Final post

Thursday August 19th 2010

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At Sea.

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It is with a sad heart that I have to say this will be my last blog entry. I just received word from Jolene, that my Mum passed away last night, she had a heart attack over the weekend and passed peacefully at 1900h Wednesday evening.

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We'd had our ups and downs over the years but I loved her and I'm sitting here feeling a bit lost. She is at peace now and hopefully reunited with Dad.

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Thanks for following us on our journey, just cant wait to get home now.

Tony

Corner Brook Newfoundland

Corner Brook Newfoundland.

We had a great day here, it's a beautiful part of our country and strange but true, closer to the UK than it is to Calgary.

This will be short, I'm tired after a busy morning sightseeing and moving cabins "yet again". We have a day at sea tomorrow, I look forward to that. This is the third attempt at writing the blog tonight, and I've somehow managed to delete the two previous attempts while trying to copy and paste. #&#@*&

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Friday we'll be in Bar Harbor Maine, our final port before arriving in Boston, It's been an excellent trip but we are ready to go home.

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Toodle loo for now.

St Anthony Newfoundland

St Anthony Newfoundland….

Had a rude awakening this morning after a great nights sleep, it's 0800, our coffee just arrived and the captain announced that we were lowering the tenders already. I'd slept right through. All I can see from our cabin are rugged green hills and a few low lying buildings. We're told it's a pretty little place so we're looking forward to going ashore.

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We'll go to the dining room for breakfast and let the hoards push and shove for their tender tickets. The lady who hands them out threatened to call security if the pushing didn't stop at our call in Greenland on Sunday, that cured the rudeness in a hurry, but some twit reported her for being insolent, we and others came to her rescue though and Dorothy drafted a letter to the captain with signatures telling how it really went down.

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The tenders were late leaving the ship due to a heavy swell making it dangerous to step from ship to life boat, the Maasdam then moved closer to the harbor entrance where there was less swell, making it a short tender ride. Had there been any wind we would have had to miss this call, so we were indeed lucky.

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St. Anthony is a fishing village, hit hard by the moratorium on fishing, we had hoped to book a whale watching and iceberg tour but darn it, Holland America had booked every available boat. The weather is awesome though so we walked around the town chatting to the locals and that was fun. Dorothy wanted to check out the shopping so I left her to it and headed for the tender dock and back to the ship.

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It was a reminder of home to see the RCMP and a Tim Hortons coffee shop, also the "Newfy" dialect which we hear a lot of in Alberta

as many Newfoundlanders work on the oil rigs and tar sands. I had conversations with at least three who had sons living and working in Calgary and it's environs.

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After our time ashore, we had lunch and went to our cabin where the carpet was wet and bumpy just as it was last week when they'd shampooed it. I had my nap, woke up and found it was wetter and bumpier, "My god I thought, we're sinking". Called the front desk who responded right away, seems that we'd sprung a leak in the wall, our cabin and the one next door were flooding. Two pieces of luggage under the bed were soaking, Dorothy's slippers were drenched and it's very squelchy.

There was much apologizing from the hotel manager on down through the ranks, and a temporary move for tonight.

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We had just finished dinner when a humpback whale breached and entertained us for a few minutes off the aft end, as our table is right by the window we had an excellent view. You'll all be pleased to know that I had fruit plate for dessert, see, I knew I could do it :)

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So here we are in our temp. quarters, at the port side on Promenade deck, Dorothy's gone to the show and I'm calming myself after all the excitement. The staff are bending over backwards for us, all rather embarrassing, I mean these things happen. I'm glad they had another cabin though, I just went to retrieve some things and it's a real mess in there.

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To be continued.

Monday August 16th.

We awoke this morning and looking out saw a blanket of thick fog, with the drone of the fog horn alerting any shipping of our position. As I stood at the rail at the aft end, I couldn't help thinking, that "this is the stuff of "Agatha Christie Novels" …

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I feel a lazy day coming on and I'm quite happy chatting or listening or reading. I love the sanctuary of our cabin and do my best thinking there alone or at the rail. I'm preparing mentally for leaving the ship, new friends and come Saturday I'll be anxious to get home.

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Our cabin boys are busy cleaning, I'm sitting here on a couch facing the escalator composing the blog, when a gentleman I've not seen before stops and says "hi, where are you from?" I tell him Calgary, he says "I'm from South Carolina" and the next thing we're talking hockey and now I'm late for a meeting with our cruise group. That's life on sea days, if I don't make the meeting, no big deal, there's always another one.

