Thursday, November 20

It was a long layover in Dubai.  When I booked it, it was an hour and a half.  About a month ago, they changed it to four and a half hours because they are repaving the runways in Mumbai today.  And now it’s five and a half hours.  That’s brutal, after a more than 12 hour flight to get this far.

The saga with Indian customs is not over, either.  Now they have sent me another form to fill out and upload to the portal with the impossible CAPTCHA.  This one is entitled “Individual-Importing-at-Company-for-personal-use”.  Presuming the company is the Oberoi, I am going to leave it for the hotel concierge to deal with, for a nice big tip.  He’ll love me for the rest of my 5-day stay.

Emirates economy class was just fine.  I probably slept as much on the short flight as I did on the very long one.  Of course, that was likely because it was the middle of the night somewhere and I had been up for a very long time.

You won’t get any accuracy from me on this stuff as I try not to care what time it is until I get to my destination and sleep until a reasonable getting up time.  Then I get up and get on with it and don’t know what jet lag is all about, because I don’t believe in it.  That works pretty well.

Friday, November 21

The Oberoi Mumbai is lovely, with wonderful caring staff, who cannot do enough for you.  They also have a good business centre.  I spent most of my time there. 

I got up at 10:30am and was at work by noon.  My first order of business was to try to lay my hands on the FedEx shipment from Distinctive Voyages.  It’s just a box of letterhead, folders, comment cards, etc.  Absolutely no commercial value, as I had already managed to tell their obstinate web site, after multiple attempts.  I got Sachin, the Duty Manager and Chief concierge, involved right from the start.  His business centre person, Prathamesh, was my main buddy, assigned to the task, but there were two or three other caring people in that business centre.   They did their best to contact FedEx but none of the numbers we were given in the multiple emails actually got through to live people.  No live people at all for the first day, only persistent, likely AI generated emails, asking for information they already had, sometimes in different formats, sometimes in another version of “to whom it may concern”, always preferred to the KYC (know your customer) web site, whose CAPTCHA wasn’t letting them in either.  

I had a nice snack at 3pm, in Fenix, with Edwin, who became my pet server, worked the emails some more, and decided to check out the RBYC, who had never answered my emails requesting a booking for the 25^th.

The Royal Bombay Yacht Club is right downtown, around the corner from the Taj Mumbai and the Gate of India.  It’s an old, old club from the mid-nineteenth century.  I showed my credentials and paid my fee to get in (<$3).  I talked to the doorman about booking 10 people for dinner on the 25^th and he gave me the email and phone number of Mr Gotam, who was in charge of such matters and suggested the next day after 10am, email first, then phone.

I poked my nose into the library, of which I had fond memories from the days when I needed to find internet on shore.

It’s old and cosy and look what it has peeking out of one of the shelves.

I had a Margarita in the snug bar on the second floor, having got there in a manned cage of an elevator.  It takes you back. 

Back at the Oberoi, Carolyn, Shelley and I had a very nice dinner in the Italian restaurant.  Mine was Osso Bucco on Polenta, yum.

Saturday, November 22

Shelley and Carolyn were off on a reconnoitering tour of Mumbai.  I got up earlier and was probably in the Business Centre by 10:00am.   My email was full of requests from KYC, as if it was all my fault that they had not even taken my package to Indian customs yet.  I decided to involve Truly India, our tour supplier in the process.  Saransh gave the job to Pradeep and Sachin at the Oberoi got copied in to it.  Ten or twelve emails went back and forth, numerous futile attempts were made, from many computers, to get the documents into the recalcitrant web site.  I wrote another letter describing the contents of the package, as per directions from the emails.  It wasn’t letting up.

RBYC was the opposite problem.  No answer to my email and when I got Mr Gotham on the phone, he just told me to wait for his reply to the email.

Carolyn and Shelley went to Shabbat and made a friend, who is going to take them to the Cricket Club.  So posh, us.

Sunday, November 23

I moved into my twin-bedded room on the 19^th floor yesterday, because Nona was due to arrive in the wee hours of this morning, like around four.  She did, and she didn’t even wake me up, I just found her there around eight when I woke up.

I got a phone call from Pradeep at Truly India, who had got through to a live person at FedEx, so it looked like there was hope.  Nona and I went to see the Holy Name Cathedral, so she could apologize to God for not getting up in time for mass and we could see it.  We were treated to some very good hymns, by a small but mighty choir, and it passed for devotions.  Then, we went shopping on Colaba Causeway, the shopping street. 

It was crowded and junky, but where else can you buy a pair of sandals, that they size to measure in a half hour, for $24? I also got a light pink salwar kameez, that looks classy and will be good for hot touring, too.  $6.50.  Then the Oberoi charged $6 to press it, but that’s another story.

Next on the agenda was the usual Nona and Helen thing, a beer in a special place.  We were within walking distance of the Taj Hotel, so that’s where we had our beer:

Just outside that window is the Gate of India.  It doesn’t get much more interesting in Mumbai.

We used the Taj’s Sikh to get our taxi.  A little tip insures that you get an honest cab.  The Sikhs know.  While we were waiting, I couldn’t resist taking a picture of this sign.  I offer it sans commentaire:

The four of us had dinner at the Oberoi again.  It’s good, and it’s easy. Not cheap, but easy.

Monday, November 24

Wanda arrived from England, in the early morning, and went for a nap.  Truly India had managed to get her an early room, so she didn’t have to use one of ours.  Nona and Carolyn and Shelley went on tour.  I went to the Business Centre. The demanding emails continued to make ridiculous demands. The best one wanted a copy of my India visa (which they had had for a week) with the number in the body of the email it would be attached to.  No one can read the attachments, it seems.  I needed to spoon-feed the artificial intelligence, which is real stupidity.  I do not like the way the world is going on that front, and when it meets Indian bureaucracy, it’s a perfect storm. 

There are wonderful things that happen in India, too.  It turned out that our tour guide, Anahita Tarapore, is a member of the RBYC and had dinner there last night.  My people told her how much trouble I was having getting my group in there for dinner and, next thing you knew, it was done.  BTW, everyone loves Anahita as a tour guide, too.  Ask me for her coordinates if you are going to Mumbai. She understands us.  She lived in Ottawa for a few years.

I had my snack at 3:00pm and took myself upstairs to get ready to meet the Montreal contingent of Patrick, Rose, Joan, Andrea and Maureen.  Maureen is a docent at the Montreal Museum of Fine arts, which Montrealers know by its French acronym, MBAM.  We didn’t know her from before, but she has been following my blog.  She’s Steve Harrold’s sister, so we do have quite a connection. A week or two before, Maureen took the rest of us through the Kent Monkman exhibit at MBAM.  There we met Miss Chief Eagle Testicle, his alter-ego.  I came out of my room on the 19th floor of the Oberoi, and became Miss Chief Blue Booby.   The hall overlooks the atrium.  I saw my five people get off the elevator and make for the front desk.  I got excited, picked up my pace and my rubber-soled Mephisto sandal caught in the thick carpet.  I went down so fast I never put out an arm to break my fall, which could have broken the arm, so was probably just as well. 

Quick as a wink, there were three hotel people around me, wanting to help me up.  I asked for time and to bring myself up unaided, please.  There was nothing broken.  I went down to the lobby, greeted my folks, saw that their rooms were correct, and went back to rest with some ice before dinner. Everyone was glad of three hours to rest, including me, who did it with the hotel provided ice packs.  They were just hard lumps of blue ice wrapped in towels.  I should have insisted on real crushed ice that melts, soaks the towel, and is a pain, but works so much better.

Tuesday, November 25

In the morning, my right breast was a very dark blue, the whole thing, and it was sore.  I had awoken in the night every time I rolled over.  I shamelessly showed the whole group the blue booby photo.  I don’t think I want to publish it on the Internet, though.  It might be seen as the world’s ugliest porn.  Patrick, the one guy in the group had the best idea.  I needed to wear my bra to bed.

I checked my email, with high hopes that my shipment had cleared customs, but the message from KYC was just happy to report that it had got past them and they would now put it through Indian customs, which might take up to 48 hours.  I didn’t have that kind of time left and the hotel told me there was a stationery store across the street and to the left.  Nona and I set out.

