jollyjones

And I live in Bermuda, pervasive cold grey damp is not in my lifestyle.

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The Cruise Consultant did confirm that the Cloud is very popular and is making SS a ton of money ...

Here we are in St John's and the Cloud is in too but she's docked a fair way away and it's so cold, grey and depressing I currently feel no inclination to go ashore.

I'm definitely not an expedition cruiser, I consider myself laid back, others would say lazy, but I don't see the point in making myself cold, wet and miserable for pleasure.

I think we've been a bit unlucky with the weather this year, maybe next year will be better, I'm doing this same itinerary on the Whisper.

PS One great improvement on the new Spirit is that Moss's announcements are clearly audible in the cabin without having to open the door - not uncomfortably loud but definitely audible. I am reminded of this because he has just announced that it is not only cold outside but very windy and has started to rain so anyone taking their suite umbrella ashore is asked to open it carefully so it doesn't blow inside out.

The latest unsubstantiated rumor I have is from the Cruise Consultant here on the Spirit.

She has heard from SS marketing that RCL intend to move one of their other ships to SS to replace the Discoverer when her lease runs out, which I think is before the Wind even completes her published itineraries.

The only expedition ships RCL has are in the Celebrity fleet and it may possibly be true because, altho' the Xpedition (94 pax) is showing itineraries till end 2020, the new build Flora (100 pax) is coming in May 2019, and there is much muttering on the Celeb board about the unexplained disappearance of the Xperience and the Xploration (these are small and old, however).

Whether RCI is planning to rebrand one of these to SS, or just loan one till the Wind has been Cloudified, or none of the above, who knows?

Well, it depends if we really are both in at the same time and the weather isn’t awful and we aren’t too far apart.

That said, it’d only be for nostalgia, having cruised on her pre-conversion, I have no interest in expedition cruising. Also, storage is irrelevant, I cruise solo and only with hand luggage, there’s always way more than I need.

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Day four of four sea days and we haven't had a pub lunch yet so, yes, it's today. It'll be in Dolce Vita, just as well, it's very grey and cold outside again (50 degrees, that's seriously cold to me). We are now back on our planned course, we've dropped down all of four degrees latitude to 47N, last night at the Venetian party Captain Mino said that in all the crossings he's done in the Spirit, he's never done one at such a high latitude as this one. We're grateful that he's taken so much care to skirt around a number of storms and lows that could have made it much rougher.

Most cruised cruiser announced at the Venetian party was two thousand and something days ... I wish! However, I did get my certificate for 250 days, not too shabby since I only started with SS six years ago.

Dolce Vita is the most used space on the ship for this voyage, possibly because we've bounced around a bit and Panorama isn't so pleasant just to sit and read if your drink keeps jumping. After my complaints about the inadequate 'library' in Tors, they are planning on putting out a selection of books each morning in Dolce Vita, an excellent response IMO, hope it works out in practice.

St John's tomorrow and apparently we will be in with the Cloud and will be able to visit her just taking our key cards, sounds like a plan. This info came last evening while I was enjoying dinner at Lester Woodfall's table, the HD - see my comment on the Wind makeover thread for another bit of info.

Now back to studying the new 2020 itineraries!

Atlantide is open for breakfast and lunch - I really enjoy lunch there, almost more than dinner.

The pool grill is more usable in a wide range of weathers now that there are heaters and screens along the side area; there are heaters above Spaccanapoli but it is more exposed - it is undercover so it is usable unless the weather is truly awful. The Arts Cafe serves light food, coffee and drinks 6.30am - 11pm, and if you're into asian food, Seishin serves sushi type stuff noon - 2.30pm.

I hope someone else can help with the rest, I never use room service or go to Silver Note.

According to today's Chronicles:

Atlantide breakfast 8am - last seating 9.30am, lunch noon - last seating 1.30pm

Spaccanapoli 11.30am - 11pm

La Terrazza breakfast 7.30am - last seating 10am, lunch noon - last seating 2pm

The Grill lunch noon - last seating 3.30pm

Silver note starts at 8pm with last seating at 11pm

(I'm on the Spirit just now but it's the same on the Muse)

And BTW, isn't this what is great about Cruise Critic? Even if all this info were to be on the website, I prefer to get it from cruisers who've actually been there!

I'm currently on board the Spirit and had a long chat yesterday with Lester, the HD, and I asked about the future of the Wind. He said that although no official decision has been announced, he believes it is inevitable that the Wind will be 'Cloudified' and become an expedition ship to replace the Discoverer. Apparently, quite a lot of Venetians who had not previously been interested in expedition cruising on the smaller ships, are giving the Cloud a go and are loving it and are coming back for more.

Classic cruisers have the Moon and the Dawn coming along with their economies of scale.

Follow the money ...

Culinarywise, the lunch and learn was hugely enjoyable (it's fully booked or I'd go again).

