Let’s look at Vista: Decks 5 & 6

by | Oct 15, 2023 | Food Experiences, Photography

We are home, and I am sitting in our living room after a very late flight, a good ride home with Century Car Service of Seattle and a fairly decent night of sleep. So, as promised, I am bringing you (between taking a walk, helping Kathleen with loads of laundry and sorting through our mail) my virtual tour of Vista with my comments on the different parts of the ship.

Going up! Let’s start on Deck 5

Unlike any ship we have ever been on before, Vista started with public decks on deck five (there is the infirmary on four). Most ships start at two, three or at least four, but Vista starts on five. And only about half of deck five, is open to passengers. Starting from the very front, there’s the Vista Lounge, Vista’s main showroom. I would love to say that I saw a bunch of shows there, but sadly I didn’t. If you want to read about the shows, make sure and check out my buddy Mike’s review in a few weeks. He saw them all. I saw one—a hilarious comedian—Cory Kahaney. We had seen her on an old show called Last Comic Standing and truly enjoyed her, so I joined Mike and Cathy at the show.

BTW: The reason I don’t attend shows is not because we don’t like shows. It used to be (on Celebrity) that we stopped going to shows because we had seen them all after so many cruises on the same line. We stopped going because, in case you can’t tell from the description on my photos, I get up REALLY early to take photos and to write posts REALLY early, like 4:30 a.m. (See what I give up for you my readers ?) So, by the time it rolls around to show time (usually 9:15 or 9:30), I am out of it. Cory’s performance was hilarious, and I really wanted to go back when she did her second show a few days later; I was wiped out and had to skip it. I should also say that I did attend some of the lectures by our two excellent enrichment speakers held in this lounge.

The Vista Lounge is a nice theater, but it needs more height. If you are at all of a diminutive stature (short ?) then you will be moving your head from side to side to see anyone on the stage. Part of this is due to Vista’s size. On most cruise ships, the theater is much larger, but on Vista, they don’t need the large number of seats that a 6,000-passenger ship needs. There is nothing that can be done about it, but this is just a heads-up. Here are some pics. For all of these shots, feel free to look at them on your phone. Nothing artsy here. Don’t forget; if you click the first shot, you can then scroll through with your arrow keys or by swiping.

Shops and Customer Service

Also, on Deck 5, you will find the Oceania Shops and a reception desk, a concierge desk and a Destinations desk (shore excursions) midships. Not being a big shopper, we walked through these once, just for me to get photos. And I only had to visit the reception desk once. And I almost forgot, these shops and desks are placed all around the grand staircase in the Atrium, where there is a beautiful glass sculpture. Here are some pics.

Two specialty restaurants

I am going to review the dinners we had at these two restaurants in an upcoming post on food. But I did want to show them to you. Vista has four such restaurants, and deck four has Red Ginger (Asian food) and a new restaurant to the Oceania fleet—Ember. (We heard it referred to as this shipboard version of Applebees.) Either way, here are some pics.

Going to Deck Six—climb the stairs–the elevators suck

Before I go on to Deck Six, I want to take a moment to talk about the elevators. There aren’t enough, the ones they have aren’t big enough, and many of the people on them are beyond rude.

First, let me say that other than walking on with carry-on luggage at embarkation, I NEVER take an elevator on a cruise. But Kathleen does, and she encountered so many problems she reminded me that I had to mention them.

First, there are only two elevator banks on Vista. One aft (nearest our stateroom) with two full-size elevators and the other at midships with four elevators. Of those four, two are full-size elevators, and two are small, oddly shaped glass elevators that hold fewer people. Just about every day, at times when people would be moving around (usually meals or before shows), those elevators were slammed. Going to lunch in the Aquamar Cafe on Deck 12, I would leave her at deck nine and climb the stairs. Many, MANY times, I would climb the stairs to deck 12 and have to stand and wait for 5-10 minutes for her to arrive. It was even worse at the dinner or cocktail hour. It got REALLY horrible when one of the elevators would go down. This is ridiculous on a six-month-old ship. By now, they should have fixed any problems and they can’t chalk it up to the ship being old.

At disembarkation, I had to carry my carry-on and my 35lb computer/camera down a flight of stairs because one of the aft elevators was out…during disembarkation—when people are trying to get down to get off—are you kidding me? Every floor had at least six to eight people waiting to get on an elevator. And many of these people were elderly or handicapped.

Deck 6—you got here—let’s eat and drink.

Deck 5 had started at the bow and went back to the Atrium. Deck six starts at the Atrium and goes to the stern. Basically, decks five and six are one deck. This is because the theater on deck five needs more space above the theater, and when you enter the Great Dining Room (GDR) at the stern, you walk down into the room. That gives the GDR some very nice high ceilings.

