Day 30 – mostly a sea day, to Oslo
- We had breakfast in the restaurant where it’s nice and quiet. I love their eggs benedict florentine with that yummy creamed spinach. I thought we’d both go back to bed after breakfast, but something kept us awake, so we grabbed our stuff and headed out so they could do the morning room tidying. It was also the last day for laundry. So he filled a bag for one last wash before leaving. It felt like we just got on and settled and we were already hitting “last” things like laundry, paperwork, and surveys.
- The tech center, LYNC, is one of the only places on the whole ship with proper tables. Almost everything else is either a proper dining room (and set with dishes, flatware, and wine glasses) or coffee tables. It was a nice and quiet place to get some work done. At the noon briefing, the Captain told us we’d be entering the Oslo fjords by about 1400 before our 1900 docking. We made plans to eat lunch at 1300 so we would have all the viewing time. While I continued to work on content, I overheard this little conversion from the couple next to us: “Who is he flying with?” “British Airways.” [big sigh] “Wwwwhhhhyyy?” LOL! We feel the same way.
- We headed back to the dining room for lunch. I combined some sides to make a veggie plate and he had a steak.
- We were poised overlooking the pool for photos of the fjord. The pool was packed. There are a lot of kids, maybe 20, grandfathered in on this adult-only ship. As this was our first real day of sunshine, they were all at the pool. We don’t use the pool or hot tubs much on ships (or even at home). It’s silly, but I just find it so tiresome to change into a suit and then, I don’t like wearing the wet suit back. My laziness paid off to avoid all the kids this time. Also, I need new swim shorts that I don’t dislike so much. He wanted to try the ones in the spa, though. He showered in the waterfall and then tried the “thermal pool”. He wasn’t there long, though. Someone came in and turned on the far too annoying bubbles.
- Everything on this ship is too tall for me: railings, barstools, chairs, even the toilets, etc. I can’t see the coast because the horizon is right behind the railings for me. I feel like a child. Meanwhile the conversation behind me when I made this note was about BBLs. That’s a weird combo.
- Our pilot for the fjords into Oslo did not mess around. He laid on the horn several times. We weren’t in our state room to see the bridge cam and could never see the front of the boat at all, really, so we didn’t know why. But later, we watched some of the approach on the bridge cam and saw boats try to play chicken and get the honk. It was interesting to hear so much honking because they had told us that there would be no ship announcements in Oslo. It violates their noise pollution laws. Here is yet another case for an app. They could quietly send all announcements without using the public address. And seriously, is there tech so dated that they can’t make announcements inside only?
- Oslo is the center of our universe. We started here not quite a month ago. We were already back to the same area as before. And in three-ish weeks we’ll be back again.
- We had some pre-dinner drinks at Founders’ where I met a fellow sorority woman. She is an ΑΓΔ from Atlanta to my ΖΤΑ, but we had a lot in common in our histories. After dinner, we decided to go ashore and found all the elevators were off, so we took the stairs down, down, down and got off the ship. Later, he figured out that the elevators being off for 5 minutes was probably for a crew drill. We think they did it in Oslo because they weren’t allowed to make the loud/annoying announcements over the PA, so doing the drill in a port that outlaws that saves us from having to hear it. They never even told us they were doing it since it’s for them and not us. Genius. Wouldn’t it be nice if all ports were quiet by law?
- We were in our same neighborhood from before and walked past our hotel/hostel. The gaming bar that was closed the whole time before was open and packed. We didn’t see any seats. It was only 70NOK/$7USD to play. We found a restaurant we hadn’t tried before and sat at a patio table for some drinks. They had these little fur hides on some of the chairs to make it more comfortable for sitting. A hella rude American stole a fur off a table, ignored the guy when he protested, and then spoke absolute gibberish in a fake/made-up language/accent when the guy asked for the fur back “for madame.” The server was quick to grab another and squelch the fighting, but it was tense for a minute. I hate that asshole for making all of us look bad. I guess he was too chicken to wear his red hat and allow people to pre-judge him. We also passed the Irish pub where we watched Norway beat the Ivory Coast, the park where we saw them breaking down from PRIDE, the ferry docks, the opera house, and more. It was weird that it felt so familiar. Little did we know. Finding no more bars and zero cheap bars, we headed back to the ship.
- In the club/Horizons, we enjoyed the 70s music that was really stuff from the 80s and 90s. We also talked with James and Adam, who are travel agents from England. They gave us a ton of good info about the UK and we made a list of things to see. They were also shocked to learn that Travel Agents in the USA have no real standards they have to follow. Our story of Australia was a total shock to him. In the UK, they are strictly regulated and have to provide itemized lists of the stuff they plan for their clients. If we ever want to use another TA, it will be them. The four of us closed down the bar and even hung out after the bartenders left.
