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Yet Another Port Day – Stavanger – 2 August 2012

Part 6
Yet Another Port Day – Stavanger

Lordy, I need a rest. Fourth Port Day in four days. Enough already. Lie in or no lie in, it’s still too much.

We disembarked late, about half ten. Weather: overcast but mild. Very grey. We walked the length of the ship to get to the security gate. I spotted a Hop On Hop Off bus, so we walked back outside the security fence (almost the length of the ship, again) to the apparent bus stop and waited. A bus duly pitched up. The driver was very apologetic, but he was completely full. He said another would be along in 10 minutes and that we should wait right where we were for that one. We sat and waited. The next bus duly came, pulled into the parking area and drove straight past us like we weren’t there. Now, we weren’t the only people waiting, there were about half a dozen of us, and he DID have empty seats, I could see them, but he didn’t even brake. I will be writing a letter. That’s just not on. Granted, there’s not a massive amount to see, but it would have been nice to have seen what there was. We seem to have parked next to the main sight, which was the White Houses of the Old Town, but there were another 9 stops, there might have been SOMETHING of interest. But now we will never know, will we?

Note: wherever you are in the world, if you get on a Hop On Hop Off with the red, yellow and purple livery, keep your ticket – it entitles you to a discount off the same company’s buses everywhere else in the world. So if you take a tour in York or London or Edinburgh, you get a discount if you present your ticket in Paris, Rome or New York. Of course, not much use to know this in Stavanger, where you will see buses but be unable to board, but I thought I’d mention it anyway.

So we walked into the town. Luckily, most of it is waterfront cafes and shops, so it wasn’t far. We browsed and wandered with ease. We couldn’t find an open restaurant that did suitable food (plenty of closed ones, which seemed odd with 5000 cruise passengers about), so we had no choice but to refuel in Burger King, where the guy at the counter was just so relieved we weren’t another dozen shouting German teenagers (the Costa Fortuna was also in port – Germans love Costa ships), that he treated us like royalty. And it had a disabled toilet, so no stairs for mum. Nice touch.

More wandering and shopping (H&M is really cheap here!) and then back to the ship by teatime. Stavanger is a fairly large city, but has very little by way of sights to see or prettiness to offer.

Things to be aware of if you come to Norway: Salg is sale. Taak is thank you. Appel is orange, Eple is apple. Feel free to re-read that if you feel the need.

Last formal night tonight. Black and White. Wearing the very dress, which I do love. It is very comfortable and seems completely uncreasable. I’m not sure which quality pleases me most!

Dinner was lovely. The roast beef was superb, although the fondant dessert was very overcooked and no longer had a liquid centre. But we had a lovely time anyway.

The continuing beauty of the landscapes we pass carried on throughout dinner as we left our last fjord. I took some photos so you can see what the view is like from our table. The bars in the picture are unavoidable, I’m afraid. They are there to reinforce the glass against large waves. The restaurant is on desk 6, which is only about thirty feet above sea level, so the risk is a little increased down at that level.

After dinner, Yvonne and I had a drink and a natter until it was time to go to the cinema. We saw The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, which was superb. Unfortunately, one of the speakers in the cinema has blown, so the sound was at half volume and accompanied by a significant buzz from the dead speaker throughout. Not ideal for the hard of hearing, so bearing in mind the average age on here, which although lower than on a long cruise, is still significantly up on the real world, the whole thing must have been very trying.

And so to Harlequins, the nightclub, for the disco. Danced til three and hung out with some very nice people, although one Welshman told me I came from the wrong valley, which seemed a tad harsh! It was surprising how few people had obeyed the black and white theme. Normally most people obey but there are one or two who don’t grasp the concept. But last night, it was a significant proportion of the women present – maybe 1% or more. It is a shame, because there is an aesthetic that is being spoiled for everyone else. Black and white night is very pretty, and yet these people who simply cannot read the newspaper or don’t care or are deliberately being malicious and disobedient, mar it for everyone else. In the grand scheme of things, if that’s the worst thing that happens to me all day, I’m doing pretty fine, but it’s still a shame. Made the DJ finish with Happy Days, which made everyone smile.

And so the cruise draws to a close. Tomorrow is the last day, a sea day, thank heavens, and the clocks will go back tomorrow night, so the early start on Saturday morning won’t feel like quite such an early start. I have a massage booked in the morning, not as early as Yvonne’s, though. I’m eager to have one, but not eager enough to be up at 9am. I am still on holiday, just. I am pretty much packed and I have received my disembarkation paperwork, so all that is left now is to download the last photos, use up the internet time and work out how I’m going to transport the rather fragile items I purchased on my travels. Which, as I am going home on public transport, is not an insignificant issue.

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Wednesday 1 August 2012 – Olden

A fairly leisurely start. Woken at about 7am when the ship slowed down and I had to put my wristbands on. Then got up properly about 9.  We were booked on a boat trip, which always feels like an odd thing to do when on a cruise – get off a ship, get on a boat.  But this was a lovely, relaxing trip across Lake Olden, just lying on the deck in the sun admiring the scenery, which is breathtaking, and getting to know fellow passengers (one of whom has no recollection of having danced with me the night before last!). Our guide was a bit old and doddery but pleasant enough and the coach trip back was uneventful but with a couple of rather lovely photo stops.

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I got off in town, having been told it was 1km to walk back to the ship. Browsed the shops, ate in the only eatery in town, which was a pub up a rather vertiginous staircase, and then back to the ship for the regulation nap.  That was NOT a 1km walk. I was shattered and woke up with screaming cramp. Had to get dad to go and buy some tonic water and bring it to me, because I was in too much agony to move. I had cramp up the FRONT of my calf. You try stretching that. 

 At dinner, there were balloons on the table and Tony had found some on his door in the morning too.  He also got a card from the Captain, as well as the one from us.  Dinner was roast lamb, which was very nice.  After dinner, we went to the show, which was songs from musicals.  Again, there was a slideshow before it started, and again there were some dreadful spelling mistakes.  It really is inexcusable.

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Then rounded off the evening with a disco called “Dancing Through the Decades”, which is the same as the usual disco but in a different room and with the bad band for some of it and all the Ents Officers dressed in silly outfits.  It transpires that DJ James rather fancies Yvonne, who sadly could not be less interested.  Very funny to watch, though.  It also turns out that Tony and Sandra do a mean jive. Who knew?! Pumpkin time at midnight. Fourth port day in a row tomorrow.  Urgh.