Office Depot, it was not.  It was a shop where they did passport photos and sold stationery.  You couldn’t browse the shelves.  You had to describe what you wanted and some minion would go search in the back.  We weren’t doing too well, even after I got a piece of paper and folded it to what I want.  The closest we came were opaque dark blue plastic folders and they were ugly as sin.  But, backs against the deadline, we sent the minion off.  While he was gone, we looked up and hanging there were a bunch of bags, white with gold Indian designs, in assorted sizes.   I started thinking, why not those, at least they were nice looking, and the design was sort of like the old DV logo, which I like better than the new one.  So we got bags, big enough to hold the letters and flyers, and then we got a bunch of little gold binder clips to Hold the papers to the sides of the bags.  Binder clips are a useful item on a cruise. 

Back in the Business Centre, I crafted letterhead, using the DV logo, and altered the welcome letter to explain why the bags, while Nona collated the whole thing.  Then the Business Centre printed the letter for us and Nona put it all together.  She was a great help and said she was happy to do it.  We just needed some time together.  It didn’t matter what we did.  You know, she’s right.  It’s like that with good friends.  These were the Welcome Packets we would be delivering:

That night we went to the Royal Bombay Yacht Club, no small thanks to Anahita, because their misogyny sure hadn’t done me any good.  We explored the library

had a drink at the bar

And an amazingly good dinner for $15 each.  The special of the night was Steak and Kidney Pie, and mine was delicious. 

Wednesday, November 26

All good things come to an end but this one had a great new beginning waiting, so something to look forward to.  The ten of us gathered, with our bags at the appointed hour, checked out, and were met by Richard of Truly India.  About ten Oberoi staff were there to wish us well on our journey, but not one of them made everyone check that their bags were boarding the van.  I should have done it my good self.  I always eyeball my own, saw some of the pax doing it, made an announcement in the bus and left it at that.  One person trusted another to have done it and that one, who shall be nameless, thought she saw her red bag in the luggage compartment of the van and presumed that the bags belonging to her and the one who tasked her with looking, were in there.  Let this be a lesson, people.  Eyeballing the bags means every bag you brought and don’t trust anyone else to do it for you.  When we got to the ship, we were missing four bags.  Luckily, it wasn’t sailing for about five hours, so there was plenty of time for Truly India to go back to the Oberoi and fetch them.  No harm done this time, but a good lesson.

Then we dealt with getting through the terminal and ran into the useful combination of Indian bureaucracy and technology again.  A lot of the phones, including mine, would not work from the door of the terminal but were OK, once farther in.  it created a pretty bad bottleneck at the door, and it was hot and humid and nasty outside.  When my phone finally pulled up the Celebrity App, I found out that no good deed goes unpunished.  I had had that lesson before.  While teaching Joan how to get her boarding pass on her phone, I had managed to get hers on to mine, too, and it was in pride of place, such that I couldn’t get to my own.  That eventually got sorted out, but I am going back to my rule of carrying paper copies of everything and not trusting the electronics.

Once on board, I met with Irish, the Concierge assigned to our group.  Our manifests matched perfectly, which was great, because there was much about the Internet that wasn’t.  I immediately upgraded it to premium and eventually to two-device premium, so I could move photos from my phone to my Computer and even that never worked, but cost about $500. 

I delivered the Welcome Packets and managed to make dinner with my own group of 10 at seven.  We convinced the dining room to let us squeeze 10 people around a table for eight and were happy there, celebrating Joanie’s birthday, with our stewards, Roy and Rose.   The entertainment was an Australian couple, piano, violin, vocals and they were very easy to listen to.

This trip has been a year in the plannning. It was assigned to me as a DV in June 2024, and it just sat in my signature, until Black Friday, when my old napa friend Carolyn asked me to price it in Celebrity’s Black Friday sale. The next thing I knew, there were 10 of us, and we were planning a veree, veree nice trip, but it wasn’t easy.

Indian bureaucracy is second to none.  I have a good 30 hours invested in it to attest to that.  Including my good self, we are a group of 10, who will join the Distinctive Voyages group of 47, on board Celebrity Millennium.  48, including my good self, but I digress.

My ten, range in age from 72 to 91 and Joan will turn 92 the day we board Celebrity Millennium.   You can see where this is going with the visas, can’t you?  I ended up doing 8 of them.  Nona had a couple of months left on a 2016 ten-year Indian visa.  Mine expired a month ago.  I needed some of Nona’s luck.  Wanda has a brilliant daughter and between the two of them, they managed to get an Indian visa in seven hours.  It’s not just that they ask personal questions, like your parents’ nationalities, they even want to know their previous nationalities.  My father was Canadian, previously Canadian, and that goes back 7 generations for him, 8 for me, but is it any of their business?  Then there are the drop downs, listing every country in the world and you have to click all the ones you have visited in the last TEN years! I ended up doing eight of these $%^&*(*&^%^&* things.  Joanie, bless her heart, made an attempt, at least, for which she gets a diamond-studded gold star, but the damn site crashes every ten or fifteen minutes and sometimes doesn’t come back for hours.  I figure I averaged 3 hours per visa, and I am pretty sure that’s a low estimate.

So, I wasn’t overly surprised when I got email from FedEx that Indian customs wanted more information about the box of DV supplies that I had requested be shipped to the Oberoi in Mumbai.  I went to their site, jumped through its CAPTCHA hoops, made it through on about the third try, and gave them my best guess as to what would be in the box.  I asked DV to do the same on their end but FedEx told them not to worry.  I would be able to bring it in when I get to Mumbai.

Tuesday, November 18, 2025

Indian Customs had other ideas, and apparently wasn’t happy with my best guess.  Now they had a form for me to fill out on my letterhead, if you don’t mind.  They wanted one from DV, too AND they wanted me to upload it to the FedEx web site.  I did my best and sent it off, but the FedEx web site CAPTCHA, didn’t let me in after about 8 tries.  They give you the thing in all capital letters, with one bigger than the others.  I tried everything I could think of and finally gave up.  I did have a lot to do.  As it was, I got off the computer and began packing at 7:15pm.  Thanks, Indian bureaucracy.

Wednesday, November 19, 2025

I was up at six, out at seven, and at the airport by 7:30am.  There’s construction in the airport, like everywhere else in this city, but I had to give a nod to the mural hiding it.  Locals will recognize the construction cone hugging the Stanley Cup.  Hockey is the principal religion here, and the cones, well, they are everywhere.

This section is iconic, too.  It has poutine, a disgusting combination of French fries, gravy and cheese curds that somehow became our most famous food, when it really needs to be a Montreal smoked meat sandwich.  That’s there, too, supported by the obligatory pickle.

I was in the Maple Leaf Lounge at YUL before eight.  That much was good.  I had bought a cheap upgrade to business a few days ago and was told it was just a seat, no lounges, no chauffeur drives to the airport.  But… nothing ventured.  The Air Canada people at the lounge, which also serves Emirates, took one look at my Business Class boarding pass and I was in.

A cup of tea later, I was checking my email, and what did I get, but an email from Indian customs, thanking me for my submission and reminding me to add it to the web site.  I told them what I thought of that, politely, of course, I still need my shipment.

And now I am on the plane and they are just setting the tables for lunch.  I wanted to get this written before I have my first glass of wine. 

Thursday, November 20, 2025

Here I am in Dubai airport, after a long uneventful flight, and not much sleep.  I was underwhelmed by Emirates famed Business Class.  The quality of the wine was up a coupla notches, but the food wasn’t any better than Air Canada’s and that’s not saying much.  The entertainment selection was great, which was a good thing, because I didn’t find anything wonderful about the flat bed.  It was flat all right, but so narrow that I couldn’t get comfortable enough to sleep.  It wasn’t even worth the $1600 that I paid for it, never mind full price.  I’m in economy DXB-BOM, so I’ll report on that in the next installment.  For now, love from Dubai.  I’m brain dead.

