Monday – 10 June 2013 – Honfleur, France
Yesterday, we took a cab from the Premier Inn, West Quay—Premier means mid-priced and West Quay is a shopping center near the cruise terminal—to the Silver Cloud at 11am. The "no early boarding" policy appeared relaxed for us as Barbara and I were on the double secret "Early Boarding List" at Security at the cruise terminal, Security inside the cruise terminal, and at the ship's gangway. Better to be on the secret non-existent list if it's to your advantage, I say. We also found that our suite was ready for us at this early hour, and we enjoyed a very nice lunch in the dining room of the ship.
I should mention that since we were last on Silver Cloud, the almost 20 year old original ship of Silversea Cruise Line, has undergone a "soft renovation". That means that all the carpets, bedding, actually the whole beds, upholstery of all the public and suite furnishing, and especially the guest bathrooms, have been replaced, and a many of the public areas have been completely redecorated. Particularly stunning is the rebuild main bar and the showroom. Very nice work indeed, and most of all the WiFi coverage in the room is provided by an ensuite access point. No need to open the door to use the Wifi. They have even provided free streaming TV channels on iPhones and personal laptops or tablets (which works quite well) and free subscriptions to many world newspapers (which works not at all). Nice touches, kinda. Best of all for many, the air conditioning system which had failed on the ship for a number of cruises before dry dock was said to be replaced. (We later found out on the one or two warm evenings of this cruise that the a/c work was not quite completed.)
We met a few folks who were on the "World Cruise" longer than our mere 50 days in January and February, gluttons for punishment that we all are, and like us are back on this ship for this one. Nice to see them, of course. I realized that despite the gluton free/lactose free screw-ups of our Caribbean cruise on this ship of a few years ago, the Silver Cloud has now gotten that as well as most of the other service issues resolved and instantly reminded me that Cloud was really my favorite ship on the line. More on that later.
We sailed up the Bouche de la Seine this morning and tied up alongside in the town of Honfleur, a lovely old (and oddly enough intact) town in Normandy. Today is the southernmost point of our 27 day cruise at just under 50 degrees North Latitude.
Honfleur—not a French word but a corruption of Norse meaning "mouth of a big river", the Norse not missing a trick—is a very touristy 900 year old town that escaped the bombardments of WWII. There are lots of very old buildings, pretty winding streets, a lovely waterfront, and narrow sidewalks full of merde du chien, a French national tradition. A carousel plays Bolero. That sort of place.
After my first day's bespoke lactose-free pastries, Barbara and I took the 9:30am ship's shuttle bus the mile or so ride to the center of town and walked a couple of miles exploring this nice low-key first stop of the cruise. Having successfully dodged the sidewalk excrement, we made our way to the Eric Satie House, where the quirky composer lived for much of his life. That is, when he wasn't begging free meals and hanging out with the likes of Picasso, John Cage, and the other turn of the century drunks and stoners. The Maison Satie is as quirky as the composer/painter/poet and a must see for those of us who love quirky, obscure museums.
We came back to Silver Cloud for lunch and a nap. A great first day on the cruise.
Tomorrow the ship spends the day at Oostende, Belgium. We plan to, of course, see nearby Bruges and probably continue on the train to Ghent.
No comments:
Post a Comment