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31 July 2012 – Andalsnes (pronounced Ondulsnes)

No tenders. Told to be on the quayside for 9.40 to catch a train we thought was at 10.15. It turned out it WAS at 10.15. And it was raining. Nowhere to sit and nowhere to shelter. We got SOAKED. Very unkind, P&O, very unkind, and totally unnecessary.

The train, when it came, was very luxurious and clean and we had a wonderful trip through the mountains, up to Bjorli (pronounced like the British motor museum – Bewli), which is Norway’s southernmost ski resort with six months of snow (!). Took loads of photos of amazing scenery.

Andalsnes is slightly messy at the moment, because the International Base Jumping Championships arrive next week. Andalsnes has several mountains just outside town with sheer granite drops of several hundred metres – it breaks in a similar way to slate – so it is the base jumping capital of the world, apparently. It is spectacular stuff, but as there are no motor vehicles allowed in the national park, apparently, they have to climb the mountain before they can throw themselves off of it!

Long queues for the surprisingly pleasant two toilets at the station. A lady asked to buy one of my t-shirts, so I gave her my email address. I was wearing the one that reads: “I might look like I’m doing nothing, but at the cellular level, I’m really quite busy” and she wants one. Clearly a lady with much taste, oh yes. Then a coach back down to town, with several photo/shopping stops, and a commentary conducive to dozing. A really wonderful trip.

We then walked the few hundred yards into town and ate a rather odd restaurant in a marquee on the quayside. I had a homemade burger, which had pieces of yellow and red pepper mixed in, which made it quite sweet and very tasty indeed. I’m not sure the sweetcorn on top was such a good idea, logistically at least. Mum and Dad ordered a small pizza to share. A SMALL one.

We then wandered around the two streets of shops, where I bought a top and some more Norwegian Kitkats. Then we’d run out of shops and stuff to do, so we went back to the ship and I napped til dinner. Dinner was delicious. I had fried loin of haddock in panko breadcrumbs, which I had never heard of, but Sandra said it’s the best bit and has no bones, which was all the recommendation I needed. Turns out she was right, it was superb. Mum’s trout came with almonds sprinkled on, which, bearing in mind she is listed in the kitchen and at the waiters station as having a nut allergy, shows that the lack of attention to detail is spreading, sadly.

After dinner, Yvonne and I went to watch the ballroom dancers and the band with the bad singers until it was time to go to the show, a Queen tribute show, which is so popular they have to do three performances, rather than the usual two. Front row seats. Had a brill time. The Headliners are superb. Must learn the name of the lead girl, as she is OUTSTANDING. Then disco til 2, midnight snack (crackers and butter) in the Al Fresco restaurant and then blog and bed. ANOTHER port day tomorrow. Crumbs.

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Bergen

30 July 2012

Oh my heavens, my feet hurt. Forgive me for slipping into Bridget-esque lists, but I’m too shattered for full sentences.

Eaten so far (NB: port days are not renowned for their nutritional purity): one choc. muffin (v. small!). One four-bar kitkat. One hamburger. 2 slimline tonics. Walked: 50 trillion miles. Feet hurty level: 11. Aches and pains carried forward from yesterday: multitudinous.

Got up at 8.30am. Tried to find food. Surprisingly tricky for a cruise ship. The chocolate muffin was the sum total of my success and it was a very sad, small one that hadn’t risen properly. Waited on the quayside for our excursion bus. Everyone else had disabled reservations for the front seats except mum. Typical. Made a bit of a fuss and got her a decent seat in the end. Had a lovely guide and a very careful driver, which, even though seatbelts are compulsory in Norway on buses (which is nice), was reassuring nonetheless. They took us first to the Funicular which goes 400m up one of the seven mountains around Bergen (unlike other cities Bergen is not built ON the seven hills, but BETWEEN them, which is MUCH more sensible). Our tickets as a group were pre-booked, so we queue-jumped the not insubstantial line of waiting people (halfway down the road) and up we went. It’s only a four minute journey, which mean it moves surprisingly fast, sedate it most certainly ain’t, but the view at the top is impressive.

Took some photos of mum with a troll (I definitely do not recall the one on the end of my pencil at school having such a phallus-shaped nose as the ones here), helped some other people take photos, ate something which turned out to be the Norwegian for KitKat and then back down again for the rest of the bus tour. Our guide was excellent – he speaks 9 languages – and his volume was set at a suitable level for everyone to hear but for me to get a nap at the same time. Passed the concert hall, described as “acoustically perfect”, but, by ‘eck, it’s ugly, and although they tell you it’s supposed to look like a piano, you’d have to imbibe an awful lot of hallucinogens to make that come anywhere close to reality (whatever reality you end up in).

When we got back to the ship, we split up and I took the free shuttle bus (see, they’re learning!) into town (from the container port where we are parked – okay, maybe they’re not learning) into town. Wandered around, talking photos of old buildings, historical statues and some very odd public art. The sun was warm, the sky was blue (it was about 20 degrees in the shade, very reasonable) and it was all very pleasant. Browsed several shops without success – the prices range from twenty quid for a top to a couple of hundred quid for the identical top in another shop. Ludicrous. But generally speaking, things were not nearly as expensive as I was expecting from what I had heard. Twenty quid (or 200kr) seems to be a default setting for pricing here. I found a wonderful stationery shop, and a small tin box I would have liked, but I wasn’t going to pay a tenner for it, let alone the twenty they were asking. Wandered through the fish market, which is an oddly smelly and unpleasant thing to have as your number one tourist attraction, and visited the old town, with its higgledy piggledy old wooden buildings.

There were several cruise ships in town, so there was a wide variety of languages and manners on show. I nearly got run over by a coach whose signs were written in South Korean! It is a very clean, tidy town, but the taggers still get through. There is even some chewing gum on the pavements, but nothing to compare with the black muck on Britain’s streets. If this is the second largest city (and former capital), I’m looking forward to the others – they’ll be tiny! My friend that collects silly/rude signs is going to have his hands full when I get back from here. Virtually everything in Norwegian either looks rude, sounds rude or is rude. It’s all quite entertaining. Am enjoying Norway so far. It’s like Alaska but with better weather and better public transportation.

They’re very prompt on cruise ships. Rehearsal in the theatre started at 4pm prompt. Two minutes chat and prep and the floor started to vibrate at 4.02 exactly. Very impressive.

