I’m still writing newsletters but there’s not much left in them now, just the last shore excursion and the farewell get-together.  The evening’s schedule was rearranged because of that iconic world cruise event, The Crew Show.  I didn’t want to miss it and neither did Liz.  So we went to see the comedian, John Evans, at 6:30pm and had dinner in Britannia afterwards. The Crew Show was at 10:15pm and it was packed, but we had timed it well and had excellent seats.  It was good.  There’s some real talent on the ship but it was all single acts.  I missed the Indonesian Monkey Dance and the Tinikling Filipino Bamboo Dance that you always have on Holland America.  There were some very good acts, though, and a bartender juggling bottles and cocktail shakers who endeared himself with the number of them that hit the floor.  It was so bad, it was good.

Our tour in Lisbon, Portugal on April 25, had a couple of start-up glitches, but nothing that a cell phone couldn’t solve.  I forget what we did without them.   It was an hour and a quarter to Obidos, during which time Isabel filled us in on Portugal’s very long history and we decided on a date, for our farewell get-together. 

Portugal was originally settled by the Phoenicians in the 12^th century BC, so it really is old and has been through a lot of regimes.  The current democracy dates back to April 25, 1974, fifty years ago, today.   Before that was the dictatorship of Salazar, who died in 1970. I got this and more at: Portugal’s Dictatorship: Salazar’s Estado Novo – Portugal.com  “Every year, the people of Portugal run to the streets to celebrate the 25 of April or Freedom Day!  From older people who lived during the Estado Novo, to younger people, this day is a yearly reminder of the value of democracy, the fight against fascism, and the end of Portuguese colonialism.  All over the country, people go out to sing, dance, eat, and march the streets with carnations in their hands. It’s common that florists will give out carnations for free.”

While the people of Lisbon were doing all that, we were in Obidos.  A nice romantic medieval town, with narrow streets and cobblestones.

 Joyce’s chair took the cobblestones like a champion.  When the rest of the people were worrying about how she was keeping up, she was usually ahead of us, up and down hills and all.  I so wish she had come on tour in Singapore. 

Only about 50 people live here now.  The old houses are filled with restaurants and shops, one street of each, it seemed.  For me, it was a food fest.  Once the guide had taken us along the shopping street, and through the church, I went looking for a bakery.  I bought their last three Pasteis de Nata, which I know as Natas Tarts.  While I was at it I bought a bag of donut holes and a bag of little meringues.  The bakery needed to fire up more of those yummy custard tarts and I was sure they would, but it would take another 25 minutes.  I ate my three right on the street, taking inquiries as to where I had found them, as the bakery on the other end of the street was out, too.  I then bought a gelato cone and directed six of my people into the gelato shop.  I still didn’t have any Natas tarts to take back to the ship, so I walked the restaurant street and bought six more from a restaurant, that was displaying them in its window.  They were 20 cents each more expensive, but I really didn’t care.  Even so, I asked if I got a better price if I bought six and was told “no, but you get a better box”.  That part was true.

We had voted to cut the stop short by a half-hour, in favor of time to take a TukTuk tour of Lisbon itself, before we had to board at 4:30PM.  For the six of us who did it, it was really magic. 

Our driver was Tania and her company is “nicifeel Lisboa”.  You can google that.  She was fabulous.  She read our needs and took us to just the right places, avoiding the Carnation Day festivities and getting us in where tour buses could not go.  She took some pretty good pictures, too:

It was a really good day.  Liz and I went to sailaway.  Then she went back to her cabin to gorge on the Portuguese delicacies she had bought in Obidos, like the bread with the sausage baked into it, that she remembered from her youth.  I had spaghetti at the Chef’s Table, two more Natas tarts, and a few meringues.  I had thought the donut holes and meringues would go on the bus, but people just had one each, which still left a lot of them.

Liz and I met up again for the show, the New Amen Corner, who were okey but not spectacular. 

The next day, April 26, I woke up full of remorse over the sugar excesses of the day before, took the tarts out of the fridge, added the donut holes and meringues, wrote a note, and left the lot for my cabin steward to share with his mates.  That was far better than adding them to my waistline.  I wrote a short newsletter to change the date of the Farewell get-together, and had it printed before I was due at the desk.

I spent the afternoon packing and filling a bag of presents, and things I couldn’t take home, for Wanda Arti, whom I would see in Bournemouth, when the ship stopped in Southampton.  I was pretty sure I could get everything into my one piece of luggage to take home now. 

Liz and I had dinner in Britannia and enjoyed Lee Mead, a West End soloist.

April 27, was the last day of the World cruise, Southampton to Southampton.  Desk hour was mostly taken up with saying “Goodbye” to new cruise buddies.  Debbie and Polly came to wave to Chew Jetty, and I had forgotten him on the balcony, where I had put him out to charge.  I had to do the waving myself.  Chris came for a hug and to exchange emails.  If we could have a date in Colombo, Sri Lanka, we can surely have one in Sydney or Montreal.  Andy came by too and we planned a get together for our little gang later in the day. 

Following the advice in the Daily Programme about booking a taxi because there would be four ships in port, I tried to book one on the Internet.  It was a fruitless task, as all I could find were rides for more than twice what they were worth.  I decided to wrap my ankle well and leave early enough to walk to the train station.  It was only about a mile.  I took photographs of google maps and directions on my computer screen.  I didn’t want to depend on cellular data, which has failed me a few times, and wasn’t going to have us miss our train.

Amanda and Liz and I met our Welsh friends, Ceri and Andy, for a drink at six, to bid our fond farewells.  We’ll keep in touch and hope to meet again.  Liz and I had dinner in Britannia again and skipped the production show because we’d seen it.

Docked in Southampton, England, on April 28, I got up at 7am to make a 10am train a mile away.  I met Liz around 8:40am and we got off the ship as quickly as we could.  The taxi rank was flowing freely and we soon had our butts in a cab heading for Southampton Central Train Station.  We were there a couple of minutes after nine and there was a train to Bournemouth at 9:30am.  I presented our tickets to the clerk and asked if we could change them for the earlier train.  He was happy to tell me we could but at a cost of 28 pound.  We only paid 11 pound for them in the first place.  I couldn’t believe it and I wouldn’t pay it either.  So we waited for the 10:03.  As it turned out, we could have got on the 9:30 because no one came to check our tickets on board. 

Wanda was waiting for us at the station and had a great plan for our short time.  It started at her house where she has the most beautiful garden:

Too bad it was too cold to sit in it, but she had some nice Madeira and appies for us, so we were very happy.  Then she took us out in the car.  Like most of the world, retail shops are boarded up and look depressing, victims of Amazon et al.  It’s worldwide.  Bournemouth keeps going on tourism and the local university, which is good.  Wanda took us to the Royal Park and Pier.  It was lovely.  They had some beautiful birds in a very quaint aviary.  Nowadays, they are rescue parrots, pheasants and budgerigars.  I hope they are happy there.  They are certainly pretty to look at. 

Most of the Victorian hotels, where the rich and famous took the waters, are faded Grand Dames now.  The Miramar isn’t, though, and that’s where we went for lunch.  It was Sunday, so it was very traditional: Roast Beef and Yorkshire pud, with bread and butter pudding for dessert.  It was wonderful and so was its view:

Too soon, it was time to catch the 2:50pm train.  Wanda delivered us on time and waited with us to be sure we got gone.  There were taxis waiting at the station in Southampton.  All was well.  By 4pm we were back on to the ship and on to the next adventure.

Old friends, Danièle and Jean Schére had boarded, so, after a nap, I had dinner with them.  What fun.  I had compliments galore from people who had benefited by their restaurant recommendations in Saigon, Singapore, Las Palmas, etc., and questions from Brits about where to eat in Southampton, when they come to board.  Sure enough, I got some of those, too. 

2024 – Queen Mary 2 Grand World– Part 5 –Walvis Bay to Southampton..5.1 Canary Islands – again

At sea again on April 18, I wrote Newsletter 18, without much to say, but needing a count for our shore excursion in Lisbon.  I only had 6 and I was hoping for 10. I alerted the tour team.

Liz and Amanda and I have taken to meeting on Deck 8, Aft, at 6pm while the weather holds.  It’s nice to be out in the fresh air before dinner.  We skipped the show.  Our own company is enough fun.

We were still at sea, the next day, April 19 and it was just an ordinary work day, but the weather was still nice, so Liz and Amanda and I were on Deck 8 again at 6.  Liz, counted as having embarked in Cape Town, had a party to go to,.  Amanda and I had pasta and garlic bread – which is a very white pizza, at the Chef’s Table.  I went back to my stateroom and had a 58 minute WhatsApp call with Patrick and Rose, back in Montreal, planning some of our summer theatre outings.  Then I went to see Michael Halverson, because I am a sucker for Cirque du Soleil people.  He turned out to be a magician, but at least, a good one. 

With yet another sea day on April 20, I was really catching up with my logging and blogging, which is a good thing.  I might get to take in a couple of lectures at some point soon.  In the World Cruise Lounge, I found out that our day in Lisbon, April 25, will be the 50^th anniversary of Carnation Day, when Portugal overthrew their dictator to become a Democratic Republic.  We have a DV shore excursion that day, which will take us out of Lisbon proper, and that may be a very good thing.  I did a little more research on it when I got back to my computer, but didn’t find enough to recommend to the family, who wanted to see Lisbon.

The weather was still good, so it was sundowners on 8 aft again with Liz and Amanda and this time we did go to the dining room for dinner.  It was a good menu and we even managed a decent political discussion.  I had a little more of my own business to handle back in the stateroom, but went out again, after ten, for a nightcap with Ceri.   I really am ageing backwards and we were gaining an hour that night.

Still at sea on April 21. there’s a gastro-intestinal thing going around again.  The Captain thought it serious enough to get on the PA around 9AM and broadcast right into the cabins.  Wash your hands, people, it happens when we leave Africa.  The passengers boarding in Cape Town seem to bring it on. 

The Captain’s announcement also brought the news that the Country Fayre, where everyone gets rid of that which they do not want to pack, was cancelled.  It was to have been in The Queen’s Room.  Afternoon Tea had been moved to The Britannia Dining Room.  Hmmm…  Peggy and Liz and I had been invited to Anne’s 75^th Birthday Party in The Queen’s Room.  I wondered where it would be now.  I called Andrew, but he wasn’t there and wouldn’t have known at that point either. 

I called Peggy and Liz and arranged to meet them outside Britannia at 3:25pm, where we could inquire of the Maitre d’ and proceed accordingly.

Then I looked at Lisbon and The Carnation Revolution again and was moved to write this to Dharmesh about it.  I included a link to what I could find on the celebrations and added  “Such festivities can be to be embraced or are to be avoided.  if you decide to avoid, I’d still be happy to have you on our tour to Obidos.”   Please let me know, sooner than later.   I have warned the tour operator we could be as few as six.  We’ll want the big bus back if you come.  

