The Plague Ship Strikes Again

By the day after our return it was clear that I was in for a White Star quality Cunard cold.  As usual.  (Martyn came back last year with a gut bug, but - fingers firmly crossed - there’s no sign of that so far.). We had to do some shopping on Christmas Eve, so I fear I may have shared my Cunard experience with characteristic generosity.

Just as well, then, that we had a Darby & Darby Christmas Day at home.  (Once I’d been down to the farm to pay for the eggs I’d bought the day before, forgetting in my snottitude to put the money in the box!). Simple roast chicken with lots of vegetables, and a long interval before Fortnums’ Christmas pud.  It was a beautiful day, so we spent a lot of it in the sitooterie enjoying the sunshine.

Meanwhile, Daisy the Cow, our mooing fridge, has been showing signs of increasing age.  We should have thrown her back earlier, given how she moaned about responding to the thermostat even from her earliest days.  Ten or so years on, we shouldn’t be too ashamed.  Anyway, Heironymous Frost arrives some time on Monday.  A very brief bit of research identified what we needed, and the fact that a local big shed was offering a discount.  In and out within five minutes.  Our kind of shopping.

La Mer...

More Funchal sights and lights

Holiday postcards: Funchal and the Christmas lights

Home again

Annual ramblings below: see last entry for November

Home again.  The last couple of days on board were pleasant and largely uneventful: we did a few more quizzes, went to another excellent piano recital by young Matthew McCombie and took in the performance of the guest choir.  (We’ve muttered about joining, but haven’t plucked up the courage yet!).  As for the seas, we lost a lot of sleep on our first night out of Lisbon when the sea was probably the roughest we’ve experienced.   Stabilisers notwithstanding, the QV rolls a fair bit!  It settled down a bit once we were round Cape Finisterre (the Spanish one) and into the relative calm of the Bay of Biscay.

The guest population of the ship was even more like that of a care home this time: we were forever tripping up over sticks, elbow crutches, walkers, wheelchairs and the Hell’s Grannies’ electric scooters.  And an alarming number of couples seemed to spend a lot of time bickering and sniping at each other.  I do hope this isn’t the shape of things to come.  Oh well: we met lots of nice, cheerful people too, and have expanded the Christmas card list a little.

Before we left the cabin this morning I’d logged in from my phone to the clever contraption in the hall here at Forges-l’Evêque and cranked up the temperature.  The house was therefore nice and warm to return to, although you could tell from the feel of stuff in cupboards that the house hadn’t been heated to normal temperatures for best part of a fortnight.

The drive home was pretty rotten: it started badly with road works closing the exit road from the terminal, hence a long crawl round the port before we could emerge to dice with the Southampton traffic.  Road works on the M27 slowed the pace, as did breakdowns on the Guildford by-pass and the M25.  It took us two and a half hours to get to Fortnums in Sevenoaks for the shopping, and then we had a number of detours to get home: there seems to have been quite a downpour, and one of our usual roads was closed.  There was much flooding in the fields, and we’d to crawl through patches of flooding on the roads as well.  Anyway, we’re home and dry, and have opened a huge stack of Christmas cards in one go!

Much as we love our travels, we’re happy to be back in our own comfortable space.

Last port of call before Southampton

A pretty rough ride all the way from Lanzarote to Lisbon in a heavy swell stirred up by storms much farther north.  Still, we got some sleep, even if not as much as we should have liked: I was awake well before 06:00.  It was a bit cooler when we arrived in Lisbon this morning, so I didn’t hang around on the balcony for too long.  Long enough to be reminded of the growl of the traffic as we passed under the Salazar/25 April bridge.