Fell asleep at this point! Woke just in time for dinner. It seems that not everyone had such a lovely day in Bergen. Sandra and Tony took a different tour to us, which they found very disappointing. I felt bad about what a good time I had. I ordered steak, as did Dad. It came with four giant chips, instead of lots of little ones. I bit into one but had to spit it out as it was completely raw in the middle! Dad’s were raw too, so the waiter got us some “proper” chips. Ironically, the steak itself was quite nice. Travelled through a fjord while we ate. We travel through fjords every evening while we eat. The views are spectacular, but difficult to describe. Conifer forests and mountain peaks (not very snowy, well, it is July) stretch in every direction and every so often, there is a tiny cluster of houses near the waterline. How these communities would survive if Hurtigruten ever stopped their ferry service, I cannot imagine. They are only accessible by sea.

After dinner, we went to the show. Yvonne insisted we sat in the front row. The show was called Reel to Reel and consisted of songs from films. While we were waiting for it to start, they had a PowerPoint presentation of facts about films, such as the actors from Four Weddings and a Funeral having to use their own suits. Unfortunately, said slide show contained FOUR spelling and punctuation errors, despite being only a dozen or so slides long. Lack of attention to detail – like I said. (is this Quibble #5?) During the show, the screens were used to show a pre-prepared film to support the on stage action. It was very distracting and 150% unnecessary. Although the bit where some crew re-enacted scenes from Pirates of the Caribbean was quite entertaining. Yvonne found it hilarious that I muddled up Mary Poppins and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, but to be fair, it was a Dick van Dyke song, so it wasn’t THAT stupid!

Then we went to watch the ballroom dancers until they went away and the disco started. We danced til about 3, I think. Tomorrow is a tender port, and although Dan the Ents Officer says it might not be, so best to turn in, just in case.

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Norway Cruise. Day 2

29 July 2012

Got up and went back to bed. Three times. Ain’t it grand to be on holiday? Finally decided I should surface about 11, mainly because the stewardess was clearly so desperate to do my room, she was trying to ram her way in through the wall from next door. Watched the telly enough to know about the hoo-ha about empty seats at the Olympics. Unsurprising incompetency. At least Mitt Romney has sodded off to insult Israel instead of us for a bit, which is nice.

Today I met a mental. Her name is Yvonne and she is on with her grandmother, Flo. They are both delightful company – funny, irreverent and a little bit silly. Okay, a lot silly. We sunbathed a bit together and then I went off to find the parents for lunch. Lunch was pitiful. Had rice. Followed it with a treacle sponge and jelly, so I’m not going to waste away, but still, pretty dire, even for the Oriana Conservatory. Tried to go back and attempt a salad, but the queue was both out the door and somewhat belligerent, so I left it.

After lunch, went back to the sunbathing with Yvonne and Flo, which went well for almost a full five minutes before it started to spit with rain. Not sure where from, because the clouds were white and fluffy and the sky was blue, but rain it did. Briefly. So we legged it indoors and waited for that particular cloud to sod off, before we went back out and tried again. In the newly-introduced Wind. To be fair, it wasn’t actually THAT windy, but Yvonne had a bit of a moan anyway. She got precisely no sympathy, particularly as, in between the moaning, she was mocking all those who were covering up. Added to which, she already has a tan line where her shorts end when she bends over, so, frankly, TOUGH. (and yes, she is proof-reading this over my shoulder).

Yvonne thought the man on the sunlounger next to her had pulled his trousers down and put them round his ankles and was sitting there in his undercrackers. I glimpsed as long as I dared and then decided she was wrong (thankfully!) and that he had shorts on and had put a tshirt over his legs (why?!). Had a good long giggle, nonetheless.

We met Vijay, who is, according to his badge, a Pool Assist. Now, I have no idea whatever as to what a Pool Assist is. I’m guessing it’s some sort of AssistANT, but that’s not what his badge would have us believe. He basically flirted with us and stood in my sun for a good 20 minutes, during which time he neither pooled nor assisted in any way whatsoever. His role, apparently is to check the water in the pool for dangerous contents and tidy up the sunloungers. Taxing. He is very funny and not a little unimpressed with Yvonne’s Liverpool origins. He seems a bit pro-royals and certainly likes the idea of Cambridge. He’s obviously never tried to sit down there*. There is a bar across the Crystal Pool, although no one, even Vijay, knows why. Neither can he get it removed. In fact, he thinks it’s a permanent fitting. I had to explain to him that it is usually only put across in rough weather or when the pool is closed, to stop people swimming (it doesn’t work, they just do widths instead of lengths!), but he seemed unconvinced. He suggested I contact Reception to get it removed. And we all know how well that will go.

We spotted a Matching Couple. His and hers black trousers and red tops (although his was red and black stripey, so Yvonne called him Dennis the Menace). They walked past us several times, giving us a fit of the giggles each time (and at this point, we were still entirely sober), and we are now desperately waiting to see what they will appear in tomorrow. Although tomorrow is a Port Day (Bergen?), so we may have to wait several days to have our questions answered. Apparently tomorrow I am supposed to be dressed and in my right mind by 10am. Okay…

Minor quibble #4: the MUZAK. AGAIN. It was bad on the Arcadia, as you may recall, due to the fair bit of ranting on the topic. But here on the Oriana, they get it equally wrong. In the Conservatory, they were blasting out Eighties hits just that bit too loud for polite conversation with the person more than one seat away. Here in Tiffanys, they had a blissful silence, but now, here comes the miscellaneous boyband crap. Again.

Parted company to get ready for dinner – Formal. Wore the monsoon maxi dress, which was complimented. The food was meh. Not spectacular but not inedible. Dessert was Sachertorte, which was very yummy indeed. Then Yvonne and I went to Harlequins to watch the ballroom dancers and slag off their outfits. Which wasn’t hard. Some of them were hideous and at least two had help dressing from people who were clearly colourblind. Kept us entertained until the decent music kicked in at midnight. Danced a lot and went to bed at 2am. Which, unfortunately, due to the vagaries of international travel, was 3am. So only 5 or so hours sleep before it’s time to get up again!

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7-day Oriana cruise to Norway. 28 July 2012

Day 1

 

Well, here we are. Back on the Oriana.

 

The coach park was very busy this morning. With coaches going to all sorts of destinations.