Dharmesh considered the situation and made the decision to come with us. When 3:20pm came around on my watch, I went to Britannia and was dismayed that Peggy and Liz weren’t there.  I eventually woke up to the fact that I was an hour early.  The clock had gone back last night. I gave myself a good talking to, found out that tea would be in The Queen’s Room, after all, and went back to call Peggy and Liz and tell them. 

And we all went to tea, and it was all very lovely, especially the cake, which was truly excellent. 

I don’t change my watch at sea, because it’s a FitBit, connected to my phone by BlueTooth, and, when the phone is in Airplane mode, neither of them picks up time changes.  I depend on my brain.  So, when I rushed from tea to meet Liz and Ceri in the Commodore Club, I was an hour early again, only I didn’t know it.  I drank two virgin Marys, while I was waiting for them and only wised up, after they had both arrived, what I thought was an hour late.  I ate three glasses of potato chips, too.  I had almost had dinner before cocktail hour even started.  Around 7:45pm, Ceri went off to eat with Andy and Liz and I opted for sushi at the King’s Court.  I also learned that the buffet’s fried chicken is pretty good, and they even have honey for it. 

Again at sea on April 22, I wrote and delivered another newsletter.  Dinner was at The Verandah with the Leighs, again.  We all tried different things and were pleased with them.  The traditional Verandah steaks are just too big.

Land Ho on April 23, in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Spain.  Liz and I had a plan for this port.  We would walk around the old town, seeing what it had to offer and end up at another Schére recommended eatery.  These seem to have replaced yacht clubs for the last month or two.  There is a good YC here, though, we passed it in our taxi back from the old town.  Must check it out next time.  First we had to get to the old town.

There was an information booth on the pier, where we got a map and general directions to take the yellow bus no 12.  It wasn’t all that easy to find yellow bus no 12.  We found a lot of blue buses and one of the drivers took pity on us and volunteered to drop us at no 12’s bus stop.  That was good, because it was a fair distance.  We gracias’d him when we should have obrigado’d, but I am sure he knew we were grateful. 

When the bus came, it was pretty crowded, but my white hair got me a seat, and a flirt got a conversation opened with a nice young local woman, who is studying to be a vet.  I told her about our plan and she had a way to improve on it.  We were to get off with her and she would show us to the top of a walking street that we could walk down into the old town.  That was perfect.  Here’s Liz at the top of said mall, happy as a clam:

The stores were the usual suspects, H&M, Zara, etc. but nice, and they had three banks with ATMs, right near the Casino.  !.  I got some Euros for tipping on our tour in Lisbon, and general spending. 

We crossed a big street at the other end of the walking street and found ourselves in the old town.  It was charming, cobbled and very old.  This looks like it was once part of a fort:

Looking for a bathroom, we popped into a university and were directed across the street to a museum of modern art, which turned out to be a real find.  It was free, had a nice clean WC, and the art was very good, too. 

This candid shot of Liz is my own art for the day. 

We toured four stories of art and walked up to the old cathedral.  We couldn’t get in but we got a chance to support a few buskers and see more nice old architecture, walking back to the main drag to catch a cab.  We got a nice female taxi driver who knew the way to Mundo Iberico, passing the Yacht Cub and El Corte Ingles, my favorite department store. 

Andrew and Anne were waiting for us at Mundo Iberico.  They have become real fans of Danièle and Jean’s recommendations.  This will be their third with me.  It didn’t disappoint.

I call that hog heaven.  We had jabugo, an assortment of cheeses, potatoes and the house salad, with beer, of course, even if mine was 0.0%.

Then we strolled down a nearby walking street that had El Corte Ingles on both sides of the street.  They had a gourmet shop right at street level that had excellent gelato, just what that meal needed to finish it.  I walked too much and was going to regret it, but it was a very good day.

On April 11, the day before Cape Town, I got email from Liz, to tell me she is back from delivering her charge to the bosom of her family in New Hampshire, and I couldn’t have been more delighted. We corresponded by email and I told her all she needed to know to meet us tomorrow, for fun around Cape Town before boarding the ship. It was all arranged that we would pick her up at her hotel, tour wine country, and she would board and check in, before the ship changed berth at 6:00pm.  The rest of the day went to travel work, logging and blogging.  I did go to the entertainment, and it was truly eye candy, Ilia and Olesja, a couple who do circus things with a ring and silks.  They were both very strong and very nice to look at. 

On April 12, 2024, we docked in Cape Town, and learned that the Queen Victoria should have docked a day and a half ago, but severe wind conditions prevented them picking up their pilot until the wee hours of this morning.   We docked behind her.  I met Lorraine at 8:45am and we were off the ship by 9.  Because Mary was behind Victoria, there was a shuttle to a place we could easily have walked, but there you are.  By a little after 9 we were in the car, with Raymond Haywood, and off to pick up Liz.  She was ready and raring to go. 

Raymond explained that there are three wine growing areas around Cape Town, Paarl, Franshoek and Stellenbosch.  Paarl is the closest and also famous for being where Nelson Mandela was imprisoned for years, before he was sent to Robben Island and after.  He was incarcerated a total of 27 years.  Between the three wine growing regions, there are 320 wine farms.  We started at Fairview, where they also keep goats and make cheese.

That’s a real goat in the tower window.  The winery dates back to 1693.  Their tasting was very nice, including a different piece of cheese with each wine.  I would have bought some wine, to bring back to the ship, but I’d have been paying 25 bucks to have QM2 open $5 bottles of wine.  What a nice perk to living in South Africa that is. 

On the way to our next wine stop, we passed the prison where there is an enormous statue of Nelson Mandela, commemorating his long walk to freedom.  Everyone has their picture taken with it, so we did, too. 

Our next tasting was at La Motte in Franshoek, and their wines were delicious, too.  All this wine tasting was a little painful for me, as I am having a dry April, but I have learned to look sniff, taste and spit, and that’s what I did.

Lunch, at least, I could partake of, and what a lunch it was.  Raymond had chosen La petite Ferme, high on a mountaintop, with this fabulous view:

It was a beautiful day and we ate outside.  I took that picture from our table.  It doesn’t get a lot better than that.  The food was exquisite, too.  This was the kudu carpaccio appetizer:

Liz had lamb for her main course and Lorraine and I had Malay Seafood curry.

The whole experience was so good that we didn’t want to leave, so we just let Raymond know that we were having dessert, Jan Ellis pudding, and staying put.  We knew we wouldn’t have time for Stellenbosch, but that was OK.  We’d be arriving back at the ship, a bit early, if anything, and that was a good thing because the Queen Mary 2 was moving at 6:00pm and we wouldn’t be able to board for a couple of hours, if we timed it wrong. 

As we drove through the little town of Franshoek, Lorraine fell in love and decided she wanted her own car for the next day, just to come back here.  She was actually entertaining the idea of moving to South Africa, and Franshoek sure looked good to her.  Raymond had another couple of drivers, so he was able to arrange a trustworthy one for her.  Liz and I had a different agenda for the next day. 

It was a tad complicated getting Liz back on to the Queen Mary, which was no great surprise, and we knew whom to call.  By the time we had all that done, it was too late to go out again, and frankly, we didn’t need any more shopping or eating, so we just repaired to our rooms.  I was in bed by 8:30pm, having had a delicious dinner of the cookies they leave in our staterooms and the rest of the Easter Bunny.

We overnighted in Cape Town, and met with Raymond again at 9am, early because there was a two oceans marathon going on and he had figured out how to avoid it.  We had to be back on board at 4:00pm anyway, so an early start was in order.  Liz had her heart set on seeing Cape Town’s famous penguin colony at Boulders Beach.  It’s probably the warmest place on earth to have penguins.  The African penguin is seriously endangered but protected at Boulders Beach.   It’s actually in the middle of a residential area with houses very near to the penguins.

They nest here, digging shallow holes in the ground, that they can cover with their bodies.  We saw all ages of African Penguins, from chicks, covered in down, to “Baby Blues” in their blue grey plumage, to adults.  It was a particularly windy day, in a windy spot, so there was less going in and out of the water than there might have been, but we did see a few of them waddle in and out of the sea.  And we ate a lot of sand.

Raymond took us through some upscale seaside towns and then inland, over the Cape Flats, to Langa Township.  There we met Mizo, a local guide, for a walk-around tour.  There are various levels of housing in Langa, from corrugated iron lean-tos and containers, where new arrivals await government housing, to a neighborhood they call “Beverly Hills” where people own respectable looking houses and have cars.  In between, is the government housing and it’s pretty minimal.  Apartheid is over and anyone can go anywhere, but conditions have not improved much for the very poor.  Mzansi, the great restaurant our tour had gone to on January 31, wasn’t open today.  It was a shame, as it was because there weren’t enough clients.  Only two guides were bringing in only 4 people, and you can’t cook up all those lovely dishes for four people.  You really need forty.  So we went to Langa’s best regular restaurant, Jordan, and it was fine.  We were the only tourists.  The rest of the people were local and most of them were here because they had something to celebrate.  Mizo said that was the only time he would eat here.  The portions were gargantuan and he had a lot to take home to his mother that night.

It was a great day for us, too.  I have our driver-guide’s permission to give you his name and phone number.  If you are ever in Cape Town, he will show you a very good day for a reasonable price.  I recommend Raymond Haywood +27 72 808 8561.  We did most of our organization on WhatsApp.  I have a winery recommendation from another passenger, too.  The Roads Scholars got taken to Boschendal in Stellenbosch, where they had a fabulous tour, tasting and gourmet lunch.  I’ll have Raymond take me there next time.

I went to Deck 8 for sailaway, but there wasn’t one.  I did have a pleasant chat with a couple who had just embarked and a Pizza at the Chef’s Table.  I slept very well.

April 14, at sea, was one of those days when there’s nothing to report because I spend the whole day, well, reporting.  We did have a DV cocktail party to welcome Liz back.  Eight people came, and four of us continued on to dinner in the dining room.

On April 15, 2024, we docked in Walvis Bay, Namibia, again for the second time this voyage.  That has been happening since Colombo.  I had heard that the Dolphin tour in Walvis Bay was a winner and I really wanted to max the only three ports left before Southampton.  It was a good tour.  It boded well when a seal named “Robbie” flopped up onto the dock before we boarded our motor launch.  He was a big one and couldn’t have come on board, but a smaller tame one, whom our guides called “Junior” was up over the transom in a flash.  A few of the seals have learned that if they make nice with the tourists, the boat operators will give them fish.  So they make very nice indeed.  They even let us pet them.

I’ll bet he feels lovely when he’s dry, if ever that happens.  Junior wasn’t the only visitor we had.  A pelican couple graced us with their presence, too.

It seemed they knew about the fishy handouts, too.  We passengers weren’t forgotten, either.  We got fresh oysters from a nearby oyster farm and a number of local hors d’oeuvres, like seal balls, shrimp, and samosas, served with sparkling wine.  I was still on the wagon, so I had a coke with that which was my breakfast.  After our cocktail hour, we passed close to a seal colony, where there were a couple of dolphins frolicking, too.  It was a nice outing.  

