Sunday, August 29, 2010
Day 16: Sea Day
At long last we have a sea day and just lounge around all day. We have fairly high seas and wind all day and are hanging close to shore as we round the northern top of Scotland. Tonight is formal night in the dining room and we have dinner with Al and Melissa from the message board. Lobster and Beef Wellington on the menu makes for a tough choice! After dinner we go to the Captains cocktail party and meet Captain Nash who joined the ship yesterday while Captain Proctor takes a couple months off. He is quite amusing during his chat with everyone. For the first time all cruise we take in some of the evening entertainment. Tonight is the Newlywed, Not So Newlywed Game show and Harry and Diann are selected to participate. As usual, they provide entertaining answers to the questions while the other one is out of the room and then brought back in to try to match answer. Sam the Cruise Directors has a hard time asking the questions because she is laughing so hard at their answers. Of course they win! They get a nice prize bag with a bottle of Champagne, chocolates, and lots of other Princess logo items. We stay for the Jeopardy game and have a team of other cruise critic friends and lots of laughs. Bedtime now as we have an early day in port tomorrow to go looking for “Nessie”.
Day 15: Greenock
Tim wakes up feeling pretty bad this morning and decides to stay on the ship. I had a cough and cold for a couple of days and am feeling almost better now, but Tim has been worsening for the past couple of days and just feels too bad to get out today. Later today, I talk him into visiting the Dr. on the ship and he gets some antibiotics and nasal spray so hopefully after our sea day tomorrow he will be ready to go again.
I have reserved a minibus for 23 of us to tour with Jim as our guide today and John is our driver. Every day keeps getting better. Jim meets us on the pier wearing his kilt which we find out is the Douglas tartan (pattern). My grandmother was a Douglas and although I had scanned a list of clan names as I was planning our trip I missed seeing Douglas on the list. Each clan had their own designed/colored tartan for recognition. No wonder Harry looks like such a natural in his kilt—we are probably of Scottish descent. My new quest before we finish with the Scotland ports is to buy something with the Douglas tartan design to bring home. To my cousin Suzie who I think is following this blog: I will get you something too if I am able to find the Douglas tartan.
Anyway, back to our day and tour. It starts out cloudy with a few light drizzles but end up nice. We travel to the village of Luss and we are the first bus to arrive. It is a beautiful village and while we are on the pier there Jim plays his bagpipes for us. It was a perfect start of a beautiful day.
Next up is a Woolen Mills coffee break stop. Out front they had a birds of prey display and for a small donation you could hold one for a photo.
We then traveled through the Rob Roy Country/ Trossachs National Park which was breathtakingly beautiful.
Next up is the town of Calendar for shopping and lunch, but first we stop to see Hamish the Highland cow who is 17 years old and his new friend, Heather.
We had a nice lunch which included banofee pie—banana and caramel—YUM!
Gordon was at our lunch stop and after they finished eating the guides started making music in the restaurant which was wonderful.
When we got back to the bus we found Jim playing his bagpipes which was our signal it was time to go to the next stop, Stirling Castle.
Stirling Castle is located in central Scotland high on a hill and is beautiful. Although it is a little overcast today, we can see all the way to Edinburgh.
It was a great day with a perfect guide and great driver. I am sad Tim missed today because I think it is my favorite port so far. I see a land trip to Scotland in our future to explore more of the countryside and highlands of Scotland.
I have reserved a minibus for 23 of us to tour with Jim as our guide today and John is our driver. Every day keeps getting better. Jim meets us on the pier wearing his kilt which we find out is the Douglas tartan (pattern). My grandmother was a Douglas and although I had scanned a list of clan names as I was planning our trip I missed seeing Douglas on the list. Each clan had their own designed/colored tartan for recognition. No wonder Harry looks like such a natural in his kilt—we are probably of Scottish descent. My new quest before we finish with the Scotland ports is to buy something with the Douglas tartan design to bring home. To my cousin Suzie who I think is following this blog: I will get you something too if I am able to find the Douglas tartan.
Anyway, back to our day and tour. It starts out cloudy with a few light drizzles but end up nice. We travel to the village of Luss and we are the first bus to arrive. It is a beautiful village and while we are on the pier there Jim plays his bagpipes for us. It was a perfect start of a beautiful day.
We then traveled through the Rob Roy Country/ Trossachs National Park which was breathtakingly beautiful.
Next up is the town of Calendar for shopping and lunch, but first we stop to see Hamish the Highland cow who is 17 years old and his new friend, Heather.
We had a nice lunch which included banofee pie—banana and caramel—YUM!
Gordon was at our lunch stop and after they finished eating the guides started making music in the restaurant which was wonderful.
When we got back to the bus we found Jim playing his bagpipes which was our signal it was time to go to the next stop, Stirling Castle.
Stirling Castle is located in central Scotland high on a hill and is beautiful. Although it is a little overcast today, we can see all the way to Edinburgh.
It was a great day with a perfect guide and great driver. I am sad Tim missed today because I think it is my favorite port so far. I see a land trip to Scotland in our future to explore more of the countryside and highlands of Scotland.
Day 14: Belfast, Northern Ireland
Another beautiful day as we arrive in Belfast around 11 am and dock just beside where Titanic was built. Today I have arranged a black cab for the 4 of us to visit the Giant’s Causeway at the northern tip of Ireland. Today is Harry and Diann’s anniversary and the big bad wolf sent her a dozen red roses this morning. Tom is our driver for the day and he gives us a great tour. He lived through the worst of the fighting and told us many interesting stories about it. We stop at an overlook for the Carrick-a-Rede rope bridge the fishermen put up but decline the chance to walk across it!
The Glens of Antrim are beautiful as we drove through. The Giants Causeway is very busy but I think our arrival time is great because when we come back up the hill we find a very long line waiting to take the bus down and it was walk on when we got there.
We take the coastal route back to Belfast and get a wonderful overview of the “Troubles” area of Belfast seeing both sides’ murals and the wall that separated the Protestants and Catholics which is still locked every night to this day.
We make a quick trip down to the docks where the Titanic ship was built then back to the ship around 7 pm.
The Glens of Antrim are beautiful as we drove through. The Giants Causeway is very busy but I think our arrival time is great because when we come back up the hill we find a very long line waiting to take the bus down and it was walk on when we got there.
We take the coastal route back to Belfast and get a wonderful overview of the “Troubles” area of Belfast seeing both sides’ murals and the wall that separated the Protestants and Catholics which is still locked every night to this day.
Tim writing on the Peace Wall
We make a quick trip down to the docks where the Titanic ship was built then back to the ship around 7 pm.
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