 

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Faultless journey down on the coach with the Cleanest, Best Ventilated, but without doubt the Smallest Toilet on Earth. By all means drop your trousers, but don’t imagine you have any room to bend over far enough to pick them up again.  No, really.  You may not have even noticed that you bend forward when you pick up your trousers, but trust me, you do.  Watch your head.  Furthermore, when you’re upright, whatever you do, don’t wobble, because the handbag hook on the back of the door is almost EXACTLY level with your right eye and only inches away.  You carry a spare, but it would be pretty unpleasant, nonetheless.  And that strange grit for soap that I had almost forgotten existed.  When was the last time you saw that?!  Anyway, the suspension was so soft, I slept most of the way, which is fine by me, because it’s a pretty boring drive – around the M25 to the M27 and then straight down to Southampton.  It takes a little under two hours.  So by the time I’ve eaten my lunch, some junk food (a giant double lolly and a sherbet dibdab, well, I am on holiday), used the aforementioned Minifacilities and had a nap, we’re there.

 

Oddly effusive welcome back on board – well, some of the staff only saw us three weeks ago, and their memories aren’t as shot as ours! Surprised how far forward my cabin is. Not like me to pick one in the front quarter, and bearing in mind that three weeks ago, I was in one of the sternmost cabins possible, this could be quite a different experience. No special single cabin this time. Paying the single person supplement all week, this time.  Boo. Need to go to reception and check how much onboard credit I have. It should be about fifty quid, but it’s always good to check these things. It varies from cruise to cruise and, particularly now that the parents and I are on different loyalty tiers, I really did ought to pay more attention to this stuff!  (Answer: £50, which I’ve already spent on internet time!)

 

Noticeably, I appear to be directly above the theatre. I can tell that they are not only currently rehearsing, I can tell you what songs they are rehearsing and what instruments they are using and that’s all over the top of the television which I currently have tuned to Click on BBC World News.  It’s doable, but suffice to say that I think my earplugs may have a challenge to deal with not just the sound, but also the vibrations coming through the floor. So no early nights when there’s a show on, on this cruise.  Not a big deal, I’m hardly renowned for my ‘early to bed early to rise’ tendencies, but it would be nice to have a choice! After all, I do rather enjoy a good nap now and then.  Will monitor this situation and see how it goes.

 

I may have ranted about this previously, but the primary problem with P&O in recent years has been a lack of attention to detail.  Just to prove that things have not improved in the slightest, I present you herewith with the first, rather glaring, example that I spotted immediately on entering the cabin for the first time.  Minor quibble of this cruise #1 herewith. Let’s see how long this list gets.

 

This is the equivalent of the hotel directory, found in every cabin, listing room services and phone numbers.  The contents are correct enough, but still…

 

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Dinner was pleasant enough. Our table mates are Tony and Sandra. Both retired. It’s his 65th birthday on Wednesday, although he is reluctant to retire. Must remember to buy him a card tomorrow. Or remind the parents to do it.  Had salmon for dinner. Surprisingly high bone content, but nothing’s perfect. I don’t think I swallowed any, so no harm done.  Tomorrow is the first formal night, so the menu is ghastly.  Minor quibble #2: How do we explain to P&O that there is such a thing as trying too hard?

 

Currently got the Can-Can wafting up through the floor. Second show has just started.   I can see this listening through the floor process saving me a lot of time and effort, whilst still providing me with all the entertainment I need. 

 

After dinner, I went to the cinema to see Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol, which I think brings me up to date with that particular franchise.  I think… There were some aspects of this film I really liked. The sandstorm chase was cool, and I also enjoyed the malfunctioning kit.  It has bothered me for some time that their electronics never seemed to fail on them, which seemed catastrophically unrealistic in a real world dominated by Windows 7 and, Heaven help us, 8.  This rectified that.  It was highly enjoyable, although perhaps a little high stress-wise for a holiday movie.  That is to say, to translate for my Stateside chums, a movie to watch on holiday, not a movie about snow and elves.  I wasn’t planning to get that stressed out and there was one moment where I genuinely covered my eyes, which is unusual for me.  Very high on adrenalin.  Not suitable for those with dodgy cortisol readings.

 

The floor is currently singing ‘Bless your beautiful hide’ and whooping a lot, so I think we’re at the barn dance bit of the show.

 

Minor detail quibble of the day #3: menu item. No spelling mistakes spotted so far, but… One item is a sirloin steak with straw potatoes and watercress.  There is an asterisk next to this item. Referring to the bottom of the menu reveals that an asterisk is a warning to alert passengers that items of game may contain pieces of shot.  Which part of the cow, potato and watercress was shot, exactly?  I like to consider myself to be quite an imaginative soul, but I can’t see the thrill in hunting potatoes or watercress – they seem quite sedentary, as vegetables go.  Neither, frankly, do I think that cows would make particularly good quarry.  All I know of cows is that they seem to have three settings: lying, standing and stampeding, none of which seems suitable for a hunt scenario. So how has any of this been shot at exactly? If I had to hazard a guess, I would say that the warning should be the one about ‘we’ll cook it to your order, but the UK Government is now so terrified of risk that it says that we have to tell you that undercooked meat is dangerous and can kill you and damage small puppies’ or whatever it’s supposed to read.  But I’m just guessing.

 

The Bolero?! With a cha-cha-cha backing?! It sounds oddly like ‘If I was a rich man’ in places.  Very odd.

 

It’s so nice to be in a virtually Olympics-free environment.  No one has mentioned the Olympics to me since I boarded the coach (the man in WHSmith was yawning because he’d stayed up til the end).  The only problem is that, as the BBC are utterly OBSESSED, it’s hard to escape when searching for news on the tellybox.  You have to plough through a good eight minutes of a news bulletin before they mention anything important, like Syria, for example.

 

I think I shall call it quits, log off and listen to the floor for a bit. Goodnight.

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Grand Eventure – Day 3 – probably

I’m saying Day 3 but, who knows what day it is? I have no clue. Today was Zeebrugge, that much I do know. But Zeebrugge isn’t much to look at, so, having been to Bruges several times before, we knew that the best place to go would be Blankenberg. Interestingly, P&O had obviously heard the same thing, so they put on a free shuttle bus to Blankenberg. Or, as Dad put it, the City of Blankenberg put on a shuttle bus to the ship!

We trekked down about half a mile of the folded airbridge, only to discover that there was a lower gangplank that they simply hadn’t bothered to mention. It’s so unkind. You KNOW that a large proportion of your passengers have mobility limitations, it’s just so thoughtless and inconsiderate, it makes me quite sick.