Welllll….. I didn’t get the Holland America’s 2026 World, it was gone before I got there. But it’s OK. I am going anyway, at least as far as Sydney, and maybe all the way around. Pat Gustafson and Joanne Sidorchuk are coming with me, and the Wescotts and Lynann Barnes, of course. Any of you are more than welcome. This is the link to the full world cruise: 133-DAY GRAND WORLD VOYAGE, and the link to FLL to Sydney is https://www.hollandamerica.com/en/ca/find-a-cruise/w6w61a/v610b. I have to decide between adding a week or two in Australia and going on around the world. I can be swayed.

The actual cruise that I will be hosting for Distinctive Voyages is just an easy little getaway: Montreal to New York City – September 26, 2026 to October 8. https://www.hollandamerica.com/en/ca/find-a-cruise/n6a12a/v652 I’ll be planning a few days of Broadway shows on the end of that one and what we do in Montreal, depends on who comes. Pat Gustafson has first dibs on my guest room and whatever we do will be very low key.

The cruise is very inexpensive and it’s a nice itinerary:

Who’s coming with me? Three people have signed up already. So we are five and counting. It’s a party.

For me, that will be Wales and Ireland.  Ireland, because of my Irish half and my very good high school friend, Mary de Meulemeester O’Beachain.  Wales, because of my great old neighbors on Ile Perrot, when I was first married, and my new friends from the Queen Mary 2, Ceri and Andy.  It’s also an incredibly beautiful place, as the illustrations show.

On April 25, in Barcelona, I was up at 6:45am and downstairs for the 8:00am shuttle.  Checking in was easy, but I forgot to ask where the Lounge was, having bought business class when I checked in for my flight, yesterday.  It didn’t end up giving me much, except very slightly better seats, with a very little more legroom, and a better breakfast at noon.  The flight was delayed.  I had a helluva time finding the Lounge and, when I did know where it was, getting there involved climbing two flights of stairs or walking 100 yards to the right, to walk 200 yards to the lounge, and it wasn’t worth it to me.  I went to the KLM desk near me and ordered a wheelchair for my connection in Amsterdam, which had been shortened.

When we got to Amsterdam, the wheelchair attendant would not take me to the lounge because they had a two hour minimum time between flights for that.  I had no sooner been dropped off at my gate when the forty minute delay was posted.  That upgrade was not the best eighty-five bucks I ever spent.  But the plane finally arrived and took off again, with me in it and, these days, that’s as lucky as you get.

The driver I had booked on line, with the impressive name of Daniel Harper-Jones, was waiting at Cardiff airport and it was a very nice drive, through what had been a ruined landscape, thanks to 300 years of coal mining.  The land is slowly returning to pasture, but some of it is still seriously scarred.  It does manage to support a lot of sheep and it was lambing season.  There’s nothing like fields and fields of lambs to bring a smile to this face, unless it’s the faces of good friends at the end of the journey.  They popped over to Peterstone Court, my home for the next three days. We had a little drink together, before I had to make last call to dinner.  Supper was very well executed fish and chips, with soda water.   What a time not to be drinking, but I had to get control of the tongue thing, and it was time for my annual liver cleanse, anyway.

Peterstone Court is a lovely old place.  This is its library:

And this was the view from my room the next morning, Saturday the 26^th:

Sheep and lambs!  Delightful.  What wasn’t so delightful was the walk up two long flights of stairs to what they called the second floor and I called the third.  It was a lovely big room and made me a fine office, after breakfast.  I ignore my diet for a comes with, full English, well, in this case, Welsh, breakfast.  I started with the self serve yoghurt and granola.  Then, nothing would do but I needed to try Welsh rarebit.  I had never had it before, so I asked the server and she explained it was toast with a cheezy chef’s concoction on it and a posh egg.  “That’s a poached egg” I ventured and was told the egg could be done any way I liked.  It was just a “posh egg.”  From a free range chicken, I suppose.  Anyway, it was delicious and I followed it with another piece of toast, on which I used about 1/3 the jam I usually do, cutting down on sugar, for the tongue thing.  I discovered, that if you put a lot of butter on the toast, you don’t miss the sugar.  Just a teeny taste of jam is enough.  It looks like that’s life, going forward.  The price I am paying for all those 4 o’clock desserts on board. 

Andy picked me up at 1:45PM and we tried to find a bank or a post office in Brecon (I think) who would take a paper twenty pound note, that I had been saving, mistakenly, it seems.  No one accepts anything but cards and plastic banknotes, now.  Canada has them, too, so I get it.  We might have better luck on Monday.  For now, we gave up.  I bought some socks in the little town.  You used to get such fabulous socks in the British Isles, but they, like us, dismantled the factories and shipped them to China, back in the eighties and nineties.  I remember in a small part, being part of that.  It was a terrible mistake and we are paying now.  The socks are nice but not a patch on the ones I was wearing, which were a good forty years old, and finally wearing out.

We circled back to Peterscourt, and Andy’s house, which was about a mile away, to pick up Ceri.  It’s in a place called Scethrog, in Powys, Wales.  Bob Weeks and I had a wonderful Maine Coon Cat, named John Cowper Powys, after the author.  I never did talk about that, while I was there.  There was no shortage of things to talk about, but now I regret not having talked about JCP, both cat and man.  This afternoon, we were off to a nearby lake, with a lot of both history and wildlife.  The locals were delighted with the weather.  It wasn’t raining, which is a rare day in those parts. 

When we arrived at the lake, the first thing we noticed, was this beautiful swan, swimming with the male mallards. 

It looks like the sheep weren’t the only ones with young families.  Sure enough, we soon came upon mother ducks leading their broods around.  We never did see mama swan, and the ugly duckling, though.  Only the cute ones:

The lake has a lot of history, dating back over a thousand years, when a king lived, in exile, I guess, on a very small island in the middle of it.  Those are the beginnings of the Brecon Beacons, in the background.  I saw a lot of them, and they are gorgeous.  Here’s a better picture.  I have a lot of them.

We drove around a little more and went back to my friends lovely home, where Ceri showed me around her fascinating garden overlooking the flood plain, while Andy was very busy in the kitchen. 

It was really a terrible time not to be able to enjoy a drink before dinner, but Ceri and I did have a lovely chat in their den, with their cat, MacCallum

She’s a beautiful Bengal, but just as stand-offish as Robbie.  

In a very timely fashion, meaning just as I was getting hungry, dinner was served.  It was amazing.  Local salmon two ways, caught by Andy and served fresh and smoked in his own smoker. 

The main course was, of course, lamb:

And was it ever delicious.  Oh, yum.  It was roasted to absolute perfection and those potatoes were to die for, too.  I ate too much, of course, but I wasn’t drinking, and the food was fabulous.  I needed to enjoy myself thoroughly, and I did. 

Dessert did have Proseco in it, a whole bottle, but I am assuming the alcohol had evaporated.  That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

This was the Proseco jelly.  It was light and scrumptious.  I could not have been in a better restaurant, no matter what I was willing to pay.  We repaired to the den, while Andy did the washing up.  Where did Ceri find that man?  I want one.  MacCallum remained stand-offish, but demanding.  Ceri and I found ourselves doing door duty.

Andy joined us presently and we solved the problems of the world, until it was time to take me home.  We hadn’t been on the road two minutes when we saw a flash and heard a bang.  We were going towards whatever it was, and it was soon obvious that it was fireworks.  Andy was trying to figure out where they were coming from, while they kept getting brighter and louder.  We turned in to my inn and it was clear that they were coming from right on the property, the swimming pool to be exact.  I have had some good welcomes in my life, but never anything quite like this:

See that window at the upper left of the building?  It was mine!!!  Can you imagine what I would have thought if I had been all nicely tucked in for the night?  Huge thanks to my hosts for keeping me out!  I suppose you also want to know what the fireworks display was in aid of.  You are demanding.  Some staff members I knew were coming in the front door, while Andy and I were still talking in front, so we asked.  It was a wake.  And I thought I knew how to do a celebration of life.  Next time, and it will likely be my own – fireworks.

On Sunday, the 27^th, after another decadent breakfast and an even more decadent massage, we were off, right into the mountains.  It was an even better day, with full sunshine, rare in these parts.  I like this picture with the sun on the gorse bushes in the foreground:

And the views were spectacular, but for some reason, I got better pictures the day before.