I met up with Liz at sailaway and we went on to dinner and Foggie Flax, who just might have been the best on board entertainer of the whole voyage.  He had us with the first song, a very good imitation of Roy Orbison, singing “Pretty Woman”.  His comedy was good and all of his impersonations were spot on.  Don’t miss him, if he comes to a ship under you. 

On April 16, we were back at sea to begin a seven-day stretch. It was a very ordinary day at sea, with another Captain’s Cocktail party at the end of it.  After all the hors d’oeuvres, Liz and I didn’t need dinner, so we went and listened to Jazz in the Chart Room, instead. 

The next day was even easier.  I went to the French speakers’ lunch in Britannia, my only lunch of the entire voyage.  I had poached salmon and it was very nice.  One of my friends has a name for the mysterious illness that seems to be going around the ship.  She calls it the lurgy.  I googled it and I think she’s on to something.  I know a couple of people who have it. 

Liz and I decided to have sundowners on Deck 8, aft, as we don’t know how much more good weather we will see.  Then we had dinner and went to see Audley Anderson’s Motown show.  It was not bad, but he didn’t inspire or get us going like Foggie Flax did.

It’s April 4th and Colombo was a turning point.  We were going home now, pretty much the way we came.  It’s disappointing, but everyone understands and we’re all making the most of it.  The Indian-American family did it best, when they went to India. 

I had a cause to work on.  I have a very smart lady in a power chair who wants to come on our excursion in Lisbon and I wanted to help her do it.  She could have come in Singapore and another guest could have brought her power chair.  I was tired of being refused and vowed to write stronger requests.  First thing in the morning I did just that, letting the tour operators know that she was very intelligent, had an able-bodied husband for the heavy lifting, and an all-terrain power chair.  I also noted that we might not make our numbers, so it was important to have these two people.  The local tour operator promised to ask the guide.  My next agenda item was to find out if I would have anyone boarding in Cape Town, after the itinerary had been thrown into a cocked hat.  I had questioned this a month ago and there was no one, but I figured it was worth checking again.  I also needed to have a cocktail party moved to a date that would work with the new agenda.

My caregiver friend, Liz, wrote from New Hampshire that they had arrived safely but she wasn’t coming back.  That bothered me because the trip was all the pay she was getting for a difficult 24/7 job that she had been performing faithfully for three months.

Thanks to my great good friend Danièle Schére, I had another non-practicing cougar date on April 5 in Mauritius.  It’s very convoluted, Andres is a friend through Daniele’s grandchild.  He moved his family to Mauritius about a year ago.  It turned out, they live at the southern end of the island and the ship docked in Port Louis, which is around the middle.

We met at the Caudan Waterfront, found the tea Danièle wanted there, and set off on our adventure.  I was being taken through the neighborhoods of Mauritius to see how the various strata of inhabitants lived.  The climate is close to paradise and seems to have bred a class of people who work when they need money and just don’t show up when they don’t.  Unfinished houses, fences, and roads abound. 

Andres had sold a software company and was working out two years of contract labor for the new owners.  I asked him if he would start another company when that’s over and he most certainly will, but he won’t be able to rely on Mauritian labor.  It will have to be an Internet company. 

We meandered up the coast looking for a likely place to have lunch.  I rejected the first one we found because the menu was too western.  It was part of a resort and the server volunteered to bring the chef out to discuss what local food he might conjure up for us, but we were afraid of commitment, particularly as there was only one table full.  Next time I pass through, I will be happy to eat there, because it was a nice setting and probably would have been fine.

We drove for miles along the coast, and it was interesting, but there were no eateries we could patronize.  Finally we followed a resort sign, down a winding road to the sea with a very upscale resort at the end of it.  It was Le Jadis Balaclava on Turtle Bay, the kind of place you’d go for your honeymoon.  You could bring your whole wedding party.  It had pools, a Spa, and all that stuff.  There were a few local dishes on the menu and we had them.  It wasn’t as great food as the setting might have led you to suspect, but it was decent and the ambiance was sublime:

It was probably the conversation that was the best part.  It was another great port day, thanks to whom I know.  Merci Danièle et Andres.

Back on board I got a refusal on wheelchair from the Lisbon tour operator, but it left the door open when it talked about an adapted bus.  Our tour supplier offered the clarification that out request does not require a lift.  It is a collapsible scooter that ends up the size of a suitcase. The guest can step onto the transportation and we just need to know if it is possible to store it on the bus as well as whether the ground is suitable for such a scooter. 

And I went to sailaway with high hopes that this was going to resolve, now that my supplier was onside.  It was the best sailaway yet, with a good band, a sunset:

A virgin frozen Margarita:

And Sweet Caroline:

After that, I repaired to my room for three hours of reading, the cookies we always have on hand, and the body of the Easter bunny.  I was perfectly happy.

The next morning, April 6, I had another read of the correspondence about the power chair and Lisbon.  I agreed with my tour supplier, and added that the guest was highly intelligent and knows how to manage her limitations.  I added my thanks for their careful consideration of this request.  It is heartwarming that everyone seems to be trying to accommodate my passenger this time.

I went to listen to Jazz in the Chart Room then dinner and the show, which was IDA, four divas, and they were very good.

Still at sea on April 7, I now have company in the car for Cape Town, a gal from NYC, now Philly, named Lorraine.  She wants to come out to the market in Durban, too, as do Guy and Judith, from Montreal.  It will be an hour and a half in the Victoria Market and up the coast to The Oyster Box, which looked like one of those nice hotels with a sweeping verandah, like Galle Face.

I spent an hour in the Chart Room and learned that a cup of tea there is almost $5.  You pay for the atmosphere and the entertainment.  Then I had a nice lamb shank dinner in Britannia and skipped the Production show because I had seen it. 

There was a total eclipse of the sun going on in Montreal on April 8, with a party on the McGill campus, a five minute walk from my apartment.  And here I am in the Southern Hemisphere.  There won’t be another one in my lifetime.  I hope Robbie enjoyed it.

I did, at least, get a happy email from my Lisbon tour operator, confirming that the chair can indeed be loaded on to the bus.  Ecstatic, I called my person, who is ecstatic, too, and I wrote a heartfelt thank you to all concerned.

She needs the chair because of a problem that originated ten years ago, with a nasty infection that got treated in hospital with massive doses of antibiotics, quinolone, metronidazole and ciprofloxin.  Next thing she knew, she had severe arthritis in all her lower joints.  It’s pain she’s fighting and I do understand that.   There sure is nothing wrong with her brain, though  She’s smart as a whip and I am very happy we will finally get her out. 

I met Amanda for drinks in Sir Samuel’s and we ended up having a spaghetti dinner in Chef’s Table and going to the show which was Worbey and Farrell, four hands on one piano and a lot of fun to watch.

April 9 was another morning, where my email brought delight.  Liz, my caregiver, was coming back after all.  She was re-boarding on the first day in Cape Town.  I was just putting the finishing touches on a newsletter and was happy to have this news to add.  I got the newsletter out just before I went out in Durban.  Lorraine had cancelled because she seemed to have a cold and didn’t want to give it to us.  Guy and Judith, from Montreal, and I were grateful for that.  We went out around 10:30am and negotiated with the tax rank.  We ended up with Marcello, who, for $50 would take the three of us to the Victoria Market, wait for us, take us 20 minutes up the coast to The Oyster Box for our lunch at 1:00pm, and back to the ship around 3:00pm.

We split up in the market and I took this picture so I would be able to find my way back to them later.  It’s the only market picture I have:

It’s a very fun place.  I didn’t want any of the wild stuff in this picture, but I do buy a lot of Zulu necklaces.  This time I went in the opposite direction, to see if I could get better prices on the ones I like and buy for self, friends and family.  My ship people had cleaned me out of the first lot, but at least I knew what the price was.  I found a few I wanted on the three sides I hadn’t visited, but surprisingly few.  No one else had the quantity, quality and variety that my January vendor did.  So, I ended up back there, and rather than sell them to me for $US8, like she had in January, they were $10 now.  The price of glass beads had gone up shockingly.  I didn’t even bother with the walk and come back dance with her.  She knew me too well, and I knew that she knew, and all that.  What do I really care for a couple of bucks in the big scheme of things.  I know everyone is going to be happy with them.  I get heaps of compliments on the ones I wear around the ship. 

I had a nice chat with Judith in the back of the car on the way to The Oyster Box.  She’s from Lac St. Jean and started working for Bell Canada there, right out of school.  Eventually they transferred her to Montreal and, by the time she retired, she was in charge of Customer Service.  That led to her forming a company in retirement to teach the subject and she did very well indeed.  All those call center people need to be trained somewhere. 

The Oyster Box was lovely and it did have a nice big verandah we could eat on.  I got 6 oysters for $10 and they were delicious.  They were the best thing on the menu, which was just OK, something for everyone.  Nothing fabulous, except the oysters.  …  and the monkeys!  The waiters were armed with squirt bottles to keep them away but one enterprising one managed to steal a slice of pizza and take it to the second floor balcony where he ate it in peace, in full view of everyone.  I thought they were all adorable.  

The weather had been threatening all day and got worse after we re-boarded.  By the time sailaway came around it was pouring.  I didn’t want supper so I just spent a lot of time with my book.  Works for me.

Back at sea on April 10, I delivered the newsletter, logged and blogged the day away, finalized plans with our Cape Town Driver-Guide, had dinner and went to the early show.  It was Celli, two cellists, who were supposed to have a unique sense of humour.  I didn’t get it and wasn’t crazy about the music, either.  It might have been over my head. 

After three busy days on land, no one came to the desk on March 28.  I finished off the Sri Lankan paperwork and sent a disembarked passenger the email she had asked for. Then I took care of my own clients, whose flights had not been ticked in time by Flights by Celebrity.  It was now three days into 60 days before departure and Celebrity tried to tell me the flights weren’t paid for, when the client had made final payment on Feb 10.  The number of errors that creep into everything nowadays is shocking.   I worked all day and had drinks and dinner with Amanda, one on one, and it was magic.  It’s nice to have a girlfriend onboard.  We just talked our way past the entertainment, Jeff Stevenson, who, I later heard was good.  So, I’ll catch him next time. 

Still at sea on Friday, March 29, I got a nice text from one of last year’s passengers, wanting me for his travel agent. I had to refuse and refer him to the Travel Leaders web site.  I’m sure he’ll find someone there.  Joining Travel Leaders has certainly been good to me and it lets me be good to my clients, too.  I can almost always match the lowest price out there and add good personal service and perks like Distinctive Voyages. 

I only had one guest at the desk. Then who showed up but Chris, the Aussie guy,  who rents motorcycles in some of the ports.  He was wondering what I was doing in Colombo, Sri Lanka.  Starting in 2012, I have been going to the Galle Face Hotel.  It started because I was always looking for WiFi, in the early days. You could hardly get anything done on the ship’s, no matter what you paid.  While I would be working in their nice posh surroundings, I couldn’t miss the fact that they have a great Indian buffet lunch.  We were going to be docking on Easter Sunday.  So I brought up the web site and ran it by him.  I was going to go there anyway and would be glad of the company.  When I went to book it online, it was twice the price, because it was Easter Sunday, but neither of us cared.  It would be a great experience. 