It was mizzly and grey and miserable in the morning, but by the time the 20 minute drive was done, at about 10.30, the sun came out. We played “spot the bit you remember” as we haven’t been here for about twenty years – I found the swimming pool (now hidden behind a sealife centre) and Dad remembered the location of a Delhaize supermarket and a Leonidas chocolate shop (nothing wrong with his priorities!). I photographed some public sculpture and a double-decker carousel (?!).

We pootled down the main street, shopping and browsing – rather successfully. We got the cheese we had been looking for for about three years since it was last spotted in Holland, and the chocolates we had been looking for for about ten years since the last shop we knew that sold them closed down in Lille. I found a shop that sold exactly the things I like to wear for work – thin knitted tops with short sleeves – so I bought loads there.

Then we scaled the staircase up to the beach. It looks like quite a mountain, but even mum survived relatively unscathed. We browsed a few restaurant menus before we chose Le Petit Rouge. The food was superb, although our waitress didn’t seem to understand any languages at all (we tried English, French and pidgin Dutch) and at first brought Mum and Dad the wrong dish, but once that had been fixed, it was all delicious and highly successful. With their meals, the parents received two of the biggest bread rolls I have ever seen – maybe twice or three times normal size. The whole meal was also about half the price of Amsterdam yesterday. The waitress was quite stunned to be left a tip!

Then we wended our way back to the shuttle and to the ship. Via some pancakes – although we caused much consternation when we asked for lemon with our sugar pancakes. They were most intrigued.

Bob was 4.30 and we got back at 4. No idea why Bob was 4.30 and not 6 or so, it’s not like it’s going to take long to get home from here, but P&O will always mar a trip somehow if they can.

There was then a very loud sailaway party on the back of 8. This was Right Next to my cabin, but wax earplugs are a wonder and I managed to nap for about half an hour – which I really needed. At the party, they announced the winner of the draw to win a free World Cruise. Everyone was very excited. Except the woman who’d won. You would think from her demeanour that she’d won the execution of her choice. She didn’t smile, she didn’t wave, she didn’t shake the hands of the people giving her the THIRTY THOUSAND POUNDS-WORTH OF HOLIDAY FOR TWO. It made everyone quite upset/angry how bloody ungrateful she was and rather ruined the mood of the entire party. If you don’t want it, love, I’ll take it off your hands. Why are we all (about 1000 people) singing ‘Congratulations’ to you, when you can’t even bother to raise a smile?! Ungrateful cow.

I had a grateful moment after the sailaway party. They kept playing rousing/ water-related/ cruising music, and so I was leaning on the rail, watching the seagulls scanning our wake for fish, listening to This is the Life and Wonderful World, and it dawned on me just how lucky we all are. It is so easy to take it for granted, or forget it entirely with all the rushing around we do, but what we cruisers do is still very special and out of the reach of most people on the planet. Very few have the finances to allow this kind of luxury, and even fewer have the time to spend doing so little and being so spoilt and pampered. I know how blessed I am that I get to do this, and it was a quiet moment where I got to gaze out at the setting sun and the beauty of the ocean and appreciate just what an amazing adventure this way of life is.

Then to dinner with the lovely ladies of table 20. Good food and (relatively) good service (as long as you weren’t thirsty, which I was) and souvenir menus. Alison had two desserts, which we had to reassure her was perfectly acceptable behaviour, particularly as she hadn’t had an hors d’oeuvre. Address swappage and goodbyes and off to do chores.

Collect photographs from Ship’s Photographers: not printed, not bearable or ready, depending on which photo you were trying to collect. I got a lovely photo of all seven ships taken on Tuesday, and a great pic of Mum, Dad, Ann and Enid at the sailaway (after a half hour wait). The solo photo of me taken last night went straight in the bin – badly lit and unflattering.

Trip to Reception: You’re not going to believe this. Do you remember the package we booked – the hotel room, free parking at the hotel for a week and free transfers to and from the ship? Well, apparently, we were only booked ONE WAY. No transfer back to the hotel. Have you ever heard anything so stupid? What use is a ONE WAY transfer?! How are we supposed to get back to the hotel? Teleport?! Magic carpet?! Of course, the girl that Dad spoke to at Reception, Amy, just told Dad to book a taxi and send the bill to P&O. We had a rant, but no one could fix it because no one has the authority to take responsibility to make any decision of any kind. But I told Dad we will simply find the transfer bus and get on it. All I have to do is find out when it is due to pick up. I’m guessing the other people on the bus are allowed to go back again? It’s either just us or there are going to be a lot of irate people tomorrow morning. What a farce. Just when you think there is nothing left that P&O can do to bugger up your holiday, they find something. I wonder what it would be like to have a hassle-free holiday.

Trip to the shop. We get a 10% discount as we have accrued loyalty points over the years, but as we haven’t left the EU on this cruise, there is VAT on everything. So we put everything back. When we go to Norway, we’ll leave the EU and everything in the shop will be 20% cheaper! You couldn’t make it up. So silly. Quiz and bed. We lost on the tie-break, which is a good thing, because it means we don’t have to drink/ carry home the foul liquid known officially as P&O red, white or rose. Frankly, I wouldn’t polish the silver with it.

And so another cruise ends. We’re not going to do any more short ones. What a hassle. By the time you’ve settled in, it’s time to go home again. Three weeks til the next one, so watch this space.

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Characters / Amsterdam Day 2 / Grand Eventure Day 2ish

The story of any cruise holiday is made up in no small part by the characters you meet.

Today, in the pool, I met a slightly mad Scottish lady called Edith. We discussed the various pros and cons of a variety of different ships and lines and places we had visited. She came to have a nose at my single cabin, which is causing quite a stir – there are only two and they have only just been put in – she is not my first tour group! She travels with a bear called Barnaby. He is larger than other such ursine companions of people I have met previously. He doesn’t cancel out the single person fare uplift, though, so we promised to spend our futures fighting for the single cabins on every cruise. He looked very smart in his shorts and t-shirt.

The pool, incidentally, was FREEZING. I got two thirds the way down the ladder before I realised I couldn’t feel my feet any more, by which point I thought, “Oh well, I’m committed now” and continued downwards. It wasn’t long, however, before I was instead thinking, “I should be committed”, because it got no warmer once you were immersed, so I did 12 lengths and a bit of a chat and then got out as sharpish as one can with wet feet that are rapidly losing all sensation.

