At sea for five days of relaxation, cards, Pop Choir and other regular things to do, like eating and sleeping.
Today muster stations for all passengers as it is 30 days since we were last shown how to wear our life jackets, with an average age of 67.1 years and an age range of 2-93 years, many do need to be shown again.
Day 67 Tuesday 25th July 2017 Halifax, Nova Scotia, CanadaTop of page
Anne two return corridor walks this morning, to book a haircut and Pop Choir.
Kevin had a poor morning at cards, cannot win them all!
Nine weeks gone and six weeks to go on this World Cruise
Out in the middle of nowhere
Fog rolled in again this morning with the fog horn starting at 7am. It is not an annoying sound just in the background from our cabin.
Production show and clocks back another hour, now 11hrs behind Sydney.
Healthy? Lunch in the pig pen.
Kevin has found his look a like (Vince) finally. A number of passengers have told Kevin they were talking to what they thought was him, but the person had no idea of what they were saying.
Fog and fog horn all night, glad our cabin is down and away from it so we are not disturbed by it.
Story of the day, not a rumour, but confirmed sighting. Two passengers were in the theatre with their coats and life jackets on because they were afraid we were going to hit an iceberg. See below we are close to the site where the Titanic sunk. We are following the white path to Halifax.
Halifax
Skies cleared, Church, 500 cards, Pop Choir and lunch as usual.
Reykjavik
Kevin was intrigued as to why the TV showed we left Reykjavik and then returned to port before heading to Halifax. Found the answer today, a “lady” very drunk damaged a number of the art gallery paintings along the main corridor with her ring, she was found out from CCTV and Sea Princess returned late at night to port to have her removed from the ship.
Above 30+ day cruise lecture and opposite, so nice to see the sun out again but deck still deserted as there is a big wind chill factor.
Dinner with Ross, Helen, Ros and Ian, had pizza first then invited down to the dining room for Cherries Jubilee.
Back to realistic sunrise and sunset times of 5:38am and 9:12pm.
Beautiful clear blue sky morning, but ground hog day as ship’s TV says it is still Sunday night.
Guess what?
Day at sea so breakfast, cards (Kevin won five games to zero), coffee, Pop choir performance dinner and bed.
Pop Choir Performance
Use your imagination as we missed seeing the whales.
Dolphins from our balcony, still no whales sighted even thought we have been told they are out there.
Kevin went to see the Ventriloquist, great technique but only average content.
Clocks back an hour again so now will be 12 hrs behind Sydney.
Day 69 Thursday 27th July 2017 New York, NY Day 1Top of page
Early start with breakfast upstairs and 8:15am tour meeting.
Gangway problem (had a “L” plate shore crane driver, our officer called the first gangway a dangerous slippery dip, so had to replace with a longer one, which still needed 5 crew to get wheelchair off) and we were not ashore until 10:15 so missed our tour, offered afternoon tour but looking at the rainy weather we decided to cancel.
So Halifax was a tour of the terminal and the view from our balcony, but we kept dry.
Halifax Cruise Terminal
Both Kevin and Anne used the free WiFi in the cruise terminal to update their phones.
Talked to a passenger that did the tour, wet and slippery, so right decision to cancel.
Made good use of the afternoon using the free wifi in the terminal from the ship. Kevin doubled his hour limit by getting a second hour using the My Passport Hard Drive Wifi to connect as a second device and also Anne updated the iPad software over the network.
As the weather cleared around 3pm, Anne, pushed by Kevin did the waterside walk before heading up into town. We were away for a couple of hours but back in time for dinner.
Clock back another hour, now 14hrs behind Sydney
Did you know about the 1917 Halifax Disaster?
Two ships collided, the French cargo ship SS Mont-Blanc fully loaded with the explosives TNT and picric acid, the highly flammable fuel benzole, and guncotton and the SS Imo
At 9:04:35 am, the out-of-control fire aboard Mont-Blanc finally set off her highly explosive cargo.The ship was completely blown apart and a powerful blast wave radiated away from the explosion at more than 1,000 metres per second. Temperatures of 5,000 °C and pressures of thousands of atmospheres accompanied the moment of detonation at the centre of the explosion. White-hot shards of iron fell down upon Halifax and Dartmouth. Mont-Blanc's forward 90 mm gun, its barrel melted away, landed approximately 5.6 kilometres north of the explosion site near Albro Lake in Dartmouth, while the shank of her anchor, weighing half a ton, landed 3.2 kilometres south at Armdale.