Menu:

Seared scallops with Clonakilty black pudding

Tenderloin of beef with oxtail gravy and tiny Brussel sprouts

Sticky toffee pudding

All prepared in front of our eyes (in a group of 26) by David in his inimitable style - of course, we actually ate 'here's some I prepared earlier' but it all tasted delicious. And helped along by wines chosen by Karolina who also 'helped' the cooking (tried to pour wine in everything!!).

This morning, the third sea day and third 25 hour day (I love them!) we awake not to a season of mists and mellow fruitfulness - instead there's plenty of mists but there's nothing mellow about the grey sea, the heavy dense low grey clouds, and the rain. According to Captain Mino yesterday at noon, we have been sailing 400 miles further north than the planned route to avoid Hurricane Helene - the remains of which are heading loosely towards 'ertford, 'ereford & 'ampshire where 'urricanes 'ardly ever 'appen - but now we have turned more southwesterly towards St John. Stepping on to my verandah, I think it may be fractionally warmer than yesterday which was the first day I didn't see a single soul out on the pool deck. For good reason.

Today will be a first for me - a twenty four and a half hour day - don't suppose it'll feel much different. And it's the second formal night, and the Venetian night. I've been invited to dine on the HD's table - Lester Woodfall - haven't ever met him so that's another new experience.

To occupy us till dinner time there's the usual round of destination and excursion talks, spa seminars, bridge games, boutique specials (been a lot of them), dance classes, Spanish and German lessons (on a cruise from London to New York), golf putting, table tennis tournament (seas a bit rough for that), music talk about Sondheim, film talk entitled 'If Love be the Food of Music...' hmmmm ...

I'll be looking at Karolina talking about Prosecco v Champagne, and David's Irish cheese tasting.

And yes, of course Moss is doing trivia every day - popular, a lot of teams - we haven't covered ourselves in glory; two firsts, two thirds, and one result to be ever consigned to oblivion.

PS Lois - if you look at the Silversea website search engine, on the right is a tab marked 'more' - under that you can select 'Ecole des chefs/gourmet cruises' to find some of the cruises most likely to have interesting culinary offerings.

A few notes about onboard activities:

So far, Charmaine, the Cruise Consultant, has proved to be as efficient as she is pleasant. She's giving a talk today about 2018, 2019, and 2020 highlights. Having just received the email from SS about 2020 and not having had time to look at it, I may go along to the talk and see what's on offer.

The internet hasn't been too bad - offline yesterday for an hour or so and a bit slow today, but we're in the North Atlantic so should be grateful we're in satellite range at all, I suppose.

Guest lecturers:

Corey Sandler (Destination Consultant) - I went to his first talk but found he jumped around from topic to topic too much that if I hadn't read it all in Wikipedia ahead of time I might have had trouble following him. He's obviously very knowledgable but not so good at getting it across, he even sounded like the Wikipedia entries.

Herb Keyser - seems to be talking about music. His first talk was about George Gershwin but he had technical difficulties which were unfortunate, and he talked little and played a lot of music so I left, not my thing but others seemed to be enjoying it. Today's talk is about Lloyd Webber.

John Bridcut, an independent filmmaker. An odd selection of topics - yesterday was about the films he's made of the Royal Family, today is about Roald Dahl, one of the future ones is about filming along the Greenwich Meridian from Lincolnshire to Senegal. Again a lot of film, not so much talking, but may be worth another look altho' I wasn't keen on his sales pitch for his DVDs.

And, of course, Chef David. Two cooking demos so far, both up to his usual standard. And something slightly different for the next three days - 'Lunch and Learn' 'watch and enjoy as your lunch is prepared before your eyes'. In Indochine, I'm going to it today, hope it's fun.

We're afloatin' on the ocean, second of four sea days from Cobh to St John's, Newfie.

Captain Mino's noontime update yesterday was lengthy and not easy to understand, he sounded unsure of what he was saying. What I understood - and I may be wrong - is that yesterday would be rough (it was) today would be smoother (it is), also tomorrow (we hope) but we are going full steam ahead at 20knots to 'get some miles under our belt' because we may be meeting a low pressure system near Newfoundland and have to slow down to ride the seas.

Hmmmm ... I hope the glue holds. The ships sure creaks, and the doors on the forward elevators bang rather disconcertingly in the rough.

On current forecast, we'll be somewhere near the remnant low that is Florence but not till next Wednesday when we should be in St Pierre & Michelon so I'm not sure what lies ahead for us. Not to belittle the disaster the poor souls in the Carolinas are facing, but I hate it when we bounce around too much, I can never sleep.

Sorry Magor, I wasn't trying to criticize you, it's just rather difficult to follow postings about one voyage if they are not all in the same thread. For example, you've started a new thread for each of your two postings and I completely missed the first one as I didn't realize which voyage you meant.

Spins original thread is meant to be communal but after the first flush of enthusiasm, I seem to be the only one left - please do come over and help me out here!

According to Moss, we’re pretty full - unusual indeed for a crossing.

