June 30th – Day at Sea
July 1st – Back to Dover. Unlike past cruises, this time we’re blessed with a decent disembarkation time and we enjoy a precious 7:30 sleep-in. To the dining room first for a decent breakfast, then it’s bye-bye to the ship as we step off the gangplank with luggage in tow. We’re off a little early as our ride isn’t set to arrive for another half hour. So we do some waiting, and then some more. Then more. Forty minutes after the scheduled pick up, Sarah calls the dispatcher—and she’s told that our van broke down and it’ll be at least another hour before the replacement van arrives. Way to totally fucking blow it two trips in a row, Woodford Chauffeurs. Fortunately there are taxis galore, and we score one for slightly less than the van would have been.
By the time we get to London it’s about one in the afternoon, and it’s a scorcher. Brits are spread eagle, either sleeping or dead, on every strip of available lawn large enough to lay prone upon. After checking in, we walk a few blocks down the road to a pub called the Black Lion to grab some lunch. It’s fish and chips all around, and we add some beers to that. I have a pint of Old Speckled Hen from a cask, which as a result is room temperature, and although I can get behind the concept of warm beer being more flavourable, it's not something I want in my mouth when it's 35 degree out. The heat is sucking the life out of me; it’s leeching the very marrow from my bones. However, Sarah’s mom decides we should walk through Kensington Garden and go see Harrods—the hugely expensive department store owned by the Fayed family. We walk for about ten minutes before I ask (quietly to Sarah), “Why are we walking through the blazing heat to go to a store where I won’t buy anything?” She shares these sentiments with her parents in a way more politely phrased, and we all agree that we’re insane for taking on this walk in this heat.
We retreat to the hotel, pick up a few beers at the corner store, and watch England vs. Portugal in the World Cup quarter-final. Portugal plays a dive-heavy, crybaby game, and every time Christiano Rinaldo appears on screen, Sarah shouts, “Fall down and break your leg!” The whole thing ends in heartbreak, of course, and I can’t help but feel it’s my fault. I rarely care about sports, and my watching them is more atypical still, but whenever I do my team always ends up shitting the bed. And I always think if I hadn’t been watching, they would have won.
Julu 2nd – End of the trip. Not much to this day, really. Had the last continental breakfast I care to have for at least a season, then we jumped on the Tube and got off on the Westminster embankment. We ran into a few thousand hot and sweaty Brits running a 10K race for every cause that could be conceived of. Ever runner’s shirt had a different cause on it: cerebral palsy, multiple sclerosis, meth addiction, rickets, the staggers, incontinence, really bad overbites, the clap.... Stopped for pictures near Cleopatra’s Needle, an obelisk and sphinx totally not stolen from Egypt. Then it’s back on the Tube and off to the airport.
We’re absurdly
early at the airport, so we have some food, some drinks, and I have time to reflect on the past three weeks. What did I love about this trip? The feeling of being home when I stepped onboard the ship, St Petersburg (all of it), our waiters, the shot of vodka at that Russian restaurant, British civility, couple shorthand with Sarah. What did I dislike? Very little, or nothing that could be changed: the homesick feeling near the end, airplane travel, and buffet food overload. It was a fantastic time, but as always I’m glad to be going home.
July 1st – Back to Dover. Unlike past cruises, this time we’re blessed with a decent disembarkation time and we enjoy a precious 7:30 sleep-in. To the dining room first for a decent breakfast, then it’s bye-bye to the ship as we step off the gangplank with luggage in tow. We’re off a little early as our ride isn’t set to arrive for another half hour. So we do some waiting, and then some more. Then more. Forty minutes after the scheduled pick up, Sarah calls the dispatcher—and she’s told that our van broke down and it’ll be at least another hour before the replacement van arrives. Way to totally fucking blow it two trips in a row, Woodford Chauffeurs. Fortunately there are taxis galore, and we score one for slightly less than the van would have been.
By the time we get to London it’s about one in the afternoon, and it’s a scorcher. Brits are spread eagle, either sleeping or dead, on every strip of available lawn large enough to lay prone upon. After checking in, we walk a few blocks down the road to a pub called the Black Lion to grab some lunch. It’s fish and chips all around, and we add some beers to that. I have a pint of Old Speckled Hen from a cask, which as a result is room temperature, and although I can get behind the concept of warm beer being more flavourable, it's not something I want in my mouth when it's 35 degree out. The heat is sucking the life out of me; it’s leeching the very marrow from my bones. However, Sarah’s mom decides we should walk through Kensington Garden and go see Harrods—the hugely expensive department store owned by the Fayed family. We walk for about ten minutes before I ask (quietly to Sarah), “Why are we walking through the blazing heat to go to a store where I won’t buy anything?” She shares these sentiments with her parents in a way more politely phrased, and we all agree that we’re insane for taking on this walk in this heat.
We retreat to the hotel, pick up a few beers at the corner store, and watch England vs. Portugal in the World Cup quarter-final. Portugal plays a dive-heavy, crybaby game, and every time Christiano Rinaldo appears on screen, Sarah shouts, “Fall down and break your leg!” The whole thing ends in heartbreak, of course, and I can’t help but feel it’s my fault. I rarely care about sports, and my watching them is more atypical still, but whenever I do my team always ends up shitting the bed. And I always think if I hadn’t been watching, they would have won.Julu 2nd – End of the trip. Not much to this day, really. Had the last continental breakfast I care to have for at least a season, then we jumped on the Tube and got off on the Westminster embankment. We ran into a few thousand hot and sweaty Brits running a 10K race for every cause that could be conceived of. Ever runner’s shirt had a different cause on it: cerebral palsy, multiple sclerosis, meth addiction, rickets, the staggers, incontinence, really bad overbites, the clap.... Stopped for pictures near Cleopatra’s Needle, an obelisk and sphinx totally not stolen from Egypt. Then it’s back on the Tube and off to the airport.
We’re absurdly
early at the airport, so we have some food, some drinks, and I have time to reflect on the past three weeks. What did I love about this trip? The feeling of being home when I stepped onboard the ship, St Petersburg (all of it), our waiters, the shot of vodka at that Russian restaurant, British civility, couple shorthand with Sarah. What did I dislike? Very little, or nothing that could be changed: the homesick feeling near the end, airplane travel, and buffet food overload. It was a fantastic time, but as always I’m glad to be going home.
Comments
I'm glad you guys are home, safe and sound.
You can use your new absorption of European culture to teach the rest of us as we make watery mashed potatoes by the fire.
By which I mean, yours sound lovely, but I would not be getting on a boat with mine unless it was with the express purpose of shoving them overboard. Not that either of them would willingly get on a boat with each other.