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The Grand Show Buffet was held in the Rotterdam dining room at 1130h. featuring ice, vegetable cheese and fruit carvings. There's an awful lot of work goes into this, by a group of very talented chefs and cooks. I took a couple of photos from the upper dining room, it was crowded down there so we went up to the Lido for lunch leaving others to devour the delectable delights of the buffet.

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We sailed out of the Danish Straights I believe, off the coast of Greenland and into Canadian territorial waters , the fog lifted and It's blue sky and sunshine now but a chill wind whipping across the decks. The temperature is 14c but feels a lot colder. I let the wind blow the cobwebs away, went in to read and fell asleep book in hand. After an hour I woke up, had a shower and read some more, I'm half way through my fifth book and feel fairly relaxed, for me that is.

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Where has this day gone? Seems like we just had breakfast and now it's time for dinner…... After dinner our travel agency hosted a cocktail hour in the Crows Nest, the hotel manager and the cruise director were there with the usual blah blah blah, there were 113 in our group, it was quite noisy (free booze) so I said my goodnights and came to the cabin, Dorothy went to the show, but showed up about 20 minutes later, she was not impressed with the singer.

Tomorrow St. Anthony's NFLD, I wonder if they named it after me :)!

Saturday PM

I'm glad I was able to capture some satellite signal this morning, the further toward

Greenland we go, the more fickle it seems to be. Sometimes I can get logged in only to find the e mail or blog site won't come up and by the time it becomes obvious that "It aint gonna happen" I've used up more minutes.

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We're into fog again with rain, winds and the high only 14c, there's a moderate swell and in all a typical North Atlantic experience. We expect this for the next few days which will make our call tomorrow in, Southern Greenland, "interesting"! I stood at the rail gazing at the fog for a while, the wind messed up my hair do, shucks and it's formal again tonight. :)

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There's plenty going on around the ship but after lunch I came down to the cabin for some quiet time, read my book (just started my fifth) had a nap and will try to stay awake for the Officers Black & White Ball which doesn't start till 2230h, way past my bed time.

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Nanortalik means "Land of the Polar bears" in the Inuit language, the bears arrive on ice floes but great care is taken to keep them from visiting. The port (although we'll be tendering) was first established in 1797 as a whaling and sealing station.

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We are hoping for two reasons that the weather will brighten, #1 it's very scenic we're told and the fjords sheer walls, spectacular. At the upper end of the 45 mile inlet, the Tasermiut glacier is said to be an impressive sight.

#2, in clear weather the Northern lights are visible but are at their best between late August and April. Perhaps we'll get lucky but what ever, it'll mean another pin on our world map.

1730h. 15 minutes till early seating, we're all spiffed up so me and Mrs. Toe are just about ready to go. There'll be one more formal before we leave the ship, probably next Thursday.

Dinner was great again, Dorothy had beef tenderloin, I had the surf n turf. Some had Icelandic cod, it was good too. Dorothy had raspberry sundae but I forget what I had! :)

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The fog rolled in and out at dinner and the ship became quite wobbly, the wobbliest it's been for the whole cruise. Walking back to our cabin, everyone had a sailors gait, it will be interesting to see what happens at the black and white ball, Dorothy has taken off her heels and I don't blame her. The show room is at the prow or pointy end, it will be very wobbly there, wobbly plus bubbly should make for an interesting evening, I think I'll take the camera.

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Last night we put the clocks back an hour and we do the same again tonight, Toe is a happy man.

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Sunday August 15th. Nanortalik Greenland.

We ended up missing last nights shindig. Dorothy was too tired, as was I, we were rocked to sleep by the motion of the ocean and when we awoke it was still very foggy. It was cold and windy until about 45 minutes before our arrival, then it suddenly cleared and was sunny all day. The Inuit again were very friendly and happy to sea the ship come in, it helps their economy and they were ready with signs all over making us welcome.

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The first tender left at just after 1015h. It was about a 15 minute ride to the harbor and the local kids were all at the pier side welcoming us to their little town. The captain mentioned that we'd been dodging icebergs all night and there was one huge one and a number of smaller ones not too far from where we dropped anchor.

We spent a couple of hours wandering around town saying hello and explaining where we were from, this was the best weather they'd had in the last three weeks so we lucked out again. After that we tendered back to the ship and enjoyed the seafood buffet lunch they'd prepared on Lido out by the pool. There were crabs legs, oysters, scallops, shrimp and a whole lot of other foods, we were spoiled for choice and it was really good.