In the afternoon, I finally got around to working on my expense account, so that’s up-to-date, There was a Captain’s cocktail party and I went, for the champagne and caviar, and shared a word or two with a couple of my people, whom I hardly ever see.  They are in the Princess and Queen’s Grill, respectively.  It’s a class ship.  I finished off my evening eating potato chips in the Gloden Lion, listening to “A Cupla Fir”, one of them on vocals and guitar and the other on the Tin Whistle.  He was very good, but the tin whistle pretty much drowned out the vocals.

On Holy Saturday, I started with a bit of client work and I went to American Greetings and sent out my April birthday cards.  At the desk I recommended The Galle Face Hotel to another group.  There was a little snag with our own reservation as they wanted to be paid about $20 with a bank transfer that would probably cost me $40.  I elected to make a Skype phone call for two cents a minute and give them my credit card over it, which was a bit of a risk.  I got some understanding from their accounting department and my reservation was confirmed without the deposit.  I did some more work on my log and went to share a table in the dining room, a little earlier.  At 8:45pm, A Cupla Fir, were in the Queen’s Room, followed by Jeff Stevenson, whom I had vowed to hear.  A lot of people had the same idea, but I managed to join a nice couple at a good table for three, ordered a double Bailey’s on the rocks and settled in.  A Cupla Fir were still playing the music that I love, but the acoustics weren’t any better in the Queen’s Room, than they were in the Golden Lion.  The tin whistle still drowned out the vocals.  Pity, that.  Jeff Stevenson was excellent, and I was glad of my entertainment choices.

On Easter Sunday, we docked in Colombo Sri Lanka. I had a great day.  Chris and I took the ship’s shuttle out of the port and hired a Tuk Tuk to get us to Galle Face for next to nothing.  He really wanted to tour us around and make more money, so we let him take us to the elephant park, which is right in the middle of the city.

Chris is a nice guy and I was having fun being a “non practicing” cougar:

The Galle Face Hotel’s Easter Buffet Brunch was a knockout and they added all the bubbly you could drink for a pittance.  I took 24 different food pictures before we even started filling a plate. 

And these were my first choice:

And what my second plateful looked like:

And I didn’t take pictures of my third, fourth, etc.  We stuffed ourselves.  There wasn’t anything wrong with the view from our table. Either.  Chris ran out to point it out:

When we could eat and drink no more, we went out looking for another Tuk Tuk and ours was waiting for us at the door.  We let him tour us around a bit and tried to do a bit of shopping in the stores but found nothing.

We got back to the ship around 6PM.  There was a market on the pier and I bought four more white blouses three of which didn’t fit when I tried them on on board.  That’s OK.  I have three young cousins to buy for and why not buy them the things I like?  I was so full, hot, and tired that I took a little lie down, got up, ate the butt out of the Easter Bunny the ship had gifted us and went to bed.   

Back at sea on April Fool’s Day, I learned that my caregiver and her charge were back at home in New Hampshire and not likely coming back.  And Amanda wrote another poem:

Faith and story

When a story is told 
About faith and belief 
It’s made to describe
A Heart feeling 
A beat 
Beyond words, beyond knowing
Beyond calling a name
A secret in silence
Wrapped in a tale 
We frame it, we name it
We give it a sign
Shine a light out of darkness
Call it divine 
We say some are chosen
Some sinners, some thieves
Some superior, Some beginners
In shame and in deeds
We mock and we punish 
Torment and expose
All for an unknowing
None of us know
Our minds cannot make sense of it
So we have to believe
There is meaning and destiny
In the stories we weave
If only we knew
That the Truth doesn’t care
Has no name
Has no place
Is everywhere
It lives inside all of us
Brings Grace out of despair 
Shows us in thought
That no-one is there
It is greater than all of us 
Can ever conceive
Gives birth to a world out of a seed
Brings comfort and joy
Out of terror and grief
All that is needed
Is to believe 
The feeling of Love is the healer
Faith turns the key
Out of unanswered questions
Finds a prayer we can Be
Believing and trusting
In Life all around
In the beauty and wonder
The Great Mystery 
Is found
….…………………….Amanda Blue Leigh

And right behind it came this stunning sunrise picture:

Photo Credit: Amanda Blue Leigh

I got her permission to publish.  Now you know.  It wasn’t mine.  When would I ever be up that early? 

I spent most of the day on my logging and blogging.  Then I went to the Commodore Club, but no one I knew was there so I went to the Chart Room and listened to the string trio for a bit before dinner.  I had the Indonesian Seafood curry and went to bed earlier than usual.

I was violently ill, all night, every hour on the hour and a couple of half-hours, too.  It didn’t feel like a virus, either.  It just felt like something I ate and it was done by morning.

But, I was drained.  I started working on the newsletter that would go out on April 3.  I slept from one to three and went to the WC lounge for a couple of scones.  I ate one of them and decided to take the other back to the room.  I lay down again and slept until 9:40pm.  Then I got up, ate the other scone, had a cup of tea, watched “Top Hat”, with Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers, and went back to sleep at midnight. 

I woke up on Wednesday, April 3^rd, perfectly fine but hungry.  Intermittent fasting would be a little harder than usual today.  I spent an hour or so booking my McGill Community for Lifelong Learning classes, spring term.  I settled on “Percussion” and “Davos Man – How the Billionaires Devoured the World”.  Should be an interesting semester.

A couple of people stopped by the desk, just social calls, passing through.  I PhotoShopped a bunch of pictures and I got another newsletter out.  Just another day at the office.  I decided to start eating again with spaghetti a la carbonara, at the Chef’s Table, followed by the comedy of Mike Doyle.  All of that sat well. 

After Singapore, there was only one day at sea before three in port.  On the third port day there was another Distinctive Voyage shore excursion, so this was going to be a busy sea day.  First I got a newsletter out because there was a cocktail party later and people forget stuff when there’s been a port day.  I spent most of the day doing the kind of paperwork we never used to have to do.  The passengers, or the ship, would present our passports to Immigration Officers and that was it.  The new, improved, method has us entering our information into the country’s web site, which is often full of bugs.  Sri Lanka’s one drove me nuts.  I was trying to do all for a family of four, but if I dared to go off the straight path to look back or if I made a slight error that needed correcting, I had to go all the way back to the beginning.  Between that and the arrival cards, it pretty much took me the entire day, and I wasn’t entertaining fond thoughts of Sri Lanka by the time I was done.

There was a DV welcome party at 5:30pm in Sir Samuel’s and it was fun.  The four new people came as well as a couple who hadn’t come before, and the usual suspects.  Five of us, continued on to dinner in Britannia and I opened the very special bottle my Melbourne friends had given me.  It was fabulous.  See if you can lay your hands on some of this:

The next day we docked in Penang, Malaysia.  I wanted to go out in Penang, so I got up extra early to clear my emails, etc.  Amanda had missed the party last night.  She’s on a different schedule from the rest of us.  Her muse sat in the wee hours and the morning’s emailbox brought this:

I wrote a poem instead …
hope you enjoy ….

Some people live for sports
They talk endlessly about the game
Their whole lives in action
Chasing the day
From sunrise to sunset
They’re running at dawn
Attending every event
They never get bored
But it doesn’t satisfy
Doesn’t hit the mark
This life in action
Soon grows dark
They ask themselves
Why? what can I do
To be the best
To be renewed
Better than most
How can I find
A game that works
A game that’s bigger
Better than best
On top of my form
Ahead of the rest
My life is slipping away 
Ahead of my age
Losing in time
Stopped in my tracks
There’s no winning game
That satisfies this
How can I create something 
Greater than me
How can I cheat death
Decay and dis-ease
How can a formula make me beat
This chase to slow down
My fate with eternity
Running the rails 
Never get stuck
My inner voice whispers
Good luck …

Amanda is writing a book of poetry.  She has credentials.  She was a singer-songwriter back in the day.  Google “Amanda Blue Leigh”.  I replied: “and that’s one of the ways.  Write one that’s good enough to immortalize you.  We make our own luck.  I like making people happy – have fun – live…  and I have been ageing backwards for the last couple of years.  I have this great exercise program.  It is pretty easy to do and damned if I am not gaining mobility, losing my pot (work in progress) and gaining more and more energy.  It’s http://www.essentrics.com The creator is an old ballerina – older than you.  I think she’s 73.”

The real news of the day was that one of my people broke her leg and was in a Hospital in Singapore.  The ship never told me.  I found out through an email from her caregiver.  I responded with sympathy from afar, an exhortation to get on with the insurance company ASAP, if she, the caregiver wanted the best treatment and the possibility of finishing the trip with us.  I threw in a couple of Singapore restaurant recommendations, which she doubtless ignored, and the cafeteria at SGH was likely pretty good, anyway.  I alerted my contact on the ship, finished off the SriLanka visa project and started on our next shore excursion in Lisbon, because that had just come in.

And, believe it or not I still went out in Penang.  It was three o’clock in the afternoon, but we weren’t sailing until nine, so I was going out for dinner.  My best girlfriend, from my Hong Kong days, is Linda Chew, a Malaysian-born Chinese with a Harvard MBA.  She has been back in Malaysia for years, now, and I have visited her on a number of occasions.  She couldn’t meet me in Penang, but she had some good suggestions.  I had been reading about Somerset Maugham’s time in Penang recently, too, so her ideas fit right in.

There’s a street in the old part of town called “Armenian Street”.  It housed a number of businesses that catered to expats, both day and night, if you know what I mean, nudge, nudge, wink, wink.  At the ocean end of said street is Chew Jetty, and Linda can trace her ancestry back to there, and likely farther. I got into a taxi and had myself taken there.  The taxi driver wanted to tour me around, too, but Linda had recommended a trishaw, so I just asked him where the best Chinese seafood around was and got off at Chew Jetty.

The picture explains it.  When you walk in, all you see are store fronts.  Every family doubtless has one or rents the space to someone with something to sell.  I had been meaning to buy a tiny little lucky cat, since they came out with the solar ones, and I found it here for less than any other place.  I named him “Chew Jetty” and he sits on my desk for office hour. 

The restaurant was closed but would reopen at five for dinner, so I had myself a very delicious hazelnut-chocolate gelato and found myself a trishaw. 

It was a great ride all in and around the old neighborhoods, Indian and Chinese.  I took a lot of silly pictures just to be polite, and because it was so nice to be able to without the structure, and dirty windows, of a tour bus.  I let him give me some more time on Chew Jetty, so he could rest, and got my best picture.  This is Linda’s ancestral temple:

Around 5:30, he dropped me off at the restaurant

And I settled in to have my meal.  There were zero tourists:

I enjoyed my Tiger Beer with Chew Jetty, while I waited to be served:

When a half hour passed without anyone coming to me, I asked a few questions and learned the system.  I needed to go to the fish tanks, choose my food, while it was still alive, order and pay for it, first.  So, I did that.  I ordered Chili Crab, Fried Flat Noodles and Ginger and Spring Onion Squid.   