Starting from the Atrium, you have the Oceania Club (people who have sailed with Oceania before) and future cruise sales. This sits right above the Atrium. If you are interested in purchasing a future cruise, please keep in mind that there are only two reps selling them (they give you GREAT incentives for booking on board), and that means a lot of waiting. They also have limited hours because they have so much paperwork, so be cognizant of that when you are planning your time. Sea days are the worst—big lines.

Moving aft, you run into Martinis, a very nice lounge—especially early in the morning—this is where I did most of my writing and photo processing between 4:30 and 7:00 a.m. We only went there for drinks once or twice because of the live music they play that makes conversation almost impossible. Otherwise, it is a very nice lounge. Here are some pics.

Further on beyond Martinis is a long hallway with a beautiful floor that runs on the outside of the casino. We are not casino people, so the only time we walked through was when I was taking photos. I did walk by a few times when it was open, and since the wall between the hallway and the casino is glass, I could tell that things were hopping and people seemed to be really enjoying themselves.

Further down that hallway, you walk into the Grand Lounge, which is really just a long, wide room leading to the Grand Dining Room, where they serve you drinks prior to dinner. It is also where the wonderful classical string quartet plays every night. We had cocktails here a few times (which were great), but this, too, was not a place where we could converse. The quartet were excellent musicians, and the people who were there to hear them deserved to be able to hear them and not us talking, so we continued to search for a place where we could have a nice cocktail and talk.

On the other side of the ship from the Grand Lounge, in a much smaller space (with a VERY low ceiling, as my brother found out), is the Founder’s Bar. This was the place for truly special cocktails. The kind that cost a bunch but are often smoky (with real smoke). But this one didn’t work for us because there were only tables for two. It’s a kind of an out-of-the-way bar, and their main job is providing the cocktails for the Grand Lounge.

And lastly, at the stern is the aforementioned Grand Dining Room. This room is drop-dead beautiful. It is everything I like in a dining room, lots of space but divided into smaller spaces. It reminded me of a nice restaurant instead of a banquet hall. My only quibble with the design was that the only two tables we ever had dinner at were in the corners with no windows. When I go on a cruise, I want to see the ocean. More about this in my final round-up but I will say that this dining room is beautiful. Here’s my final set of pics for this page.

 

Charleston: Bad Bread On My Great Sandwich

by | Oct 13, 2023 | Food Experiences, Photography

Let me explain the headline here. Imagine my day yesterday was a sandwich with moldy bread but a great piece of BBQ brisket in the middle. That was my day in Charleston.

When I finished writing up yesterday’s post to finalize NYC, I headed upstairs, and while Kathleen was in the shower, I heard what I believed to be the pilot boat outside our verandah. So I grabbed my camera and went out to shoot photos. What I saw might have been a harbinger of what our day would be like—two tugboats—actually pushing and pulling the ship. In all our years of cruising, I have never seen the wind so bad that it took two tugboats (one pushing, one pulling) and the ship’s thrusters to get us on the dock. Added to that bad wind was driving rain. And I was going to go out and walk in that as soon as we docked.

Here was our plan at that point. I had rented a mini-van from Enterprise Rent-A-Car. Their office was 1.9 miles from the cruise terminal. I was going to take a walk with my camera on a beautiful sunny day, get the car, and then come back and pick everyone else up for a day of planned activities. Then, at the end of the day, I would drop everyone off, return the car and walk back to the ship.

Problem one: It was not a beautiful, sunny day. The rain was coming down sideways, and the wind was at (according to the ship’s info on our TV) 34 knots. But I had a job to do, and I was going to do it. So I grabbed the big golf umbrella that Oceania puts in every stateroom, and I headed out to go get the car. The walk was not pleasant. The umbrella reversed itself in the wind about every 10 steps until I got away from the port, where I was better protected from the wind. By the time I got less than 500 yards from the ship, I was pretty much soaked from the waist down. The spray from cars going by hitting big puddles didn’t help either. But I mustered on. And after a long, wet, dreary slog, I got to the car rental place. Except the sign at right is what I found.

I had made the rental car reservation with Enterprise in February when Mike and I were planning excursions. We each took some ports, and I had taken Charleston because we had been here before and loved the city. In all the time since April 28th, when the sign in the window states that this office closed…permanently, you would have thought that Enterprise would have bothered to let me know this pretty important fact? Did they? NO! In fact, they had sent me an e-mail reminder about my rental two days prior showing this address. In fact, if you go online to Enterprise right now, you can still book a car at this address. WTH???

To say I was upset with Enterprise at this point was probably one of the biggest understatments of this century. I was screaming, cursing, soaking wet, standing in front of a closed store. So I call the number on the sign. I was put on hold by their automated system for five minutes and then told that their voicemail was full and hung up on. Did this three times before I finally decided to call their 800 number, which put me in touch with another Enterprise agency about a 20-minute drive away from where I was. Notice I said drive.