Tonight was the only formal night of the cruise – a gala party with free booze and nibbles and a speech by a relatively senior officer (usually the Captain or Staff Captain, but today the Executive Purser or, as he described himself, the Second Reserve, as the proper bods were busy steering us back through the canal to the North Sea). Said party is just before dinner, which was a Heritage Dinner, with old-fashioned menus in old-fashioned fonts and a glass of free bubbles to toast to the next 175 years. Another speech, more stultifying than the last, as it was clearly drafted by Southampton to be read out on all the ships at once; no other reason why I would be yawning my head off at 6pm. Bumped into Edith and Barnaby. Edith had a lovely red dress on and Barnaby had a full formal wear outfit, complete with kilt, sporran, little boots and proper hat and everything. He looked very smart indeed.

The people on our table are lovely, which is nice. It’s only two nights, but that could feel like a very long period of time if they had been ghastly. They are Alison, Dorothy, Kathleen and Linda. Alison is Linda’s daughter and Dorothy is Kathleen’s daughter. Linda’s husband can’t travel as he was diagnosed with Motor Neurone disease last November and it is progressing very fast. Linda is a joy and she was next to me, so we had a great time. The food was a bit over-fancy – when P&O try too hard, they really try too hard – but it was edible and Alison said the ham was perfect and my roast beef was excellent.

Alison was sad that she hadn’t been able to have the beef. She was under the impression you had to share one between two. It wasn’t Chateaubriand by any means, so it took us a second to realise what had happened. The menu had been sub-divided into sections: entree, sorbet, etc. and she had seen “Joint” next to the beef, and assumed it meant you had to share it! Raised a bit of a giggle, that did.

Disconcertingly, there is a woman at the table next to us with one of the most disturbing digestive conditions I have ever come across. At least three times during the meal, she coughed and spluttered and then produced a cough/burp so loud, deep and long that everyone in the restaurant (about 300-400 people) stopped talking and turned around. It must be very embarrassing for her, but it sounded bloody disgusting at the next table. Seriously, a foghorn comparison would not be unkind. It was an atrocious noise.

I think I’m coming down with a cold. I have that sore feeling at the back of my nose and throat. I have gargled with Listerine but I think it’s too late.

Today was Amsterdam day two. It wasn’t as hot and sunny as yesterday, but it was still very warm and as it was overcast, it was mad humid. You could barely breathe. It was like Singapore. Silly humidity. We went to C&A and shopped the sale til we could pretty much carry no more. They have a cafe inside which served us with a perfectly adequate light lunch. We then wandered back towards the station in the sunshine. Dad was trying to find a cheese shop marked on the map and after I had put us on the correct road, despite his protestations, we found it, only to find they had never heard of what they wanted – they only know the stuff they make themselves on the premises. Seems like a pretty rubbish sort of cheese shop that hasn’t heard of any cheese except its own. I wouldn’t walk into H&M and expect that they had never heard of C&A!

The humidity was getting to all of us, so we stopped at a good but rather pricey creperie, for sugar and lemon yumminess before weaving our way carefully across the four million lines of traffic (bikes, island, cars, island, tramlines going both ways, island, cars, island, bikes, pavement) between us and the rather spectacularly beautiful train station, where we grabbed a cab back to the ship.

Not only did we not need our passports today, there was no one at all in the terminal, except the souvenir sellers, so we couldn’t even bend anyone’s ear about the behaviour yesterday. Cunning.

So, all in all, I still don’t like Amsterdam. C&A Centruum is marvellous, don’t get me wrong, but the rest of the place I can take or leave. I’m sure others will have a wonderful time here, but it’s not a place I will rush back to. Meh.

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Grand Eventure – Day 1 Amsterdam

DISCLAIMER: Everyone is entitled to their opinion on any topic. These are mine. I do not expect you to agree with all of them. Neither do I expect to be taken to task for expressing them. If you don’t agree, fine. But it’s not your blog, is it? It’s mine, so it’s my opinions you’re going to get. 😉 If you’re wondering why I feel the need to stress this at this point, on the 125th posting on this blog (happy anniversary, me), it may become clear as you read on, but, as a starting point, I don’t much like Amsterdam. 😉

Woke at 10, which seems quite civilised. I am on holiday, doncha know? *insert vociferous head nodding here*.

Got up at 11. Well, no rush. Am currently reading ‘Thinking, Fast and Slow’ by Daniel Kahneman. Review to follow.

Well, they’ve found the Higgs Boson. Huzzah. Watched the news people trying to get all excited about something even I don’t understand, and I’ve done a bit of astronomy and quantum physics and stuff. Sort of. For those looking at me blankly, the theory is that no particle has mass unless the Higgs gives it mass. Don’t ask me how, but that’s my impression of what it is. So if an atom has no mass, it has no pull to drag it towards or bind it to any other atoms, which means no sticking together to form bigger stuff which means no stuff at all. No planets, no people, no stars, no McDonalds, nothing. So the Higgs is really rather important. Assuming all the other assumptions are correct of course… ahem… Anyway, they’ve found it, which is the important bit and now they can study it and the Europeans beat the Americans and everyone is mighty relieved that we didn’t destroy the archaeology of three entire countries for nothing. So phew. And someone at the BBC deserves a prize for the headline caption: Mass Higgsteria. No, really, take a bow, that’s beautiful.

Went up onto deck in shorts and t-shirt. Warm and sunny. Lovely. Read for a bit and then eventually located parents for lunch. Oddly, it seemed like the ship stopped moving just when I left my cabin. Turns out we were in a lock. Who knew? During lunch, the captain tannoyed us to explain not to get too excited, it would take us another two hours to get through the canal to Amsterdam and moor up and stuff, so the 3pm ETA remains intact. Okey dokey. Back down to cabin for proposed nap which turned into yelling at HardTalk on the telly. Niall Whathisname, who clearly knows not one jot about either banking or human nature, saying there is too MUCH regulation in the banking sector but refusing to explain how he thinks it should be done/would be done if he ruled the world. Rather a waste of camera time, all in all, except we all got to see what an ignorant, pompous, opinionated yet ill-informed divot he is. Which was nice.

At 3pm, the Captain tannoyed time to go ashore and everyone did. At once. Eighteen hundred people. One gangplank (Netherlands immigration insisted, allegedly).

They then demanded passports, which meant several of us were sent back. Now, firstly, this is Europe, so strictly speaking I don’t have to show anything at all, that’s the whole POINT of Europe, and secondly, a photographic driving licence is valid Government-issued ID and should be acceptable. Oh no, not this bitch. Lots of people gathered around the ship’s head of security to yell at him, but it wasn’t his fault, so I just went off again and snapped at the immigration bitch, whose fault it actually was. She just said “Rules are rules”. Pay attention, this is important. This is not the last such behaviour we will encounter along these lines. Officious seems to be a much-admired personality trait in Amsterdam.