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I guess you can if you want, but is there any reason you’ve chosen to start a new thread instead of posting on the already extant ‘live from’ thread about this voyage?

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Not criticizing your assumption, just looking for any glimmer of hope for the Wind. I’m not interested in expedition cruising so would be sad to lose the Wind as she offers quite a different experience from the bigger ships.

That said, I’m getting used to the Muse and now the stretched Spirit and I do wonder if I’ll miss having the increased choices ... Well, I’ve got three cruises on the Wind next year, guess I’ll find out.

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Itineraries for the Moon should be coming out next week, and according to Charmaine, Cruise Con here on the Spirit, don't go making assumptions about the Wind despite what it might look like!

Pretty much everyone arrived at the M&M with a plateful of cheese so all worked out OK.

Charmaine Waters, the Cruise Consultant, seems to be on the ball, as well as being a pleasant person to chat to, and already knows she's going to be inundated next week once the 2020 itineraries come out.

For us solo cruisers, she was reassuring and said she has a long list of the future voyage solo supps which she will deliver to us, and just because they have disappeared from the website, the low solo supps still exist.

She also says that she believes and as yet has no evidence to the contrary, that RCI intend to keep the SS product largely unchanged.

Talking to Moss, he feels that most of the changes won't be directly visible but will be beneficial - such things as improvements in marketing, internet bandwidth, procurement and delivery of supplies that come with a huge company with clout in dealing with suppliers.

Enjoyed a pizza in Spaccanapoli after the M&M with Spins and her DH, good pizzas as usual but also helped by not having to look at the hideous red jogging track a la Muse - the deck is just regular color.

This morning in Cobh under sunny skies with a cool but pleasant temperature (60 ish) - pleasant to me anyway after spending the summer dying in the heat at home in Bermuda - it's currently 80 degrees there at 5am!

After a relaxing day at sea yesterday, we are now docked at Falmouth under overcast grey skies - a shame because this attractive town is not being seen to it's best advantage. However, I am still looking forward to a stroll around town to feel the local flavour.

On our trip down the English Channel, the ship occasionally had a strange jumping/juddering feeling - just for a few minutes at a time - and at dinner last night Moss explained that it's been happening since the stretch whenever she's motoring at about 10 - 10.5 knots (which we were) and she hits the seas just so. It seems to set up some resonant frequency causing the jumping - it feel a bit like being on a trampoline - and the speed and course are changed slightly as soon as it happens so it goes away. Hmmmm, sure hope the glue holds as we cross the pond ....

Our M&M is at 6pm tonight and, true to form, it has been set exactly clashing with another event I'd like to attend - David Bilsland doing a cheese tasting. Since I very much enjoy British cheeses I will be torn, although since both events are scheduled for the Dolce Vita which, even enlarged is not that big a room, I may be able to attend both simultaneously.

Arts Cafe is larger but it’s Starboard, not Port as on the Muse; the larger Silver Note is where the Arts is on the Muse. One could be confused.

Have bumped into an exhausted Spins, the sun (by British definition) has almost shone, the wind is bloody cold, and Tilbury as we suspected is a dump.

Millions, well, over 20, solos at the get together which I opted not to join.

Dinner in Terrazza shortly, hoping to avoid the tasteless and oversalted duck ragout that others rave about, can’t imagine why.

But oh so glad to be aboard - can’t beat cruising!

I’m on board, and first impression is (having disembarked the Muse in June) how very, very familiar it feels. The Spirit is Musing me.

And David Bilsland is onboard too! Oh joy!

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I've been in London since Friday, done all I needed to do, and am ready to get the Tilbury train tomorrow. Weather forecast to be pleasant.

Looking forward to being aboard and checking out the stretched ship - that'll be the most interesting sight, the scenery around Tilbury docks won't be much to feast one's eyes upon.

PS It may still be dark when we pass the White Cliffs - we sail at 11.30pm, presumably with the tide - not sure how far we'll have gone by morning.

. Last night at dinner in The Reataurant, we witnessed 4 “collisions” of food, water, etc being spilled by hurried staff.

:mad::mad:

Interesting ... it was only three collisions on the other thread you are running about this cruise ...

Pure genius! And, you couldn’t have trained DW and Silver Princess in your ways this past June?

 

 

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Sorry - much as I enjoyed spending time with all you Stumbles, it was nowhere near long enough to achieve that!

It's taken me many, many cruises to achieve.

Please be aware that where it says London the port is London Greenwich not Tower Bridge as only Wind and Cloud can fit.

If you're lucky!

When I booked my upcoming Spirit cruise, it was from Greenwich but we've been gazumped by Azamara (there is only room for one ship) and now we have to trek out to picturesque Tilbury.

Jimmy gets on in Boston, Moss gets off in NYC after the handover - that’s what Jimmy told me in June.

‘Course, Moss might jump ship in Boston if he’s totally exhausted, we’d better be nice to him.

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