Unexpected Stop in Marseilles

Wednesday 29 August 2007. The Island Star has docked in Marseilles and having walked around the Old Port on last year's cruise, we have opted for an excursion to nearby Cassis.

However, our tour guide asked the driver of the coach to stop near the Old Port so that she could point out something and that turned out to be long enough for the French Transport Ministry officials to board and decide they were going to do a spot check of the coach's condition. This would take half an hour.

The tour guide explained that there had recently been an accident resulting in many deaths due to a coach having faulty brakes and therefore there was currently something of a crackdown. I can remember a similar period in the UK when coaches were being randomly stopped and checked and so we were just unlucky.

We spent the half hour walking around a corner of the Fort St Jean on the eastern side of the port entrance. The guide was trying to juggle between pointing out the sights and talking on her phone to the driver to see if the inspection was finished and to the ship to keep them informed. The ship had just insisted that another coach be sent to pick us up when the driver appeared around the corner with the good news that his brakes worked and we could carry on!

Thankfully we clambered back onto the coach and resumed the journey to Cassis. And that's where we will be for the next thrilling instalment!

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Genoa Waterfront and Aquarium

It is (still) Tuesday, 28 August 2007 and we emerge from the alleyways of Genoa onto the waterfront.

We emerge into the shadows of the elevated roadway but having crossed the roadway at ground level and passed under the elevated flyover, we come out into sunshine once again. There is an aquarium nearby and we are in no hurry to rush back to the ship so we decide to go for a look.

We are first directed into a cinema to see a 3D film about deep sea creatures. Of course - we can't understand a word as it's in Italian! The first tanks we come to hold jellyfish and whilst it is too dark to get sharp photos (flash was not allowed) the colours are fabulous.

It was a large and well-stocked aquarium and had some absolutely huge tanks. There were sharks and dolphins too, although I always feel it a shame to keep such intelligent creatures as whales in captivity as even their large environment had to seem very confining to them. It also had no vegetation, furniture to swim around or through and no playthings to stimulate them.

There were three dolphns in the tank and this one kept coming up to me to say "hello", or more likely, "help! Can you get me the hell out of here?" The captive dolphins' smile does them no favours at all... it's easy to assume that they love it where they are.

There were giant sea turtles, a pool with seals and a flat fish touch pool.

There was a superbly set out penguin pool with the water surface at eye level so that you could view the penguins both in the water and above. We spent a good hour and a half to two hours in the aquarium and thoroughly enjoyed it, although there was that touch of guilt about enjoying the dolphins. I'd much rather see them in the sea even if they are a much rarer sight and harder to spot!

A huge ship of the line battleship is moored along the waterfront, I'm guessing but it must carry somewhere around 70 guns. You can count over 30 gunports on the side, double for the other side and there would be stern chasers and bow guns. A standard British ship of the line of the late 18th century carried 74 guns.

As we walk west along the marina we pass in front of the basttleship and get a better view of the figurehead. A bus passes behind us, ooh -they have trolleybuses here!

The flyover is a bit in-your-face and dominates the seafront of Genoa. However it allows traffic to flow freely along what would otherwise be a pedestrian heavy environment and slower, frequently stopping traffic such as buses can operate at ground level without obstructing or delaying through traffic.

The Stazione Marittima, with it's sculpture of the prow of a galley under the pediment and fountain playing over a ship's screw. As we reached the ship, we came up behind Cissie and Ada on the gangplank. "Do you want to get past?"
"How?"
"I can't go fast!"
"You are going fast enough!"

We went for a spot of lunch and joined the two ladies on the pool deck. "Do you want to borrow my sun cream?" asked Cissie, pushing a plastic bottle of Nivea sun lotion at me. The top was wedged on with a rather soggy tissue.
"What's this for?" I asked.
"The top won't stay on..." The tissue was between the top of the bottle and the lid, wedging the lid open. I pulled the tissue off and the lid clicked shut. "Well, I can't press it hard enough," she said. I replaced the tissue...
"Tell him what you did when you got it," Ada said to Cissie. She began her distinctive laugh - a sort of "Hih hih hih!"
"I asked my son to get it for me," she said, "but I got confused and asked him to get me some viagra by mistake!"