 All of that came to about $25, a very good bargain, given the quality, and as it came with WiFi, which I used for a WhatsApp call to my caregiving friend in Singapore.

 

Once I was well sated, I wandered back out into the street and there was my trishaw waiting to take me back to the ship.  I gave him a very nice tip, because that was just perfect.

Another day, another port.  This one was Langkawi, Malaysia  on March 26.  I worked a bit on tomorrow’s shore excursion,  finished getting out a newsletter, reminding everyone of the tour in Phuket tomorrow, and of the fact that they could not assume the ship had done their ETAs, unless they has asked it to.  It was after two when I got out in Langkawi.  All I had time for was a shuttle bus ride, to an aquarium that I didn’t want to visit, and a few seedy looking restaurants.  It was a twenty-five minute walk to town and my Singaporean friend said they hadn’t seen any particularly good-looking restaurants. 

There was a seafood restaurant across the street from the aquarium, so I decided to brave it.  It had a good few of our crew members there, which is a decent indicator.  It did have fish tanks, too, just a lot of the seafood didn’t look to healthy.  I made sure my crab was wiggling desperately, before I agreed to him.  I reversed the treatment, having chili squid and ginger and spring onions crab. 

It was all delicious.  They didn’t have much for dessert but there was an ice cream vendor across the street and I got a nice cup of chocolate ice cream and mango sorbet to take to the waiting shuttle bus.

Then I went to sailaway, skipped dinner, and stressed some about Phuket being a tender port. 

I was up at seven, in Phuket, on March 27,  not so worried about how the tour would go, as how it would start.  The tender operation was well underway by the time I got up, so it was looking brighter.  My people were good, on time and ready, and we got an escort to the tender at the designated time. 

Our guide was at the other end, was where he needed to be, waiting.  He had interesting things to say on he bus ride.  The economy of Phuket at this point is almost 100% tourist based.  Patong beach, where we landed, is famous for its night life, mind you it’s a sort of seedy claim to fame.  Bring on the sex tourists.  Did you know “Thai” means “free”, so this really is the land of the free. It was never colonized by Europeans, which is unique. 

Before we got to our first stop, I had presents for everyone, little packets of Watson’s Keenex, suitable for taking into dodgy toilets, in case we met any.

Then he took us to the promised old Phuket Farm, which turned out to be an experience center – purpose built, rather than an old farm.  It served its purpose, though, and we did see how rubber was made.  Did you know it’s a sap, like maple sap?  There were flora, rice paddies, a couple of water buffalo, and a nice replica of a Thai house on stilts, with its upstairs uncommonly well furnished.

Lunch at One Chun was the hit of the day.  It was bountiful and delicious.  We got a fabulous yellow crab curry with glass noodles, pork belly that was as divine as a pig’s stomach can be, two whole fried sea bass with onion and ginger, squid with butter egg sauce, fish balls, six vegetarian dishes, and a lovely frozen desert.  I bought beer and wine for all and we were very happy.  But when we got back into the street for our tour of Phuket town, the heat was overpowering and we could hardly wait to get back on the bus.  Back on the ship, I went to sailaway, had two chocolate desserts and slept for eleven hours. 

2024 – Queen Mary 2 Grand World– Part 3 –Sydney to Singapore..3.4 Saigon to Singapore

The latest scoop from the ship in today’s Daily Programme, delivered last night, March 20 as we left Saigon, was that Singapore required an arrival card, which had to be filled in online before arrival.  I called everyone and volunteered to do the online work for them.  Those who had not had me do their Indonesian or Sri Lankan visas would have to bring me their passport info.  I ended up doing about half of my pax.  My recovering wheelchair bound passenger had asked me to get her a quote on next year’s world and I took a minute to write to her travel agent because I knew she’d love it:

I worked on the Singapore arrival cards for everyone and found out from my Indian American family, that I would soon be doing a different set of SriLankan visas for them because they were planning to get off the ship in Colombo and spend some time in India.  What a great idea.  I am jealous.

I made up welcome packets for two cabins who would be boarding in Singapore.  I worked late, had an early dinner and got ready for our tour in Singapore in the morning.  It was masquerade night and I did get one of my people to take this picture of me, in my Saigon market find, with the ship’s flower arrangement, well, because:

On Friday,March 22, I woke up in Singapore.  I had texted our Singapore Tour Guide, around 8am, and she had replied.  My people assembled in the Champagne Lounge at 9:00 am.  We had been warned that it might take a long time to get through the terminal, with the new facial recognition systems in place, but, it was pretty easy and we met Eliza Hoh so early that we all had to wait while she called the bus in, and it came.  Singapore being Singapore, that didn’t take too long and we were soon off.  Eliza had an excellent command of the English language and the facts about her city.  She used COVID for continuing education, first taking courses, then training newer tour guides.  We hit the jackpot this time.  Singapore is a small place, with a large population and a big middle class.  It would be an enormous parking lot if there weren’t very restrictive rules on the acquisition of vehicles.  You have to be rich to own one.  First you need a certificate of entitlement, which are distributed by lottery and cost a bomb.  The smallest cheapest car requires a $20,600 certificate.  That’s $15,000 USD, and you haven’t bought the car yet.  It’s going to cost you double its price, because you pay 100% tax in it.  You can only keep it until your certificate runs out, which is ten years.  Then it gets sold into some poorer country and you begin the process again.  There’s a lot of car-sharing going on, as you can well imagine, and the public transportation system is second to none.

Singapore works.  It has gone from a third world country to first world, and very first world, in 40 years.  I started coming here 30 years ago, and I am not sure I totally believe that, but she’s not far off.  People own their apartments, with a 99 year lease, so it depreciates when the time is running out, before the government takes it back.  The average apartment is worth $2000 USD per square foot. So a 1000 sq.ft apartment sells for $2,000,000, just an average one, mind you.  If my apartment were in Singapore, in an equivalent location, it would be well over ten million, likely more, but I can’t wrap my mind around that. 

The powers that be (Lee Kwan Yew and his well chosen team) did not think the city should break up into neighborhoods along ethnic lines.  The breakdown is 75% Chinese, 15% Malay, 8% Indian (mostly Tamil) and 2% Eurasian, only a few of whom are purely European.  Therefore, apartment buildings are to be occupied in that proportion.  If you are Malay, you cannot sell to a Chinese, because it would upset the balance.  It can get complicated.  But…it works. 

All that interesting stuff brought us to the Orchid Garden.  I have been there a number of times, it’s gorgeous.

The only mistake Eliza made all day, was letting one of my guests do the walk with her walker, when she could have asked the front office for a wheelchair for her husband to push.  By the time it became obvious we were too far away from the entrance to fix it.  The tour operator should have permitted her 50lb collapsible power chair and all would have been well.  We had the same bus all day.  She could have brought both the chair and the walker and at least used the chair in the gardens.  They were fully paved.  I let it go because the garden had not been paved the last time I was here, 2018, but the guide should have known and the tour operator shown more flexibility.  They need to understand these new lightweight power chairs better.  I only leave this story in, because it might help someone else visiting Singapore with a handicap.

Back on the bus, Eliza showed us around the neighborhood where the “Crazy Rich Asians” live.  It’s very near the Orchard Garden.  She also took us through Little India and told us about Moustafa, where you can get anything at any hour of the day or night, and explained the sheltered walkways the neighborhood is famous for. We went through Chinatown, too, and got an education on the best Singaporean dishes, chili crab, laksa and chicken-rice.

Our last treat was a bum boat ride down the river and around the Marina Bay Basin.  That was good for some photo-ops.

My Indian family left the tour to get a good vegetarian lunch in Little India and the rest of us went back to the ship for a nap.  A 6:00pm we went back out in Singapore for dinner.  This was one of my pay-as-you-go add-ons.  We went to Loulou, a French restaurant in Chinatown.  Yes, I know that sounds odd, but when the Schéres recommend restaurants to me, I listen.  It was fabulous.  We have a ton of food pictures.  The best dish was one I had never had before, at least not together – it was tartare on moelle:

Which wouldn’t be everyone’s cuppa, but sure is mine.  There wasn’t anything wrong with the bouillabaise either:

We waddled out of there and called it a night.  I tried for another bum boat ride at night, which would have been a completely different and maybe greater experience, but there were no takers.  And I wasn’t sorry to see my bed, either.

We had another day in Singapore on March 23, 2024.  Amanda and I planned time in the Little India arcade followed by an Indian lunch.  Holland America’s Zuiderdam had docked this morning and I was hoping to link up with Arthur and Linda Starr for a little fun.  It was Purim, so that was always iffy, but, in came the email and it coincided nicely with our plans.  We would just be a little later into the terminal than the Starrs. 

As it turned out, our timing was magic.  The Starrs liked the front end of my day plan and Tom Mullen was coming out at the same time. How cool is this?

Tom had a tour to lead but the Starrs had been able to free themselves up.  Off we went to Little India.  Arthur found a haircut and I found Bobby Pebbles, who sells me nice kurtis, which are about all I wear in warm weather.  Thank you, Ulla Brown, for putting me on to them fifteen years ago.  I have been in them ever since.

Amanda did some damage at Lotus Mantra, too, which is air-conditioned now.  Smart move, Bobby, it was very hot.  Banana Leaf Apolo is much improved, too, although it’s more like a food court with a restaurant in the middle of it.  They now serve Chinese specialties as well as Indian, like all the ones Eliza mentioned yesterday.  We bought what we thought was her “chicken-rice” and it was good, but the butter chicken and onion bhajis were better.  It all washed down nicely with Tiger beer.

We parted company after lunch, Amanda back to the ship, the Starrs off for more touring and me, off to Moustafa.  I needed a drugstore and the one in the Little India Arcade had closed down.  Everyone pointed me to Moustafa.  I walked, using the sheltered promenades, but it was still pig hot.  Moustafa is an enormous building, a whole city block.  There are security guards searching your bags at every entrance.  The one I needed was the second one, so there I went and found everything.  If I had had more energy, I would have explored, but the heat had done me in.  I went looking for a taxi. 

The first one I saw was being loaded up by a whole family with a trunkload of purchases.  You do your week’s grocery shopping at Moustafa, too.  Before the taxi could take off, up came a woman who disputed that family’s right to be in it as she had been first in line, wherever the line was.  The family unloaded and the two of them got in with their bags.  It wasn’t looking good for me getting a cab.  I couldn’t even figure out where the line was and who was waiting and who wasn’t.  It was shady on the side street, but the taxis were few and far between and the shoppers were accumulating.  I decided to go up to the main street and hail my cab in full sunlight.  It would be painful, but it might work.  The first one I hailed cast aspersions on my literary prowess, asking me grumpily if I could read.  His dome light read “change”  How was I supposed to know it meant off duty for shift change?  Creep.   The next one I got was more sympathetic, and I think he was off-duty, too, and just took pity on me.  I was grateful for that.

