Tick that one off the bucket list. Passing just 20 feet below Sydney Harbour Bridge, the aerials on the ship getting rather closer than that. I has photographs. I mean, I don’t have a bucket list, but if you do, add that one.
That was the peak moment of the day. Maybe the only moment of the day. I’d been awake since 5am, hit the road around 8.30 and only needed 70 minutes to travel the 21km to drop off the car. Sydney is big and full of traffic.
I crossed the Anzac Bridge to get there, saw the cruise ship from the bridge. An hour late I crossed it again in a taxi which turned, went under the bridge and dropped me at the terminal.
The queues to check in were an hour long. I sat reading my book, glancing over from time to time to see how they were going. I was surrounded by others also waiting, more arriving all the time. A family sat nearby, the mother taking the six year old for a walk, the toddler in a wheelchair starting to cry. Her father picked her up, sat holding her upright against his shoulder and she continued to cry as he patted her back. I looked at her, caught her eye and she stopped crying, just looked at me.
I don’t know how I do this.
An hour later she was still leaning against him, still awake, clearly just enjoying being held. I’d been reading my book, watching the other passengers, drinking coffee. Eventually I stood up, walked to the back of the queue and was immediately called forward to a counter. That plan backfired after passport control as I ended up stood in another queue for 40 minutes for a bag check.
My bag was full of charging cables, usb cables, other cables. They took it off me, emptied it and scanned its contents separately. Then someone rifled through the cables as though they knew what they were looking for. They didn’t find it.
With my bag back I was now missing only the ship’s keycard. This is used to check you onto and off the ship, to unlock your stateroom, to scan you for the emergency drill (and in emergencies) and other things. I’d put it on my wallet in a tray to go through the scanner. I no longer had it. Another quarter of an hour was lost until eventually a security guard found it, on the floor beneath the scanner, somehow fallen through the machine.
On board the routine kicked in quickly. Emergency drill, and if we do need to take to the lifeboats I’ll be sharing with a 4 year old girl. This can’t possibly go wrong. Dinner in the main dining room, no photographs of the chicken samosa I had to start or the roast chicken with stuffing I had for a main.
That’s when I had to make my apologies and leave dinner early. The ship had left the wharf half an hour early and I needed to get on deck. I made it, I took photographs, I was happy.
The photos aren’t any good. No sensible vantage points, lots of people around, a constantly moving vessel.. not conducive to quality photography. I’ll settle for them as holiday snaps.
Tonight’s hotel is.. ah, it’s a ship. The cabin’s a nice one though – still no window, but a whole sofa to myself. I’m on the main deck, beneath the casino. The strange knocking sound that started once we cleared the harbour wasn’t the casino though. The motion of the ship was enough to make the hangers in the wardrobe swing and knock against each other, and against the wardrobe door. They’re spending the rest of the voyage on the floor.
The crowd on the ship are younger than the last cruise. Multiple children ranging from ‘in nappies’ to ‘almost teenager’. The Lido pool is busier, louder, more exuberant. Other passengers are spread more across the age ranges, adult children with parents, OAPs, solo travellers and young couples. It’ll be interesting to see whether that makes the ship feel different over the next couple of weeks.
Only 4km walked today. Lots of sitting, waiting. Handing the hire car back I’d clocked up 2813km in the week, didn’t mention the lack of tarmac for a quarter of them. Now distance is measured in nautical miles. The itinerary’s already changed, we’re no longer docking at the port in Cairns, instead going to Yorkey’s Knob. No, I have no idea either. Going to be seriously annoyed if that stops me getting a cheap visit to the Great Barrier Reef though.