1) We went through the North Sea. It was rough, although not as rough as the Tasmanian Sea. However, you know that the ship thinks it is rough because they put “vomit bags” on the disposal cans by the elevator. I think a lot of the nearbees had some seasickness problems.
2) I had asked a bar waitress a couple of nights ago to dance. They must have a policy that the bar staff are not to do this. This makes sense if it interferes with them doing their job…like when lots of people want to order a drink. However, when the place is almost empty, the other principle is to make every effort to have passengers be happy. I could tell she was stressed on this issue, but used my animal magnetism to convince her to dance anyway. She and I did well.
So tonight we had a Captain’s reception for the guest (ie for the new guests). Since I have seen the Captain (he is new, the original Captain got off in Singapore), I gave him a note as follows”
“This grants Victoria (her name), or any alternate holder of this note, the right to dance with passenger Mr. Roberts, or any other passenger equally charming.” The Captain immediately realized that this was more of a good idea than a bad idea, so he signed and gave it to me. I presented the note to Victoria later in the dance area, and she did not know what to make of this. I suspect that she will keep the note as an example of having made contact with a passenger and had something strange happen.
3) So this was formal night. I think it is formal night number 13 for us. It is my last one! They have a new one scheduled for Friday. I’ll skip this one. Kathleen took 2 hours to eat! I left after 1-1/4 hours to go to the dance room. I did find one other passenger to dance once with, but the band played some really great dance songs that we missed because Kathleen chose to eat slowly….or talk afterward about stuff.
4) A clerk that we know at the ship’s boutique said that she saw one of the passengers put a $69 Russian lacquer box in her pocket. The clerk told her manager. Later the passenger asked the manager to put two items aside that she might choose to purchase later. The manager said okay, then reached in the passenger’s pocket, pulled out the stolen box and said, “and we’ll charge this to your card now.” What an idiot (the passenger, not the manager.).
5) Denmark uses the Danish Krone for currency. What a pain. We have had two weeks of using the Euro. What a wonderful idea the euro was. You do not have to worry about changing more money than you will use in a given country, because the next one uses the same currency. Greece, Italy, France, Spain, Gibraltar (accepts the Euro even though it is not their currency), Portugal, Ireland, and Holland all used the euro.
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Flower DVD’s from Another Passenger
One of the other passengers that we met is big into photograph and also into flowers. So far he has taken 32,000 photos on the cruise. He left in Dover, so he was gone prior to the Keukenhof Gardens.
He has a software program that he uses to make DVDs from his photos. He buys music at each location and uses these with the photos. He gave Kathleen two of his DVDs that only run trough about half of the cruise. Each is 40 minutes long and is about 50% flowers or plants. So he may well send to us two more DVDs of the rest of the cruise. Regardless, Kathleen will have a lot of flower DVDs to share with her Garden Club buddies.
We think we may need to send our ~50 photos from Keukenhof to him. He’d likely make another DVD from these.
He has a software program that he uses to make DVDs from his photos. He buys music at each location and uses these with the photos. He gave Kathleen two of his DVDs that only run trough about half of the cruise. Each is 40 minutes long and is about 50% flowers or plants. So he may well send to us two more DVDs of the rest of the cruise. Regardless, Kathleen will have a lot of flower DVDs to share with her Garden Club buddies.
We think we may need to send our ~50 photos from Keukenhof to him. He’d likely make another DVD from these.
Changing Character of the Ship
I mentioned before that about 3/4th of the passengers left the world cruise on Sat in Dover. We were off the ship in Normandy at the time. When we got back onto the ship, there were many new passengers who were on for a 10-day Baltic cruise only.
In some ways this change is great. In other ways it is less different than I had anticipated.
The changes are that the bars are more full and the casino is more full. The specialty restaurants are also more full. This all makes sense. You can do a lot of special eating, a lot of drinking and lot of gambling for one week. However, if you have 17 weeks, you are not going to hold that pace for 17 weeks in a row.
We do notice that the “sea of background people” is new and unknown to us. However, what surprised me is that even though there are only about 20% of the passengers who remain, when we do see one of them, we and they are happy and stop to talk. So we probably talk to them more, and the net effect is not so much different from we experienced before Dover.
The other strange effect is the different relationship the long-cruisers have with the staff compared to the relationship that the “newbees” have with the staff. We and the staff feel like a family because we have lived together for 4 months. Kathleen and I got some hugs from some staff when we got back on from Normandy because that staff person was happy to see another recognizable friend.
We heard one new passenger yelling at a staff at the Passenger Services desk. I was tempted to intervene and tell the person to stop being an a**h***. I did not (or at least I did so quietly enough that he did not hear me.) It is like we have had a family established over the 4 months, and now these new people are invading our family, and it is not right if and when they misbehave with one of our family.
In some ways this change is great. In other ways it is less different than I had anticipated.
The changes are that the bars are more full and the casino is more full. The specialty restaurants are also more full. This all makes sense. You can do a lot of special eating, a lot of drinking and lot of gambling for one week. However, if you have 17 weeks, you are not going to hold that pace for 17 weeks in a row.
We do notice that the “sea of background people” is new and unknown to us. However, what surprised me is that even though there are only about 20% of the passengers who remain, when we do see one of them, we and they are happy and stop to talk. So we probably talk to them more, and the net effect is not so much different from we experienced before Dover.
The other strange effect is the different relationship the long-cruisers have with the staff compared to the relationship that the “newbees” have with the staff. We and the staff feel like a family because we have lived together for 4 months. Kathleen and I got some hugs from some staff when we got back on from Normandy because that staff person was happy to see another recognizable friend.
We heard one new passenger yelling at a staff at the Passenger Services desk. I was tempted to intervene and tell the person to stop being an a**h***. I did not (or at least I did so quietly enough that he did not hear me.) It is like we have had a family established over the 4 months, and now these new people are invading our family, and it is not right if and when they misbehave with one of our family.
Sailing out of Amsterdam
We take a lot of time to leave. We have to sail very slowly because there is a river and lots of boat traffic. Then you go through a lock. Going from the river in Amsterdam into the sea, you actually have to be lifted up. It was only about 2 feet because the sea was at low tide. This means that the river normally cannot empty. If there is a flood, then the river could be high enough to empty. However in typical times, the river is lower than the sea.
Photos:
1) Modern windmills.
2) The locks on the river out of Amsterdam.
Day 111 – 5/5 – Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Our port is right at Amsterdam. We sailed through a lock, then about 3-1/2 hours up a river.
So our choices today were: a) legalized prostitution, b) legalized drugs, or c) 7,000,000 tulips at the Keukenhof Gardens. We chose “c.”
We had originally signed up for the ship’s excursion, but it looked from the schedule like we might only have been there 2 hours. Kathleen needs more flower-watching time that that, so we hired a taxi and go on our own. We paid a little bit more doing it this way, but had more freedom do as we chose.
Kathleen’s Garden Club buddies are going to love some of the flower photos. The place was huge and impressive, even to someone not particularly into flowers.
We spent some time afterwards in Amsterdam. Kathleen and an older woman thought they saw a mannequin in a window and went up to the window to get a closer look. It was a real woman, advertising her services, so when she moved it startled Kathleen and the other woman. (I’m disappointed that I did not get photos of these ladies, but they do not like photos taken.)
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