Ferry to Norway
We started our day with a leisurely breakfast at our hotel in Newcastle. Then we took a longish cab ride to the ferry terminal outside of town.
When we checked in we were informed that the ferry was delayed two hours, so we ended up hanging out in the ferry terminal for four hours. But it wasn't too bad ... there was a cafe and toilets. This model shows what our ferry looks like (I didn't expect to be able to get a shot of the real one from the outside).
We camped out in the part of the waiting room closest to this climbable kids structure.
Once we boarded and stowed our bags in our cabin, Sarah's first wish was to visit the play area, so we stayed there for a while. Sarah's in the top centre throwing balls in my direction.
Later I endured a half hour queue to make a dinner table reservation, then got outside just quick enough to see us leaving Newcastle.
The ferry is ginormous. It's the closest we've seen to a cruise ship. It's got nine levels and includes restaurants, bars, lounges, cinemas, casinos, and two shops, plus two decks of car parking. The hallways on the two cabin-only decks go on forever.
Below the car parks, on the lowest level, are pools and saunas. You can see the water sloshing with the movement of the ship.
There wouldn't be much to see for the next while, but we seemed to be cruising along at a nice speed.
After dinner, we got Sarah ready for bed. I went off to the cinemas to see Transformers. I sank a few pints beforehand, which I'd read is a necessary requirement for the enjoyment of the film. You can't have too many reasoning brain cells available. At 55 kronor, it was about half the price I'd pay in the UK (ten pounds/$20US), plus I didn't have to endure any commercials (we get that too). On the downside, it was probably played from a laptop on an LCD projector, and one of the two little speakers was mute, so I didn't get the full bowel-rupturing sound of all the big explosions.
I didn't get much sleep that night. As the ferry made its way through the swells, about every fifth sway was severe enough to give me the feeling of falling quite a bit and bringing me to alertness. My rational mind was trying to calm me, reminding me that I'm surrounded by professionals, that loads of these trips are taken every day, but my fearful mind kept listening to the creaking and clanking all around and recalling Titanic and The Poseidon Adventure and noting that, if the movies have taught me anything, it's that ships only sink at night, so I wouldn't be completely safe until morning ...
When we checked in we were informed that the ferry was delayed two hours, so we ended up hanging out in the ferry terminal for four hours. But it wasn't too bad ... there was a cafe and toilets. This model shows what our ferry looks like (I didn't expect to be able to get a shot of the real one from the outside).
We camped out in the part of the waiting room closest to this climbable kids structure.
Once we boarded and stowed our bags in our cabin, Sarah's first wish was to visit the play area, so we stayed there for a while. Sarah's in the top centre throwing balls in my direction.
Later I endured a half hour queue to make a dinner table reservation, then got outside just quick enough to see us leaving Newcastle.
The ferry is ginormous. It's the closest we've seen to a cruise ship. It's got nine levels and includes restaurants, bars, lounges, cinemas, casinos, and two shops, plus two decks of car parking. The hallways on the two cabin-only decks go on forever.
Below the car parks, on the lowest level, are pools and saunas. You can see the water sloshing with the movement of the ship.
There wouldn't be much to see for the next while, but we seemed to be cruising along at a nice speed.
After dinner, we got Sarah ready for bed. I went off to the cinemas to see Transformers. I sank a few pints beforehand, which I'd read is a necessary requirement for the enjoyment of the film. You can't have too many reasoning brain cells available. At 55 kronor, it was about half the price I'd pay in the UK (ten pounds/$20US), plus I didn't have to endure any commercials (we get that too). On the downside, it was probably played from a laptop on an LCD projector, and one of the two little speakers was mute, so I didn't get the full bowel-rupturing sound of all the big explosions.
I didn't get much sleep that night. As the ferry made its way through the swells, about every fifth sway was severe enough to give me the feeling of falling quite a bit and bringing me to alertness. My rational mind was trying to calm me, reminding me that I'm surrounded by professionals, that loads of these trips are taken every day, but my fearful mind kept listening to the creaking and clanking all around and recalling Titanic and The Poseidon Adventure and noting that, if the movies have taught me anything, it's that ships only sink at night, so I wouldn't be completely safe until morning ...
posted by Michael Nelson at 11:39 am
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