Friday, September 9, 2015
photos
Clay was up early this morning for his small boat excursion.
Too early as it turns out. Originally it was set for 7am as that was our
scheduled docking time. They changed it to 6:50am. We were not docked til after
7am and Clay figures they left at least 45 minutes after the 6:50am time. I
don’t know why they would make the tour times earlier since all but one of our
tours has left later than posted. The one was not on time early, it left early
thus mixing late comers for that tour with early arrivals from our time. It
seems to be a universal truth that the weakest part of every cruise line is
Destination Services or the Tour Desk. The Panoramic Nuuk we booked was 1pm on
the ticket. A few days ago they notified us it had been moved to 12:20pm.
Reflections today which is supposed to be the most up-to-date information had
it back at 1pm. I went down to the Hollywood Theater to find an excursion
person and she told me it is 12:20pm. I didn’t take Reflections with me so she
didn’t believe me. Clay got mad when I told him because the assumption is that
we’ll show up at 12:20pm and they won’t depart til after 1pm because of
Reflections. He took the page out of Reflections and went down again. When he
showed her Reflections she got on her radio and told someone and they said they
would broadcast voice mail to all ticketed participants to be in the Stardust
at 12:20pm. We’ll see. They have a regularly running shuttle bus here and in
hindsight we should have saved our money here and not bought any tours. Clay’s
tour which was clearly advertised as whale-watching months ago has been
verbally re-advertised as a fjord cruise ever since the tour people started
talking about it. The first we heard that was as we understood it long past the
cancelation with refund date. It was $250. We are both on Panoramic Nuuk at
12:20pm or 1pm, however it happens. It will end before the ticketed time most
likely unlike the morning tours because all aboard occurs before the time on
the ticket. Obviously, whenever it departs we will get a truncated tour. We
should have just done some research and assumed there would be a shuttle to and
from the pier and planned our own day with a map. It would have saved us $100s
and been a better use of our time. Live and learn.
I slept in til 8am. I got up to take a shower and there was
no hot water and no cold water. I used the cold water from the sink to wet my
bed head down and went to the Concierge as per Reflections request to arrange
our departure time in NY. He already had us scheduled for 8:10am and that was
perfect. I told him about the water and he said his screen had just gotten a
message that they were turning it back on and I should try again in 10 minutes.
I had to go sit an hour in Bistro for the cabin to be serviced now anyway. Clay
was expected back at 9am but it was closer to 10am when he got back. He said it
was a nice boat. It was too hot inside so he sat outside with the daughter of
the father/daughter boat team and randy older expedition guide. He said it was
a nice sunny scenic morning, but no whales or other animals. He said a woman on
with the rest of the 10 passengers said she had been up late last night as it
was very lively for one night with the zodiac drivers from Shackelton aboard
for the night. She was thus out after midnight and saw the aurora! We have to
gain an hour tonight so we will plan to either stay up or to set an alarm and
go out. We are below the Arctic Circle now, but still pretty far north at 64
degrees 10’ N so with clear skies and a moderate chance of northern lights
maybe we’ll get lucky. We’ll see.
We went to the library about 9:30am, a half hour after
opening to get our Magic Castle at Sea tickets. This was announced in
Reflections that you each have to go get your own ticket. The show evidently
only seats 20 people at a time. We never heard of this before booking Crystal
but people rave about it so when in Rome. Evidently it is based on
magiccastle.com, a private club in Hollywood, CA. We got tickets for the 4pm
show on day 2, September 11. We have 3 sea days starting tomorrow, before 4
days in US ports followed by disembarkation on day 2 in NYC.
At 10am or so we went up to the Late breakfast in Tastes. It
was our brunch. Since we both had a bite early and we’ll be on tour during
lunch.
Before I go for now, I want to comment about our cabin 7042.
We are fine with it really and have been comfortable but we wouldn’t pick it
again. One it is too far forward for our comfort. This is one of the few ships
we’ve been on that didn’t have a distinct aft vibration when at speed. The
rougher the seas and the higher the ship’s speed the more stable it feels the
farther back you go. Good to know, but too late for us. We wouldn’t book
forward of the mid ship elevators again if we returned. The other thing is 7042
is backward facing. Every other cabin would be. This means that in bed, sitting
at the desk or on the loveseat that you are facing aft not forward. We just
don’t like that. We’ve gotten used to it, but it wouldn’t be our first choice.