After a slightly less extravagant breakfast than usual, we were out and about before 09:00, and soon equipped with our day tickets for the buses and trams.  After a bit of trial and error, we found our way up to the castle.  The modern 737 bus follows the same route as the ancient 26 I first met thirty-some years ago, but I suspect it’s a whisker easier to drive.  From the castle we hacked back down again to Figueiras and caught a (modern) tram to Belém, where we soon found the celebrated Pastéis de Belém shop.  Behind the shopfront there is an extensive network of dining space, and we settled in briefly for a toasted sandwich and a pastel per man.  Extra sugar and cinnamon are provided for the latter: I eschewed both, and have to say I’ve never tasted a better one.

After lunch we did a spot of shopping in the Ale-Hop shop next door.  There’s an awful lot of tat in there, but the place brings a smile to one’s face.  We bought some mugs from them on our first trip to Madeira (the crockery at the flat was not nice), and now use them all the time at home.  Thence to the Cais de Sodre for a quick look at the Mercado da Ribeira.  Although the food market had closed by the time we got there, the cafés in the next hall were doing a roaring trade.  I’m told it’s very popular pretty well through the night.  Next, a glass of wine and some people watching in the sun at the kiosk opposite the station before catching a bus back to the cruise terminal.  The day tickets cost us €11 each, which is about the quarter of the price of the hop-on, hop-off buses, and they offer much more people-watching opportunities.  Granted, you need a little bit of local knowledge to make the best of it, and you can still get lost up blind alleys, as we did this morning, thinking that the Lavro funicular would give us a leg-up on the way to the castle.  It didn’t, but walking downhill into the sun could only bring us back towards the river, and we saw some interesting and gritty bits of Lisbon in the process.

Much of Lisbon has been prettified and sanitised since my first visits in pre-EU days, and the place is lousy with Macdonalds, Starbucks and the rest.  But a lot of the third-world feeling remains, and does much to explain our love for the place.

Heading north, and rough again

Our last two island ports of call were Tenerife and Lanzarote.  Having had a fine tour of Tenerife by car last time we were there, we decided instead to explore the town a little on foot.  We legged it along to the auditorium, which is a pretty striking piece of work, set, like its antipodean inspiration, on a little promontory on the seafront.  Curiously, the rocks to the side of the terrace are decorated with portraits of artists and composers, including Beethoven and - who else? - Elton John.  From there we ambled up the hill to the huge local branch of El Corte Inglés.  I forgot to bring a coat with me, and having bought a parka in the ECI in Madrid in 1979, thought I’d give it a try.  (The parka was fine on the 1979 frame, but has failed to adapt with the times.  It still fits Martyn, though!).  If the parka has not moved with the times, prices sure have!  I remain coatless.

From there we took a tram into town and walked a little.  Like its neighbour, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Sta Cruz de Tenerife is an unprepossessing town.  It has some grandiose architecture here and there, but is otherwise pretty boring in that respect, and the industrial docks add little to the attractiveness of the waterfront, but the snaggly mountain backdrop is impressive.  Don’t write Tenerife off, though: if you scroll back to this time last year, you’ll see how enthusiastic we were about the Teide National park and the views from high up, looking towards the shore and the neighbouring islands.

Lanzarote was equally impressive.  Eventually.  We had booked a car, and were a shade alarmed when the ship moored on the other side of the docks from where we’d expected to find the car hire joint.  On looking out from our mooring, hoewever, I could see a few dozen late-model cars, all in the car rental livery of black, white or metallic grey, or combinations thereof.  Of car rental staff, however, not a sniff.  Telephone calls got unobtainable or busy signals.  One of the excursion drivers thought they’d send a mobile office.  09:00 came and went, unlike any mobile office, so we sat and waited, assuming that a Sunday in Lanzarote entailed relaxed opening schedules.  When 09:30 had bin and went, we asked someone else, who advised us to enquire at the tourist office at the Marina.  A longish walk later, we found the tourist office, complete with a car rental desk, albeit unattended.  ‘Oh, I expect he’s gone for a coffee’.  