At this point, I have to give this Enterprise agency (they are a franchise) full credit. Their manager jumped in and sent an Uber for me, got me to her store, had the car I had reserved ready and waiting and had me on my way back (a 30-minute drive) to the ship in no time. By now, it has been almost two hours since I set out, and I am just getting back to pick up the rest of the gang—minus Kathleen, who had caught Jocelyn’s cold—and get started on our day.

Our original plan had been for me to drive the group downtown, where we would grab a horse-drawn surrey and take the tour around the older parts of the city and the waterfront. Not only had we lost the time to do this, but the horse-drawn surreys were covered to protect people from the sun, but those covers would do nothing to stop us from getting soaked by the wind-driven, sideways-falling rain. So we bagged that idea, and I drove the group around the old section of town that Kathleen and I had visited in 2016.

Our plan for the day continued with an early lunch at Rodney Scott’s Whole Hog BBQ. When I was here in 2016 to teach a workshop, I met James Roller, a great guy who owns and runs a website called DestinationBBQ.com. He is something of an authority on the vinegar-based BBQ that is all around this state. I asked him then what BBQ place was the best in Charleston, and he said, “Hands down, it’s Rodney Scott Whole Hog BBQ.” So I went and tried it, and he was right! I mean, this place has a James Beard award for BBQ. That has to say something. And I love going to eat someplace that someone tells me is the best, and it is. So, when I came back with friends to Charleston, I had to take them there. If you go, and you eat meat, you should go there too.

We had the MOST amazing lunch. To me, this lunch was the best thing I ate on the entire trip. Or at least it tied with our meal in Toscana (on the ship) for the best meal. It was so good I have to describe it to you. I ordered the two-meat combo, and the two meats I chose were the “whole hog” and the brisket. Each order comes with two sides and a slab of cornbread. I got the collared greens and the onion rings. Topped that off with a local IPA, and I was in HOG HEAVEN! The meat was melt-in-your-mouth, and the sides were perfect. If you are ever in Charleston, this should be your one must-eat place…unless you happen to be a vegan.

Our next stop was a drive out of town to the Magnolia Plantation. We had booked three different 45-minute tours there in advance. The first started at 1:00 p.m., and we arrived right on time. The first tour is entitled Slavery to Freedom. We met up with our guide for this tour, the wonderful Vanessa (who had recently moved here from Seattle), and she shared with us the life of slaves on the Magnolia Plantation from the mid-1600s through the present day. I am ashamed I did not get a photo of Melissa, but my buddy Mike did, and I will let you know when his review comes online in about three weeks or so. That way, you can see what she (and the other guides I forgot to take photos of) look like. Her tour was definitely the best of the day as she did a presentation, and then we toured four historical slave/free man quarters. See my photos below.

From there, it was on to our tour of the plantation house. The photo of the outside of the house is here because we weren’t allowed to take photos inside. Our tour guide was Millie, and again, you will have to wait for Mike’s review to see what she looks like. (BTW: I will post the link when Mike’s review is done, so you if follow me, you will get it when it is ready.) It was a very nice tour, and Millie (a retired teacher) was an excellent guide. The house is very nice.

Our last tour started just outside the house when we boarded a tram and were taken on a tour of the grounds to see how they farmed rice in the 1850s when the plantation was in full production. It was a nice tour, but since the driver who did the tour was two cars in front of us, I never got his name. This tour was just “fine,” and we all decided that if we were to do the tours again, we would skip this one. It’s just not enough to see beyond some swamp and some far-away baby alligators.

At this point, our plan was that I would drive the rest of the crowd back to either downtown or the ship, and then I would go and return the car and walk back. Well, you know I couldn’t walk back. This presented another problem. We were 28 minutes from the ship, the rental car return was 25 minutes from the ship, and I needed to have the car back by 5:00. We left the plantation at 3:55. YIKES! Not only that, but if I got the car back by 5:00, they would give me a ride back to the ship. After that time, they would be closed, and I would be on my own. Needless to say, it was one of the longest, most stressful drives of my life. I did get the group back to the ship, knowing full well that I was going to have to turn around and go back out to the rental agency. And as we drove to the ship, we just happened to notice that the road I had to drive back out on was SLAMMED WITH TRAFFIC! I was not in a good place. The ship wasn’t sailing until 6:30, but I was beginning to doubt I would be able to get back in time. I was sure I would never get back to the rental agency by 5:00, so I would be on my own to find an Uber to bring me back to the ship. While waiting at a light on the way back, I checked, and the nearest Uber could not even get to the agency to pick me up for 45 minutes, and the ride would cost (surge pricing at rush hour) $64.

