Where's my Suitcase
This blog starts on Friday morning, August 15th. Why?
We boarded our cruise ship Friday afternoon and once underway, discovered none of us could use our personal wi-fi devices, therefore blogs have suffered. Instead, we'll get online when possible in our ports of call. We can purchase a wi-fi plan, but it's very expensive and is slow. Of course my Boeing cell and email continue to work. Therefore, we will publish blogs when possible which may cover several days.
FRIDAY, AUGUST 15
Being our last day in Copenhagen, Karen and Carla decided we'd go to the town centre to shop and enjoy the beautiful weather. Of course the ladies were successful and managed to buy a couple souvenirs. The guys enjoyed walking and talking and stopped along the way at a bakery for an energy boost - a chocolate covered cinnamon roll (Bill decided to stop and let everyone try a piece - it was real good).
After an hour or so, we headed back to the Marriott and stopped to take a picture of Hans Christian Andersen looking over at Tivoli Gardens.After checkout, we jumped into two taxi's for the short ride to the cruise ship - maybe we should say short distance, long duration! It's only a couple miles, but traffic is a nightmare. It became obvious why you see lot's of walkers and bicyclists as it took us 45-min, whereas at home, this distance would only take 10-min. And the city is not that large and easy to walk. The main reason for the traffic is Copenhagen is putting in a new metro system and they have dug up a lot of the roads. It will be done in 2015, so plan your trips to Copenhagen after that.
The boarding process was very efficient...once Bill was straightened out. While Bill was paying the cabbie, along with the Greens bags, his were taken out of the trunk and put on the conveyor belt to the ship w/o his knowledge. Normally that would be OK, but he wanted to retrieve his camera and the tablet from his bag. Fortunetely, he saw the bag disappearing in the nick of time and the dock agent was able to grab it just before it disappeared. To speed things up, he quickly got his stuff and off it went into the scanner...but wait. After it was on its way, Karen asked if he had his passport. You guessed it - in a hurry to not hold anyone up, he didn't think to grab the passport. Meanwhile, Mike, Carla and Karen's bags were with them because they rode in the same taxi and had not yet given the dock handler their bags. So, once again Bill shouted to the agent "I need my passport sir - it's in my bag". Good news, they grabbed it off the conveyer belt after it was scanned and before it went onboard and he was able to retrieve his passport and as we said, the boarding process went well once Bill had his stuff.
Our rooms are very nice with a 70% partial view and plenty of space to include closets and places to store roller bags out of the way. In fact, this is the first cruise ship we've been on with a bath tub. After check in, we had a good lunch on the Lido deck, outside. After unpacking and walking around to get our bearings, it was time for the first dinner seating (we choose 6pm). The food was great and they even worked with Karen to ensure she had a vegan cuisine. This cruise is a drastic change from last years river cruise, carrying 2,100 passengers and a crew of 800. Last year our river cruise carried 110 passengers and everyone ate at the same time.Ric and Bill went to the 9:30pm entertainment/cruise intro show while others went to bed or back to the room to read. All in all, a great start for our 2014 Baltic Cruise.
SATURDAY, AUGUST 16
This morning there was a time change so when Bill looked at the clock at 6:30 it was actually 7:30am. So now we're 10-hrs ahead of PDT (6am in CA is 4pm here). After a good nights sleep, all of us except Vicki met for breakfast in the dining room while Vicki enjoyed sleeping in for a while. After all, this is vacation. Today is a sea day so we all pretty much did what we wanted. We walked, read, had massages (Karen), acupuncture (Ric), and generally relaxed. We finished off the day in one of the ships special dinning rooms, the Tamarind - an asian fusion restaurant that was excellent. We even had chocolate filled fortune cookies. We sat and talked for several hours and generally enjoyed good food and good conversation.
SUNDAY, AUGUST 17
This morning we arrived Tallin, Estonia with evidence dating back 5, 000 years. The ancient city, with cobblestone streets and medieval homes is beautiful.
We hope to be able to post a blog again in a few days. Meanwhile, Carla may be able to post as she is using an ipad and purchased a package although the wi-fi has been difficult to access. Her blog can be found at carlaspastrytour.blogspot.com. Stay tuned for updates.