Nepalese take out was on the menu tonight, Ceri’s contribution.  There’s an Infantry Battle School in these parts, and it’s the Royal Gurkha Wing. The soldiers are real Gurkhas, from Nepal.  So naturally, a Nepalese restaurant sprang up and it does take-out, which the locals are happy to buy, along with the soldiers.  It was yummy.  No pictures, though.  I haven’t found Indian food to be particularly photogenic.

Monday the 28^th, we found a solution to the paper 20-pound note problem.  A clever teller wouldn’t change it but told Andy to deposit it in the ATM and withdraw twenty pounds.  When they empty the ATM they’ll never know who put the paper note in.  Wonder if that would work with counterfeit?  Never mind – I googled it.

Off we went to Tretower Castle and Court, in Crickhowell.  Good of Google to provide that, too.  I wasn’t paying attention.  The castle, mostly in ruins, dates back to the 11^th century

 and the Court to the 14^th.  Like all these things, it had fallen badly into disrepair, but this one as lucky and a group of concerned citizens raised the money to have it restored in the 1930s, for us to go play in.  We had some fun:

And we tromped around the place, soaking up history and our own fun company.  It was my turn to do dinner, so that was at Peterstone.  It was very good and a very nice way to end three wonderful days with some of my very best cruise buddies.  I hope they enjoyed it as much as I did (they did say so) and that we get to meet again, sooner than later. 

Tuesday, April 29, I was on the road again, off to Ireland.  Andy picked me up around 9am and took me to the train station at Abergavenny.  It was going to be a complicated enough trip, as I had to take a train to Manchester to catch a flight to Dublin.  It was a bit soon in the season to have Cardiff to Dublin, nonstop.  The traffic is seasonal. 

That would have been fine, had not there been damage to the track somewhere near Hereford.  After a bit of a panic, and some nice, friendly locals, it was determined that it would likely be OK, just involve a bit of a bus ride past the damaged track.  It looked like I had plenty of time.  After getting off at the second stop, on to the bus, off the bus, back on a train, it didn’t look that good at all.  Luckily trains have conductors, and nowadays, conductors have smartphones, and the conductor was able to advise me to get off two stops before I would have and take a taxi to the airport.  That cost me another 26 pounds, and a few more grey hairs, not that it matters at this point.  I ended up making it, but it was a very stressful journey all in all. 

My high school friend, Mary, met me in the airport and took my sorry ass home with her.  We weren’t going to have dinner together because she had gone and won the president’s prize at her Bridge Club.  I had got to order what I wanted her to leave me, and it was smoked salmon and Irish brown bread, with cream cheese and capers.  I was perfectly happy and glad enough to rest on my own from the stress of the day.  I was pretty well knackered.

Then the lights went out.  Of course it was still light outside, so I just thought it was an Internet glitch, until resetting the router did nothing at all.  So I went around the house, trying all the light switches, but nothing came on.  I looked out the window and there were a couple of little knots of neighbors chatting in the street, but, for all I knew, they do this every night.  Mary has been living in this house for a good 50 years.  She and Sean bought it when they moved back to Ireland, which has to have been about 1974.  It’s fun to visit a place you have been visiting every few years for most of your life.  There’s a nice homey feeling about it.  Homeyer with the lights on, mind you.  I was careful to have myself in bed before it got fully dark.

The lights came back on before Mary got home.  She only had to deal with the alarm, which was flashing.  I was sound asleep. 

We really only had one full day together.  I was informed I needed to stay longer next time and I was not, under any circumstances,  to come when I wasn’t drinking.  So we made the most of our day.  The weather was glorious here, too.  First, we went to visit Sean, where he is staying in memory care.  The facility is beautiful, spotless, and located a very pretty walk, from a very pretty town.  We took Sean for the walk.  I wish I could say he remembered me and all the fun times we have had, but sadly, not.  I know only too well how nasty it is.

Mary and I stopped back at the house, because it was as close as anywhere, and grabbed a bite to eat.  It was shrimp on toast, pretty darn good for a little grab.  Her daughter, Mairin, whom I also love, dropped in and that was a treat.  Then we drove off to the seashore and a picturesque old mental institution.  Mary thought it was warm at the seashore.  I was freezing my ass off.  This reminded me of pretty much all of my trips to Ireland. 

There was no better place to have dinner than Mary’s house.  It was simple, but delicious, and wanted only some wine to be perfect.  We, too, had lots to talk about and relished the quiet.  I care more about the friends I visit than the places.  Mary has been one of my closest friends since I was 13.  We don’t look a day older, do we?

The next morning was the first of May.  I was up at 5:30am to catch my plane.  Mary would get up at 6:30 to drive me.  At 6:20, I opened my email to find out that the plane was delayed, an hour.  I woke Mary up to tell her she had another hour to sleep, and worked my email while I waited.  It didn’t get any better when I got to the airport.  The plane was further delayed and it’s no longer nonstop to Montreal.  You go through Toronto, which is 350 miles out of the way.  The 2.5 hour connection I was grousing about, turned out not to be enough.  It would have been, if I had not let the agent in Dublin convince me to check my bag.  She said it wouldn’t matter, since I was going home.  The bag could follow me.  That may be true in Europe now, but over here, you still have to be on the same plane as your bag, and someone had decided I wouldn’t make it and put my bag on the next flight.  So, I took that, but the bag missed it.  I got home two hours later and the bag got in the next day.  You have to love travel to put up with it these days.  And you all know, I do. For the summer, however, I’m home with Robbie and happy to be here.

Saturday, April 19 was the day of the DV Shore Excursion in Lanzarote and it was a perfect match for all we had heard about Lanzarote.  You can be told a place is “volcanic” but even the wonderful onboard education we got couldn’t prepare us for vineyards that looked like this:

We talk about quality in Napa, hand picking, etc.  It’s not a patch on the hand labour that goes into tending these babies.  The vines are three feet down, each in its own hole, with a stone wall windbreak.  The vineyard workers have to climb in and out of the holes to keep them clean and pruned.  How many times do you do that before you pick? 

Lower in the valleys, they can plant in rows, but still far apart and with rock windbreaks:

It will be hundreds of years before this place even starts to look like Napa.  And the earth keeps spinning.  We learned more about the evolution of Lanzarote and heard all about Cesar Manrique’s tragic accident, when we passed the scene of it.  Our next destination was a museum, restaurant and cultural center Casa-Museo del Campesino with its monument to Fertility – Manrique again.  What a difference that one man made.

There was a little glitch, about our gofio and sauce making lessons and we had a free 20 minutes, so some of us shopped and some grabbed a glass of wine.  I was in the latter group.  Eventually we were led into a Manrique design a beautiful underground restaurant and the fun began. 

The chef demonstrated how to make gofio.  It’s named after and made with the indigenous corn of the island.  The island got its first desalination plant in 1965, before that there was almost no water, and very little grew.  This gofio stuff is amazingly hardy and needs a fair bit of work to even be edible.  What the early people came up with is the ground corn, mixed with sugar, and a lot of spices.  It comes out like cookie dough and they served us quite a bit of it.  We ate it all.  We knew there was a “tapas lunch” coming, but were unclear as to what that would consist of, although the silverware should probably have given us a clue. 

Next lesson was mojo rojo and mojo verde, the sauces of Lanzarote.  They are good on all sorts of fish and the little potatoes that grow here.  We were served some very good sourdough bread with the two sauces and olive oil.  Then it was three cheeses with fig jam, and bowls full of the little potatoes to have with the two sauces.  Then came fish croquettes, delicious octopus, that we could barely finish.  There was a lot of wine, all through the piece.  Then, and only then, when we were well stuffed, came the main course.  Oh dear God, it was substantial, a block of pork, sort of a terrine, but heated, with gravy, mashed squash, carrots and brussels sprouts. urp. 

Of course there was dessert, again it was some interesting concoction that featured small pancakes and honey.  We waddled out.  My table mates were my regular table mates and the table voted to skip dinner.  Only I could not.  I had a dinner date with my Canadian friend. 

Somehow, I got through dinner, with a glass of wine before and one during.  I drank all this over a period of at least 8 hours, so it never gave any sort of problem, or so I thought.

