Perhaps the final word

I say perhaps because I’ll probably think of something later. I am talkative in case you haven’t figured it out…

We are so grateful for this opportunity. The timing couldn’t have been more perfect. Neesh was amazing at walking around for miles, and even built up some leg strength. She was in far less pain than usual, so two resolutions came out of this. One, more walking, and two, less housework. We’ll see how that goes. 

I’d like to thank Steve, Paul and Bob for allowing me to take so much vacation time. I really tried to keep up with work, but with the lousy internet speeds, it was difficult. They have earned even more loyalty from me, and I will never forget their generosity.

Thanks to Steph for watching the house and more importantly, the doggies. Work on your housekeeping skills though.

It was great meeting Randy and Deen. They are wonderful people, and we felt instantly comfortable with them and shared quite a few laughs. There were some other folks we met, particularly Shel and Abra, and B.J. who were a pleasure to talk to. I wish we had a little more time to talk to all these folks.
Again, Melanie, Alvin, Erwin, Roselle and Rockin’ Roldan (aka the Hulk), thanks for the great service, and more importantly, treating us as friends.'

Thanks for reading. I didn’t particularly want a large audience, but the comments that at least a few people were enjoying it was gratifying. John & June, get your butts over to Norway!'

I was going to take a down day on Sunday, but the weather was supposed to be sunny and dry (unusual for August), so back up to the White Mountains for some hiking. Right back into the bushwhacking. Lousy route, but what a beautiful day. Back to work on Monday, surprised and nervous to find my name removed from the mailbox. Crap, they figured out they could do without me. Then one of the engineers let me know we had made the move to the first floor. My cubicle opening was completely blocked 7 feet high by packing boxes. :) Very funny, Mr. Heim! The vacation glow, usually only lasting 4 hours, went into the middle of Wednesday. Not too bad!

It’s great to know people from all different places all over the world are really all the same. Their politics or beliefs may be different, but if you take away all of our accents or the differences in how we look, we all want friendship, we want to be happy, we all laugh and cry at the same things. There’s my “deep” philosophical moment.

So life returns to normal, but I feel changed. I can’t describe it though. It feels like some level of maturity (tough to believe, I know) combined with a mellowness. We have 8 ship made DVD’s, 1231 photos and this blog of the experience to always look back on to remind us of the details of this special opportunity. We’ll take more vacations (another week long cruise planned for 10/2013), but this will always stand out as the dream of a lifetime.

Day 35–Boston, Massachusetts

Woke up before the alarm to see the final pull in to Boston, where it all began. We had reminisced with Melanie last night about how goofy we were when we first came on board to the Crow’s Nest, getting the low down on the smoking tables. I had remembered that feeling of “wow, this is neat” transforming to “this is our place!”

It had been a great vacation, but it was time to go home. They started calling out numbers, and we were something like the 4th group off. Customs was nothing. They glanced at the front of the form, and that was it. I could’ve brought back 30 cartons of cigarettes and 100 gallons of booze and they wouldn’t have cared. Not that I had room for it. The backpack and duffle were killing my shoulders, and I could already feel the nerve pinching tingles coming on. It took a bit to find the luggage, and once again coming full circle, no porters could be had. After several futile attempts I said screw it, I’d shuttle it.

Raining outside, yay. We waited under a roof for Jeff and Karen, and didn’t have too bad a wait. Home at 10:30, no flying involved. How great is that! To top it off, the sun was out. Took care of unpacking and some cleaning, and that was that. It was done.

The final view from the balcony. Bye bye!

Day 34–Bar Harbor, Maine

Here’s the welcome we got. :)

Gun from the balcony – day 34

We got in late thanks to late tours in St. John’s, and since this was the first stop in the US, we had to get our passports looked at by Immigration. The notice said wait in your room until your group is called, and do NOT queue up. We were supposed to be first because we had early tour tickets. We waited, being informed it would be about an hour late, and waited, and waited. I finally went down to see what was happening, and found no activity yet, save for a line stretching through the casino, and then through the shops. What the hell, can anyone follow instructions?

