BecAus

Our arrival into beautiful Cape Town

Some other photos from the ship:

Had to get my glasses back off the (?) rabbit before we left yesterday 

The sunset as we were catching the tender back to the ship

Africa cake the talented staff had done in the WJ

The beautiful moon as we were departing Mossel Bay

Today we are in Cape Town. We are hanging around off the Cape of Good Hope at the moment. Our arrival into CT got pushed back a bit several months ago, perhaps due to port traffic?, and we aren’t due to dock till 11am this morning.

We had a nice day yesterday in Mossel Bay. They finally got the first tender away about 9.45am, the delay due to the swell and then determining whether they could tender. They could only use one side of the ship and only 65pax a tender.

Some guests went along the coast, called the Garden Route, to visit a town called Knysna. Others went to a game park.
We took a tour with RCI and went up the mountains to a town called Oudtshoorn. It is where they do a lot of their agricultural growing (we are growers so it was of interest to us) Saw a lot of different farms including some really large ostrich farms. They gave us afternoon tea at a lovely hotel up there.

We went up the Robinson Pass and back down the Outeniqua Pass. The scenery in the mountains was stunning but a bit sickening looking at the huge drop off right next to the road!

They’ve said they can tender but only on one side of the ship, using only two tenders and capacity will be reduced to 65 passengers/tender for safety so it will be a slower process than normal. They did say it will be a bumpy ride in!

We have a RCI tour but not till 1pm (tender about 12 noon) so hopefully some of the backlog will clear by then. Being a RCI tour (although we were supposed to meet on the pier) I guess they will get us on to the tender on time either way.

Captain just made an announcement - there is some issues with the tendering. You can feel some ? light wind pushing against the ship causing some swell.

They are lowering a test tender on the calmer side of the ship to do a trial run to the dock to determine whether it is safe to do tender operations or whether they will have to cancel - it’s a wait & see…

I hope the pictures are posting ok - it’s hard to tell as I only have my phone with me

14 minutes ago, sgmn said:

I hope you post more of your African adventure when you do your land sectors

Will do - not too many as I don’t want to annoy or distract people as this is the UWC thread. We go to Kruger / Sabi Sands then Cairo for a couple of days before heading to Rome and Odyssey for a week to hit some of the ports we’ve had to miss and rejoin June 20th.

Gotta think about packing today for the 24n off.  Not looking forward to that part!
 

Side note: not sure if they’ve started tendering here in Mossel Bay yet, it’s after 8am. They seem to be having trouble with the tender dock, certainly the one on our side anyway 🤷‍♀️

Yesterday (Friday) was our first stop in South Africa at Port Elizabeth 

Immigration officials came on-board and a face to face inspection and passport stamp was done in the Safari Club - super quick and easy and no wait.

We were off to the Addo Elephant National Park which was a 1/2 hr drive. We booked a private tour & ended up with 3 other couples from the ship who were a really fun and lovely group of people.  
Saw a lot of guests from the ship here. Others went to other game reserves in the area and some guests left on 2n RCI excursions to various parks in the area.

We saw quite a lot of different animals including: elephants (of course), warthogs, zebra, hyena, water buffalo, monkeys, kudu, impala, ostriches and lots of birdlife.  
We never spotted the lion, cheetah or rhinos. The park is 630 sq miles and they have only a few of these so you are lucky if you see them.

The animals in Addo are all just roaming freely and it was fun trying to spot them.

We stopped for lunch at the restaurant and I can easily say it was one of the best beef burgers we’ve ever had!

The lookout overlooking the park - guess you can’t say they didn’t warn you!

It was a fun day out! We head to Kruger and Sabi Sands when we get off for a few weeks in Cape Town so will hope to see more of the Big 5 then.

Today we will be at a tender port, Mossel Bay, and on to Cape Town tomorrow for an overnight stay. We will get off on the 2nd day after doing a tour on Day 1.

We spent Monday at Réunion Island, a French overseas region, formerly known as Bourbon Island.

It was a lovely day with an occasional splatter of rain, especially down on the south coast which is common apparently.

We only had a short day here with all aboard at 2.30pm. Due to this most people who booked a tour did so with RCI, including us. Captain stressed more than once that due to the distance required to get to our next port in South Africa they would have to leave on time, no waiting for late-comers!

We did a full day tour (7hrs) which did a loop around the whole island and included a lovely lunch near the beach

The Notre Dame des Laves in Piton Sainte-Rose

(Our Lady of the Lava)

The 1977 eruption of Piton de la Fournaise volcano came right up to the church front door but the church was barely damaged - the lava flow still remains outside 

Not a great photo but we went around the island travelling over this motorway built over the ocean, there were massive cliffs on our right - it was really stunning scenery!