We boarded our cruise ship Friday afternoon and once underway, discovered none of us could use our personal wi-fi devices, therefore blogs have suffered. Instead, we'll get online when possible in our ports of call. We can purchase a wi-fi plan, but it's very expensive and is slow. Of course my Boeing cell and email continue to work. Therefore, we will publish blogs when possible which may cover several days.
FRIDAY, AUGUST 15
Being our last day in Copenhagen, Karen and Carla decided we'd go to the town centre to shop and enjoy the beautiful weather. Of course the ladies were successful and managed to buy a couple souvenirs. The guys enjoyed walking and talking and stopped along the way at a bakery for an energy boost - a chocolate covered cinnamon roll (Bill decided to stop and let everyone try a piece - it was real good).
After an hour or so, we headed back to the Marriott and stopped to take a picture of Hans Christian Andersen looking over at Tivoli Gardens.After checkout, we jumped into two taxi's for the short ride to the cruise ship - maybe we should say short distance, long duration! It's only a couple miles, but traffic is a nightmare. It became obvious why you see lot's of walkers and bicyclists as it took us 45-min, whereas at home, this distance would only take 10-min. And the city is not that large and easy to walk. The main reason for the traffic is Copenhagen is putting in a new metro system and they have dug up a lot of the roads. It will be done in 2015, so plan your trips to Copenhagen after that.
The boarding process was very efficient...once Bill was straightened out. While Bill was paying the cabbie, along with the Greens bags, his were taken out of the trunk and put on the conveyor belt to the ship w/o his knowledge. Normally that would be OK, but he wanted to retrieve his camera and the tablet from his bag. Fortunetely, he saw the bag disappearing in the nick of time and the dock agent was able to grab it just before it disappeared. To speed things up, he quickly got his stuff and off it went into the scanner...but wait. After it was on its way, Karen asked if he had his passport. You guessed it - in a hurry to not hold anyone up, he didn't think to grab the passport. Meanwhile, Mike, Carla and Karen's bags were with them because they rode in the same taxi and had not yet given the dock handler their bags. So, once again Bill shouted to the agent "I need my passport sir - it's in my bag". Good news, they grabbed it off the conveyer belt after it was scanned and before it went onboard and he was able to retrieve his passport and as we said, the boarding process went well once Bill had his stuff.
Our rooms are very nice with a 70% partial view and plenty of space to include closets and places to store roller bags out of the way. In fact, this is the first cruise ship we've been on with a bath tub. After check in, we had a good lunch on the Lido deck, outside. After unpacking and walking around to get our bearings, it was time for the first dinner seating (we choose 6pm). The food was great and they even worked with Karen to ensure she had a vegan cuisine. This cruise is a drastic change from last years river cruise, carrying 2,100 passengers and a crew of 800. Last year our river cruise carried 110 passengers and everyone ate at the same time.Ric and Bill went to the 9:30pm entertainment/cruise intro show while others went to bed or back to the room to read. All in all, a great start for our 2014 Baltic Cruise.
SATURDAY, AUGUST 16
This morning there was a time change so when Bill looked at the clock at 6:30 it was actually 7:30am. So now we're 10-hrs ahead of PDT (6am in CA is 4pm here). After a good nights sleep, all of us except Vicki met for breakfast in the dining room while Vicki enjoyed sleeping in for a while. After all, this is vacation. Today is a sea day so we all pretty much did what we wanted. We walked, read, had massages (Karen), acupuncture (Ric), and generally relaxed. We finished off the day in one of the ships special dinning rooms, the Tamarind - an asian fusion restaurant that was excellent. We even had chocolate filled fortune cookies. We sat and talked for several hours and generally enjoyed good food and good conversation.
SUNDAY, AUGUST 17
This morning we arrived Tallin, Estonia with evidence dating back 5, 000 years. The ancient city, with cobblestone streets and medieval homes is beautiful.
We hope to be able to post a blog again in a few days. Meanwhile, Carla may be able to post as she is using an ipad and purchased a package although the wi-fi has been difficult to access. Her blog can be found at carlaspastrytour.blogspot.com. Stay tuned for updates.
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