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Getting a Bit Lost in Genoa

Tuesday 28 August 2007. The Island Star arrives at Geoa, Italy. It sails past the industrial area of the port and right into the city waterfront where there are moorings for cruise ships and ferries.

It is an old city, spoiled a little by an elevated roadway running right across the waterfront. Some of the buildings look a little tired and run down.

A huge quayside building, the Stazione Marittima leads from the wharf to a pleasantly spectacular piazza, the front of the building telling of past glories. It was well maintained and truly impressive. Excursions were being offered to Milan and Portofino amongst other places. We had opted for doing our own thing today and hopped innocently onto a free city shuttle bus. This took us on a very roundabout journey, passing through a couple of tunnels before dropping us off in the middle of the city. I had no idea at all in which direction the port was or how far away it was!

Well, we have a good choice of directions to go in, so we just set off. You never know - we might find our way back to the ship... This cafe looked familiar. Our favourite Blackpool cafe (we live there) has this same Elvis figure sitting in its window! I saw a sign for a Tourist Information office and we were able to get a street map and sort out where we were.

We were on a hill. Going up led to the medieval part of the city and going down led back towards the waterfront and through a maze of alleyways. We headed uphill, coming to this magnificent gateway through the old city wall. Then a few steps down and we came to a small piazza to our right, almost every inch of which was covered with parked scooters, Lambrettas, Vespas - the Italians like their scooters. I don't think there was a single motorbike amongst them!

On our left side was this wonderful ruin about which I know nothing whatsoever. I could go off searching on Google, but then I know that a few of my readers like these little challenges, so if you know what this is called, how old it is, who built it, whether it was used for worship, games or sacrificing grasshoppers - please leave a comment or get in touch!

And now we have a look at the small building next door... This was labelled quite clearly and proudly as Christopher Colombus's house. He was born here in fact, although when we called he had gone out... I don't know what it is with us and Italy, we are just unlucky in this way. We went to see Vesuvius one year and that had gone out too...

We left the birthplace of Christopher Colombus and passed once more through the medieval gate, heading eventually into the dark and slightly seedy alleyways leading to the waterfront.

Some of them are well lit and filled with shops and neon light. Some are alleys in the truer sense of the word, dark with six-storey buildings on either side, concealed doorways and smoking men looking at you suspiciously. A chap walking alone in front of us was accosted by a prostitute. He waved her away irritably. She didn't take offence.

I even found a guitar shop in one of the alleys, though I thought perhaps I might have problems getting it on the flight home. We were looking for a tobacconist as Fran had some cards to post. I haven't a clue what stamps is in Italian and when we eventually found a tobbaconist we went in warily and I said a tentative "poste?" The tobacconist tutted (in Italian) and said in perfect English: "Post office - next door!" Ah...! Well, for Heaven's sake - it's yellow! Red! That's the colour post offices should be! We have some more wandering to do before we return to the ship, but once we were back we got into a conversation with a couple who said "We were walking through some alleys and ran into some Carabinerie police. They said it was too dangerous for tourists to be in the alleys and they escorted us back to the waterfront!"

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Back Onboard the Island Star

It's Monday 27 August 2007 and we have returned to the Island Star cruise ship after our excursion to Pisa.

Something had taken up residence in our cabin! We dropped off some things and picked up others and went up on deck where Cissie and Ada waved us over to their table by the Pool Deck bar. "Have a Heineken Light," they said, "They're two-for-one!" They started telling us about the karaoke they had been to on the previous night. "Are you going to have a go?" So it came out that I played in a band. The name though was a bit much for Cissie... "Creeping what???" she spluttered. It got worse. Just about every day, at least three times, she would stop whatever she was doing, fix me with an eye and say hopefully, "Is it... Grumbleweeds?"

"No..." we'd say, "it's Creeping..."
"Creeping!" she'd cry triumphantly.
"Yes! Creeping what though?"
"Creeping Lightfield?"
No... Creeping Bent..."
"Creeping Bentfield!"

"Well, you're not the bent one..." commented Ada as a gorgeous girl walked past in a tiny bikini and I went momentarily cross-eyed.

