Day 10 and 11 - Two more days at sea, including a visit to the bridge!

So, we had a weekend at sea with no land in sight both Saturday and Sunday.

And again, we pretty much have a schedule worked out that we're happy with for sea days. Breakfast, internet time, an hour long workout in the gym, lunch, trivia and/or nap time, laundry, dinner, evening show, etc.

But, we had an interesting diversion today!

Day 9 - The magnificent scenery of Prince Christian Sound, Greenland

One of the highlights of this trip was the planned scenic cruise through Prince Christian Sound in Greenland. It sometimes doesn't happen due to fog or bad weather, so when we woke up Friday morning to fog, it wasn't looking good.

However the captain obviously knew more than we did, and as we neared the entrance into the fjord,  things started clearing up and it became a beautiful blue sky day!

Day 8 - The Greenlandic town of Qaqortoq

Given our experience with the tender lineups from yesterday, we planned things a little differently. This time, we were up at 6:00am, went and had breakfast at the buffet, and we were down to get tender departure tickets.

We were a bit surprised that many other people had the same idea, however this time we ended up with departure group 11, instead of group 18 like we had the day before. So, slightly better.

Day 7 - Welcome to Greenland, country #73 for us!

So, lets get this out of the way first... is Greenland a country?

Well, there are arguments for both sides of that question. The United Nations officially has 193 countries in it. However there are other countries that are not officially recognized as countries by the other countries. Examples are Kosovo, Taiwan, Western Sahara, Transnistria, Somaliland, Northern Cyprus, and Greenland. Among others. If you add these all up, it comes to 215 countries.

For our purposes, Greenland is a country! So, with that out of the way, welcome to Greenland...

Day 5 and 6 - Two more days at sea

We have been puttering along at about 35 km/h (22 mph) which doesn't sound very fast, however when you're doing it 24 hours a day, you do tend to put on some distance!

Writing this on Tuesday evening after a total of three days at sea. Wednesday morning we will wake up off the coast of Nanortalik, Greenland where we will spend the day exploring!

July Expenses - Everything just added up!

A little late getting this out, but regular readers will know that we've been busy!

We try and have some laptop time in the morning after breakfast here on the cruise ship, so I'll quickly get our July expense report out to you. July was an expensive month!

Day 4 - Our first sea day

Sunday was our first full day at sea, and we have two more sea days ahead of us before we arrive in Greenland.

So, what did we do all day to keep busy? Well, there is no shortage of things to do. In fact, it almost seemed like there wasn't enough time in the day!

Day 3 - Cobh, Ireland, and this could get interesting!

We had traveled overnight from Falmouth, England and on Saturday morning we woke up at 6:30am docked at the port at Cobh, Ireland. 

For those who don't know, Cobh is famous because it was the last port of call for the Titanic on its maiden (and only!) voyage to New York City.

Day 2 - Falmouth, England and the casino!

We were up at 6:30am because we had a plan.

The ship was visiting Falmouth, England but although Falmouth is a deep water bay, there is nowhere for the ship to dock, so they have to anchor in the bay and use tenders to bring people back and forth.

Day 1 - First Impressions of cruise ship life

We went out in the morning and picked up a couple of last minute things, then back to our room to get packed up. We had been told that they begin boarding at 11:00am, so we could arrive at the terminal anytime after that. Or before, if you want to wait in line!

We didn't see the point of waiting in line, and when we got there at about 11:10am, the terminal doors were open and we were directed upstairs... where we had to wait in line!

Wandering Southampton, and welcoming the Emerald Princess to port.

It was a gorgeous day here in Southampton yesterday. High of 25C (77F) with sunshine and a few clouds. Exactly what they forecast. 

We went and did some exploring around town, and some pre-cruise shopping. Ended up spending about about £40 ($73 CAD, $53 USD) on clothes.

Arrived in Southampton

When we left off in our last blog post, we were sitting in the premium lounge at Rome airport waiting for our scheduled 12:45pm flight to Amsterdam.

And then I started getting notifications from KLM that our flight was delayed. First to 1:15pm and then to 1:45pm.

Goodbye Albania, hello Italy!

Writing this from the Premier Lounge at Rome Airport (FCO).

We left Berat at about 10:30am Monday morning and did the longer drive up through the mountains on the old road towards Albania's capital city of Tirana.

We're going on vacation!

Well, our time here in Albania is just about up. And we're ready to move on. It's been a good visit, but we won't do it at this time of year again. Spring or fall are the best times of year to be in Albania, so while I'm sure that we will return, it won't be in July!

But of course the only reason we came here was because of the dental work, so at least that is now done.

A new credit card

We haven't done very much the last two days because it's been too hot. The temperature went up to 41C (106F) both days, so we just stayed in the air conditioning and only went for a walk in the evening after the sun went down. 

So that made for lots of internet time, and we ended up signing up for a new credit card.