The next morning, April 20 was Easter Sunday, and we were docked in Agadir, Morocco.  I woke up with a funny sensation on the edges of my tongue.  I have had this before and I knew that I wasn’t going to be having any more wine for a while.  It would really burn.  That was a shame, because I had been invited to dinner with Ron Houtman, the Food & Beverage Manager and that meant free drinks before and wine with. It was a nice congenial dinner table, a particularly delicious dinner, and Ron Houtman was very entertaining, but I did miss my wine. 

On the 21^st, Easter Monday, we were in Casablanca.  I went walkabout with Glen, and nobody bothered us.  Well, hardly anybody.  This fountain on a public square was pretty and attracted both tourists and locals, pigeons and seagulls.

We circled back to the square where we started and I recognized it as having been where Lenora and I were last year.  We were very close to the souk. So, there we went.

And it was interesting.  I even found a thing or two I actually needed.  But mostly it was for the local color and here it is:

Yes, Casablanca is a Muslim city now, so much so that when we went for our beer on the square before I boarded the bus, it ended up being a mocktail.  They were good, and the waiter took pictures but they are on Glen’s camera, so I don’t have one for you.  It’s the usual, just sans alcohol, which is good for my tongue, anyway.  Might as well do liver cleanse month, now that I have a start on it. 

At dinner, Suellen diagnosed my problem as possibly sugar related and sure enough, my Montreal nurse practitioner, whom I had contacted, told me to stay off booze, acids and sugar and gargle with warm salt water. 

Coloratura soprano, Christina Johnston was on the stage with a lot of my favorite love songs and arias.

I didn’t even go out in Gibralter on Tuesday, April 22.  I probably should have but work was starting to back up.  I did go to happy hour twice, once with my new friend, Stacy, and the other with my Canadian friend, Glen.  I like them both a lot and we are getting near where I get off, so friendships trumped location.  Of course I have been to Gibraltar before. Yes, I did both happy hours dry, sigh. 

On Wednesday, April 23, we were at sea, and it was time to pack and tie up loose ends.  We’d be in Barcelona tomorrow, and I would be disembarking at 9:00am.  Before I knew it, it was time for the last supper at the table.  I’ll be missing my table mates for a long time, but I know I will see them again.

Thursday, April 24, we docked in Barcelona.  It was a big, interesting day. I have been on board for the Amazon leg of the Pole-to-Pole to be with Wells, Dee, Lynann and a new couple Dee brought to me as clients, Tanner and Suellen.   HAL’s regular Round the World, on the Zuiderdam, is Henk Mensink’s last hurrah as Hotel Manager.  Today, the two ships meet in Barcelona and there’s a lot of partying around Henk’s retirement.  I applied to get invited to the Zuiderdam for that.  It had to be approved by Henk himself and he did.  I was happy, touched and flattered.  Henk and I do have a history of 5 world cruises together and the DV Host’s desk is right outside the Hotel Manager’s Office on the Amsterdam.  I used to sit there working most of every day, very accessible.  Dolly Smith would stop by and chat.  Remember her?  She lived on the Amsterdam for years.  I also spent a lot of happy time with Christel, Henk’s wife and the Guest Relations Manager. 

I checked my luggage with the front desk and debarked at 9:00am so that the ship could get down to its zero count for the segment.  Then I got my visitor’s pass for the Volendam and got back on board.  I ran into Glen, as I was checking my computer out again for a few hours.  He volunteered his cabin for the day, for luggage storage, and I took him up on it, trading one of the too many presents HAL have been giving us. 

Glen was going out for the day, with a couple of his friends, both named Susan, and they waited patiently while he helped me get the 3 pieces of carry-on to his cabin at the other end of the ship.  There we found out that the key they had given me worked, but now his own, didn’t.  That cost him more time at the Front Desk getting a new one, and I wouldn’t be at all surprised if he has to do it again when he gets back.  No good deed goes unpunished.

I decided to eat around eleven because who knew how the day would go.  I had to wait until 11:30pm for Dive-In, the burger joint by the pool, to open.  So I set up shop with my computer, while I waited.

The Zuiderdam sailed into port and greeted us with her horn.  We blasted back and it nearly blew me off my chair.  Then I felt the tears welling up.  It must have been the good memories.

A half hour later, while I was still chowing down on my Flying Dutchman with caramelized onions, to use In-‘n-Out’s secret menu terminology, Henk and Christel and 3 or 4 very important looking people, doubtless executives from Seattle, strode into the pool area.  I popped up abandoned my food, and very rare for me, my computer, crossed over to port and chased them.  By midships, I had drawn even and shyly waved at Henk, just to let him know I was there.  Next thing you know, I had a big hug from my good old friend and he was calling Christel over.  More hugs and “so happy to see yous”.  The parties don’t start for a couple of hours, but I am properly happy.  It’s a good day.

Lynann joined me for a chat and it was back to Glen’s room to change and rest a bit.  I was to be escorted to the Zuierdam at 4:00pm.  The Volendam 5-star Mariner concierge escorted me to the Zuierdam, where I got another visitor’s pass.  My Zuiderdam escort never materialized and I was fine with that.  I know the Zuiderdam well enough, having spent 4 months on her in 2023.  It turned out I wasn’t invited to the Grand Meet-Up Dinner after all.  That was just for President’s Club and Suite guests.  I could, however have dinner on the Zuiderdam before the party, which started at eight.  Here it was 4:30PM, and I wasn’t going to go back and forth to the Volendam.  Ships are big, and even though they were docked butt to butt, there was quite a bit of distance to cover, and I wasn’t ready to do that twice more. 

I walked around, to see whom I would meet and ran into Tom Mullen, a lovely friend from 5 world cruises, where he was the Criuise Specialists host to my Distinctive Voyages Host.  He would be working tonight.

I was thirsty, so I went up to the Crow’s Nest and had a glass of water.  It was empty, The Crow’s Nest, not the glass.  I didn’t meet another living soul I knew in any of the public areas, so a little after five, I went to the Ocean bar and caught a set of jazz.  At six, I moved to the Rolling Stone lounge and caught a set of Vintage Rock that ended with “Satisfaction”, of course.   The forced relaxation did me a world of good.  At seven, I presented myself in the dining room and enjoyed a particularly delicious dinner with four very nice people. 

A little after eight, it was time for the Grand Meet up party on the aft deck and I understood why the ships were butt to butt.  It was like one big party, only we each only had access to one side of the “room”.  I met up with Ginny Stibolt, right away.  I have known her since 2012.  She’s a HAL speaker now, an authority on all things horticultural.  I know she’s good, I get her blog.  I saw a few other faces I recognized, but had never been friends with, and then I ran into Rosita, who, with her husband Karl, were friends.  Then the toasts and such started, ship to ship, and we heard Daniel as well on the Zuiderdam, as if we had been on the Volendam.  I am guessing they heard the Zuiderdam cruise director, Kim, too.  I was bragging about how good Daniel was, but I couldn’t sell Rosita, who just loved Kim, who she said was the best Cruise Director they ever had.  The 2026 World Cruise will be on the Volendam, and Kim will be the Cruise Director.   It looks like that will work just fine. The last person I had a chance to chat to, before I turned into a pumpkin, if I didn’t get back to the Volendam, grab my luggage and be off by ten, was Lenora, with whom Nona and I had fun in ports in 2023.

I covered the flyway between the ships at top speed, for me, retrieved my bags, turned in my visitor’s pass, and was off through the largely empty terminal.  There were no taxis but I got an Uber easily enough and he got me to my simple airport hotel .  I was in bed by midnight, and slept well, if not long.  A couple of bugs got in the open window and bit me, but even that couldn’t keep me awake.