But thanks to the Apple Maps app that routed me around all the traffic on some back country roads that made me think I was lost the entire time, I made it to the agency at 4:58. They had their van going out with the incredible Linda driving it, so she took me back to the ship. And she even found a way to get me back on board by 5:45. She is my Charleston hero. I was sure I was going to have to call my friend who lives in nearby Mount Pleasant and get him to let me spend the night and then fly to Miami today. Thank goodness that didn’t happen.

So now you can see why I said yesterday was like a moldy bread sandwich with great filler in between. Our lunch and tour were excellent, but getting there and getting back were not.

With all of this going on, I did manage to get some pics so here they are. Don’t forget; if you click the first shot, you can then scroll through with your arrow keys or by swiping…and PLEASE…don’t look at my photography on a phone. Please…

That about covers one of the MOST STRESSFUL DAYS of travel I have ever not had the pleasure to experience. Loved the lunch, liked the plantation, and I will NEVER rent from Enterprise Rental Cars again. The idea that they never told me that location closed or that they are still showing it open on their website is just WRONG!

Just a quick note about the rest of this review of our Oceania Vista cruise. We are on our last full day today. We are at sea, headed to Miami (where it is predicted to be raining and 99 degrees—how fun) tomorrow to disembark. After we tell Mike and Cathy goodbye (they live in South Florida, so they just need a car ride to get home) we will execute a plan to get the rest of us to the Fort Lauderdale airport at different times. I will also be renting a car there (but thankfully from Avis—and you can believe I checked on it) and driving. Steve and Jamie to catch their 2:51 flight back to Orange County, and then Kathleen, Jocelyn and I will grab lunch before we return the car and get on our 5:40 p.m. Alaska Air flight to Seattle.

My plan is to finish the review at home, where I will do a quick post on disembarkation (probably tomorrow at the airport) and then, sometime in the next few days, do a major post (with photos) about the public rooms on Vista followed up by my last post summing up and reviewing the cruise itself with a comparison with Viking Ocean. I hope you will stick around for the last couple of posts.

Charleston is one of the best built, handsomest, and most agreeable cities that I have ever seen. —Marquise de Lafayette

 

 

We made it into Bar Harbor and got to see it all!

by | Oct 7, 2023 | Food Experiences, Photography

The headline says it all for our group. When we did a New England cruise in 2018, we could not get into Bar Harbor due to sea conditions. The winds and the waves were really blowing. And when our buddy Mike went earlier than that, it was in the middle of the last government shutdown, so he was not able to get into Acadia National Park. But this time…calm seas and a fully-funded federal government (at least for now). Starting next year, Bar Harbor is limiting the number of cruise ship passengers that will be allowed to disembark all vessels to 1,000 per day. Many cruise lines have taken Bar Harbor off their itineraries. Can you imagine being on a LARGE ship (like Caribbean Princess with more than 3,000 passengers who was in port with us yesterday) and being told you couldn’t get off the ship until someone from the first 1,000 came back on board? So, yes, we were thrilled to be able to visit Bar Harbor.

Our day started with an immigration line. We had been informed the day before that Customs and Immigration agents would board the ship at 8:30 am when we arrived in Bar Harbor (Our first US port) and that everyone on board would need to come up to the Horizons Lounge on deck 14 forward and meet with them face-to-face. We had to bring our keycards and our passports. We had a tour of Acadia National Park with Oli’s Trolley booked at 10:30, and rather than be late or miss it entirely, Mike called and rebooked us for the 12:30 tour. From past experience, we knew this could be a long slog. The letter about the inspection stated that we would be called in deck by deck but that Oceania shore excursions would go first. We imagined long lines in the hallways when they announced a deck could go, followed by long lines at the elevators.

Happily, that is not what happened. First, we got into Bar Harbor early and they were ready to start the inspection at 8:00, so we gained half an hour then. Then we went to eat breakfast at Baristas, which is also on deck 14. They started with the lower decks first, so Jocelyn, being on deck eight, was the first one of our group to be called. My brother walked her over to the line and texted us back that there was no one there (Decks 7 and 8 were just about over) and that the young crew member supervising the line said that we could come right through.

So we jumped up from breakfast and walked over, expecting at least a small line. And there was a small line for some of the people on board—the US citizens. In fact, there was NO line for us. We were in and out of the entire thing in less than five minutes. It was amazingly organized and totally efficient. The Immigration office had sent a number of people, and they just looked at our passport, looked at us, we got a green dot on our keycard, and we were good to go. I should add that there was about a 15-20 minute wait if you were a non-US citizen.