We didn’t have a lot of choice when we cleared the waitlist but we also didn’t
have the information about cabin configuration. We have been happy enough with
Crystal and our time on Serenity that if the right itinerary came up we’d
return. That said, we are probably more suited as Oceania cruisers where it
isn’t so formal. As I’ve said we haven’t been to a tea or a show so much of
what Crystal offers is just wasted on us.
Today we are docked on the starboard side and there is a
rather unattractive dock to view. Our port side has a bunker ship alongside so
not too scenic here either. We are pretty far from central Nuuk out here, so
best bet was just to take a shuttle into town and spend the whole day.
It is 2:40pm and we’re back. It was actually worse than
expected. We got a ride for an hour around the suburbs which are all new and a
drive by the airport. We were dropped outside the National Museum. Our guide
was not Danish or a Greenlander. He never said where he was from only that
people moving here were making Nuuk a faster growing city than Beijing or
Shanghai. He liked it here so he’s staying. If you can say he was speaking
English, it would have to be at least his 3rd language and we only
understood about 3 of 10 words he said. He was laughing a lot though so I guess
he thought it was funny. We did get a late start but it was before 1 and after
12:30pm. He gave us a farewell and thanks for visiting Nuuk speech as he told
us to get off the bus, tour ends here. Our Crystal rep on the bus rushed after
him saying the tour ends at the ship. It was our understanding as well, also
that we’d paid for admission to the National Museum. I asked the local guide
about the bus and he agreed the bus would be here in one hour if we didn’t want
to just take any shuttle bus. I asked him about the National Museum and he
agreed it was right there and we could go in if we wanted. We walked in and
were asked to pay the 30DKK admission. We had the conversation that we’d
already paid for admission for the tour and the ticket guy didn’t respond but
asked again if we were going to buy tickets. I said no, I’m not going to pay
twice. We walked around the water front and through a souvenir shop and back to
find a waiting shuttle bus so we left. The people on the bus sitting behind us
said they had a good guide, but she hadn’t told them the museum was included
either. Like us they went in and were asked to pay so they did. After they got
inside they found another group who told them their guide had told them to
enter and tell the ticket guy they were on the ship’s tour and they wouldn’t be
charged. I don’t think the ticket guy got that memo. Anyway, $109pp and a
wasted day. That on top of Clay’s non-whalewatching $249 tour. We really messed
up here in Nuuk. To add insult the woman behind me on the bus was sick and
coughing all over me!
We set sail on time at 4pm. The captain came over the
loudspeakers to warn us of strong north winds and heavy seas when we leave the
harbor. He said we need to average 18.5 knots to make Bar Harbor on schedule.
We made private touring plans in Bar Harbor, now I guess we’ll regret that
because neither of us can remember hitting speeds anywhere near 18 knots in the
past nearly a month. So we don’t think we have a chance of making it on
schedule. Oh, well. Sometime before 5pm we got another voicemail from the
excursions desk. They were letting us know they were refunding 50% of our tour
price this afternoon. Either Crystal has professional quality complainers
onboard for these rapid group refunds or else their tour escorts must really
let them know the same feedback we would give if we could bear it. It doesn’t
make overpriced, excursions that don’t meet the description in the first place
OK but I guess once it’s done you can’t give people back anything other than
money, not time.
Not looking forward to dinner or the next 3 days with the rocking
we’re doing already! The skies are still pretty clear so we’ll probably try to
go out late and look for an aurora. Clay said the woman said deck 13, so I
guess he knows where the dark spot is that we need to go to see it if possible.
Fingers crossed. Last chance for an aurora according to Tim Soper last night.
We spent the afternoon watching a movie about 2 old men
taking a driving trip around Iceland. Clay has a new item on his to do list.
Iceland is next to Greenland. Greenland is the world’s largest island. It is
considered part of Europe economically and part of North America geologically.
I thought a lot of the land around Nuuk resembled the land in parts of the
Canadian Maritimes, like around Peggy’s Cove. I’ll post this now if I can.