Day 31 – Oslo ii
- We rushed to breakfast to avoid the food gap and then gathered up our stuff and went ashore.
- It was 21ºC/70⁰F and gorgeous. People were swimming in the Bjørvika bay, jumping off platforms, kayaking, and paddling. It was a sight to see. Against the dock, but closer to shore we found dozens of floating saunas. Some of them have motors and can be driven further out. All of them had a fireplace, sauna room, a small deck, and a ladder to get back up from the water. Norwegians love their hot sauna and cold plunge combo as much as the Icelanders do.
- Oslo felt like a whole new city to us, as if we had never been there. We were in the neighborhood called Bjørvika, just a few blocks over from where we were before, but it was wildly different. We had seen the opera house and people walking on its roof the first time, but somehow missed the giant Ferris wheel right beside it. There was also a small beach park with food trucks and lots of kids. We walked through an area with gorgeous apartment buildings to get to our destination.
- The Flop museum was funny and fun. We saw several failures we knew about and a few more that we didn’t. Grow with me Skipper, Crystal Pepsi, Google Glass (ironic in the year of Me.ta Ray Bans, which will be a flop!), a model of Tesla’s truck, a full-size plastic car, and more. He had a nice chat with the staff about the Shake Weight and that episode of South Park.
- Next, we grabbed lunch-before-Munch at a different Los Tacos than the one we found before. It was a very busy area and day, so avoiding nicer places was just easier. Plus, we know we like their food.
- Munch was a fabulous 13-storey building with 11 distinct galleries. Since we invented and named our style Turbo Tours, we thought it would be a quick run through, but even at our pace, and especially in the larger crowd, it was a much longer adventure. We loved the building. We saw all the exhibits, but didn’t care for the art much. So, we were beyond ready to go back to the ship, rest, and take showers.
- After dinner, we enjoyed the push off and departure through the Oslo fjords. As that faded, we found the club to be kinda dull with bad song choices. Dear all cruises ever: You can not fill all the play lists with ABBA and Rock the Boat. You get once per voyage. So of course, the Founders bar was nearly full and had a gaggle of doctors in it. One of the plastics guys only works on dead people. And he was just as creepy as you’d expect. It was busy and loud, so we got wine to go and went back to our cabin to “work” on stuff.
Day 32 – the North Sea
- We had looked at the schedule and planned a very slow day. The only item on our agenda was a 1930 dinner seating at Jaques, the French restaurant. My goal was to catch up (finally) on these writings. We grabbed breakfast before the food gap.
- We tried to work in the concierge lounge on our deck, but one guy was watching a movie and it was generally just loud. Plus, it’s an interior room and has no windows.
- Looking for a better spot, we found the Mahjong and Bridge group in Toscana where tables were draped but not set. They even set out a bucket of ice, glasses, sodas, and water for everyone. It was a great place to “work” on content!
- Lunch in the cafe was great. I had two tiny club samiches. Sandwiches are one of my favorite foods. On the Viking cruise, I looked at the sandwich option every day, but it was never something I liked. And it took until nearly the end for a good one on this ship, too. So, finally! A guy near us had hard-shell tacos we never saw on the buffet, but he only ate the insides of them. What a waste.
- I crossed my fingers that we’d be able to get back into Toscana to “work” and was relieved to find even more Mahjong players and the same Bridge group back. He fetched his gaming system and played it until it died. And I got all caught up on the words! I can’t do anything with pictures on this part of our trip because I can’t get to them on this bad Wifi. But for all the days where we were too busy to flesh out our travel notes, the writing was caught up! Also, finally!
- That of course, required a rest in our state room.
- Before our French dinner, we had drinks in Founders and watched them make drink bubbles. Why are those guns so dang expensive? I neeeeddddzzzzz one!
- At Jaques: I had the crab salad, soupe à l’oignon, creamy seafood, and chocolate mousse. He had deviled eggs, steak and Mille Feuille (Crispy Baked Puff Pastry Layers with Light Vanilla Cream). Jaques was amazing. I’m glad we saved it for last since it would have made the other three special restaurants seem terrible by comparison. Unfortunately, a very loud woman was seated next to us. She’s former Navy and needs hearing aids. It ruined our atmosphere, for sure. Dear all people: get your hearing checked. New hearing aids are mostly invisible. Some just look like earbuds and still function that way, too. Save the people around you from the hell of you screaming every word.
- Back at Founders, it was full of fun people avoiding the mentalist magician and karaoke. We met a woman from College Station who used to live in Boise. And then we met Jeff and Christine, who are friends with Tom and Nancy. Ship life is a small world. As Founders was winding down, we scooted over to a table in Horizons, which was dumping out after karaoke. We didn’t meet or chat with anyone, but we got great service from Jeremiah. He was kind and gentle.