We stopped at the Lava Fields in the south-east of the island which go from the volcano down into the ocean 

The Lava Fields

Anse Waterfalls near Sainte-Rose - an amazing walk through a park with a series of many stunning waterfalls - too many to count, coming down the cliff-face

A lovely little restaurant by the beach in Sainte-Philippe. There were 4 RCI buses but it was handled very well - each bus had their own buffet - food was very good!

The local brew - pretty good I’m told but served a bit warm for my husband’s liking! 
We had a great day in the time we had & got to see the main highlights of the Island. Long drive but it was worth it.

Three sea days ahead - she was really rocky last night, not as bad today but definitely not what I’d call smooth. Waiting for Captain’s midday address to get an update on the sea condition 

Not sure why this photo posted down here: not a great photo but was interesting to see

A photo on the church wall showing some lava that made it in the church front door

1 hour ago, Arzeena said:

The port pictures are lovely! Thank you! Where does this leg of the sailing end?
 

I was also interested in learning about the ship's condition and maintenance, please? Does it seem very battered? Is it kept clean and up to date? Thank you.

The current leg ends in Cape Town on the 27th May - we arrive there for an overnight stop on the 26th.

For the Africa diversion RCI offered a couple different options. Basically split into 2 sailings - Dubai to Cape Town & Cape Town to Ravenna. You could get off for one or both of these and receive a full refund.  Quite a few people took up the option.

We are getting off in Cape Town and back on in Ravenna. We originally wanted to reboard in Bari, Italy a couple of days before Ravenna but once I realised we would be forgoing the full refund for the 24 days off ship if we did that I quickly changed my mind on that!

There is then 2 mini legs following that - Ravenna to Rome and Rome to Barcelona where S3 officially ends.

I can honestly say the ship is in excellent condition with no sign of wear and tear. They are constantly doing the regular maintenance that they always do.  IMO you would not think this ship is 20yrs old.

The bed has been super comfortable and our stateroom shows no sign of age and I’ve seen no wear and tear around the ship that I could mention - she looks in great shape. We have really enjoyed being back on a smaller ship after a few years sailing the Quantum class!

Day 2 in Mauritius

We had a private tour booked today to go to the local market, try local snacks, swim with turtles & local lunch on beach, visit old Fort / Citadel

Pineapple - peeled ready to eat. Our driver stopped & got us some at a fruit cart on the way back to the ship - so sweet & delicious!
 

The beach from where we went out to swim with turtles - they’re wild so not guaranteed - we saw some, perhaps 3 - was cool to see in their natural environment & some fish. Water was really nice - not too cold at all!

Noodle dish we had, cooked by van at beach. I said I was vego - not game to try ‘beach meat’. My husband did, no ill effects so far. Was very tasty!

Saw LOTS of sugar cane in this area - there was a large sugar mill on the dock next to where Serenade was berthed.

View over Port Louis from Citadel

Previously used as a fort and a gaol

Looking down from Citadel hill to where Serenade was docked

Our home away from home!

Lovely couple of days in Mauritius - off to Reunion Island tomorrow  : )

We arrived in Port Louis, Mauritius this morning. It was a lovely sunny day, about 27 degrees. We did a tour with RCI down to the south of the island including a nice buffet lunch

We went to a Tea Factory - this machine was making tea bags

All the teas which we got to try afterwards on a lovely veranda overlooking the tea plantation 
 

Our view while enjoying the teas

A sacred Indian (I think!) lake with many statues around the edge

Monkeys near the Sacred Lake

Male Indian statue

Female statue
 

The view, including waterfall, at Black River Gorge

Monkeys at the Gorge car park - 

The view from the verandah out towards the ocean where they took us for lunch near the Gorge

Bananas growing near the restaurant 

The Dodo bird is a big thing here, apparently the last place they were before becoming extinct 

They took us to a ship model shop, quite famous apparently 

The model above is the Titanic 

Black Pearl

View from the top of the volcano lookout over Port Louis

Trou aux Cerfs - the dormant volcano  - we were looking down into the volcano here. It was quite hard to capture what we were looking at

Below is a (tour) photo I found elsewhere - we were standing at the top looking down into this

We had a great day, it was a good tour and we saw a lot and had a nice lunch

We’ll be spending overnight and tomorrow here as well.

3 minutes ago, Sunshine3601 said:

Wow!   Those cakes look delicious.   Was there a special occasion being celebrated?

Love the towel penguin, adorable😊

No reason I’m aware of this time.

Usually there is a reason when they do the big cakes - like the Mother’s Day one and I believe they’ve done one for certain milestones for the FWC like half way mark etc..