Back to the room, more waiting. After another half hour, I went down to find the line moving with no announcements made. OK, now I was pissed. This was a total cluster****. I got Neesh, and we waited in the long line, and it was clear not everyone had excursion tickets. No one was announcing that, and I was worried we were going to miss it. Turns out no tenders had left yet.

Finally get up to the officer, who simply looked at the passports, and asked stuff like where do you live. Probably just checking accents, who knows. Not terribly thorough, although they obviously had all the info. on file somewhere. He looked at my hat and said “Welcome back to Red Sox Nation. They’re still terrible.” A good laugh broke my funk.

Off to the showroom to get our tender and we were informed the tour to Acadia was being merged with the 11:15 tour. Not terribly surprised since it was 9:30, so we had to get regular tender tickets. Neesh was already sketchy about this as she wanted to walk around Bar Harbor, but I assured her we’d have time. The usual announcements that things would be moving quickly, and sure enough, not at all. Two groups in 50 minutes, and we were not even close to our tender number. I really had enjoyed nearly every aspect of Holland America, but the tendering has been flat out horrible. They finally called the tour ahead of everyone else. Phew.

Once we got ashore, we made our way to the bus to be informed it would be leaving at 11:45 instead. That was enough for Neesh, we’d skip the tour. What she didn’t realize is that we wouldn’t get reimbursed once we got ashore (turns out they did regardless – thank you Shorex dept.!).

We tooled about, and found a place for lunch with something I had been craving for days now. A meatball sub. Oh was I happy. It was good being back in the US, and I had fun telling the bartender we sailed for 34 days from Boston to come to Maine. More sampling of the local beers. Good stuff here.

More walking and shopping, including some great t-shirts (“Always bring a compass. It’s awkward when you have to eat your friends.”), more, emmmm, rest stops (glug glug glug), and after 4 hours, we were toast. We got in the tender line, and of course, the folks in front of us filled it. Hmmm, bar right there, I don’t see another tender, let’s have another drink! Against my better judgment. Of course, as soon as we got our drinks, another tender was loading. Hey, where was that thing hiding? Neesh gave me that look, you guys all know what that is. :)

Drank our drinks, got on the tender, back on the ship. I was pretty buzzed at this point, oops. Still have the final packing to do. This truly sucked, and took some time, and the dulffle bag was heavy as hell, as well as my backpack with two laptops. It was not going to be pretty tomorrow getting off the ship. That being done, my dinner consisted of chocolate ice cream, which even that didn’t sit well on my stomach. 35 days of vacation was finally catching up to me.

Still, stuff to do. We were able to find the cabin stewards easily enough, and then we headed to the Crow’s Nest to find as many of the four waiters as we could, but on the way we ran into Glen coming out of the front. I reminded him of the CD, and he said, come with me, through the emergency exit only door. I was like, wow, can we go in there, but he assured me it was ok, and off into the unknown I went. Turns out it’s all “V” cabins, for the talent. They are small, with a small single person bed, and little room for anything else (I suppose there was storage that I couldn’t see). Neat to see that. So with CD in hand, we were on the waiter hunt. A couple had been reassigned during the cruise, but I was keyed in on where they were at by now. Success. Erwin, Roselle, Roldan and Melanie all found.

Our absolute favorite was Melanie. She was finishing a 10 month contract tomorrow, and she is one hard worker. They put in 12 hours or maybe more on the ship, 7 days a week, and she said she usually doesn’t take much time off. The two months she was thinking of taking was an exception. This girl was doing everything she could to take care of her family in the Philippines, and at this point, we had talked enough about our lives to consider her our friend. We let her know all this, and traded facebook names to stay in touch.

All tasks accomplished, we hit the room and set out the luggage. Holy crap, they must be filled with lead. Dear porters, I am so sorry. Off to bed with a 6:30 alarm. Home tomorrow!