Well, soon we’d got our slightly beat-up car, and about an hour a half late, we were on our way.  We drove pretty much the length of the island, and found the interior every bit as lunar as they say.  Though arid and largely black, the volcanic landscape is a vast palette of browns, ranging from sandy to almost crimson.  Lanzarote gets little rain, so agriculture relies on planting in thousands of little craters that concentrate any moisture that occurs.  Many of them are surrounded or edged by little dry stone walls, and we read that the island produces wine, tomatoes and quite a range of other fruit and veg.  Agaves grow quite abundantly in places, and there is a significant aloe vera industry, though much of the island supports little or no vegetation.

We had a sandwich per man at the Mirador del Rio, which offers fantastic views of La Graciosa and the islets beyond.  The viewpoint is on a slight overhang at the top of a vertical cliff, so one doesn’t linger too long on the edge.  Fortunately, there wasn’t a breath of wind.  

[Memo for petrol heads: the car was an Opel Mokka with a gutsy little turbo petrol engine and a six-speed automatic box.  The tall build allowed it to roll a bit (not quite to 2CV levels), and the short wheelbase gave it a choppy ride.  Reversing, given the lousy rearward visibility, called for luck, divine guidance or a man with a red flag.  We were lucky.]

On Monday we were awakened by the sound of Martyn’s water glass sliding off the bedside table: we are sailing into a hefty swell again, and the increasing wind is whipping up some white caps.  Attendance at breakfast seemed healthy enough, though!

Land!

Annual ramblings below: see last entry for November

We did the usual bunch of quizzes on Wednesday, and won one of them.  After lunch went to Matthew McCombie’s piano recital.  Nice bag of lollipops from Chopin, Mozart, Grieg, and Scott Joplin.  The Grieg selection ended with the fiendishly difficult Wedding Day at  Troldhaugen, which Matthew executed brilliantly.  

When we went up for breakfast on Thursday, we were steaming past Porto Santo, which I hadn’t seen before: on previous cruises we’ve arrived around daybreak, and sailed off later in the other direction.  Some beautiful lighting effects from the early morning sunlight through breaks in the cloud.  By that point the sea was pretty calm, with only a few white caps on the surface.

The approach to Funchal was impressive: the last couple of times we arrived by sea it was in darkness, so the approach on a warm, sunny day was a treat.  After lunch we took a ride into town for some shopping, a stroll and some people watching.  The place is pretty well dolled up for Christmas with the usual fine displays of poinsettias, but it’s after dark that it comes into its own: we took another shuttle bus after supper.  The old joints are protesting a bit at all the walking, but it has been worth it.

The street lights on the hillsides are already beautiful enough, but the coloured lights in the streets and along the front are spectacular.  The two roads either side of the valleys that converge on the harbour are festooned with suspended lights, one red and one blue, and the side streets seem to compete with each other with their illuminations.  We found ourselves speculating as to the city’s sources of electric power.

Afloat, and moving rather a lot....

Annual ramblings below: see last entry for November

Well, though we did awaken to the familiar view of the Western Docks, we were moving by 06:15, and were treated to fine views of the Isle of Wight that we wouldn’t have had if we’d left on schedule after dark.  Once we were out of the lee of the island, the sea was quite rough, and given also a strong wind, we’ve had a pretty lively ride for the initial 36 hours at sea: the barf bags are discreetly deployed in the lift landings.  But in a big tub like this, you scarcely feel the movement, and we were in no danger of parting with our meals.  Apart from the swell and the wind, the weather has been fine.  Not balcony weather, though, since the ship was at times putting up a lot of spray.

I have to say that the catering seems a little less expert than in the past.  Up in the Lido, of course, the self-service format means that stuff lies around for a while, and that can’t help.  This does not mean, alas, that we have stinted ourselves.  

The ship’s programme offers lots of entertainment on days at sea.  On Monday we went to three quizzes (and won two), I went to a lecture about the origins of GCHQ and we heard a pretty good piano recital.  Meanwhile, I finished reading a Peter James thriller, and Martyn is well into a biography of Julie Andrews.  