Now we were done and ready to go, and we realized that we could have easily made that 10:30 tour. But that was OK. Mike, Cathy, Steve and Jamie headed into the village on the first tender, and Kathleen, Jocelyn and I waited about an hour and then took the tender in.

One major rant about some of our fellow passengers—when a cruise line tells you that there is a MANDATORY immigration interview that you MUST DO before you can get off the ship in any port on the rest of the cruise—BELIEVE THEM! Do the interview. As usually happens, right around 10:30, when everyone else had gone through the interview process, the cruise director started making announcements asking those who had not come up (about 30) to please come immediately so that the Immigration officers could get off the ship. They not only had to make this announcement three times, they had to call out individuals who had not shown up. I heard people talking later that they thought because they weren’t going to get off in Bar Harbor, they didn’t have to do the interview. But this interview cleared them not only for Bar Harbor but for Portland, Martha’s Vineyard, NYC, Charleston and finally, Miami. People, please—get with the program.

We met the early tenderers (is that a word ?) for lunch at a really great place right at the end of the pier—West Street Cafe. I need to say a word here about this place. The food was great, the service superb, it was clean as a whistle, and we had a great time at a big round spot on the end of the bar, just about a perfect port lunch. We all highly recommend it. Mike and Cathy had the clam chowder and blueberry pie and said it was a great New England culinary experience.

I should also mention the tender ride into the harbor. Being the first of three ships to anchor and be ready to start tendering meant we got the prime landing spot right at the base of the village. It also meant Vista got the prime anchoring spot. The other two ships that were anchored were much further out, and while our tender trip was under 10 minutes, theirs was at least 20 or more. And because the Immigration inspection was faster than most thought it would be, it was easy just to walk down and get on a tender.

Once done with lunch, it was on to Oli’s Trolley (using that word in a singular fashion makes you think there is just one trolley—don’t worry, there’s more) for our tour of Acadia National Park. We had chosen the 2.5-hour tour. They also did an early morning tour that lasts 4 hours, but it is basically the same tour with longer stops. Ours had 15-minute stops, theirs 30. To be honest, 15 minutes sounds like a long time, but it isn’t. I just about had to really run at every stop to get the pictures I wanted. The stop where I also used the restroom was a mad dash.

Our guide was a very nice man named Fred, who got us on board and off right on time. The roads were PACKED, but he kept us moving, and we did the entire tour and returned only 10 minutes late. I would detail the tour for you, but my photos will do a better job. I think I did OK with them, considering two things. First, we had fog yesterday, and it was a bit cold. That meant that instead of using the open-air trolley, they used one that had windows. By the time we got there and the fact that almost everyone had a jacket or coat (that they quickly shed on the hot trolley), they could have used the open-air variety. Which, for me as a photographer, would have made for a lot more photo opportunities. Shooting through glass is not fun. Your biggest enemy is reflections from the glass. Or if the glass is dirty at all, the camera focuses on the glass window and not on the subject that is far beyond it.

The windows on this trolley did open a little bit (just enough for me to stick my lens out), but I couldn’t get low enough to see what I was shooting through my viewfinder. So when we stopped for just a minute or two so our guide could point something out, I got very few shots. But I am happy with what I did get. My best fall foliage photo was shot while the bus was going around 35 miles an hour, and I just pointed at the scene I was seeing and clicked the shutter a bunch of times, hoping that one of the shots would turn out to be a good one. I call that photography by pure luck.

You will have to judge for yourself. Here are the photos I got yesterday. Don’t forget; if you click the first shot, you can then scroll through with your arrow keys or by swiping…and PLEASE…don’t look at my photography on a phone. Please…

That was just about the end of our day. After the Trolley ride, everyone except Mike and I went back to the ship. Mike went to take a photo of the ship, and I went to roam the streets of the village. I got a few shots, as you saw above. Our day finished up with an amazing meal in Toscana, Vista’s Italian specialty restaurant. More about that in an entire food post coming later.

One last note: while I was coming back on the tender, I got a call from our tour company in Portland, our next stop. We were supposed to do a small boat tour around the islands off Portland. They informed me that because Hurricane Phillipe was headed to Portland, they were canceling all tours. That made me both sad and apprehensive until I got back to the ship and looked at the National Weather Service website, and then I was just perplexed. Here’s the map from this morning.

As you can see, the hurricane (now a tropical storm) is not scheduled to be near Portland until 8:00 a.m. on Sunday. We are currently in Portland Harbor, and we have had no bad weather as of yet. Oh well, they gave us a full refund, but now we have to find something to do in Portland today. I guess I better get on that—more tomorrow.