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The anchor was weighed at 1700h and we're headed for Newfoundland, less than 15 minutes after we moved out we were in thick fog again, the people in the suites will no doubt hear the fog horn throughout the night. I will not bore you with dinner details other than to say it was great.

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No show for Toe, I'm going to have another lazy evening, reading and hopefully getting the blog sent, we can't see the glacier due to the fog and I suspect there'll be no Northern Lights display either, it's all rather eerie out there, I love it……...

Reykjavik days one and two

Thursday August 12th.

Good morning, we have just arrived at the pier in Reykjavik, to grey skies and

rain, with our tour not leaving till 0900h we had time for breakfast in the dining room.

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What a contrast to yesterday (weather wise) but we can sing in the rain, no problem. Our tour left at the appointed hour, first. We visited a heritage settlement where homes, churches etc. had been relocated, and opened to the public to show how life was back then.

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We were surprised to learn that the temp. in winter does not get much below freezing but they do get wind storms which can make life a tad difficult. We saw more sod roofs and houses with special entrances for the sheep to come in at night or during inclement weather. I distinctly remember seeing similar at a heritage site in Wales except without the grass roofs. I can't begin to imagine what life was like under those conditions, although sleeping with the sheep may gave been fun if one was on the outs with the Mrs. :)

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Reykjavik which means (hazy inlet) due to the geothermal steam is the capital, it's a modern city and looks much larger than one would expect for a city of only 170,000 inhabitants. Iceland has been hit hard by the current economic times and like other countries is suffering major belt tightening. I saw tee shirts with

"Don't *%&# with Iceland, we have no cash but plenty of ash" and a volcano spewing ash silk screened on the front.

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No doubt a money maker for someone with an entrepreneurial spirit!

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Next was the museum showing prehistoric and Viking artifacts, complete with skeletal remains, where DNA has been extracted from teeth and is believed to

date back to the evolution of mankind. A display of more recent implements like razors and hair clippers, made me feel old as I remember them from when I was a boy.

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Tonight Icelandic performers will come aboard for a show at 2100h, while tomorrow we are going to the thermal waters and (Blaa Lonid) the blue lagoon. We leave at 0800h :( After dinner we were in the crows nest for an hour before the Icelandic group came aboard, I left Dorothy with our table mates to see the show while I came down to put this together.

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It was great having internet available on the quayside, I was able to get a few overdue emails away, and post a short message to my ostomy group. It seemed so fast compared to the satellite I've been used to for the past month. I found the mouse awkward at first as I've been using the touch pad on the net book and my fingers got confused.

Friday August 13th.

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Good morning Vietnam! Oops wrong year wrong ship….

I was up at 0545h and my butt is dragging, "still", sleep did not come easy, hey ho, at least I'm on vacation. No need to rush, our tour doesn't leave till 0800h. Cereal and yogurt, a nice cup of hot water and I'm raring to go back to bed :)

The rain is pouring down, I can barely see across the harbor for the mist and I'm wondering if there'll be any "Kodak" moments today. Ed our table mate who has taken the VOV cruise each of the last four years says our tour today is very picturesque, we'll have to wait n see, and if not this time, what better excuse than to take it another time.

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It continued to teem down for most of the morning making photography rather difficult, and once off the paved road it was quite a bumpy ride. We arrived at the geothermal lava fields passing the electricity generating and treatment plant, and the pipeline that carries thermal heated water to homes and industry to Reykjavik. It was interesting to see the bubbling mud and steam rising eerily out of the fissures. The lava fields, some smooth others huge piles of black craggy boulders looking more like the surface of the moon than planet earth.

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Next stop, the blue lagoon where many were bathing in the warm, mineral rich waters, we had coffee and Icelandic cakes, no icing though. The gift shop had the usual assortment of tourist "stuff" and skin products made from the minerals, all at highly inflated prices.

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Our last stop was another Viking museum featuring a full size replica of the ship that sailed to Newfoundland in Y2K celebrating the new millennium and to prove that Vikings were indeed the early discoverers of North America. We were a bedraggled looking bunch as we boarded the bus to head back to the ship but the sun came out, the mist cleared giving us the view that we'd missed this morning.

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1500h. Everyone made it back to the ship in time for our sail away, It's full speed ahead in order to make Greenland, our next stop….