Perhaps they just decided to change it up for a bit rather than the standard fare of desserts offered, possibly also something extra special given the extra unexpected sea days we’ve had this week.

It was being well received and appreciated by the passengers I saw up there in the WJ  : )

(Another) Day at Sea:

They had a massive array of cakes as the dessert option today!

They also had one side of the buffet filled with every kind of roast meat option: Ham / Turkey / Beef / Lamb etc..

The lovely seating area out the back of the Windjammer 

Doesn’t really capture the chop out there today, it’s not too bad but there’s definitely a bit of a rock to the ship - barf 🤢 bags are out on the stairs!

Our first towel animal this cruise! 
I don’t need our room attendant to be doing these - he has enough to do!

This penguin was particularly cute though and appreciated 🐧

My first ever find of a duck - found a few days ago up in the Viking Lounge

From what I understand, the menus are on a 28 day rotation.  The chatter I saw from most FWC’s beforehand is that they wouldn’t normally have that sort of rotation at home and weren’t worried.

It would be interesting to hear if they are tiring of the meals.

 We haven’t made it to the dining room other than one day for lunch.

When we booked we were only offered MTD but then it got changed to 5.30pm without notice. That’s way too early for us.

We've just been eating in the WJ. We just can’t be bothered getting suitably dressed to go to the DR this trip so far!

The food and service has been excellent. There’s a specialty of some sort every day. A wok station. They’ve had the Tutti Salad bar option in there for lunch 2 or 3 times that I’ve seen.

It was taco’s last night. They were crunchy and delicious.

The food, everywhere, has been of a very high standard so far.

2 minutes ago, Ocean Boy said:

Do you know why the bananas are pink?

Not really, just a different variety I think he said. They have several different varieties of the bananas (& pineapples) including the regular yellow ones.

He did mention that the pink varieties of both were particularly sweet.

l really liked the look of the pink pineapples. 

Perhaps Royal should have picked some up. The fruit onboard has been pretty average!  They might have stocked up in Dubai. The fruit we saw there in the supermarket like watermelon, rockmelon & berries that we tried were very average - don’t think it’s their strong point in Dubai!

1 minute ago, RFerrington said:

I read something about a fire onboard.  True ?

 Yes - happened yesterday. It was in a stateroom on our deck (7) There was a Bravo announcement and staff were running - they were straight onto it and it was handled very quickly and calmly by the staff. They are so well trained!

I heard, but cannot confirm so don’t know for sure, that a guest had a fan blowing near some clothes, possibly to help dry them, and items fell onto the fan & caught fire. 🤷‍♀️

I do know some passengers were bringing fans onboard. I assume they aren’t electrical as they aren’t allowed I thought?

Anyways, no idea if that was the actual cause but it was dealt with swiftly and there was no panic.

You could certainly smell a smoke type smell in our corridor last night. Not super strong but it was definitely there. 

As mentioned by Lala (& John) on the previous page there is a little bit of weather out this way.

The Captain had to cancel our stop the next day at La Digue Island, Seychelles - very close by Mahe. It was a tender port and deemed too rough to tender and it would be a sea day. That was at 7am.

In his noon address the Captain further advised that we would not be able to proceed to Madagascar as planned either.  This was also a tender port. We were due to be there tomorrow but it was forecast that there will be a cyclone / hurricane type event in the area at the time we were scheduled to be there so it is a no go.  That one is a real disappointment for a lot of guests including us. I was really looking forward to going there and our excursion to Amber Mountain National Park to hopefully see Lemurs, Chameleons and other wildlife.  It’s not a place that we will ever likely be able to get back to.

As they say though, ship happens! Safety must come first for passengers and crew.  I know the FWC’s have had to miss a few things on this adventure - just the way it goes sometimes when travelling.

So, we are bypassing to the east of the worst of the weather and headed to Port Louis, Mauritius. We will arrive a day early on Saturday morning & overnight there before going on to Reunion Island & then on to South Africa a few days later.  It’s a little rocky out here tonight but not too bad.

We will be leaving the ship in Cape Town and rejoining in Ravenna 24 days later. We had no interest in the west coast of Africa. I’m immunocompromised and can’t have the Yellow Fever vaccine and just no desire to do that leg.

We are able to retain our cabin whilst off the ship and will just take what we need with us. We received a full refund for the 24 days we’ll be off and also the 25% refund for the 18 days affected on this leg.  Royal have been extremely generous with their offer for this (IMO) 

It took a bit for them to sort it all out and their communication left a lot to be desired but it’s worked out in the end!