Tuesday was pretty dull and damp, though the swell was slightly less.  But it was still a day for sitting reading rather than striding out round the promenade deck.  Martyn snoozed for a while in the afternoon, and I popped upstairs for a sandwich.  Matthew McCombie, whose piano recital we’d enjoyed on Monday, was sitting on his own, so I barged in and we had a good chat for 10 minutes or so.  Nice fellow: good to know he’s on board for the rest of the cruise.

We did a couple of quizzes as usual, but didn’t win anything.  It was a dinner jacket night, and it was a comfort to find that we can still get into them comfortably.  It may be a different story ten days hence...  We went to the show in the evening: Jacqui Scott doing numbers from West End musicals: not really my thing, particularly when so over-amplified.  The bass guitar practically drowned out everything else.  

We notched up another couple of stickers at the Wednesday morning quiz.  The hostess is a cheerful young Welsh woman, and she has pretty well given up on the arcane Welsh topics, thank goodness.  Wednesday is our last full day at sea for a while.  Quite happy about that: although there’s a lot to do on board, I do start to get cabin fever after 48 hours or so.  Can’t imagine what it must have felt like to travel to India or Australia by sea!

Afloat, but not moving

Annual ramblings below: see last entry for November

Just as well we allowed some extra time to get to Southampton: the M25 was down to one lane for a key part of our itinerary.  Fortunately, not only is Martyn a brilliant navigator, but he has a fair bit of local knowledge, having lived in W Sussex for a few years, so we headed across country.  The A27 round Chichester was about as slow as usual, and Southampton was a mess of roadworks.  Still, the luggage was on its way to the ship and the car to the car park a little before our due check in time.  Half an hour later we were in our cabin, and the bags had been delivered.  This really is a slick operation.

It transpires that, because of the storms, we shall be leaving later than planned, and expect to arrive in Funchal a good half day late.  Unfortunately, this means cancelling our visit to La Palma, our favourite of the Canary Islands.  The good news is that we shall have an overnight stop in Funchal rather than just sail in and out on the day.

Dinner was good, once I’d sent back a crab and shrimp starter that was laced with chopped raw onion.  Our table is alongside only one other, and our companions, Caroline and Ray, are sociable and likeable.  Phew.  

Our 20:00 departure slot came and went, and as I write at 21:30, the gangway and lines are still firmly attached.  We hope not to awake to a view of the Western Docks...

Some hope.  Monday, 06:15: moving at last.  Well, if it avoids our being thrown about in the storm, it’s something to be grateful for.  Stand by for expressions of gratitude from Madeira.

December already

Annual ramblings below: see last entry for November

Martyn replenished the bird feeders the other day, and we've been rewarded with visits from robins, nuthatches and sundry tits: great, blue, coal and long-tailed.  As the weather gets colder, I dare say we'll see plenty more.

There have been a few days when it has been pleasant enough for a spot of gardening. The big sedum is cut down to the base, and I've made a modest start on the iris sibirica. Various tubs are re-stocked with flowering winter bedding, and I've grubbed up the boring geraniums by the front door and replaced them with polyanthus. I've done some of the planting on tops of tulip bulbs lifted in the spring: they say it's not worth bothering trying to get repeat flowering from tulips, but we'll give them a try at least. Talking of polyanthus, the ones we brought on from plugs last year went into the new bed for the summer, and are starting to flower nicely. There's a lot to be said for improving the soil - and more still for getting some big strong boys in to do it for us. Some of the antirrhinums we had in pots on the steps were showing signs of life when I heaved them out, so they have gone out behind the bench at the top of the garden along with said boring geraniums.

The art group met on Thursday for its last session of the year, and eight of us repaired to the Carpenters' Arms for lunch afterwards. Not a bad meal, nicely served in pleasant surroundings. Martyn has been painting like a mad thing lately: he has really got the hang of watercolours, a medium that continues to thwart me. Still, I'll take a small kit with me when we put ourselves into floating residential care next weekend, and maybe knock out the odd vignette or two during the twelve days we're on the high seas.