LAST DAY - MONTRÉAL TO DULLES

Alas, yesterday in our afternoon in our Montréal hotel was dedicated to managing our health. Anne’s cold/flu has persisted and left her aching and fatigued, while I am just aching and fatigued! Thankfully, we were able to watch two US Open men’s semifinal matches (in French), though both of our guys, the two 20-year old phenoms lost.

At least the Orioles won again!

Some final tidbits from our trip:

1 - all of the land tours on our cruise were on school buses - the travel economy not able to support the comfortable couches that we were used to; so backpack on the lap and knees up toward the chin

2 - we missed a chance to see the Northern Lights because we were too tired to get out of bed 

3 - there was a young ethnomusicologist on board who gave several very interesting presentations; he displayed an amazing understanding of musical traditions, including sea shanties! We learned from folks who had dinner with him that his wife told him that he needed another interest to counter his obsession with musicology, so he collects tubes of toothpaste and has somewhere around 5,000 already - some apparently quite rare… really?

4 - there were 130 passengers on our trip and 85 crew from mechanics to waiters to bar tenders (2) to housekeepers to officers and so on - there was one ship’s doctor (and two disclosed cases of COVID) and one masseuse.

May our flight home be on schedule and our drive home without incident.

Here are photos Anne took with her iPhone:

 CRUISE DAY 9 - Exploring Eastern Newfoundland

Anne set off on a zodiac cruise of our protected harbor at 9:30. I rested. We packed. I had an 80 minute massage at 4 pm. It was not the relaxing Swedish massage that I had longed for, but it was probably better for my aching back. 

 CRUISE DAY 8 - L'Anse aux Meadows

This morning I dragged my aching body out of bed at 7 am, for an 8:30 Zodiac ride to Norstead - “Norstead: A Viking Village and Port of Trade is a reconstruction of a Viking Age settlement. Located near L'Anse aux Meadows in Newfoundland, Norstead won the provincial Attractions Canada award for "Best New Attraction" in 2000, and was the centerpiece of a series of events held that year to commemorate the 1,000th anniversary of the Vikings' arrival. The site also houses a 54-foot replica Viking knarr which sailed from Greenland to L’Anse aux Meadows in 1998 with a crew of nine men.” Wikipedia 

We had choices for lunch; 1) a Viking feast; 2) a seafood feast; or 3) return to the ship. I was one of 6 souls who returned to the ship - Anne chose the seafood lunch and reported that the fried cod cheeks were a standout. 

The weather is unusually warm today. 

Anne stayed ashore for a seafood feast and tour of the home of Sir Wilfred Grenfell: “Wilfred Grenfell and his wife in 1916 Sir Wilfred Thomason Grenfell KCMG (28 February 1865 – 9 October 1940) was a British medical missionary to Newfoundland, who wrote books on his work and other topics.” I returned to the ship and took a long nap!

 CRUISE DAY 7 - Red Bay

Monday I felt like a stray abused dog as I took up arms to battle a nasty cold/flu (not Covid thankfully). Braving nasty weather, in the morning Anne visited the Red Bay Basque Whaling Station and learned a lot about the best preserved 16th century Basque whaling site in the world, according to UNESCO. She hung out with her ailing partner in the afternoon.

 CRUISE DAY 6 - Gros Morne National Park

Sunday we visited Gros Morne National Park and learned how old the earth is - in a place called the Tablelands, the mantle of the earth was pushed up into some large hills when two continents collided half a billion years ago. Cool rocks. We also visited two wind-swept lighthouses and a cove with some very old cliffs. The weather was perfect. 

This was my favorite day so far. The vistas were amazing and the strong wind was cool and refreshing.

CRUISE DAY 5 - EXPLORING THE GULF OF SAINT LAWRENCE 

We were supposed to choose between kayaking and zodiac tours, but weather and a maritime rescue prevented us from either. As we were entering this protected harbor, the captain saw a man alone in a small fishing boat waving his arms in distress. The cruise director (Mike) and one of the naturalists (Alyson) were dispatched by zodiac to provide assistance. Turns out the poor fellow had forgotten his gas can and had run out of fuel. He was anchored in the middle of the harbor for several hours until we showed up. Mike and Alyson towed him back to his dock, and we headed for our next destination. It was too windy and choppy for kayaking and zodiac tours.

Rescue tow in process.

 CRUISE DAY 4 - Îles de la Madeleine, Québec

We went ashore and toured a cheese factory, a herring smokehouse, and a fishing village.

 CRUISE DAY 3 - Louisbourg and Baddeck, Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia

We visited the reconstructed Fortress of Louisbourg, an 18th-century fort where the British and French fought. Then we visited the village of Baddeck, where Alexander Graham Bell built his summer home, which is now the centerpiece of a beautiful park and museum.

The tip of Bell’s property.

CRUISE DAY 2 - St. Pierre, France

I forgot to mention that last night we were invited to dinner at the captain’s table in a separate private dining room. The captain is a very good looking 38-year old Ukrainian from Kherson; his wife and two daughters are currently living in Odessa. He clearly did not want to talk about the war (who would blame him), though he did say two things; 1) his house in Kherson was still standing, and 2) when his next trip was over he would not return to Ukraine lest he be conscripted into the army.

He managed the conversation by asking each of us to tell something about ourselves - an awkward variety of jumbled bios ensued.

We arrived in this very remote French outpost in miserable weather - steady rain and fog. I had somehow managed to forget my wet pants and was not game for a wet tour of St. Pierre, but Anne went and came back soaked.

CRUISE DAY 1 - Aboard The National Geographic Explorer - Tuesday August 29

We were allowed on board at 4:30 pm. Our cabin was on the starboard side mid ship and comfortable, though oddly configured with a floor to ceiling post in the middle of the space between the bed and the TV, with two modest-sized chairs on either side that were too close to the TV.

The TV is where we could get information on the day’s activities and watch presentations being given in the lounge from our room. And there were many interesting presentations, from the history of the cod fishing industry (now much reduced due to over fishing), the geology of the islands that we visited, the underwater life around several ship wrecks, the various species of fir/pine trees on/ the islands, local music traditions, and photographs taken by professionals on board with us. 

On the second to last day we finally discovered that we could also watch movies, though the collection was very thin. I would recommend watching My Cousin Vinny - a classic comedy, if you missed it in 1992.

The cruise includes all the top shelf liquor that you can handle (served in the lounge every evening) and wine with lunch and dinner. I got to try Hendricks gin for the first time, and now understand why it is so expensive. 

The food was okay - we gave it a B rating - and plentiful. Some of the included wines were so so (you could buy a bottle of better wine - but then you would be tempted to finish it after the cocktail in the lounge…)

 Catching Up

It is Thursday afternoon, September 7, and we are back in a hotel in St. John’s Newfoundland, having been booted off the ship at 8:30 am to make way for the next group of adventurers - when we left our cabin, the name card on the door had already been changed! 

We were very lucky to get a room at 9:30 am.

And now I can access this blogging app again.

Anne has come down with the same nasty malady that I am still trying to shake. We are treating it like a bout of flu and taking it easy, resting up for our flight to Montréal tomorrow. And glad to have missed the recent heat wave in Maryland. It looks as if we will return home to a rainy weekend.

So we ventured out for lunch (seafood stew with lots of cod) and spent the rest of the day in our room sleeping and reading. Dinner in the hotel dining room was not bad, though there is a reason why they only charge $5 US for a Tanquery and tonic - the notable absence of much gin.

I am going to post some short summaries of our days aboard the National Geographic Explorer, some of which will be a repeat of what I tried to send out in emails.