Taxi waiting outside. Nice touch, missing in many ports. Although a shuttle bus would have been nice, P&O. Ahem. Went to Rijksmuseum – dad had booked tickets on the internet last week. Strolled in, strolled around, nowhere to sit for the first few rooms – naughty. Had a sit, lost mum and dad. Strolled at own speed through The Night Watch (definitely not allowed to sit in here, got to keep the crowd moving!) and into the shop, where I did my Thing. Oh yes. Can’t beat a museum shop. Even in a country you hate and have no intention of ever returning to. Oh, didn’t I mention this? Right, short digression time.

Last time I was in Amsterdam, which was my first ever visit, I was dipped. I, a Londoner, born and bred, who have lived in a crime-filled city all my days, never so much as a glare from the criminal underclasses, am in Amsterdam for less than 24 hours before someone helps themselves to my wallet. So the first time in my life I ever set foot in a police station, it’s a Dutch one. Next day, queuing for the Anne Frank House, get a phone call on my mobile from a frantic parent. He has just had a phone call from a random stranger in Amsterdam to say he has found the contents of my wallet by the side of a canal. Have I thrown myself in? Erm, no. So got the stuff back (not the cash, obviously), but the cards were already cancelled and the hatred of the city was already firmly in place.

So there’s the background. Now, add in the officious immigration bitch, who has just blown it completely for Amsterdam – you only ever get two chances from me, sorry. I am in a Bad Mood. I’m hot because I changed out of my shorts into long jeans only to find it was over 80 in the shade ashore and now I’m in a museum with virtually no seating. I am not the cheeriest of souls right now, shopping notwithstanding.

So, anyway, the Rijksmuseum e-ticket says if you eat or drink at the Cobra cafe, you get a discount if you show your e-ticket. Very nice. So out we go. We hand back the chair we borrowed for mum and the man says, ‘nip out the side gate and the cafe is round on the left’. So out the door we go. There is another security man at the gate, which is open. We try to walk out of it. He stops us and says we have to walk 100 yards to the right, go out the main gate and walk back 100 yards along the pavement before we can go left. We can’t go through this gate, they’re doing deliveries. Go on, guess how I reacted. Bearing in mind that other people are blithely walking through this gate while he is gesticulating at us. I point out, surprisingly calmly, for me, that my mother walks with a stick and I will be going through him before I am making her walk the long way round. He folds immediately and waves us through.

Now, there is a lesson here, which will stand us in good stead for the rest of the day. Everyone in Amsterdam is unnecessarily officious. But if you argue, they always fold immediately and without further ado. Take note, this may come in handy if you ever come here.

So we go to the cafe. It is next to a little pond and I wish I still had my shorts on because everyone is paddling due to the very intense heat. We sit and order two cokes and a lemonade. Well, I summarise. We get ignored for about a quarter of an hour, then told we can’t sit there and THEN we order two diet cokes and a lemonade. They have a private party coming. We can drink our drinks outside but not inside. Despite the fact that there are at least six tables currently occupied by a Japanese coach party, who I am pretty sure are not the intended party people either. More officious for the sake of it. So we move outside, drink our drinks and leave as hastily as possible. Why would we want to give our money to people who so blatantly don’t want it?!

We grab a cab back to Dam Square and Dad is feeling nostalgic so we pop into the Hotel Krasnopolsky for a cup of tea and to use their undoubtedly lovely loos. Dad stayed here about 50 years ago with his mum and his brother. So we order drinks, served by a lovely man, and we notice that the food would suit us dinner-wise. It is 6pm. Would you mind if we wasted some time and then ate here? Of course not, they’d be delighted. The tea was not to mum’s liking, so she used her own teabag and sweetener – using only the hot water and a drop of milk provided by the nice man. Are you taking notes? Good. There is a quiz at the end. We have a superb meal, of several courses, which costs about the same as a snack at the De Vere but leaves us fit to bust. For the fact fans, we had one tomato soup, one salade niçoise, one vegetable lasagne and one Waygu burger, several soft drinks and one chocolate mousse. I’ll leave you to work out who ate what. When the bill came, they had charged mum for tea, despite the water and milk thing. When we pointed this out, the nice man backed down but not nearly as immediately or as graciously as he could have done. Rules is rules, remember? But if a glass of water is free, why isn’t a cup of hot water?

So, we’ve had the immigration lady, the museum gate man, the cafe that would only serve us if we sat in certain seats and now tea that you have to pay for even if you use your own teabag. Like I said, we had a nice day, but the officiousness and the sheer bloody-mindedness is now starting to wear somewhat thin. So 10pm, back to the ship.

Now, I am aware that, hating Amsterdam with a firey passion already, as I do, I may be a little biased, hence the disclaimer at the outset, but even Dad agreed that the attitude was started to wear on him somewhat too. And we all know how lovely and patient and put up with anything he is.

So tomorrow, is Amsterdam’s Very Last Chance. We are going off in the morning to shop at C&A. There is a 60% sale on, we’ve checked. And I really don’t care who we have to hurt to do so. I am on a mission – particularly as the Calais branch has left me empty-handed twice this year – and I will not be putting up with any bloody-minded officiousness from anybody, whoever they may think they are.

Watch this space. This could get messy.

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Grand Eventure Day 0

Well, Dad says Oriana arrived at 5am. I’ll take his word for it. We can see Oriana, Aurora, Arcadia and Ventura all lined up from our bedroom windows. From elsewhere in the hotel, you can also see Azura, Adonia and Oceana lined up on the other side of the quay. P&O have posted arial photos showing all seven in one photo on their Facebook page already. It is very misty and grey, which is a shame, because the photos are a bit vague. But the weather forecast is for it to rain all day and all night, so it’s going to be a challenge all day to get decent photos.

We went to dinner about 8.40am which was wise, because by 9 there was a significant queue building up. The breakfast buffet was very impressive indeed – cold meats and cheeses and smoked salmon (?!), black pudding, mushrooms, beans, etc., eggs fried in front of you by a chef with a frying pan full of oil, poached on request, and various fruits, juices, cereals and croissanty stuff. There is a do-it-yourself toaster, which although laborious and somewhat tiresome for the waiting, does at least ensure your toast arrives on your plate hot, rather than being delivered to your table tepid at best and quasi-refrigerated at worst.

