| Our final port of Cherbourg on the 23rd and lost an hour. I didn't bother getting up as I was still fighting this bloody cold plus I'd been here before. I was always feeling much better on deck. No dry throat, runny nose, coughing, sneezes. Air con is evil making people sicker than they would be at home! I managed to get other parts of the windjammer so that left just the Aquarius dining room WHEN I could get in at a time it's empty. The high speed ferry, Normandie Express, was in for refit, later joined by normal ferry, Barfleur The refit men were going at it like maniacs after being relatively quiet all week in comparison. They were also talking about the new cabins on that deck. As I was uploading the photos to my laptop, I was occasionally getting a wifi signal which wasn't coming from shore side, but you couldn't connect to it. My safe had decided to bugger up the night before, saying it was closed while remaining open. The maintenance man couldn't fix it so replaced it. I managed to get into the Aquarius after asking a waiter, although the Maitre D' wasn't that keen, ordering me to stay on deck 5 ONLY. I saw Barfleur sail, thanks to Tony 'Munchkin' Weaver telling me the departure time then returned to the cabin. About 8.30pm, I heard the rope machinery so went onto the Prom deck. There had been no pre-departure speech from Captain Lis for the third port running. We had to wait for the men to arrive, which they did twenty minutes later the ran to the ropes. Then we were off and I went into dinner. I almost forgot to pick up the cruise DVD to see if my being filmed meeting Captain Lis was included then finished my packing and put the case out. Although we'd gain an hour, I knew I would have trouble sleeping so tried to have an early night. |
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| Surprisingly, I had slept pretty well and when my alarm went off at 4am, we were already at Calshot! Our arrival time had been changed to 5.15am, the same as Indy, Adventure and Celebrity Eclipse, but they didn't bother changing that on the info channel. I quickly went on deck and we hit a mist patch at Fawley. I couldn't believe it was almost over and a shame we weren't going to the QEII Terminal for her final call, which is where it all began in 1998. Instead it was bloody City, complete with closed Dock Gate 8 thanks to the poxy Boat Show, which finished two days prior, but they took about another week to piss off. In 2012, we went up to turn. This time we did it properly, at the berth. There really was no time for breakfast with the Windjammer opening at 6pm and ships to spot so my breakfast consisted of an apple in the cabin! MSC Opera arrived first followed by AIDAsol making her Southampton debut then Mein Schiff 1 taking the QEII Terminal. It was a bit of a reunion as Vision had been with AIDAsol in Amsterdam back in 2011. The AIDA didn't get to kiss her Ducky bum then and she certainly wasn't about to now! Then I went in, collected my stuff and went to wait in the Showboat Lounge, talking to some Americans who also weren't keen on the changes. I was Green 3 so my time was 7.10am but we were told to go a good ten minutes before that. I got a taxi home, had a little sleep then went to watch her sail. |
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| And so that was that. The end of my fifth and longest cruise on Vision so far and last on her as she was so glad I booked. The ten nights had just flown by but I did enjoy myself, despite the cold I came down with in Greenock. It was the end of an era now for me with her in Europe and I hope they give her nice, long cruises from the US after 2014. Four, five and seven days are a waste. Now the countdown begins for her post-refit final European sailing.
To see more pictures of the other ships, go to the Other Stalking index while those of Explorer can be found in Various Ships in Port. Photos of the Southampton arrivals and Vision sailing to refit can be found here while the post-refit cruise review is here. |
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