Continuing up the West coast of Africa on April 16, we were in Dakar, Senegal.  I went out for a walk with a fellow Canadian whom I had met in the airport in Montreal.  It wasn’t the kind of place I wanted to walk around, so I was glad to meet him at my door.  We took the shuttle to Independence Square and started to walk around it.  It was as bad as the market, but we didn’t want to engage a “guide”.  So we kept having to discourage them, one after the other.  At the far end of the square, we ducked into a bar and ordered a beer.  That kept the number of hawkers down, and got rid of the wanna be guides, for a bit.  The beer was really good:

And the blackboard graffiti better:

I could have posed for it:

On leaving the bar, we picked up another guide, like you pick up burrs in the bush.  He was going to take us to a big market, which ended up being his father’s store, a table on the sidewalk.  We wouldn’t have followed so docilly, had the route not being back in the direction of the bus, just on the back streets.

When we finally shook him, we found ourselves near La Galette – a French pastry shop.  I had to go in and see if they had a millefeuille and sure enough:

So I had one and they had Easter chocolates, too.  I bought some for everyone at the table.  Fish, a chicken, eggs, an egg, and a bell.  How strange.  No bunny rabbit.  In Senegal, he turned into a bell.

The Chamber Trio were on the World Stage and they were very good.

We were back in the Atlantic on April 17, Holy Thursday.  The ship has been taking small groups of us on a behind the scenes tour and today it was my turn.  I have done such things before on various ships but this was the first one that took us to the bridge, the Suites Only Lounge, the galley, laundry, the fridge, the freezer, the wine cellar, the engine control room, the marshalling area, the crew bar and mess. My favorite was the biodigester. 

It takes all the food scraps, but the bones, adds only water, and works like a giant stomach, until it turns out something that can be used in power generation.  The ship uses a lot of power.  Essentially, its diesel engines, just generate electricity and the electricity power everything from the propellers, to the lights, stoves, washing machines, etc. Fun tour.

Right after that, Daniel gave a good talk on Lanzarote.  I had been to Arricife, but only to the town, to sample the jamon, I had no idea the whole place was so interesting.  The Canaries are volcanic and they didn’t push up out of the sea all that long ago.  Until they had a desalination plant, life was seriously hard.  Daniel told us about the first settlers, and its iconic devil symbol, created by Cesar Manrique, an artist who returned to his native island, made it more beautiful, and fought for its environment. 

Christina Johnston, Coloratura Soprano, entertained us at night, with a very unique voice and personality.  She hasn’t been entertaining at sea all that long and is still thrilled with this new life of hers.  It was a lot of fun.

Still at sea on Good Friday, April 18, Daniel gave us an appreciation for the every many and varied people who had lived in Morocco, in sequence and in parallel.  There were the Amazigh or Berbers, the Arabs, the Jews and the French and, in the early part of the 20^th century, they were all living more or less in harmony.  After Morocco gained its independence from France in 1956, things went downhill in a hurry.  By the 70s, the Jews and the Christians had mostly left and it became a Musim state.  Agadir had a massive earthquake in 1960, and is not what it was.  Casablanca is more interesting.  Daniel’s talk was followed by Katie Chang, who enlightened us further on Cesar Manrique and his legacy on Lanzarote.  He was born in 1919, so was in time to be in the Spanish civil war under Franco.  He hated war, but was a good artist and ended up in NYC, making a name for himself.   He returned to Lanzarote after the 60s, when air travel was starting to cause a tourist boom.  He wanted Lanzarote to keep the cachet created by it’s unique, volcanic landscape, and fought hard against another row of beachfront high rises.  He succeeded in having it declared a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve, with strict limits on the heights of buildings.  Quite a unique place.  We visit tomorrow.

We had Katie and her husband Mark for dinner and it was a hoot.  We liked them a lot.  Katie is a BBC and Mark figured that made him a BBB.

The repertory company did a thing they called Rock Britannia and we found it a tad disappointing because they did a load of songs we didn’t know, by a bunch of rock stars that we very much did know.  Old farts aren’t hard to please.  We like some old, same old, as long as it was good old.

And so on April 6, we were clear of Brazil, in the Atlantic Ocean and on our way to Devil’s Island.  It’s still French, but they don’t keep their prisoners there anymore. Daniel had a great talk about it, including a sad tale about a man wrongly convicted, and how he was finally brought back to France.

Devil’s Island and The Dreyfus Affair

The World Stage featured pianist, Katie Clarke, and I always love a piano.

On April 7, we were at Devil’s Island.  The Island we actually tendered to was Ile Royal, the largest of Les Iles du Salut (Salvation Islands).  You could see Devil’s Island from there

Make no mistake.  Those are shark infested waters, at least they were when they were feeding them dead prisoners in the day.  I went out with Bev Moon and we walked around a bit, until the skies just opened and dumped on us.  We took shelter under a pretty substantial tree, but still got soaked to the skin.  So, it was back on the tender and into a hot shower.  So much for that.  Nice place but I wouldn’t want to live there.  I missed the magician, Craig Diamond, but I heard he was good, so I’ll catch his second show.

As of April 8, we were in for four sea days, and, of course I had high hopes of catching up – and I didn’t.  You guys must be wondering what I am doing with my days, and it’s not snoozing and having massages.  It’s not even playing Bridge.  I am as busy on a cruise as I am at home, busier when I am hosting.  It’s nice not to be this time, but I am selling cruises and servicing bookings, which can include selling insurance, working on claims, creating and maintaining Tripits for my clients, interacting with tour suppliers, booking my own travel, etc.  I did manage to get a blog out on April 8, so the catching up started well.

The Runaround Kids were on the main stage.  A four-piece boy band like we had in the late ‘50s, 60s.  Think Runaround Sue.  They were silly but fun and that’s my music.

The 9^th was another sea day, and I was busy with miscellaneous and assorted travel work all day.  There’s a lot of minutia in this business and that’s what people pay me to do.  The theory is that I get better at it, the more I do, and the new tools make it faster.  Well, some of them do, and some of them don’t, and pretty much all of them break a lot.  The good news is that It’s now cheap and easy to phone just about anywhere in the world and get your business done, even from as ship, as long as you’re patient.  I never thought I would be getting paid for patience, but that’s how it’s turning out.  Patience and persistence are the keys to success in this game, and it doesn’t hurt that I know my way around a computer and its mate, the Internet.  My assistant, TripIt, is going through some growing pains at the moment and I am helping by reporting problems, with screenshots, etc.  Their support team is pretty responsive.

We had Susana, the Hungarian violinist for dinner tonight, and she was delightful, then we all went to the World Stage for another dose of Martin Beaumont, who makes us giggle.

Daniel Edward was back on the stage on April 10, with a moving description of Cape Verde, where the slave trade began, think Roots and its hero Kunta Kinte.  His memory was evoked rather strongly.  YouTube doesn’t seem to have this video.  Maybe someday.  I took time out for that and went back to work.  I also had a nice walk around the deck, a good dinner at my fun table, and a half hour at the fun fair, where I managed to toss a couple of rings over a couple of bottle necks and won a couple of tickets, which won no prizes in the lucky draw.  Oh well.

On April 11, having run out of ports to talk about for the time being, Daniel got very philosophical and delved into the topic Pole to Pole to Pole.  The third pole being the middle, not the North, not the South, not the highest, nor the deepest, but the middle, where most everything lives.  It got deeper than I will ever be, but he’s always fun to listen to, and so were the Repertory company on stage at night. 

April 12, Land Ho! Mindelo, Ilha de São Vicente, Cape Verde.  You really need to send someone else out in the world to report.  I never even got off, after four days at sea.  What a bore I am. When I stay aboard on a port day, I really get to get some work done.  The best I can do is a picture taken from the promenade deck of an interesting mountain skyline of a sleeping giant.

And Katie Clarke was on the piano on the World Stage.

I did get off on Sunday, April 13, in Praia, Ilha de Santiago, Cape Verde.  And, well, it was Sunday.  I took the shuttle into town.  It left us off at this slightly frightening place. 

The locals were waiting for us, ready to walk us around any place we wanted to go.  I wanted a pharmacy and a very pushy passenger wanted to buy a couple of bottles of booze.  She was well on her way and willing to share, but I thought not.  What I wanted at the drugstore was Imodium.  I didn’t get it either.  It was Sunday and there was only one drugstore on the island open.  It’s address was posted on the shuttered one near us, but it was a 5 euro taxi ride away.  I didn’t need the Imodium that badly. Somebody on the ship always has it, if you do.