Day 33–At sea

Packing day. Yuck. Four suitcases, one garment bag. There’d be little time to do it unless I wanted to spend all of the last night taking care of it. I woke up, Neesh was tooling around the ship somewhere, and I got right going, starting with all the souvenirs and gifts. Thankfully(?), that was only about half a suitcase. It took about 4 hours, off and on, but I got it done after some prodding for Neesh to pick out what clothes she wanted. My goal was to minimize what went in the large duffle I had brought for extra space and that I’d have to carry off. Meeting that goal was looking marginal due to a bottle of liquor I’d have to carry as well as a billion hangers that were taking up a lot of space.

Another order of business was to figure out the extra tips to leave. Tipping is very personal to us. Neesh moonlighted as a cocktail waitress when she was raising 3 kids herself, and her son Corey is a bartender. We know how hard these folks work, usually getting a lot of crap or lousy tips in the process. So we started a few years ago just leaving an extra dollar with every round on top of the included 15%. The bartenders and waiters have been clearly touched by this. In addition, we always leave our favorites a chunky tip at the very end, telling them how much we appreciate them particularly. Also, our cabin stewards were excellent, so we had to leave them something too.

Today was the grand buffet for lunch out by the pool, so I took a break and we went up to see what’s what. Oh yeah, it was grand. The entire pool was surrounded by tables and tables of food. Suckling pig, grilled lobster tail (yummy!) and other grilled goodies, shrimp, desserts, stir fry, etc. etc.

The self-proclaimed Lobster Man

Piggy all dressed up for lunch

Man, Holland America knows how to do food.

I finished what packing I could and shoved what I could under the bed. With effort. We did the usual stuff, stopping in at The Mix to see Glen Pearson play the guitar. He had played us some of his CD, and it sounded excellent even through his smart phone, so I told him to bring one by tomorrow. He’s a great, funny guy, full of energy and a wit similar to mine.

Hit the sack now really just wanting to be home, but we have a stop in Bar Harbor tomorrow. First things first!

Days 31 & 32–St. John’s, Newfoundland

I considered it a blessing we weren’t due in until 5 PM, as that might mean I could actually hit some bars and not want to go to bed before 9:00. My notes said George St. was supposed to be pretty loaded, so that was the plan. Unlike missing the Barbican in Plymouth, I definitely wanted to check out this area.

Sailing in was quite scenic.

Yeah, yeah, it’s a view from the balcony

More hiking trails, but I didn’t think I’d have time to get over there. Off the ship and another Newf welcome.

Big wet dog, but I didn’t care – I got my kisses. I’ve now got Neesh convinced to get one. We started walking towards George St., and we passed a poutine roach coach (Mr. Miville, paging Mr. Miville). Stopping at a couple neat souvenir shops, I realized we had almost missed George St., and taking a right brought us to the end of it. It’s short, but it is nothing but bar after bar after bar. Well, this makes bar hopping easy!

We heard some good tunes coming from one place and went in to find it empty, save for the two bartenders that looked like they were still in high school. Another group came in, and then some dude. Neesh and I joked that all the older people went to one bar across the street, and as I was laughing at another group going over there, I looked up to see the dude looking at me, so I smiled, nodded my head and turned back to my beer. Oh, and Neesh, too. Eventually the dude comes over and leans into me and says “are you laughing at me?” in a thick accent. Oh crap. This guy’s wasted, and probably on a hair-trigger temper. My muscles tensed and I was ready for a showdown, but talked my way out of it, explaining what I was laughing at. Turns out he moved here from Quebec and hated it here. I was still extremely uneasy, and he proceeded to screw with the bartender (“watch dis, watch dis, dis will be funny, watch dis”). I turned to Neesh and said drink up. She didn’t know what was going on until I quietly whispered, “he’s wasted.” “Ohhhh!” I explained after we got the heck out of there. Sheesh.