So, another sea day tomorrow then we should be docking in Mauritius the next day if all goes to plan from here : )

some photos I tried to add in my 1st post 
 

The Butterfly Garden at T3 Singapore Changi Airport

Our view of the Burj Khalifa and fountains from our upgraded room

I think I’ve worked it out, the photos I couldn’t upload were too big and I think I’ve worked out how to resize them so they’ll post!

The Sir Selwyn Clarke Market in Victoria

Note the bird and (might not be able to tell in the photo) huge amount of blow flies on the fresh fish in the market - seafood anyone?

We had 4 sea days to start and then had our 1st (and only so far!) port day in Mahe, Seychelles.  It was a lovely sunny day but VERY humid (in the 85-90% humidity range if I remember correctly) so it felt super hot and we were pretty sweaty.

i booked a private day tour / driver for the day through’Get My Guide’ - $280 AUD (~ $180 USD), just the two of us in a nice, air-conditioned van.

The guy was really lovely and gave us a really comprehensive tour of the whole island. He explained everything about the place and stopped constantly to show us plants, all the spices they use like vanilla, cinnamon and many, many more.

We saw pink bananas and pineapples just growing alongside the road!

We also got to visit with some 100 year old Giant Tortoises!

We saw many lovely beaches, lookouts, walked around the town of Victoria and the local market. A lovely waterfall, stopped at the Tea Factory, tried the various rums at the Rum Distillery and had a very nice, but expensive, lunch on the beach. A pizza, coke & 2 beers was ~ $50 usd - we paid for the beach location I think!

We had a really great, relaxing day and I was happy with the tour I booked, it worked out really well.

I’ll try and upload some pictures but I seem to be a little hopeless at it. I got a few to post above but not all the ones I intended 🤪

The Clock Tower in Victoria - modelled on Big Ben

Balloon drop to celebrate the start of S3

The ship looks great and all the staff have been wonderful. Every single crew member greets you and many want to stop and have a chat.

We started with about 750 passengers in Dubai and just under 100 re-boarded in Mahe, Seychelles so the ship is feeling pretty empty!

No wait for lifts or to find a table in the WJ.

It is great to be back on a smaller ship - we’ve really only cruised the Quantum class the last few years as that’s mainly what they send us down in Oz land!

Might have to work on my photo uploading as I’m not sure the photos I added have uploaded properly 

I only have my phone with me which is a bit of an annoyance, not that I know how to upload photos from my laptop anyway!

Just checking in……finally! We boarded in Dubai for S3 only.  We flew in from Australia the night before the cruise started. Just had the one evening in Dubai which was enough for me - VERY warm there.

Stayed at the Ramada Downtown and they upgraded us from the 5th floor to the 30th into a 2brm apartment with a balcony overlooking the Burj Khalifa and water fountains which was very nice.

Flights with Singapore Airlines were very good, processing through Dubai airport and taxi to hotel was all very quick and straightforward. 

Took taxi to the port and check-in to Serenade was quick and easy.

We are in a mid-ship ‘hump’ balcony on Dk 7 and the room is great.  
We managed to only bring 1 suitcase each (mine was right on the 30kg limit!) and we can fit everything nicely in the cupboards.

We are on day 8, all sea days except 1 day. Not sure what we’ve been doing with our time, amazing how quickly you settle in to doing not much at all to fill your day!

28 minutes ago, LadyZolt said:

We docked in Tianjin yesterday and those of us on the included excursions had a choice of going to either just the Great Wall (and having a shorter, more manageable day), or the Forbidden City and the Great Wall (which was about a 17-hour excursion). My husband and I did the latter one. It was a long day -- we didn't get back aboard the ship until about 1 am.

What a great day you had! Seems like it was very worth the effort of doing the 17hr day!  Thanks very much for your wonderful photos and regular reports you've been doing. Beautiful!!

12 minutes ago, island lady said:

The true adventurers deal with them as they come and experience the new and different with open eyes and open minds.  🙂  I am looking forward to rejoining in Barcelona.  I already miss my friends on board and the wonderful crew

I really wanted to tell you how much I enjoyed reading about your time on S1 & seeing all the great photos you posted - it was wonderful to read about how you enjoyed yourselves on your 2months onboard and I looked forward to seeing what you’d been up to when I was able to check in - I meant to post & tell you before it ended! You did a brilliant job of keeping us all updated!

(we had a really sad & unexpected bereavement in the family early Jan & the inevitable things that go along with dealing with that went into Feb so whilst I checked in occasionally I didn’t get around to posting much but I very much enjoyed reading your daily reports when I could - really brightened my day when I saw your posts / photos - you have a wonderful way of expressing yourself)

Hope you have a great upcoming cruise on Wonder and your upcoming adventures before you rejoin S4 in Barcelona - we will probably be like ships passing as we get off & you get back on!