We had our meal in the Beachcomber restaurant onboard. This was open 24 hours every day. It had two identical halves and one was open whilst the other one was being cleaned and re-stocked. There was plenty of choice, starters, salads, themed main meals (one night it would be Italian, another Chinese etc.) and there was always something for those who had simpler basic appetites. There were plenty of sweets and desserts also, accompanied by fruit sculptures such as this rabbit.

There were mousses and flans, puddings and custard, ice creams and cheese and biscuits. There was a huge bowl labelled Berry Sauce which was absolutely luscious.

This was the most relaxed of the restaurants aboard. There was also a steak restaurant, a second Silver Service restaurant and a mid-range restaurant. Add to those an on-deck grill serving burgers, hotdogs and chicken etc. and there was plenty of opportunity to pile on the pounds. You could literally eat all day. Indeed there was breakfast, elevenses, lunch, afternoon tea, evening meals from around 5:00pm and the odd midnight snacks! I actually lost 4 pounds during the week - chuffed or what?!? I think it was all the running from one restaurant to the other...

Exhausted by eating we went up on deck and helped ourselves to a coffee. It was getting nicely into twilight. A splash caught my eye. Then there was another. Could it be? Oh yes - there one has jumped clear of the water for a second. "Dolphins, if anyone's interested!" The ship's rail got suddenly full although there were only a few dolphins and they weren't frolicking out of the water too much. Keeping an eye on where the last one surfaced meant you missed the next and most people soon got tired of trying to spot them. I did manage to grab this shot - the only one of half a dozen to actually feature a dolphin, though the quality won't win any competitions!

Miss Franny was too busy chilling out to take much notice anyway. A full moon hung in the sky, reflected in a long trail on the water. I was torn between feeling amorous and keeping an eye out for werewolves - you can't be too careful...

As it got colder with the disappearance of the daylight, we moved back indoors and watched the casino players for a while then took up a couple of seats near the ship's photographers who had set up a makeshift studio with a simple white background along one of the walkways. The best part of a bottle of wine followed by John Smith's dark nectar made me rash. "Come on then, we'll have our photo taken!"

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Excursion to Pisa

Monday 27 August 2007. We get up early to watch as the Island Star sails into the industrial port of Livorno in Italy. It's our second time here, as we did this same cruise last year. On that occasion we took a trip to Florence. This time we are taking an excursion to Pisa.

The famous tower is one of three buildings in a large grassed piazza, the Piazza del Duomo - the Cathedral Square. In addition to the cathedral and the tower, which is the cathedral's free-standing bell tower, there is the Baptistry. We'll see that in a little while.

The main basilica or cathedral (or duomo...) has some wonderful carvings including several Roman stones incorporated into it. The builders weren't all that bothered by which way up they should have been or whether the carvings faced the interior or exterior. This one, if you tilt your head to the left, has a carving of two Roman galleys passing a lighthouse.

Inside the cathedral it is equally as stunning. The lantern hanging from the ceiling is the very same one that was watched by choirboy Gallileo. He was astounded to find that no matter whether it swung a little or a lot, the swing from one side to the other took exactly the same amount of time.

He started to experiment with gravity, climbing to the top of the leaning tower (it has been leaning since soon after its first building) and dropping both heavy and light articles from it. He learned two things. One - that both light and heavy articles fell at the same rate. Two - that the heavy ones hurt more when hitting the top of someone's head after being dropped from the tower...

We come out again and take a look around. This is the Baptistry which also leans, but not as much as the tower. All the roofing tiles have been removed from this side, presumably to allow for roof maintenance.

Inside the Baptistry is a central huge font - the Baptists believed in total immersion. The floor of the Baptistry is raised slightly towards the font allowing spilled water to drain towards the edge of the building. There are a number of galleries which give a superb and prolongued echo. Our guide ushered us in before 11:00am and then shushed us with a strident "Silencio!" which echoed around the place for ages... The Keeper of the Baptistry, a robed lady, walked to the edge of the central font and lifted her head before singing the three notes of the C Major chord in succession. The echo took the notes and merged them into a perfect musical chord.