Off to get some food now that we finally found a spot in the Yellowbelly brewery. Pizza was excellent, wheat beer was mediocre. Should’ve gotten a stout. Back up to George Street, and we went a-hoppin’.  At an Irish place we ran into Randy and Deen, as well as Abra and Shel. The guitarist was playing local folk music – pretty good stuff. We ended at a place where the guitarist was damned good, surprising me by playing a Mumford & Sons tune. Sadly, we reached the end of his show, and I was pretty much toast at that point, maybe around 10:30, so we headed back.

The next day, we wanted to do some more shopping and walking about, so we went up the other direction with some showers. They have a nice war memorial here.

One great thing about just wandering is the surprises. Little things to be sure, but we found a guitar impression in the sidewalk.

Apparently Newfies have a good sense of humor.

We walked for a few hours, and went back to the ship. Sailing out was also scenic, just from the other side now.

A relaxing evening, tomorrow is the last sea day, so it’ll be busy!

Day 30–At sea

So lazy today I didn’t even take a picture. Not much to see in any case. Watched a geology presentation, and then the captain came on with yet another itinerary change. This time a storm was brewing near St. Anthony, and with 12 foot seas, tendering would be impossible. So we are making our way straight for St. John’s in Newfoundland, arriving at 5 PM tomorrow for an overnight, and we’ll be docked. The captain was hoping we’d understand (what’s not to understand?) and finished with his dry humor of “I hope you’re all enjoying your 2012 Voyage of the Vikings adventure.” Apparently we’re in an a spate of unusual weather changes and itinerary changes for this yearly cruise.

Heck, I like this change. St. John’s purportedly has a good number of restaurants and pubs, and with a 5 PM arrival I might actually get to enjoy some nightlife.

Felt “off” all day, so we again tried a movie at 9 PM. Neesh was out 6 minutes in, I made it to about an hour and 15 minutes. Crap. Woke up at 11, and tuned into another movie, and watched the last 45 minutes of it, and it was really dumb. Something about Apollo 6(?) with rocks turning into moon creatures attacking the crew, blah, blah, blah, filmed similar to Blair Witch Project. Really bad. Yet I couldn’t turn it off. Hmmm. Went to sleep to some showers and the seas getting rougher. Zzzzzzz.

Day 29–Qaqortoq, Greenland–almost

Surprised again to wake up to perfectly sunny skies. We were anchored already off of Qaqortoq.

View from the balcony – day 29. The village of Qaqortoq

Wanna buy some fish?

Two hours after getting up, we finally mosied down to the theater where they were handing out tender tickets. The idea is instead of standing in line, you wait in the comfort of the theater. So we waited. And waited. Annnnnnd waited. After 50 minutes, it was now 2.5 hours from the last tender, and we said screw it. Just as they called our number. We figured it’d be 15 minutes to get there, and a nightmare getting back.

At some point I heard on the radio there were 620 passengers out, and 110 crew, and later that there was a queue to get back. After Steve and April got back they said there was a 40 minute long line just for the souvenir store. So while I was disappointed to not set foot on Greenland, it was for the best we stayed put.

So we sat out on the balcony and saw some whales out fishing. A nice bonus.

I watched the last tender come in and get lifted. I noticed this before but finally got a picture of it. Where the heck do you fit the other 60 people?

We sailed away to lots more icebergs and scenery.

The seas got rough again in the evening and after a Frankie Vallie and the 4 Seasons tribute, I started feeling punky again. So much for gaining a sea stomach. Fell asleep to yet another movie. Someday I’ll see a whole one.

Sea day tomorrow before St. Anthony, Newfoundland on Tuesday. Should be another quiet, lazy day. I’m actually looking forward to next Sunday off at home and getting caught up with everything.

Day 28–Scenic Cruising in Prince Christian Sound

Woke up to perfectly clear skies, raising the excitement for going through the narrow passage in the sound. Despite 9 hours of sleep, I groggily went out onto the balcony to spy some clouds, so I figured Greenland was out there somewhere. Then I realized they weren’t clouds, they were mountains and glaciers. And there were pieces of ice floating about to boot.