Back on board, I worked a little more, among other things, asking Bevs for invitations to be sent to remind our people of our cocktail party tomorrow night.  I went to sailaway, which was lovely, and turned in early.  It had been a busy two days.

2024 – Queen Mary 2 Grand World– Part 3 –Sydney to Singapore..3.3 Hong Kong to Saigon

Back at sea, on March 15, everyone is raving about the wonderful party the ship put on at the Rosewood for World Cruise passengers.  The praise could not have been higher. I was sorry they didn’t serve a Chinese banquet, but completely understood how hard it would have been, with most of the guests never having had one before. Never mind, what they did serve them blew their socks off, and they do wear pretty expensive socks. They are, after all, cruising the world on the QM2. One guest went so far as to ask me if the Rosewood would share the recipe for the beef. It was that tender and tasty. Was it wagu? They couldn’t believe how good it was.   I wrote, said wonderful things and never got an answer back.  Guess they’re not sharing. 

I had some of my own TA work to do before office hour, went there and heard wonderful things about Hong Kong from a lot of people.  One of them went to Graham Street Market and loved it.  I had never heard of it, but after Internet investigation, I recognized it as the place I went to buy fresh fish to cook, when I lived in the Victoria Apartments.  It was almost directly above me.  I still remember the day I bought my fish live, had it gutted, paid for it and started down the hill.  It scared me half to death when it started flapping around in the bag about five minutes later.  I ran it back up the hill, only to be embarrassed when the fish monger took it out of the bag and showed me it was quite empty.  Their nerves twitch for up to twenty minutes. 

I dealt with a couple of my people.  Then came a very nice man who appeared to be flirting, and he was, but not for himself.  He wanted me to have dinner some night with him, his wife, and his childhood friend, who was travelling alone.  This sounded wonderful, until he told me about his friend’s dementia.  Not going there again, might do the dinner, just to help them out.  It won’t happen for a while as we are going into a very port-intensive period. 

There was a cocktail party for WC passengers in the Queen’s room to say goodbye to Captain Aseem Hashmi, who was leaving us in Singapore.  We all liked him a lot.  I went with one of my people, because her husband wasn’t feeling well, and she introduced me to my new friend, Pina.  A few hors d’oeuvres were enough for supper, after all the eating I had done in Hong Kong.

Tha next day, March 16, we docked in Chan May port for Hue, Vietnam. I woke up around three, and had trouble getting back to sleep.  It was very foggy out and the ship was sounding its fog horns at about two minute intervals.  I was glad I hadn’t booked an excursion because I had already done the ones that interested me.  I just wanted to get some sleep.  A 7:45am, still yet to dock, because of the pea soup fog, the Hotel Manager came on the PA, waking me up again, to tell us about the delay in docking and reminding us that we had to get off to have our passports stamped at the pier, if we wanted to get off at either of the other two ports, where there would be no customs officers to do it.  Duly noted.

We docked about 8:30am and it was still very foggy.  I rolled over and slept some more.  Then I got up and worked on my log and blog.  It was still very foggy at noon.  I went down and found the customs officer on the ship, near the gangway.  I also found out that there was street food on the pier, and planned to be back there at three.  It was foggier at 1:30PM than it had been at noon, when you could see a bit of a mountain in the distance.  I kept working.  At 3:00pm, the sun peeked through and I could see the mountain again.  I went out as far as the pier, bought a couple of scarves, and found the pop-up restaurant.  It was brilliant.  The squid were alive in tanks.  Feast your eyes on this ten-dollar feast:

There was not a single passenger in the place.  They would be afraid of getting sick.  There has been a lot of gastro-intestinal illness going around the ship, but it doesn’t come from squid so fresh that it was alive when you ordered it, and served piping hot, right out of the wok.  The crew have no trouble understanding it.  Best of all for them, this place had Balut.  Now, even I draw the line at Balut.  It’s a Philippine delicacy, though, also eaten in Cambodia and Vietnam.  Wiipedia says: “A balut is a fertilized bird egg (usually a duck) which is incubated for a period of 14 to 21 days, depending on the local culture, and then steamed. The contents are eaten directly from the shell. Balut that is incubated for longer periods have a well-developed embryo and the features of the duckling are recognizable. The partially developed embryo bones are soft enough to chew and swallow as a whole.” You see what I mean?  But check the look on he crew member’s face, while you are checking my fast disappearing plate:

As is my habit, I eat everyone’s meat or seafood, and nobody’s vegetables.  This is my idea of a clean plate:

I missed sailaway in my zeal to get the last Blog out.  I wasn’t hungry for dinner, so I just grabbed a couple of desserts from the trough and called it a night. 

It was a bit of a sad awakening on St Paddy’s Day, when I found out I have a client in the hospital, having just had a serious emergency operation.  They were to fly out on a Club Med Holiday in three days.  Luckily, they have good insurance, but that’s never fun for any of us. 

One of my people came to my desk to tell me how much fun they had had in Hong Kong and how happy he was with Elvon’s tailor.  He has two suits and three shirts coming to him by DHL.  They had gone on a private excursion in Hue and wanted to recommend “Les Jardins de la Carambole” in Hue.  I googled it and found out it was the restaurant we (DV) used in 2018 on Oceania.

His wife had taken her new power chair into Hong Kong and used it in the J.W.Marriott and all over Pacific Place.  She loves it.  They ate in the Marriott’s best Chinese restaurant and got a good local tour guide from the Concierge.  He wanted to thank me very much for my good advice.  I love to hear that.  Most people don’t take my advice and don’t know what they are missing.  These two will be having dinner with me in Singapore.  Good.

I needed a car and driver for Saigon, booked ahead, because one shouldn’t be out there catching a taxi, with a wheelchair bound person.  Four of us were going out for lunch in Saigon at a restaurant Daniele and Jean recommended very highly.  They had also recommended a driver, but he had never answered me, and, when queried, Daniele now couldn’t find him either.  So I googled for a bit and finally punched the country code for Viet Nam into my phone.  Up came Luat, our DV tour guide in VietNam in 2019 on Seabourn.  I sent hm a text.

Another of my people stopped by and we listened to the Captain’s noon shpiel together, as we often do.  He explained why there was no hot water in the showers this morning.  It was ship-wide, and had not been much fun.  She gave me a good trick for the next time that happens  You just crank the heat in the room all the way up and leave the bathroom door open.  Then the cold shower is just another day at the beach. 

I continued on with the car and driver project for Saigon, gathering resources from the Internet, while waiting for Luat to answer.  Presently he did and promised to help me find a car and driver.  No guarantees how much English said person would have, but we would get around. 

I had dinner with my new friend, Pina, who was born in India but has lived in the states most of her life.  We would make good travel buddies.  Since we had an early dinner, we caught the early show of “Strings Alive”, a guitar and a violin, leaping all over the stage, like a couple of kids, and they weren’t.  But that killed time before the Irish Dance performance in the Queen’s Room.  It was SRO when we got there and there were more women standing than men, while seated it was about even.  The age of chivalry is long past, apparently.  The dance performance was worth standing for, although I have no idea why they couldn’t have put it on the main stage, in a theatre that seats more than a thousand.

I was out of there in a hurry when the line dancing started.

On March 18, 2024, we anchord off Na Trang, Vietnam. I had picked a short tour, called “Street Food”. It was basically lunch, strung out over a number of places.  I was happy to see one of my people in the group waiting to be called to board the tender, and we hooked up for the day.  It was her first tender ride, ever, so she was glad of an experienced friend.  She did fine.  On the bus ride into town, our tour guide shared that the country sending them the largest number of tourists now is Korea.  She didn’t say North or South, but number two is Russia and number three, China.  The communists are traveling in droves, apparently.  I suggest you all get out there and help bring our numbers back up.

One of the best reasons to visit Vietnam is the food.  They have done a wonderful job of combining their French, Chinese and indigenous cuisines into gastronomical delights.  The ship’s shore excursion department’s idea of street food isn’t mine, but it’s probably safer and incites less panic.  All of our stops were actual established restaurants, rather than carts or stalls.  The first one taught me to appreciate Thang Nam and I’ll now be finding it on Ste Catherine Street:

This was my sampler:

And I ate every morsel of every one of them.  They were all delicious.  Next, we stopped at an even bigger restaurant and had oysters and beer.

My friend wasn’t into raw oysters, so I had another three.  And we were both happy with the beer.  The next place served us Do-It-Yourself spring rolls, which would probably have been better if they had done them for us, but they were OK.  And the last place was the worst.  All we got was a beer in a very nondescript bar, right next to a gorgeous restaurant on the beach which was mostly empty.  They needed to charge us more and put us in there to end on a high. 

Back on the ship, my Australian friend Chris, whom I had met in Cairns at the boat club, waiting for the tender, had rented a motorcycle for $8 and treated himself to some real street food, for almost no money at all.  Chris is about 65 and has been riding motorcycles for 50 years.  He was also a Navy pilot, so doubtless has nerves of steel. 

Then I had a Pizza at the Chef’s Table, chatting to Aussies, Norma and Mario and went to bed.

Back at sea on March 19, Luat came through with the car and van prices and, since you could only put 3 in the car, and we were 4, I went for the van and hoped to get a couple more to bring the price down.  But, just in case, everyone agreed to $92.50 for the day’s transportation to Saigon.  In the World Cruise lounge at tea, I ran into a couple, who were delighted to join us and so now, it’s $65 each.  Nice.

I google translated the places we wanted to go and printed it.  They were Notre Dame Cathedral, The Old Post Office, Ban Thanh Market, and The Deck.  I ate in the dining room at a share table, which I had not done in a while, and went to “The Vallies”, a Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons tribute group.  They were very good. 

The next day, March 20, we docked in Phu My port for Ho Chi Minh City – Saigon.  We all met up at the gangway and Mr Ha was a hundred feet away with his van.  We had paid an extra $100 for this, in our price, and it was well worth it.  Jeanne had to have it, and the rest of us were grateful when we saw how far it was to the port entrance.  The driver made one pit stop on the way in to Saigon, but it was so early in the game that none of us got out.  He did grab himself some lunch, though, to be sure he ate.  We loved Mr Ha.  He was a good kind man, but he did not understand us at all.  Poor Luat was called again and again to translate, and he did it cheerfully, though I know he was leading a tour of his own.  I’ll be calling him a lot sooner the next time and have him in the car with us.

Notre Dame Cathedral was covered in scaffolding and no one wanted to get off for the Post Office, so we were in the market by noon.  Even so, we only had one hour to shop.  Peggy found what she wanted right away, but the rest of her browsing was cut short by trying to sit down on a piece of luggage, and having it roll away, leaving her to land on her tush.  There are worse ways to land, but she was shaken and grateful when three little shop ladies fanned her while the rest of us went off to shop. 