There’s a quality of life in Maine which is this singular and unique. I think. It’s absolutely a world onto itself.  —Jamie Wyeth

Kind of Sad Shelburne

by | Oct 6, 2023 | Food Experiences, Photography

Update to yesterday’s Cape Breton post

First, I need to update yesterday’s post and give you the right contact info for our incredible guide, Dan the Man. After looking at Dan’s business card and talking to Mike, it appears that Mike booked the tour with Blackwell Tours, but Dan just contracts with them. He has his own company, Sydney Adventure Tours. His name is Dan McKinnon. Do Dan a big favor and book him on his own website (that’s the link in red). That way, he and his family get the total amount you pay for the tour as well as any tip you give him. And, of course, I know you all tip your guides very well ?. Also, if you book him there, you are guaranteed to get Dan. If you book with Blackwell or through a company like Viator you can get any guide they contract with. You want Dan.

Shelburne—the little village that couldn’t

Yesterday, we were in the tiny village of Shelburne, Nova Scotia…for about 20 minutes. In fact, I think the time we stopped there was less than the time we took to tender in from the ship. Okay, I am exaggerating. But not by much. But even in his daily talk, our cruise director said that Shelburne “is a cute little village you can see in under an hour.” He was right.

We arrived off Shelburne around 11:00 a.m., and the ship had the first tenders running into the port within minutes. Most people, like us, had lunch on the ship and let those who wanted to rush in get off before we went down to get on the tender. We headed down around 12:30. Kathleen decided to stay on board (I should have stayed too.)

Once we got to the port, we did a kind of cool thing that might be the best thing that happened yesterday. Mike had found a FREE app called PocketSites. You download it to your phone, and then it gives you free walking tours of thousands of ports around the world. Now, this isn’t going to work for big ports like Barcelona or Athens, but it might have a neighborhood walk you could take in some of those places. BTW: If you don’t want to use the app on your phone, you can also do it online. Their website explains how it works for the town and for you, the user. Besides the app is free, there are no ads. They make their money from towns that want to post tours of their attractions.

We had all downloaded the app, and when we arrived, we just started walking the route. At each historical site, we could see a photo (to make sure we were at the right place), and there was a description of what we were seeing. Some of the sights had some in-depth stuff as well. As I was reading one aloud to some of our party, a local woman walked by and asked me to repeat what I said about a particular place and then told me, “Really? I had no idea that was what it was used for.” So, the app really knows its stuff.

The entire tour of Shelburne has 24 stops. When we got off the tender, we were right in front of number 11, so we started there. The entire tour took us under an hour. Mainly because there really was not that much to see. There are a lot of historical buildings painted with really interesting colors that date back to the 1700s. There are two pioneer museums, but both charged admission so we decided to skip them. The buildings that housed them were pretty small, so we weren’t sure of the value. Others I spoke to after we got back on board had done the museum and told me we were right to skip it.

The locals did try really hard to make everyone feel welcome. A few dressed in period costumes and led tours. I kind of felt sorry for my fellow cruises who purchased walking tours here in Shelburne from Vista. They, too (like the folks who paid to get in the museum), probably did not get their money’s worth. I felt bad for the village because if cruise ships coming there were supposed to boost the city economically, it wasn’t working. There were very few shops and restaurants, and most were empty. Especially since the ship had arrived so late and people had eaten lunch before they left the ship. Usually, when I get back on a tender, there would be all kinds of people holding bags of stuff they had purchased in port. Yesterday, I saw one person with a small bag who told me she bought two small bars of homemade scented soap. Most people who got off walked the waterfront, took some photos and went back on the next tender.

And speaking of photos, I had hoped to get some super photos in Shelburne based on pictures I had seen. Sadly, many of those photos I had seen were taken from a boat in the middle of their small harbor. I didn’t have a boat, so those wouldn’t work. Not to mention the fact that the skies were the blankest shade of white. Nothing flattens out a day of photography like flat, white skies. Here are the few I feel comfortable showing you. Don’t forget; if you click the first shot, you can then scroll through with your arrow keys or by swiping…and feel free to look at these on your phone. They are that sad.

Pizza Night on Vista

Last night (after our Shelburne adventure), we decided to have a pizza party. In the evening, Vista’s Wave’s Grille (where you can get burgers, paninis and hot dogs during the day) turns into a pizzeria. So we decided to grab our usual table in the back of the buffet and have a pizza night. It was awesome. We started with salads from the buffet. Then we headed to the pizzeria to order. They make eight different pizzas and will customize those for you. So we ordered seven of them, plus a BBQ beef flatbread (that was amazing), some Chianti, and a beer for Mike, and we had a great meal. I have never tried so many different kinds of pizza and I have never been so stuffed. But everyone agreed it was a superb way to do dinner. Just something to think about doing on Vista.