 
View from the balcony – day 28

Iceberg and a glacier

It was a chilly 46° when I got up, dropping 4 degrees from when Neesh got moving a couple hours earlier. We anxiously awaited for the Captain to announce if we would be cleared to go through the sound, and shortly before arriving, we got the ok. Just after that a surprise came in the form of the helicopter giving us a fly-by. Turns out it was the ice patrol chopper (tail number OY-HHS). And then the sights came on strong for about 5 hours.

We finally got a seat in the Crow’s Nest (which was packed) and I was able to keep running outside to take pictures. On the starboard side the sun was warm and the wind not bad, but on the top deck the wind was blowing at an effective 50 knots. Exhilarating, actually. I’ll just let the pictures do the talking now.

Who moved the Matterhorn?

Rugged peaks

Demarcation between fresh and salt water

Some Inuits saying hello from a village of 120 that we passed

The temperatures plummeted once we got near the open water, and then we were back in the fog. A check of the window thermometer showed 40°. Welcome to December! We’re tendering to Qaqortoq tomorrow, which could be interesting given the short stay. Last tender is at 12:30 PM. Ta ta for now!

Day 27–At sea

I woke up to the usual Canada to Iceland scene. Fog. Fog, a raw 55° with some showers to boot.

View from the balcony – day 27. I picked up the thermometer around the first week.

Got caught up with the blog and work emails, and putzed around for much of the day, getting some reading in and occasionally hitting the casino.

I soaked in the whirlpool tub trying to drive out the last of the cold, and then we went up to happy hour (buy one, second for a dollar) to find the clouds breaking, and then decided to hit the casino. After a bit, Neesh says “I got dealt 4 of the royal flush.” “Uh-huh” says I, looking on with mild amusement knowing there was only a 1 in 47 chance of yanking the right card, but I was still hopeful. She hits the button, and I find myself staring blankly at the Jack of spades. Time slows down. That’s the one, isn’t it? And then the music starts. Neesh just hit her second Royal Flush on the cruise (and the only person to get it at all). Unbelievable odds.

Shazam for Necia Ann!

We’re giddy. She has had monstrous luck on this cruise, and I know it just shouldn’t be happening. We collect the winnings, run to the room safe, and pull the trigger on the celebration. A bottle of this wonderful stuff.

Yummy, with a stupid strap and lens cap in the shot…

That’s Louis Roederer Cristal Champagne. I had my first glass of this stuff maybe 15 years ago, and I described it then and now as “liquid clouds.”

Now a bit tipsy, we ate, watched Glen the guitarist for a bit, and then got a movie. I was tired and in bed at 8:50. I felt a bit bad because I committed to going to a Cruise Critic get together at 9:00, but the combination of the adrenaline rush crash, the champagne, and the time changes left me too tired to do anything but lie down. Sure enough, we both fell asleep during the movie, but that’s the way it goes, and it certainly was not a bad day!

Tomorrow is sailing through Prince Christian Sound, which I had no idea what it was until earlier today when I checked out the maps. It’s a passage through a mess of islands at the southern tip of Greenland, complete with glaciers, fjords and waterfalls. Hopefully the ice and weather conditions will allow the passage, it’s sounds pretty exciting.

Day 26–Akureyri, Iceland

We woke up to an amazingly beautiful day after passing through (and back through) the Artic Circle overnight. Akureyri is at about 66° north, and it was already well into the 60’s when we arrived. Crazy.

View from the balcony – day 26

We were glad to see we were docked today, as tendering was a possibility, and we got going around 10 AM. It was windy. My hat blew off and flew about 50 feet before I caught it, but once we got into town, the buildings blocked the worst of it and I was walking around in a t-shirt. Seriously, we’re this far north and it’s this nice?
Town was small and we went through most of the shops quickly enough but not before I was attacked by a polar bear.