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Tonight there will be a luau in the Crows Nest, a show in the Rembrandt lounge and as every night, the adagio string quartet from Canada playing in the Explorers lounge. If one prefers to watch a movie there's always a current one showing in the

Wajang theater and a whole bunch of other things to do if one is so inclined.

Tonight we gain another hour which our bodies will thank them for, personally I've never had so much trouble with my body clock adapting, I've done lot's of walking and stair climbing, I get really tired but even with my sleeping pill have trouble sleeping.

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Dinner was really good tonight, fresh Icelandic haddock was our choice and it was excellent. I skipped lunch so didn't feel the least bit guilty ordering the hazelnut mousse "a la mode", Dorothy did her best to shame me though by ordering sorbet, but it didn't work :)

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Saturday August 14th.

Good morning once again dear ones, with the extra hour and my pill I slept through the night and felt well rested when I woke at 0700h. Dorothy was already gone, doing her laps on lower promenade, we'd decided to have breakfast in our cabin and with perfect timing both Dorothy and breakfast arrived at the same time.

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To be continued.

Heimaey Iceland

I had an awful night and felt like I'd been dragged through a hedge backwards when our steward delivered the coffee. Once my feet hit the deck and I'd completed my morning routine I felt a bit better, Dorothy did her 10 laps then we went to the Lido for breakfast.

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After breakfast and after our room had been serviced I tried catching up with a nap but to no avail so checked out the Explorations lounge and had a go at today's Sudoku. Big mistake, I drove myself mental for about an hour and was happy to see some of our group show up for a chin wag. After that I found a quiet corner and read for a bit, I'm well into my forth book now. My eyes were getting heavy so back down to the cabin I go but as soon as my head hit the pillow, the committee who hold regular meetings in my head were going at it gangbusters, I tried not to get involved but nary a wink did I get, then Dorothy, who'd attended the talk on Greenland came by to tell me it was lunch time already.

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We could see the Icelandic mountains from our lunch table, and watched a school of Minke whales showing off about 50 yards to starboard. We went out on deck for a better view, and watched their antics till they tired of being the main attraction and swam away.

Now we’ve arrived at Heimaey where we can see the two volcanoes Eldfell and Helgafell. Eldfell last erupted in the 70's and added two square miles of new land albeit black volcanic lava in contrast to the green of the mountains adjacent to it. We are told that the people of Heimaey are the friendliest of all Icelanders, it is so isolated and gets very few visitors, the harbor is small so only small vessels and ferries can enter the narrow entrance.

The Maasdam has drifted as close as local regulations allow, we'll be tendering in but can't drop anchor for fear of damaging under sea cables and cutting of power to the town. The ship will stay in place using it's thrusters and screws thus giving a shorter tender ride.

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This port is a first for Maasdam, and Holland America for that matter. The queue for tender tickets was a mile long so we waited until what we thought would be a good time to go. Well what a dogs breakfast that was, the Rembrandt lounge where the tickets were handed out was a zoo we finally got our tickets and waited for our number to be called.

It was 1450h when we entered the lounge and 1605h when we decided not to go. Had we gone we would have had very little time there, and then queue up to come back :( It was a hard decision but the right one we felt, at least we saw the whales and took some pics. Those who went ashore enjoyed their visit.

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Perhaps you'll remember the movie, "Free Willy"? Keiko the whale was the star and lived for a while in the Heimaey harbor until he was ready to be released back into the wild. It really is a beautiful area, the ocean a lovely shade of green and with it being such a glorious day, if we hadn't know better it could have been the South Pacific. The air is so clean and the mountains thrust up out of the sea, their sharp green edges etched in a blue sky.

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Barb, our travel guide informed us that the Puffin colony is watched over by the locals, who created a sanctuary for injured Puffins some affected by oil and other contaminants that occasionally wash up on the shores of this little island. She also said that Puffin is a delicacy that the islanders feast on from time to time! Imagine, a Puffin muffin for breakfast.

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The dining room was not too busy at early seating, most passengers were still ashore. We could see a small passenger vessel docked there, it had to be small as it was too shallow for Maasdam and she's not a big ship. Our captain did mention that in another life she was named the Stockholm who infamously hit and sank the Andrea Doria, just out of New York in 1956 with a loss of 46 passengers.

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It is only a hundred and a bit miles to Reykjavik where we'll overnight tomorrow, we left Heimaey on time and will inch our way there, I guess.

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Time to see if we have satellite connection! Grrrrrrr Will try later

hooray i have satellite