Can't wait to get onboard and look at this almost new ship.
Sunday 3rd Off to sea
with MSC
We woke at 7 and found Magnifica
was almost in Kiel. We rang Steph and also Warren, whose car had apparently
packed up. Steph wanted to see the dentist but we have suspended the health
insurance while we are away. Sorry L
It is the first time Magnifica has been in Kiel and the tugs put up a wall of
water from their cannons to salute her. The ship will also be presented with a
plaque.
Breakfast . . oooh Yes. A quick farewell stroll round
Kiel, which is having a trash and treasure day. The streets were jammed with
stalls selling all the same junk (antiques) that you get at Aussie swap meets. We forcibly
restrained ourselves from buying Lachie his first pair of lederhosen (the
German uniform of leather shorts with braces). These were pretty sturdy – made
of something like buffalo hide. (I reckon he would have looked cute in them. J)
We checked out just before 11 and
strolled the kilometre down to the port, where we had a pretty lengthy but
relaxing wait while they filed 3500 passengers through 2 xray machines. I hope
Elisabeth will forgive me mentioning that some Germans seem uncomfortable with
the concept of waiting for a turn in a queue and this turned into a mass scrum.
We were half expecting to see Dieter or some other quiz player from any past
cruise but no such luck! Up to our familiar cabin on deck 8, in to the buffet
(just the way it was on Musica), unpacking the mountains of luggage, arranging
some formalities at the service desk (where the girl didn’t speak German!!
(Poor harassed thing) and down to the fire drill. I brought the laptop down and
blogged right through it. J has gone off to do something and I am still
relaxing at the very back of the Umma theesta lown juh (Amethyst Lounge- so
purple) watching them wind in the ropes from the wharf, after which the ship
absolutely surged sideways! We are used to the thrusters moving the ship away
from the wharf but this was really powerful. Minutes later, we are powering
down the fjord and out towards the North Sea and another adventure.
The boat is obviously an updated
copy of the Musica, the most obvious improvement being the enclosure of half
the pool deck under a sliding roof, which creates a very pleasant atrium.
Nowhere near as appealing as the Victoria, Epic or Silhouette but it has a couple
of spas in there and some comfortable chairs. In view of where we are going on
this trip, this may well be a very pleasant place to while away some time.
Dinner was somewhat stifled. We
almost got led to the same table as we had on Musica but veered off to a 6
seater which we shared with Karlheinz and his mother from Leipzig, who speak NO
English and a German/American couple who were quite bilingual. They were
constantly trying to run separate conversations across the table in different
languages. And it took over 90 minutes. Not that there is any hurry – there is
no entertainment at all tonight, which is a first. They usually have a warmup
show to introduce the Cruise Director and his staff and give the band and
singer/dancers a bit of a go.
So we went to the gym J The sun set at 9.49
just as we went under the tall bridge that links to some of the offshore
islands. There were a lot of wind farms out there in the water.
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