Polar bear dinner of Dork

We had a drink and decided to walk up to the mall as opposed to the Artic Botanical Gardens. Neesh seems to be getting stronger walking-wise, and we made the walk quickly through a pleasant neighborhood.

Walking to the mall

The mall passed the time, and we found a store with household stuff including a bargain bin with a pair of prescription glasses and a hard case for 10 Kr. That’s 8 cents, the best bargain in an otherwise expensive country. We eyed a Subway and a Quiznos on the way out, but settled for the Greifinn restaurant, with a pretty good pizza, except the pepperoni was about 3/8 of an inch around. Weird, but just as tasty.
We took a shortcut through another neighborhood to the ship when a little boy said something, then yelled it again, making it clear he was speaking to us. I said, sorry, I don’t speak Icelandic. He says “oh” and after a pause, “good morning!” We bade him a cheery good morning (despite that it was 2 PM) and had a good laugh. Everyone knows English here, don’t bother asking.
It was 75° when we got back. Wow. Up to the Crow’s Nest to watch us leave, and it was not disappointing.

The mouth of the fjord

It was with a bit of sadness to say goodbye to Iceland,  much as Norway. It’s an amazing place, and perhaps someday we can return. We went up to the Crow’s Nest at 9:00 to see the sun still up, and by the time we left at 10:15, it was still up. I poked my head through the curtains at midnight to still see an orange glow in the clouds on the horizon. Two seas days now to get over (hopefully!) to Greenland.

Day 25–Seyðisfjörður, Iceland Waterfall Trail

I set off on the road to the river where the trail started, noting a map which was lacking in detail in the close range, but I spotted a path next to the river as well as some stakes with yellow paint to blaze the way. Temps. were in the upper 60’s with a bit of a breeze. After a short bit, the trail turned away from the river and picked up a little elevation.

Water, moss, grass and cliffs – the views that would dominate this hike 

The trail went along the hillside, and no treeline means no lack of views. I was hoping the trail might go up to the ridge, but I could feel the effects of the cold just after 200 feet of gain. It was about 60 degrees out, and bugless with a bit of a breeze. I did pass several falls coming off the ridge.

One of many waterfalls to be seen

The trail to the junction was longer than I thought, but I was making good time given the lack of elevation gain. I had a turnaround time of 2 hours to make sure I got back to the ship well before it left, and I wanted to get as far as I could. Finally I came to the junction, completely unmarked except I could see a trail going straight where the loop trail turned right. Must be it. A new shade of yellow blazes marked the way this time, and it was a good thing as the path was not obvious at times.

And so I came to waterfall number 1 in 5 minutes. This trail would live up to its name.

Some hook beaked bird decided to harass me for a quarter mile, following me and sounding its alarm call. The trail climbed some more and the views back were great.

More and more falls presented themselves, including this one near the end.

And finally the trail ended here.

I had 15 minutes left to turn around, so I decided to do a little bushwhack to a small fall up near the cliff bands. It was interesting walking, as the ground was very spongy in some places, and I’d sink in many inches as I stepped. Not wet, just spongy. I’d find herd paths here and there, and then stumbled on a blueberry patch in its peak. Time to gather.

The little falls was nice after some steep climbing.

I started to climb up a little more, but it was steep and my legs had little up in them left, so I headed back. Once back at the junction, I noted a trail on the map going up to the ridge, and was bummed I missed that, but as I said, it would’ve been grueling for me today, and I did get to see a lot of neat things. I only realized the next day that I did indeed spot this trail at the junction.

From here, I took the part of the loop I hadn’t taken yet, dismayed to find out it was a roadwalk for much of the way. Yucky. Ah well, back to the ship to get a cold beer and a shower. This was about 9 miles total with a max. elevation of 600 feet, but I felt like it was quite a workout, and saw a side of nature many haven’t seen. Good stuff.