A little walk around and back to the ship. Craig Diamond was on stage and he’s a very good magician.

We were still at sea on April 14.  The Atlantic is a big ocean. Daniel was there to teach us about The Gambia and Senegal.  Daniel often teaches me things I feel I should know already.  No one has taught me quite as well before.  As often as I have traveled I never really realized that The Gambia, home of Kunta Kinte, looks like a snake on a map.  Apart from the part that touches the Atlantic Ocean, which makes it so valuable, it’s just a long curly sliver of land along the Gambia river.  

Britain had a lot of forts along that river and they manned them to be impenetrable.  The 1783 Treaty of Versailles gave Great Britain possession of the Gambia River and the French got the rest of Senegal.  The river was that important to the slave trade.  Wikipedia is a good source, once one’s curiosity is piqued.  Who knew this little country has meant so much? 

The Runaround Kids were back on stage, still silly, but good enough for a night’s entertainment before bed.  This is the life.

And the next day, April 15, we were IN The Gambia.  I was in the market, of course.  There were way too many “guides” waiting to escort us through.  I tried to get rid of mine by saying I had been here before.  He said he remembered me.  I told him that was unlikely because I had not been near the market the last time, having just shopped on the pier.  I knew that was right because I read my own blogs, usually right before I re-visit a place.  He stuck with me like glue.  Leading me all the way through the market to its outer edge, when I said I wanted a black marker.  I took pictures along the way whenever we turned, so I could find my way back out. 

There wasn’t a chance I would need them.  Your man remained stuck.  If I found a stall I liked, he became part of the negotiations. 

When he finally got up the courage to ask for money, for milk, for his baby, twice, I explained that I had planned to give him $10 for his services, keeping me safe and getting me back to my bus, BUT, every time he mentioned it again, I was going to subtract a dollar.  That worked so well, I wished I had come up with it in the first 30 seconds of our relationship.  He became focused on good things like making sure I got my change in a timely fashion, etc.  He was now motivated to get me through there and on to that bus, ten dollars lighter.  Money talks. I am learning its language.

Happy Easter from Agadir – Morocco – Instead of Easter bunnies, I have something quite different. The story continues …

On Wednesday, April 2, still in Manaus, we were going on a “Pink Dolphin Encounter”.  Unlike pink elephants, which are a figment of your imagination when you have had too much to drink, pink dolphins are real.  I spent my time photographing one of my favorite marine photographers, Dee, while she found just the right angles:

The next day, we docked in Parintins, home of the Boi Bumba Festival.  These are the people with the blue Coke cans, remember?  They have figured out how to turn their town’s obsession into money.  It helps pay for the costumes, staging, and all.  I signed up for the show but got all screwed up in the time changes and arrived way early, two full hours early.

I spent the first one touring the town in a tuk tuk.  

Note the politically correct shirt the Tuk Tuk driver wears.  He’ll take a red fare or a blue fare.  Makes no difference.  Parintins isn’t a city.  It’s just a town.  It has a church, which my driver assumed I would want to visit:

A waterfront:

Traffic and shops:

But, what’s important here is the Boi Bumba Festival, the costumes, the dancing, the floats.  The festival celebrates the Bumba Meu Boi, a legend about a resurrected ox. It is also a competition where two groups that perform this play, the Boi Garantido (red) and Boi Caprichoso (blue), compete in extended retellings of the story, each team attempting to outdo the other with flamboyant dances, singing, and parade floats.

There are installations all over town creating this kind of thing:

This would be the red side garantido.

Here’s some blue side work:

All of which is very cool, but I never did get a blue Coke.  When I got made to the Pier, very near the show venue, I was still an hour early.  I had made a bigger mistake than I thought I had.  Luckily I met up with another passenger, Bev Moon, from Tennessee, who had managed to do the same.  With another hour to kill, we went out in search of an ice cream cone, or a beer, whichever we found first.  It was the beer.  The bar was interesting.  At the same counter as the libations, you could also buy snacks, cigarettes, razors, menstrual period supplies,

On the opposite wall, were the groceries, and, if that wasn’t complete enough, that wall was just a divider.  There was a bank and a notary on the other side of it. Here we sit, bellied up to the bar:

We thoroughly enjoyed that little interlude and it put us in the right mood for the Boi Bumba show.

It was a hard act to follow, but our comedian, Martin Beaumont, did a creditable job that night.  We have had him to dinner a couple of times since and he’s a lot of fun.

On April 4, we were at Alter do Chao and I decided to give it a miss and catch up a little.  If that had been more successful, I might not be writing about April 4 on the 18^th, but now I really am catching up.  Maybe.  Alter do Chao looked like another Boca de Valeria only less lively, if that was possible.  The ship obviously didn’t think much of it, as we pulled in at 8:0am and out again at 1:30pm. They even scheduled a dressy night, which they pretty much never do on port days.  They put the Repertory company on stage too, and that’s always good. 

On the 5^th we were back at sea, and crossing the equator yet again.  We were sailing away from Brazil after a whopping 18 days.  I don’t know if I have ever been on a cruise ship that spent that kind of time in one country.  Oy! Brazil

At long last on Sunday, March 30, we docked in Santarem, our first Port on the Amazon.  The city of Santarem is actually on the Tapajós river.  The meeting of the rivers is a big deal.  The muddy Amazon meets the clean Tapajós and you can see the demarcation for miles.  Here it is:

We were on that small boat, bound for a piranha fishing trip.  It was about a 45 minute ride up the Tapajós river and our guide filled it with all sorts of interesting facts.  We were well into the rainy season but not yet at high water.  So the farmers would still be home here.  This is what a farm looks like as we approach it:

As we got closer, we could see the animals.  This farmer had water buffalo, pigs, goats, chickens and all.  Here are the goats:

Since we are not at high water yet, it seems to be time to be getting worried.  The farmer is prepared:

He’ll just load his livestock on to this boat, with his family, and enough food to last and they’ll ride it out.  If he is rich enough to pay for grazing on higher ground, that’s good, if not, they’ll float it out, maybe a couple-three months.  Methinks I’d rather be on the Volendam, where a nice dinner and violinist Susana awaited.

But we were on a fishing trip, so we had to fish for an hour or so, first.  We each had a baited hook and a line, but no pole, nor reel.  I was lousy at it.  The fish ate my bait five times before I could get it out of the water.  There was a prize for the biggest piranha and this one won:

Tanner won the prize for the biggest fish overall, with this impressive catfish:

You get the idea.

The next day’s port, Boca de Valeria, was a sight more primitive, but not so primitive that they hadn’t figured out the value of the tourist dollar.  The cruise lines had got together and funded a very basic dock for tenders. 

You had to walk through a bit of water to get to shore, even so.  But it worked.  The village swole to about five times its normal size when there was a ship.  The welcoming committee consisted of the children of this and neighboring villages, with their pets, wanting a dollar for a photo op.  But we weren’t going there just yet.  The local fishermen had their own business taking us out two by two in their motorized longboats.  I hooked up with Lisa Moser, who was on my tender and whom I knew a bit from the Queen Mary 2 last year. 

We left the village behind and meandered up and down the tributaries to the suburbs:

And among the giant lily pads:

To a bigger village with a church and school:

Back past a country house:

To the dock at Boca de Valeria.  You can see the Volendam in the middle of the river as we approach.

It was time to pet the animals, click the shutters and pay the children, and so we did.

There was obviously some rivalry:

And this guy was my favorite:

But you have to give this girl and her turtle their due:

I was surprised there weren’t more people patronizing the bar.  It was up on stilts, a little up from the water and with a great view and a breeze.  Lisa and I had a thoroughly enjoyable local beer:

And were happy to get back to the Volendam, a good dinner and Luca Lattanzio on the stage again.  He was just as good the second time.

On the first of April, we docked in Manaus for an overnight.  I got off late morning and walked to the market, which was supposed to be good.  On the way, I met one of Robbie’s relatives:

I met a nice lady from Montreal, so we did the Market together.  It wasn’t much.  She continued on to the Cathedral and I went back to the ship but via the back streets which looked interesting.  There were a lot of shops for locals, and tables on the sidewalk, selling anything you might need.  I bought three pairs of socks for $5.  They are cute, too.  Then I has another pastel de carne lunch, in the park, with the locals, at this spot:

Cheap, delicious, plenty of local atmosphere.

