disinterest in “yet another Hanseatic League city.” These buildings, though clearly similar to ones we saw in Riga, Latvia and Lubeck, Germany in our previous trip and Nyhavn in Copenhagen, were built in dverse styles in different centuries—and had an unmistakable charm…
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Kiel Canal
This morning we ejected ourselves from the Baltic Sea, via the Kiel Canal into the North Sea. The Kiel Canal is a 61-mile shortcut (like the C&O Canal in Maryland and many more in the US) which opened in 1895. Of course, back then who knew that the Canal would…
Uncharted Waters 