- As the night started to end, we moved to the barstools for one last glass of wine and then went back to the room to handle a volunteer thing and to get more comfortable.
Day 33 – Amsterdam
- We had an 8am docking, which means we didn’t see sail in. We slept until lunch, though, so that was nice.
- The ship was quiet; almost everyone went ashore.
- We noticed a tour group seeing the ship. Three groups of about 20 people came through the cafe. They were Travel Agents touring the ship to sell trips.
- After we got some pics from the Terrace Cafe deck, we checked out the spa and found it dead. This was our chance.
- While we waited for Housekeeping to finish our stateroom, we sat in Toscana where it was ultra quiet, even all the Majong/Bridge players went ashore, it seemed.
- After we were sure our room was clean, we grabbed our suits and went to soak in the tubs at the spa. We had the entire spa deck to ourselves for a few minutes. Even by the time we left, there were only half a dozen people up there. The longer soak in the tub was nice. We also grabbed a second lunch…and noticed it was busy. People seemed to start coming back about an hour before the All Aboard. Our Captain probably liked that. He likes to Sail Away a little early. I get it; I’d be the same way.
- We asked a guy at the Future Cruises desk about getting Dr Pepper on the next boat. They don’t accept special requests like that, but they did say we can bring it on board ourselves and that Europe sells it pretty commonly. From there, we popped into Martini’s and found a table for a tiny amount of “work” before Sail Away.
- Push Off was delayed by a missing passenger, then it was ultra slow, then we had to spin 180⁰ in the canal but very slowly, probably because there were so many barges and small tour boats in the canal. The whole thing took an hour to do. I now see why Amsterdam is phasing out cruise ships. We had two pilots, a police boat, and a traffic boat monitoring everything and turning all the little boats away.
- For another two hours, we sailed through the canal. After the city, it was mostly industrial areas. Then, we came upon a lock, the largest sea lock in the world. That took another hour and almost made us miss dinner. But we could still watch the whole thing from the Restaurant.
- For dinner, I had their Beef Wellington, but it was not at all like the one at Hell’s Kitchen. His pork chop had a honey chipotle BBQ sauce. On the way out of the lock, we passed a town we will come back to and saw a sailboat that looked like they were having some sail troubles on the rough (for small boats) water.
- We wanted to have some drinks and found every space was full of loud drunks: a screaming gaggle of women celebrating her (March!) birthday week (Is she a 30 year old stuck in 2010?), a wine sales rep who stood to talk to interested guests making his voice carry across the whole space, and even the jigsaw puzzle crowd was loud. We just gave up and went back to our stateroom.
Day 34 – Bruges
- Bruges was an early-ish day for us. The crew had a drill and we didn’t want to be there for it. Yet, we were still among the last off the ship.
- As soon as we were off the gangway, we were directed to the mandatory shuttle; there is no walking allowed on the dock. It was also a long shuttle ride to town. In town at the train station, fire alarms were going off at a hotel and at the train depot. Because of the alarms, a train line staff member was helping everyone use the kiosk to make it faster. She gave us a little slip with a QR code for the app for the Belgian train system, and that paid off later. Trains ran every 30 minutes to Brugge station and then it was a 1.5km/1+ mile walk to the city center and the old medieval area.
- First, we sat at a cafe for a small lunch snack and drinks. Next, we wandered around the cute little medieval town. We took a different route out so we could see different things and found the area along the canal, which reminded us a little of Colmar, France. There was a constant stream of boat tours. I found a pretty scarf to add to my souvenirs and to help me dress up a little more on our bougie boat.
- Back at the train station, we learned, via that app, that our train was delayed. We found seats on our platform and then learned that our train was fully canceled. So, we went back to the terminal, got snacks and drinks*, and made our way back up to the correct new platform. *+1 for being back in a drinking country. I got a Belgian pilsner, and was allowed to drink it on the platform while we waited for the train.
- The train was full, but quick. The first shuttle was the same. They drove us around and around to get there. Because the dock is super strict about people and doesn’t allow walking, you have to take a second bus to the cruise terminal building to take us back to the actual ship. Having been to several port cities by this point, everyone thought it was ridiculous and stupid.
- Back in our stateroom, we used the rest of the afternoon to rest and pack. We grabbed pre-dinner drinks at Founders, had dinner in the cafe, and went back to Founders for a night cap.
- We got to say goodbye to several new friends. That really is the hardest part of cruising.
- At some point in the evening, I overheard: “Oh. We don’t like Billy Gram.” and “Do you mean Instagram’??” Old people be olding.