Since we were overnighting in Manaus, the Wescotts, David and Wendy Clarke, from Montreal, and yours truly, went out to dinner.  We took one taxi and one Uber to Gaucho’s Churrascaria, a Brazilian BBQ place, or what Dee’s grandkids call “steak on a stick”.  I found their web site and browsed through their 34 pictures and the one they didn’t have the one that tells it all.  So, here’s mine:

That drink you see with all the limes in it is Brazin’s national cocktail, the “caipirinha” and it’s delicious.  Quite strong.  We only had one each.  The Uber had come in about three times the price of the taxi, and the taxi driver had given me his phone no.  I WhatsApp’d him and we got two taxis for the way home.  You never know what’s going to work best.  Every city is different, but this is fact in Manaus in 2025.

Our Cruise and Travel Director’s web site is still not delivering, but I heard that his talk on the Selaron Steps, in Rio, is on YouTube, too, so I googled around and sure enough: The Selaron Steps in Rio de Janeiro  is there for your viewing pleasure.  There are other videos there, too, but I like the simplicity of the web site – if it ever works again. Meanwhile, enjoy the YouTube. 

Daniel posts his talks at www.danieledwarduk.com but at the moment, the web site is broken and not delivering.  He promised me he’d look into it but a Cruise and Travel Director doesn’t get a lot of free time, so bear with him.

Back to my own blog.  I left you in Brail on March 23, and we had a lot more Brazil to go.  We were privileged to have aboard, a group of educators, animators, singers and dancers called OiBrasil.  They gave lectures, taught crafts, dancing, musical instruments, cooking, just about everything about a culture you can think of… They even put on a couple of Carnaval type shows.  I missed one of those in Rio, but caught a few lectures and the second show.  They were great to have around for a couple of weeks.  HAL billed them as Cultural Ambassadors, and they sure were.  You can get a little taste at: Bing Videos  and if you want to hire them, go to www.oibrasilshows.com

On March 23^rd, we docked in Maceio, a biggish seaport, where the market had taken over an old stadium.  There was a free shuttle to it.  I indulged myself with a new hanging purse that won’t work after all, and will likely be abandoned because it won’t fit in my carry on, a new top that might be able to replace a worn one I will abandon, a pair of sandals, which are pretty flat, a pastel de carne and a coke. 

This thing is really good.  It has both meat and cheese in it and comes to you piping hot from the deep fryer.  The coke came with a glass of ice, which I should have thrown away, but didn’t.  I survived but it’s a good thing there is no shortage of restroom facilities on a ship.  Dee and I could compare footwear at the table and the Repertory company was on stage.  It was a good day.

On the 24^th we were in Recife, where the Girards and I took a Catamaran cruise called “Venice of Brazil”.  We had hoped to be going into the three rivers that meet here but it was a silly big catamaran , a flat tour boat that just poked around in the hot sun and all the pictures were full of tourist debris.  So I don’t have much to show for it.  See what I mean:

The next day, the 25^th, Bosco of OiBrasil filled us in with a little history and explained Brazil’s ties to medieval Europe. He dove deeply into the climate, soils, and early settlers.  Now I don’t totally understand this but it seems, the discovery of America coincides with the last years of the Reconquista.  That was the 900 years war that drove the Moors and Jews out of Europe.  A lot of the Spanish and Portuguese Jews came to Brazil.  The Dutch conquered the place and all of that was fine because they didn’t try to convert the Jews but when the Christians won in Europe, they come to the colonies to drive the Dutch and Jews out.  So that lot left Brazil, moved north and founded, you guessed it, New York.  You can see it in the architecture of Recife, our next stop.  But in the countryside, along the Amazon and into the jungle, the culture of the poor doesn’t change much.  They don’t travel and they barely have schooling.  They dress in leather and ride mules.  It’s a thorny place and it’s still medieval and old stories get passed down.  Bosco told us of a prize bull, who was killed for his tongue to satisfy a pregnant lady, whose husband was a little over zealous.  But not to worry, the bull got resurrected and everyone lived happily ever after, only they react the whole sorry mess every year in Parintins, and we’ll be going there.  More to come.

Richard Watson, another OiBrasil speaker, taught us more about the culture along the river, how they farm, catch fish, gather fruit, and move every year when the water gets too high.  We learned about the different soils, table mountains, waterfalls and a lot of other geography that amazed, amused and confused us.  It left us with a healthy respect for this mighty river and we hadn’t even got there yet.  Eli Moore, the Piano Bar entertainer, was on the World Stage.

The 26^th, we were in Fortaleza.  Another town, another market, another top that I hope I can get home.  My carry on will be bursting at the seams.

The entertainment that night was spectacular, and that, I don’t have to pack.  OiBrasil were on stage with their Carnaval themed show and it was marvelous.  If you didn’t take the link up there in the first paragraph, you might want to now.

The 27^th was the first of three more sea days before we would get to the mouth of the Amazon.  It’s some mouth, 200 miles wide as it opens to the sea.  Daniel had a wonderful talk on the Amazon and our first two ports on it, Santarem and Boca de Valera.    Discovering the Amazon River: Orellana and the legend of Naia The stories are good, but I warn you, Danial’s talks take more than a half-hour each to watch.  You might just want to remember they are here, to watch when you are about to venture to the Amazon.  The stories are good, and little known.  In this one, you learn about the first European to venture into the Amazon on a boat and how it got its name. 

That night there was a lovely Hungarian violinist on the World stage, name of Susana.  She was very easy to listen to.

On the second sea day, Daniel told us all about the rise and fall of Manaus.  How the city grew under the Portuguese, built fine palaces and a fabulous Opera house, only to shrink back when the British exported rubber plantations to Asia, particularly Indonesia and Malasia, from whence it was much easier to distribute than from hundreds of miles from the sea.  A great disservice done to the Brazilians, a favor to Asia, and pots and pots of money for the British Rubber Barrons.  Daniel tells it so much better than I: A Cruise Tourist’s Guide to Manaus, Brazil  Oi Brasil had a good talk for us in the afternoon about Brazil’s geography, the river that runs under the Amazon, the reef system in the Atlantic, and the horror that is the trans Amazonian highway, fortunately not completed.

It was Wells Wescott’s birthday at our table.  Panjang amurnia.

Our repertory company were on the world stage, and they are always good.

On March 29, we began cruising the Amazon river, itself.  You might as well be on the ocean for all the shoreline you see, when it’s 200 miles wide at the mouth.  But the color is different.  It’s not the clear blue sea, it’s the muddy brown river.  We are going to have to do without laundry for 5 days, because it just takes too much water.  Better that than not being able to shower, because it’s hot, and we’ll really feel it when we get on shore.  The ship, you see, makes fresh water from sea water for all its needs, but it can’t make clean water out of thin mud, so we’ll only have what we go in with.  Our tanks are full, but there are more than a thousand of us on board, passengers and crew.

Daniel’s talk, about two of the places we would be visiting, was great, as usual.  This one delved into the story of the resurrected bull that OiBrasil had told us about, and how that story spawned a festival that is so big and so divisive, that the Coca Cola company makes Coke in Blue cans, because the blue side won’t drink out of a red can in June.  We could hardly wait to get there.  A Cruise Tourist’s Guide to Parintins and Alter do Chao, Brazil

Richart Watson, of OiBrasil, enlightened us on how the indigenous people managed the soil for centuries, and what a terrible toll the rubber boom took on their civilization.  Whole tribes were wiped out, others lost 90% of their people, many retreated farther from the river, where they remain.  In the 1960s, indigenous territories started to have governmental protection, so there is some hope, but the gold rush which was still going on in the 1980s wasn’t helping.  It’s a polluting process.

We celebrated Wells’ birthday again, this time in the Pinnacle, with the Captain Rens Van Eerten, who is delightful, at our table for 14.  And I don’t have a picture.  There’s a professional one but I never did lay my hands on it.  An Italian vocalist, Luca Lattanzio, was on the World stage and we just loved him.