It was very, very hot in there.  I would make a purchase, check on Peggy, make another purchase, check on her again.  The little fanning ladies stuck with it. Before my last purchase, she got up and moved to our appointed waiting spot.  They offered a little plastic stool.  She accepted and it was no better than the piece of luggage.  She hit the floor again.  This time Mr Ha had arrived and I managed to convey to him that he should put her in the air conditioned van, while the clock ran out and the rest of us assembled.  I made a quick purchase, and waited for the others, who were there quickly.  Our wheechair bound lady had been having the time of her life in that market.  She is one spunky lady.

Off we went to The Deck and it did not disappoint. This was my first order:

The things in the copper tumbler are soft shell crab and it was amazing.  Just about everyone else ordered them once they saw me with it.  Here’s our exceptionally happy group:

That’s Jeanne in the middle.  She weighs about 65 pounds but she’s pretty lively.  She actually came to sailaway, had a cigarillo and a gin and tonic, and asked me to email her travel agent for a quote on next year’s HAL world, on the Zuiderdam. 

I had two beers and a chocolate pear cake for dinner. 

Just before we were to leave the van, Peggy made a little speech. She wanted to tell us how this day had changed her. She had grown up in the ’60-70s in the USA, where the Vietnamese were the hated enemy. After meeting them up close in the market, and seeing how kind they were, she realized how very wrong we can be. That’s what travel will do.

2024 – Queen Mary 2 Grand World– Part 3 –Sydney to Singapore..3.2 Bitung to Hong Kong

Well, now all the fabulous, exciting ports coming up, like Hong Kong and Singapore, are going to have to beat Bitung as the passengers’ favorite.  People were talking about it all day, on March 10.  Every one of us felt like a celebrity.  We were bathing in the warmth of Bitung’s welcome.  I spent most of the day working on and delivering Newsletter 12, attached. 

I spent most of the day, working on client issues and plugging away at this blog.  In the evening, I met those of my people who were coming to dinner tonight at Sir Samuel’s.  I was delighted that it included my caregiver and her charge.  It was so rewarding to see her up, out, alert, eating and smiling.  We had a very nice time together.

With only 2 days to go until Hong Kong, March 11 was busy with preparations.  I wanted to be sure everyone had the best time ever.  There was one couple staying in Pacific Place and going to Elvon’s tailor, and a couple of others who were adventurous enough to take my advice.  And I was working on addresses in Chinese for all, just in case.

Liz came along to pay for lunch in Bitung, which I had put on my credit card. Two of the seafood nasi gorengs, most expensive on the menu, and three pints of beer, came to $21.16, total.  Liz was so happy, she decided to treat me, so I got that lovely lunch for the tip I left, which had been the last of my rupiah.

I went to the Commodore Club at 6:30pm, ,had a very nice time in congenial company, and ate alone in the dining room, as I am still coughing and don’t want to scare anyone. 

March 12 was much the same.  David Pong wrote to say he had had a relapse of the bug that’s going around and wouldn’t be showing me around the new HK Palace Museum after all.  I decided that was fine, because I am just recovering, myself and saving the energy was probably a good thing. 

I ate alone one more time and missed the show because I wanted to go to bed early before my two big days in Hong Kong.

On March 13 I woke up in Hong Kong.  I had packed yesterday for my overnight in Wanchai.  My backpack contained my computer, chargers for it, phone and watch, toothbrush, dopp kit and these clothes:

I was wearing boots, my light raincoat, black yoga pants, a long sleeved black leotard top and a diaphanous blouse.  At various times I wore every piece you see except the second pair of disposable underwear. 

Since I wasn’t going to the HK Palace Museum, and was traveling light, I decided to get to the Grand Hyatt the touristy way.  I left my room at 9:40am and went through customs at 10:00am, quickly, by facial recognition.  It was a long walk through the parking garage to the ship’s shuttle.  The new KaiTak Cruise Terminal is a work in progress and it’s pretty basic at the moment.  That explains why I couldn’t find a decent restaurant in it. Soon come, I’m sure.  At 10:45, the bus deposited us on Chatham Rd, with the usual instructions to take pictures of the surroundings so we could get back to the bus and the caution that the last bus was at 10:00pm.  I didn’t care.  I wasn’t coming back.  I just had myself pointed towards the Star Ferry and off I went along Chatham Rd to Salisbury Rd.  I crossed over to the waterfront at the HK Museum of Art and walked along the Avenue of the Stars to the Star Ferry.  I missed the 11:00am ferry by a couple of minutes and sat down to wait.  It never takes very long for another ferry to appear and I was soon on my way to Wanchai.  I took this picture of the ferry to Central and the Chinese Resort Ship that was docked in Ocean Terminal, where I would have wished the QM2 was. 

I was living in the nearer black building with the red bands, when I met Elvon.  Not all of the buildings you see here were there, then, certainly not the enormous IFC tower.  You see it better in this shot:

And if they call the thirty-story building behind the Ferris wheel the “thousand assholes”, you can just imagine what they call that one.  I wouldn’t be surprised if it was shaped that way on purpose.  Just before I got off the ferry in Wanchai, I got this shot in memory of Elvon.  It would have made him so proud:

That’s the new convention centre on the right, and I was staying in the Grand Hyatt, whose upper floors you can just see on the right of it.  I walked there from the Star Ferry, arriving around 11:40am.  My room was ready, so I checked in, left my backpack, used my facility and went downstairs to the taxi I had ordered on the way in. 

The taxi took me to Deep Water Bay and the Hong Kong Country Club, where I was the guest of Elvon’s old 2IC, Alwin Lam and his wife Agnes.  I had asked to bring along a friend, because I wanted Mabel Lam to meet her “relatives.”  Alwin invited the duck:

That was one oinker of a lunch, and an oinker of the very highest quality.  The Hong Country is known for the quality of its food.  Only in Hong Kong do you find a country club chef who can compete with the Michelin starred restaurants.  The members know what they want and they don’t mind paying.  It’s a terrific set-up, too.  Look at the picture again.  We are in our own private little room, where you can have any conversation you want, where the participants hear every word and there are no adjacent tables to eavesdrop.  It just doesn’t get better than that. 

We waddled out to Alwin’s car, and he had his driver drop Mabel and me at Hopewell Centre, where there was a Watson’s, easy walking distance from the Grand Hyatt.  Mabel had kindly agreed to come shopping with me, which, apart from just being fun, provided me with an interpreter and an extra set of arms to carry things.  I just needed mouthwash, elastic bandaging for my ankle and all the disposable underwear I could lay my hands on.  In Hong Kong my arse is an XL.  I bought 14 packets of 5.  They came in around 57 cents a pair.  The ship charges $3.00 to wash a pair of gotchies.  That’ll save me $170.  You can stop laughing now.  I have bought them online but not as cheap, nor as comfortable as Watsons’.  God bless uncle Li Ka-Sing.  He knows me.

Mabel and I hauled it all back to the hotel and she came up to see my view, from the seventeenth floor, which was spectacular:

I would be hosting drinks before dinner to watch the Symphony of Lights, which plays on HK buildings at 8pm every night.  Most of the buildings involved are part of this view.  I downloaded the music to my phone. 

After Mable left, I had a 45 minute bath, ordered an ice bucket for the champagne the Lams had given me at lunch time, and waited for my guests to arrive.  While I was waiting, I cleared my email and, what do you know? There were the horse race tips for the evening from our friend, Bill.  I was having dinner with Simon and Delia Clennell, Don Meyer and Cindy Kwok.  Simon, Don and Bill are all Mensa friends from my days in HK, more than thirty years ago. 

Don and Cindy arrived around 7.  We weren’t expecting Simon and Delia until dinner time.  The three of us drank champagne, ate the snacks Don and Cindy brought, and enjoyed the Symphony of Lights.  Then we went down to the eighth floor to One Harbour Road, the Grand Hyatt’s top class Chinese Restaurant.  Our table had a similar view to my room and the food was wonderful.

The picture would be clearer, if I had set the camera to auto, instead of no flash, but you get te idea and some of you know the people.  Not only is the food delicious, it’s a work of art:

And there’s nothing like being with good, old friends.  We never did bet on the horses, we just didn’t have the means to do it.  Next time, we’ll actually go to the races.

I slept like a log, with the curtains wide open and woke up on the 14^th to that view I can never get enough of.  It took me quite a while, but I managed to pack everything I brought and bought into my backpack and one small Grand Hyatt shopping bag.  Then I checked out and met my McGill friends, Lily and Alex Chu and Elizabeth Law, for Dim Sum.  I had made it easy on myself.  We went to One Harbour Road again.  This, folks is what really good dim sum looks like:

It’s subtle, but it’s in the texture of the noodle, the freshness of the ingredients, and the flavour.  You don’t get that quality just anywhere.  It’s pretty rare outside of the very good restaurants and hotels of Hong Kong.  I made a pig of myself again, aided and abetted by my good friends.  It was so great to catch up.  It is interesting how Hong Kong people now view the world.  They are quite happy under Chinese rule, as many things work very well.  They are not worried about the new security laws.  They feel safe in Hong Kong.  They are particularly disgusted with Western politics, where billions are spent on election campaigns that could be used on infrastructure, housing, health care and other worthy projects.  There’s a good point there.

While I had been savouring One Harbour Road’s food last night, the Queen Mary 2 had its gala for its world cruise passengers at the Rosewood, a brand new hotel, on the Kowloon side.

I wanted to see what the new hotel was all about, so I decided to make it my base for the afternoon.  There couldn’t be an evening meal, because we were sailing, but Mabel said she could meet me for tea or a drink at five, and that sounded good to me.   I took a taxi to the Rosewood, flashed my IATA card and asked for a tour.  It was scheduled for an hour hence and so I went down to the mall below.

It was a very fancy mall, so all I bought was a $50 tube of lipstick from Yves St. Laurent, but it will make a nice souvenir, a memory every time I use it. The tour started on time and it gave me a chance to talk to the Director of Sales about how the Cunard banquet went last night.  He told me they had served Western food because when they try to serve a Chinese banquet to 500 westerners, the questions the servers get about everything break the timing of the service.  Too bad, but it makes a lot of sense. He was happy to tell me that the Rosewood opened in 2019 and is the top hotel in Asia and no 2 in the world.  A very simple room is over $900/night and they have some serious suites.  One of them is a 5-bedroom, 5,000 sq.ft suite.  It was rented to a celebrity for the 3 years of COVID. 

After my tour, and because of everything I had eaten in the past two days, all I wanted was water.  I went to the ground floor restaurant and asked for a glass, explaining my case, a bit.  The servers couldn’t have been nicer.  Over a period of about an hour they served me four glasses of water and I drained them all and used the facilities a couple of times.  No charge.  Dress well and go to the best places.  Always.

Mabel appeared about a quarter to five and I still wasn’t ready to eat anything, so we asked my nice server about our choices of bars.  Their lobby bar, the Darkside, is listed among the 50 best bars in the world so we went there.  The name comes from when Kowloon was referred to as the dark side of HK because all the skyscrapers were on the HK side, so as not to interfere with the airport, which has now moved to Lantau island.