A cloud of white smoke rose to over 3,600 metres. A tsunami was formed by water surging in to fill the void; it rose as high as 18 metres above the high-water mark on the Halifax side of the harbour. SS Imo was carried onto the shore at Dartmouth.
Over 1,600 people were killed instantly and 9,000 were injured, more than 300 of whom later died. Every building within a 2.6-kilometre radius, over 12,000 in total, was destroyed or badly damaged. Hundreds of people who had been watching the fire from their homes were blinded when the blast wave shattered the windows in front of them. Stoves and lamps overturned by the force of the blast sparked fires throughout Halifax, particularly in the North End, where entire city blocks were caught up in the inferno, trapping residents inside their houses.
Day of rest at sea in preparation for two busy days in New York, and it is getting warmer as we head south.
Anne shorn, and walked there and back, to coffee and lunch.
Day started early with a 4:45am entrance to New York under the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge Bridge. We only had a few metres clearance so not sure how the big ships go.
We were scheduled to be docked by 6am, but it was after 7am before we were docked. Two problems, very old infrastructure, floating wooden rafts used to keep ship away from the dock instead of the large rubber rolls used elsewhere, secondly we gave the corner of the wharf a solid kiss.
We are docked in a great location (for New York) just two piers up from the Intrepid and its Museum.
Next, US immigration, had 8:10 tour booking, group 9, we actually left around 10:45am and at the immigration’s queue the wheelchair was given the fast treatment with group 7 people still having 30 minutes to go in immigration queue. (Both hands fingerprinted and photo taken, I wonder how long before they will need DNA sample also). Note over 80 year olds did not required finger printing or photo as they are too old to be a terrorist.
On American soil finally and on the shuttle bus up to Times Square at 11am filled with all sorts including a Donald, Elmo and to censored
Toilet stop (sorry Restroom at the Doubletree Hotel)as Maccas and Starbucks broken, coffee Starbucks and next onto the Hop-on Hop-off bus for the uptown loop, wheelchair and VIP pass meant we were onto the bus ahead of the queue. Spent an hour and half (red line on map below) or so on the loop seeing up to 125th street and areas we have not been to before, got off at Central park (Blue track on map) and put on the bus supplied poncho but were not really needed.
Back on bus to Times Square and then decided to make the easy 40 minute walk down to our ship(purple)
Damaged side
Even Donald was in Times Square
Ship
Back to ship at 5pm ready for dinner and an early night.
Day 70 Friday 28th July 2017 New York, NY Day 2Top of page
Below we enter Central Park where we spent an hour plus walking around.
First, off 8:15am onto shuttle bus to Times Square (Red), did a walk around, Coffee and toilet stop. Then the downtown loop (Black) for approximately 1.5 hrs to World Trade Centre Site. Walked then to the ferry wharf for our included ferry tour (Yellow), then walked to the High Line gardens before returning to the ship at 3:30pm for our 4:30pm departure.
Shuttle from ship to Times Square
Downtown Hop-on Hop-off Loop
Included Hop-on Hop-off Harbour Cruise we used to get back to near ship
We leave after a hectic but fabulous two days in New York New York.
We leave our cruise and head 4 or 5 block down stream to the start of the High Line then back upstream to the Sea Princess past the Intrepid.
Kevin enjoyed slow but free Internet from the Intrepid but iPad could not pick it up.
Singer Building
World Trade Centre
The immense The Oculus representing a freedom dove with Westfield Shopping Centre inside just next to the World Square Memorial
New Year’s Eve Ball
The High Line is a few kilometres of old suspended railway line converted into a garden and walkway
We needed help to get up the ramp to the Sea Princess
We were this close to the Intrepid and Kevin with the better computer could use their free wifi from our balcony. A great place to explore New York from.
We saw the Queen Mary 2 at the Brooklyn Wharf, much less convenient than where we were.
c fully loaded with the explosives TNT and picric acid, the highly flammable fuel benzole, and guncotton and the SS Imo
A cloud of white smoke rose to over 3,600 metres. A tsunami was formed by water surging in to fill the void; it rose as high as 18 metres above the high-
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