May 4, 2023

Dear beloved readers, this is the blog from the bus window.

We docked in Marseille, France at 9 o’clock.  I was awakened from a good night’s sleep at 8:15, and followed my bride to the shower – no one should throw up in their mouths because it is a one person shower and I got in when she was finished.  

Refreshed and dressed we went to the Windjammer for breakfast.  It was very busy with folks scurry to stuff and then go ashore.  Our plans were a shuttle ride to wherever the shuttle went and wander for a while, so we were in no hurry.  Yesterday at breakfast one of the servers, Ellison, said he hoped to go to the Cathedral of Palma de Mallorca and get a picture.  While we were there, Bonnie found a great postcard of the Cathedral and we bought it for him. When we gave it to him you would have thought we gave him a bucket of money instead of a one Euro postcard.  He tried to give it back several times, but we told him we had bought it for him – in case he couldn’t get off.  He had us write our names on the back and invited us to his home in India (he has been trying to get my cruise buddy to add spice to her breakfast and one morning he brought her a mug of Musalla tea – she didn’t like it; I did).

After breakfast I visited with Leezamit, a server from an earlier sailing.  She is also from India.  This morning she told me that after she flies to Mombai at the end of her contract, she will have a 3 day journey to her house.  When we walk into the buffet, she points to the cook and gives me a quizzical look.  It is her way to ask if I want two cracked eggs with bacon, and then she brings it to our table, getting drinks for both Bonnie and I.   Great kid.

Well, somewhere around 10 we went outside to get on the shuttle and I didn’t really want to get on.  I said nothing, but after a 20-30 minute ride to the drop-off point, with all of the things we would want to see a long walk away and up steep hillsides, Bonnie said, “I don’t want to get off the bus.  I don’t have a good feeling about this.”  I said, “Okay,” and we stayed in our seats and rode back to the ship.  No idea what those feelings were, but you are all Believers and you know when you get one of those nudges, you listen.

Out the window I took two pictures: one of two Samurai holding a shipping container (neat sculpture) and the other of one of the cathedrals.

Tomorrow is the port for Florence and Pisa, and I think I told you we had booked a 10 hour excursion before we left home, but after the 7 hour one a few days ago decided to cancel it.  There is a little place to explore off of the ship and that will be our adventure.  Then it’s back to pack and put the luggage out before disembarking on Saturday, meeting Pino, and going to Rome to spend the night and then fly home.

And here’s Blogging Bonnie.

Unlike my husband I was out of bed at 4 am, 6am and then stayed up. For some reason last night I got really shivering cold at about 4 and covered with my little sleeping blanket. At 6 I tried to go back to bed but could not so I listened to my sleeping husband till he got up at 8:15. The ship docked at 9. I had a cup of hot chocolate and a bacon sandwich for breakfast.  After breakfast it was after 10 so we headed out to the shuttle. 

Like him I was uneasy about getting off. There were a total of 6 cruise ships in dock. Five where we were docked and an Azamara a little farther in. That means there were over 20,000 people in town!  We had pre bought out shuttle tickets so we got in that line, though at first it was tough to tell which line that was. We waited about 15 minutes to get on a shuttle. They had said shuttles would leave every 20 minutes or when it was full. There were different shuttles for each ship. They were everywhere. As we started out of the port I noticed there was a free shuttle a little way down. It would have been almost impossible to walk to town. We drove almost 30 minutes to get to where stuff was. The traffic was terrible. The Azamara was parked at a dock about 15 minutes away from where we were parked. It looked like an area that had once been the dock area.  When we got to the drop off point I said I want to go back. So after everyone got off we told the driver we wanted to go back. She only spoke French! But she understood and told us we could get back on the bus. I thought we might have to wait till it was full but with us and 2 other passengers she headed back. It was a little strange because the sign on the bus said Symphony of the Seas not Odyssey. But she took us back and the ride back didn’t take as long.

Then of course it was through customs and metal detector. Yes I set it off and this time the woman was even rougher and touched my back, front, arms between legs and more. It gets really tiring to be touched like this.

Well, it was almost lunchtime so we took our 2 bags of chips from our last stop and headed upstairs to get a hamburger. Then, back to the 270 for cards. The violinist for tonight’s performance of The Book was practicing in the 270. They had the volume up on the sound tract and her violin as far as it would go. It was deafening. We finished our game and went to the room. By now it was 2 pm. I wanted to sleep till 4.

I needed to wash my hair and dress for formal night. After 4 days with a hat on my head, I had serious hat hair. And I don’t like cute like Mac does with hat hair. Tomorrow I will do the same thing take a bath about 4 so I can dress in what I plan to wear off on Saturday and pack all the rest of our stuff. We put our suitcases out by 10 pm tomorrow night. We have ticket 37 for getting off. We have to be out of our room by 8 am. We go to deck 5 theater to wait till they call our number. Then pick up the luggage and meet our driver. 

Not sure what we will do tomorrow yet. We shall see. We get home Sunday after about 20 hours traveling. We will be tired.

Love you all. Mom, Granny and Bonnie

And now:

TTFN

Hug each other.