Unless you are a pizza, the answer is yes, I can live without you. —Bill Murray

 

Montreal: Food Tour and Church Show

by | Sep 30, 2023 | Food Experiences, Photography

I’m up very early today (our third on the road). We boarded Oceania Vista yesterday, and I haven’t adjusted to the AC in the rooms. With my sinuses, that means I get up when I can no longer breathe through my nose. But enough about me. I promised you more about Montreal.

Following my pre-dawn photo walk (see previous post), we had a complimentary breakfast at our hotel. We had a two-night stay at the Homewood Suites by Hilton Downtown. It sat right at the base of Chinatown, just across a roaring freeway from Old Town. At least we were on the eighth floor, so the noise didn’t bother us that much. The breakfast (we ate there both days) was OK—your typical free hotel food. Which was OK; we had a bunch of food headed our way.

At 10:30, we grabbed Ubers. I wish there was a better way to order an Uber. We needed a larger car because there were seven of us. We knew that we couldn’t all fit in one car, so we ordered two of their XLs. Those are supposed to fit up to 6 people. What we got this morning (for four of us) was a Mazda that barely fix four, and I had to climb over seats to sit in a third-row seat that was designed for a child of about eight years old. Not a grown human. Yet my brother got a full-size van that could have easily fit seven, but they were already gone by the time we got ours. There needs to be a way to see the kind of car you are getting before you say OK.  Maybe there is, but I don’t know what it is.

On to the food tour. We met our guide, Eric, of Secret Food Tours of Montreal, at Guillaume Bakery in the Mile-End section of Montreal. Eric was a great guide and had quite the tour planned for us. We started off with a brioche from the bakery, which was delicious. I might have even voted it the best thing we had. While we ate it, Eric told us all kinds of cool facts about his city and quizzed us to see how much we already knew. Great brioche, fun facts and trivia—I’m in!

Our next stop was Drogheria Fine, where we got to sample some excellent gnocchi. Eric told us what was really important here was their world-famous (or at least Montreal-famous) tomato sauce. The gnocchi were only a delivery system for the sauce. Not only that, the place only does take-away in paper cups with chopsticks. Either way, the gnocchi was delicious, and the sauce was pretty good (I like my Italian grandma’s sauce better).

From there, we were off a long walk to the Green Panther restaurant. This place has a fully vegetarian menu, and we sampled a pita sandwich made with jackfruit. Even though Kathleen and I don’t eat a lot of meat, which means I cook a lot of veggies, the jackfruit sandwich did nothing for me. It’s easily my least favorite food on the tour. And the very long walk it took to get to that restaurant left Kathleen and Jocelyn worn out before we even got to the fourth place out of six.

Our fourth place was St Viateur Bagels. Montreal is (we were told) famous for its bagels, which are not boiled but baked in a wood-fired oven. Eric wanted us to sample bagels right out of the oven, and they were delicious. The ones coming out of the oven when we walked in were sesame seed (again, not a favorite of mine), but my bite was very good. The bakery provided an excellent photo opportunity of the bagels being moved around the HUGE wood-fired oven.

Next up was Poutineville. Guess what the specialty of this place was? If you guessed poutine (Canada’s favorite comfort food), you would be correct. For those who have never had poutine, it is a beef gravy (this one had lots of Montreal Smoked Meat in it) poured over french fries (which, in this case, were kind of wimpy) and topped with cheese curds. As I mentioned, gravy and smoked meat were delicious—the fries were kind of flat.

Our last stop was a tiny Italian deli-type place called Caffe Grazie Millie, where we sampled espresso and some outstanding cannoli. I LOVE cannoli, and they have four different types of filling. I chose the traditional ricotta, and Kathleen had the limoncello. We each took a couple of small bites from our three-inch long cannoli and swapped. I still go with the traditional. It was excellent.

Here’s the food tour pics I promised above. Please don’t drool on your device of choice. Don’t forget; if you click the first shot, you can then scroll through with your arrow keys or by swiping…and PLEASE…don’t look at my photography on a phone. Please…

Completely stuffed, we again grabbed Ubers back to our hotel, where I did a bunch of photo-processing, and Kathleen took a quick nap as we had tickets for a performance of Aura at Notre Dame Basilica of Montreal. I would love to show you photos of the actual show, but they don’t allow photos during the 20-minute-long performance. If you check out their website, you will see the kind of laser-light show we got to see. It was truly amazing and very beautiful. Our entire group said they would recommend it to those coming to Montreal. I was able to take a few photos before the show, and they are below. If you come back tomorrow you can see a lot more photos of the inside because Mike, Steve and I went back the next morning for a photo shoot. We were late getting there before the performance so we didn’t have time to really take photos then.

Whew! That was one long day. But a good one. We would do just about everything again (other than the Uber rides) and highly recommend it to anyone visiting Montreal. The food tour was a little long for those who aren’t regular walkers. Eric told us it was 1.6 miles, but my walking app said it was closer to three. Just keep that in mind if you decide to go.