Most people in the hotel are on the ships, so there is always someone to chat to. Dad and I went for a wander after breakfast, to try and find a good view. There isn’t one. We were just about to give up, when we bumped into a gentleman on the Ventura who took us out onto the fire escape (which he found the night before last when the whole hotel was evacuated at 2am and six fire engines turned up to try and find the problem), which was a sort of greenhousey area on the roof. Great views to both sides of the hotel, so of all seven ships, albeit in two photos, rather than one. Being in between the two mooring areas was always going to make photography tricky! Then, as we were heading back indoors, I spotted that one of the doors had been wedged open, so we went out on the roof and got proper pictures with no glass and raindrops in the way. Heaven knows how many rules we broke, plodding across the pebbles on the roof (not that many, probably, as there were deckchairs lined up, presumably for staff to use!), but very enjoyable, and that frisson of feeling a bit naughty, and going somewhere we probably shouldn’t, was nice too.
And then the waiting began. First the waiting and dozing in the rooms and then the waiting and drinking caffeine in the lounge area. Checkout of the rooms is 11am but the shuttle buses aren’t collecting us til 12.30, so everyone is a bit lost, wandering around like spare parts or desperately eking out yet another very expensive coffee (£3.50 for ordinary decaff, two quid for a diet coke) to while away the time. It’s sort of like disembarkation but in reverse. Instead of sitting around like lemons waiting to get off the ship, we are sitting around like lemons waiting to get on. Rumour has it, the Princess Royal and all the seven Captains will be having lunch on the Oriana, but I’m guessing they’ll be in the Captain’s dining room, not in with us proles.

Much, much later…

It’s half midnight. Well, to you, half eleven, but we’re losing an hour overnight. Like we’re not shattered enough. The shuttle bus materialised eventually and shuttled us such a short distance, we could have walked it, even with hand luggage. We boarded at Gate 101, which has a lovely stone entrance arch, on which are listed all seven ships. It took me a second to grasp it, but they are listed in AGE order, so Oriana first and Adonia last. Wow, brain ache. We did the usual dance you do, whether boarding a plane or a ship or a sneeze – passport, ticket, photo taken, boarding pass, scanner, metal detector, blah blah, and then, just to top it off, a walk of well over half a mile down an airbridge folded back on itself. Which is unnecessary and unkind. So to the cabin and collapse.

I have one of the newest cabins on the ship. They banned kids and removed the entire area of the ship which had been sealed off for brats only (this is not a generalisation, this is a specific and choicely chosen epithet)(they had their own play rooms, toilets, ball room (that’s a room full of balls, not a dance floor, a disco and a room entirely devoted to four Wiis), and turned it into cabins, including two SINGLE cabins. No single person 70% uplift here, because I’m no longer taking up a room designed for two. Hah! The cabin is lovely. With a wide bed, LOADS of drawers and cupboards and a wetroom-style shower. Superb.

Met parents for a very late lunch (half two?!) in the Conservatory, which has been refurbished. New furniture, somewhat dodgy new carpet but, more joyously, they have replaced the blown double glazing panels, so you can now see out the windows. Food (bang your hand on the new sneeze guards which are too low), drink (prices have escalated rather and now mirror the De Vere in exorbitant-ness), cabin, NAP. Absolutely worn to shreds. Slept an hour and a half.

Tried to go for a walk, but discovered one third of the ship, including four lifts (FOUR?!), cordoned off for HRH. V. annoying and v. tiresome.

Went to muster. This is where they explain what will happen in an emergency – what they do and what we are supposed to do. You are supposed to take your lifejacket from your cabin when you go. They are now taking it all VERY seriously (Costa Concordia) and get quite arsey with those who do not conform. The girl next to me refused to practice putting on her lifejacket and accused the staff member of talking to her like a child. She has a point, frankly. Particularly on this cruise, everyone has cruised before and we are all perfectly capable of watching a demonstration of putting the thing over our heads and closing the Velcro and wrapping the belt around ourselves, without needing to get up and have a go. The whole thing is both ludicrous and patronising, but they use the excuse that they need to check your lifejacket isn’t faulty. So when we are asked to put them on our beds for a fortnightly inspection, you don’t check them then, you just look at them and walk away, do you? I didn’t have mine with me, cos I was far too shattered to walk to the other end of the ship to get it, so I got a jolly good telling off too. But for these people, they get bossed about and abused all day every day by rude passengers. This is their moment of power. Go for it, get it out your system. No skin off my nose. I know you’re being an idiot and you know I know you’re being an idiot. And you know as well as I do that if there was a genuine emergency, I would handle the situation better than you, because I’ve done it for real, whereas you haven’t. So chill, really. Get over yourselves.

Anyway, out on deck for a glass of free shampoo and a streamer. Sailaway in the drizzle. Marvellous. Each of the seven ships hooted its whistle and pulled out in turn, with a confetti blower on the quayside and a small brass band running from one ship to the next to play us out. Threw streamer when ordered to do so. P&O colours – red, blue, yellow and white. Very pretty. Passed through a flotilla of about a hundred or so little boats that had come out in Southampton Water to see us. Escorted by police boats with blue flashing lights and several hundred people along the banks as well, flashes blinking in the mizzle. They must have been FREEZING. The mist made taking photos very tricky. I hope the “professionals” had more luck. I won’t upload here until I’ve seen their offerings tomorrow. Better pics will take priority over personal pride! The Red Arrows didn’t show up because the weather was too rubbish, but the fireworks barge had a separate little display for each ship as it passed. Once out in the Solent, past Portsmouth, we all (that’s all seven ships) sang Rule Britannia at the tops of our lungs and then we went our separate ways.

Eventually gave up and went inside for dinner. Was delighted to find Anne and Enid are here. They were with us last year on Arcadia (in fact, they’ve been on most of the cruises we have been on!) but they booked too late (although only days after we did) and were told they were 63rd on the waiting list to get on this cruise. But a few weeks ago, they got the phone call and here they are! Had a very pleasant meal, despite the somewhat recalcitrant waiter and the desperate lack of water glass refills. We chatted for four hours, including some significant chunks of reminiscing about Los Angeles immigration. Then mum went to bed and we (me, Dad, Enid and Anne) went to Tiffanys bar for a couple more drinks to the tune of some of the loudest and most strident piano playing ever heard, before we, too, called it a night.

And then I lost an hour. So it is now twenty to one and I really did ought to go to bed! Gnight. That, ladies and gentlemen, was the Grand Event. 175 years you waited for that. I do hope it was worth it.