The ceiling treatment was mesmerizing.  Those are hour glasses, containing varying amounts of white sand, flowing at varying speeds.  

There we sat, enjoying our expertly made cocktails, well attended to and happy.  Too soon it was 6:45 and I needed to get back to the ship for 8:00pm all aboard.  Of course, that 8:00 pm was an assumption, based on the fact that we were sailing at nine.  Had I been on board to read last night’s Daily Programme, I would have known that all aboard was actually 7:30 and when I clocked in on board at 7:32, I was the very last passenger to board. 

I went to sailaway and to bed without any supper.  I didn’t know if I would ever want to eat again.

2024 – Queen Mary 2 Grand World– Part 3 –Sydney to Singapore..3.1 Cairns to Bitung

It’s March 1 and I am going into high gear in preparation for Hong Kong.  I won’t be going to the ship’s big ToDo in the Rosewood, because I have friends to catch up with.  I still want my people to have the best time each of them can have.  There’s a lot to do and conversations to have.  Hong Kong is the most crowded place in earth.  It’s intimidating and there’s good reason for it.  You can get lost and you don’t speak the language, not anymore.  You’re fine in the hotels and fancy shops but you can’t spend all your time there, and you shouldn’t.  I was having private conversations with just about everyone to try to ensure they had the best time ever, in the city that I love so much.

I also have shore excursions coming up in Singapore and Phuket and it’s time to start communicating with the tour operators.  I acted on Daniele’s always reliable restaurant suggestions and booked “The Deck” in Saigon, which is Asian fusion and bound to be great.  Then I put it, as well as LouLou in Singapore, into Newsletter 11, which I delivered later in the day.

I had dinner with one very nice couple and the singer in the Royal Theatre was the best of those, yet.  She performs in a sequined tux, and no nonsense shoes.  She’s not young but she’s full of energy.  Her name is Lisa Crouch and she has a great voice.  She did Tina Turner, ABBA, etc.  

The next day, March 2, we docked in Yorkey’s Knob, for Cairns Australia.  Before I could go out, I had some work to do.  Then I went walkabout in Cairns or maybe it was just Yorkey’s Knob.  The tender ride put us down at a boat club, not the public pier I was used to.  It wasn’t right downtown, like the old public Pier.  It was out in the burbs.  Like getting dropped off at the Royal St. Lawrence, when you want to visit downtown Montreal.  There was a shuttle, but it only took us to the nearest suburb, which was, at least, a waterfront one.  It’s esplanade was somewhat developed, so after I addressed my pharmaceutical needs, I was able to find a decent bistro.  It was called “Little Sisters” and the kingfisher carpaccio was yummy.  There were slices of jalapeño and roe in the sauce.

Then I walked back to a gelato place I had spotted and got a two scoop sugar cone, one chocolate sorbet and one hazelnut.  That was a tad too distracting, so I took a left where I should have taken a right and walked three long blocks before I found and fixed the error.  My left ankle will not be pleased tomorrow.  I was three minutes past my personal deadline to be on the bus, but 37 minutes before the last bus, so all was well. 

The bus got me to the boat club by 4:24pm, for a 5:00pm last tender.  Only the tender operation was so backed up that we must have waited two hours.  There had to be 300 people there when I got there and there were more buses coming.  I blessed the fact that I needed to use the bathroom, when I found out there was a party of sorts going on at the club.  The poor members were drowning in a sea of well, us.  The smart ones of us.  There were still a few seats at tables on the deck, when I got out of the loo, so I ordered a beer and settled in. 

After about a half-hour the live music started.  It was hotter than hell, but sitting down with a cold beer, on a covered deck, listening to music sure beat standing in line in the sun. 

After a day like that, I enjoy sailaway and a little pizza at the Chef’s table.  I skipped the magic show, as I would have had to wait until 10:15pm for it and book and bed were calling.

Ofice hour was busy at sea on March 3.  The new people came to see me and are coming on the tour in Singapore.  They also want to come to LouLou with Amanda and me.  We’ll be talking more as they also want to go to the Marina Bay Sands at some point to be on top of that big boat in the sky.  The way to do it is KU-DA-TA or one of The Marina Bay Sands’ restaurants and we found an Italian one online that looked great to them.

The husband knows Hong Kong from business trips and was dying to show it to his wife.  So, I suggested they just book a room in Pacific Place on the HK side, which is far more interesting anyway, they can walk to the Peak Tram and my husband’s tailor, best in HK.  They liked the idea of the mall and of using the hotel concierge to find them a car and guide. 

It was another dinner in The Verandah Steakhouse with my new friends.  It was perfectly lovely.

March 4, we were at sea again and there was more work to do.  Some people’s plans for Hong Kong make me very nervous, like the one who plans to go out on his own looking for a department store in Kowloon where he had bought or had shirts made long ago.  I asked him when but he didn’t remember.  Kowloon is not my area of expertise, but I was pretty sure there wasn’t a department store in the area he was describing.  This really made me go to work on Hong Kong Addresses for taxi drivers in Chinese characters.  Anyone who goes out alone, including me, needs to be carrying such a thing.  I started working on it.  As I worked, I noticed that I was feeling worse and worse.  I filled myself up with cold meds and started taking Cipro.  I had been invited to a Captain’s Cocktail but decided I had better not take my germs there.  I took a nap, ordered room service, watched Golda, with Helen Mirren, and the port talks for Darwin and Bitung. 

Still at sea on March 5, 2024, it was a quiet day at the desk, which was good, because I wasn’t feeling all that great.  Cunard gifted us with a World Cruise Diary, two months in.  I had to buy my own in NYC and now have to buy another because I am almost through it. 

I went to the Chef’s Table, where I could eat at a table for one.  I had my bottle of wine brought from the Britannia dining room, because I’ll do this for at least two days.  I went to bed early but had trouble sleeping for the coughing. 

On March 6, 2024, we docked in Darwin, Australia.  I should have turned in my Territory Park Tour in a couple of days ago.  There was no way I was going to make it.  I was too sick to even call the Medical Department to deal with it.  I’m self-medicating with Cipro and it will probably work, but it’s costing me the price of the tour.  I finally got to sleep around one this morning, and the phone rang at three, even though it was in airplane mode.  It was on WiFi, though so maybe that’s why, and maybe I could have picked up, but I was too sick for that.  I texted the caller and went back to sleep.  When I got up I dealt with it. 

I was glad it was a port day and I didn’t need to go to the desk.  I had tea in my stateroom and spaghetti at Chef’s Table and watched a cute movie about a cyclist whose dad was a stonecutter.  I never saw the name of it but AI gave it to me when I asked.  It was “Breaking Away”.  I’m overcoming my fear of AI, which may be more dangerous. 

Back at sea on March 7, my mobile phone has lost its mind.  Sometime in the night, it left Darwin and went back to Sydney time.  That caused it to wake me up at 7:00am ship’s time, which was all I needed when I wasn’t feeling well. I reset it for 9:00am.  I woke up then, feeling much better and took more meds to keep it that way.  No one came to the desk which was perfect for me, and probably them.  I did some personal business and took the Bitung shorex I had booked in for a refund. 

I dined at a table for one in Britannia, finishing off that bottle of wine.  I think it was it’s fifth night.  I am getting four to five nights out of a bottle, nowadays.  Sad, but economical, at least.  

Still at sea on the morning of March 8, it was my turn to get the time wrong and I ended up hustling through my shower and exercises with Miranda Esmonde-White on my computer.  I discovered that I have more mobility when my hair is still wet, meaning my body is still warm from the shower.  Must do it this way more often.  It’s easier and probably more beneficial.

In a strange coincidence, two couples stopped by to talk for a bit, neither of whom were my people, but one couple was from Santa Rosa, the other from Montreal, and the Santa Rosa couple had HK accents.

Liz, my caregiver passenger,  came by to tell me that now her charge has thrush from all the antibiotics.  This care-giving aboard thing is like Whack-a-Mole.  Sad for both of them.  At least they have a nice new ADA room and they are loving it.  I sent in a log and posted its companion blog.  Then I went to the dining room and ate alone again.  I was getting steadily better and full of Cipro, but with all the sickness on the ship, no one wants to be near anybody who is coughing, and I still was. 

On March 9, we docked in Bitung, Indonesia. I got up early, worked on the Chinese addresses some more, called everyone to remind them of dinner tomorrow night in Britannia, and went out to meet Liz in the Terminal at eleven.  The plan was a pharmacy run, a walk and lunch.  The pharmacy run turned out to BE the walkabout, as we got lost.  There hadn’t been a ship to visit this port in more than eight years.  It’s not much of a port and it needs the business.  It felt like the whole town had turned out to meet us.  It probably helped that it was a Saturday.  We were the attraction for the family outing.  At first we were leery of everyone wanting to have their pictures taken with us, but once it became clear that they weren’t asking for money, we relaxed a bit.  When it kept happening, it became less and less annoying, and more and more fun, and our smiles became more and more genuine. 

The first pharmacy we found after much asking, sans language, actually had what I wanted, more guaifenesin, phenylpropanolamine etc. cold stuff.  You know, that which they say doesn’t work, only it seems to for me.  Thrush medication was more elusive and somewhat embarrassing to ask for in sign language.  We ended up retracing our steps to where we thought we might have made a wrong turn and, from the other side of the street, it was obvious that all we had had to do was keep going. 

Through all this, Liz got treated to Helen, in her starring role as the world’s most nervous pedestrian.  You don’t want to be near me when there’s a busy street and no crosswalk.  You can’t try to take my arm because I might bolt in the middle, taking you with me and get us both killed.  I told her this, and she didn’t, and a couple of nice policemen helped us across the street and then wanted pictures with us.  I do like this one.

After Liz had completed her business in the pharmacy, they were still outside, so I asked them where we should go for some good nasi-goreng.  That caused a lot of discussion between them and they finally decided we would be happiest at the restaurant on the way back to the ship, which had put up an entertainment tent extending the restaurant over the sidewalk and into the street. 

Were they ever right.  Not only did we love Bitung, like the sign said, we also loved:

And the nasi goreng was delicious, and the entertainment was fun. Some of the local police gals joined one of our passengers and

We could have stayed all afternoon, but Liz had to get back to Jeanne, so we made our way back to the ship, having our pictures taken and signing autographs, all the way.

Liz got creative when she was presented with a whole blank copybook page and wrote “My name is Elizabeth, like the Queen of England”.  That would be a hard act to follow for most people, but yours truly wrote “My name is Helen, like Helen of Troy, the face that launched 1000 ships.”  I always groan when people say “Helen of Troy” on meeting me, but I was glad of it, just then.  We hope the kid got an “A” on his assignment for that trophy. 

Back on the ship, I had a little nap and took a shower and a phone call from one of my people, to say she would be coming to dinner tomorrow.  Sailaway was fabulous.  It looked like the whole town had turned out at the pier to bid us farewell.  It got dark before we left and the shore was alit with cell phone flashlights.