I love Montreal. I love the people, I love the history.
—Stephen Thompson

On our way

by | Sep 27, 2023 | Air travel, Food Experiences

Yes, we wore masks on the plane while people were loading. Didn’t want anyone sneezing and coughing all over us as they went by. We will wear them in any indoor crowd gatherings as well and probably on the way home.

It’s 6:30 a.m., and we are sitting in The Club Lounge at SeaTac with our good friend Jocelyn, having a light breakfast before our flight to Montreal. And I am calm now.

Calm as compared to yesterday when Oceania sent us the second of two e-mails making changes to our cruise. First, we got one on Monday letting us know that due to their new ship not being “waste-water certified for one of the ports, they would not be able to get into that port (Saguenay) that we were really looking forward to. They did send us a $500 Future Cruise Credit, but that means you have to buy another cruise from them to use it. And, of course, it comes with lots of restrictions on time and cruise that you can use it on.

I was ticked at this one because Oceania should have known in advance that they needed to be “certified” to get into this port. They should have switched to another port if they couldn’t get “certified” in time. As it is, we will have another sea day or should I say another day cruising in the St. Lawrence seaway. It was not a horrible experience, but it was not what we were hoping for.

Then yesterday, we got another e-mail that “in order to accommodate the vessel’s operation needs,” we would not be boarding at 11:00 am but would now be able to board at 2:00 pm. Ok, you are thinking, that’s not such a big deal. But it is to me, and here’s why.

First, about three weeks ago, I stayed up until midnight to be on their website in order to get an early boarding time…which I did. We love getting on early, and the hotel we are staying in has an 11:00 a.m. checkout time, so this worked perfectly for us. But here’s the rub. Instead of saying, “Those people with 11:00 am times will now board at 1:00, those with noon times at 2:00, etc. they had switched to those with BIG suites will board at noon, the ones with small suites at 1:00 and all the rest of us at 2:00. If you have read this blog for a while you know I HATE the caste system that so many cruise lines are adopting. It harkens back to the early 1900s when every ship sailing had (as the Titanic did) First Class, Second Class and steerage. In this case, we are in steerage. Thankfully, when I got the e-mail about this, I was out walking, so I had a chance to cool down before I got home. If you read in the news about a madman walking around Redmond Ridge screaming and swearing at a cruise line, that was me.

Which brings us to right now. 7:09 a.m., sitting the waiting area of the S gates at SeaTac waiting for a flight we should have been boarding right now. We all got up at 3:30, got picked up at 4:30 (by the wonderful Julian from Century Car Service) and were at the airport by 5:10. Through security and waiting by 5:30. We followed all the rules. And what do we get for following all the rules—a delayed flight until 8:15. I know, I complain too much. But again (like the two cases with Oceania), this is just bad management. They say they are fixing a minor mechanical problem. Well, the plane they are fixing has been sitting here overnight. So why didn’t they fix it then?

The good news out of all of this is that we are again…traveling! So I just hope we get to Montreal, meet our friends and family, and have a wonderful time for the next 17 days. I promise not to complain too much in the days to come (unless it is really bad) and to start posting a ton of photos with the next post.

Picking this up in Montreal. It’s around 8:45 here (5:45 at home). I have been up since 12:30 a.m. our time (couldn’t sleep), and I want to finish this up. The flight was very nice. Really impressed with Air Canada. It has a great entertainment system, outstanding flight attendant, and comfortable seats. The food was OK (a parsley omelet? Really?). Customs in Montreal was outstanding. Quick, easy and right through. All is done by machine with a single check at the end by a human. Really well done. Then we had a mix-up with Uber that I will have to handle with my credit card company. And I could not believe the amount of cigarette smoke at the airport so much so that I got a doozy of a sinus headache. Not inside the airport, you got slammed with it when you stepped outside.

When we finally got to the hotel (which is very nice–more on that tomorrow) and I got some sinus medication, and we found Mike and Cathy, and then we went to dinner…all was well, especially after we stopped at the hotel bar on the way back for drinks. Our hotel is right at the entrance to Montreal’s Asian section. So a special shoutout to Jocelyn (who lived in China for a few years) for finding us an amazing DimSum restaurant for dinner. It was really funny that the one she found was literally about four doors up the street from our hotel. The food was fantastic. We just ordered a ton of steamed and fried DimSum and pretty much ate it all. I am still stuffed two hours later. I mean, check this out.

We are back in our room now, exhausted but happy and I need to be up by 5:15 so I can get out and get my pre-dawn photos in and have some very cool sights in Montreal to show you later this week.

We must accept finite disappointment but never lose infinite hope.
—Martin Luther King Jr.