The place was absolutely full of people standing with their hands up, hoping that the photographer would produce something superb... like this... [coughs modestly] It's amazing how old these buildings are - the cathedral was started in 1063. Three years before William of Normandy set off to do battle with King Harold at Hastings! It was completed in 1092.

The Leaning Tower was started in 1173 and completed in 1372. It started to lean almost from the very beginning.

Reluctantly we follow our guide out of the walled piazza. To reach the bus station involves a half a mile walk, which takes us past more souvenir stalls. We bought a Leaning Mug of Pisa to bring home!

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A Day at Sea on the Island Star, 2007

Sunday 26 August 2007. It's our first full day on our cruise and we have a day at sea whilst we sail from Majorca to Livorno in Italy.

I'm not grumpy - I'm just reading my book, ok? We spent some time reading and more time exploring the ship. Then we used up a few more hours talking to two older ladies we met out on the pool deck. I'm going to call them Cissie and Ada, because they reminded me so much of Les Dawson and Roy Barraclough's wonderful creations. On a day at sea, the ship is always full to capacity. There's nowhere else to go. So we sat with these two ladies, one of whom, it transpired, lived on a well-remembered street only a mile or so from my teenage home. "Oh, I used to really fancy a girl who lived down there!" I said unthinkingly. She only lived next door, didn't she...

A ship's shop, No matter how quick you say it, they won't serve fish and chips... Anyway, I digress... Sitting on the deck in front of us were another elderly couple, taking up a huge amount of space. They had placed their sun loungers with a full three feet at least between them and a family from Northern Ireland had arrived looking for somewhere to sit. There was room for three other sun loungers but there were four of them. They politely asked the couple to move up a little so they could get the other sun lounger in. "No!" came the brief answer. I thought they were joking at first but then the chap started snarling and shouting that they had got there early and weren't going to give up either the space between them or the space to either side. It was ridiculous. The father of the family put a sun lounger down next to the old woman anyway and she started pushing it and shoving it away and the old chap announced he was going to report them to the captain for "manhandling his wife". They had done no such thing. He actually did storm off and came back with a ship's officer, though we soon put the officer right about who was being unreasonable and who had done what. Meanwhile the old woman's breast had flopped out of her costume. "Bloody Hell!" yelled Cissie at the top of her voice, "She wants bloody ironing!" The ship's officer told the couple to move up and respect other peoples' rights to some space. They weren't happy...

The ship's library and games room. Anyway we sat with Cissie and Ada every day after that. They were hilarious. They soon found that certain drinks were on special offer so Cissie's voice would boom out at passing waiters, "Heineken Light - two for one!"

It was the formal night and a chance to meet the captain. Look at that - Fran, did you not bring my high heels???

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Mediterranean Explorer Cruise on Island Star, 2007

Saturday 25 August 2007. We are joining the cruise ship Island Star for their Mediterranean Explorer cruise. Eagle-eyed readers will perhaps spot that we did this exact same cruise in 2006. Ah yes - but this time we'll do different excursions!

We drove off to Manchester Airport and left the hire car (as mine was having dents removed) and Fran suggested checking in the bags before dropping the key off at the hire desk. So we parked in the hire car drop off place and checked our luggage and ourselves on the plane and we then found that the hire car desk was back outside in the car park instead of in the check-in area... Warning bells rang, but thankfully only in my head. "You realise we've just checked two suitcases onto an aeroplane and now we are walking back to the car park?" I said, picturing large uniformed people with guns wondering why we were taking this course of action. Either thankfully or worryingly the security didn't notice this...

Skip forward to Palma, Majorca. We got a coach from the airport to the ship and checked into our cabin on Deck 6 without any worries that we might decide to to anything faintly suspicious on the dockside. Then it was out onto the Pool Deck to grab something to eat and have a look at Palma.

We spent the rest of the afternoon lazing about, watching boat sail in and out of the harbour and watching planes flying down the mountain range and into the airport, adding to the compliment of passengers aboard the Island Star. Flights were delayed. Therefore so were we. We ate in the Beachcomber Restaurant which was the self-service eatery onboard. It was starting to go dark once we got back to the open deck.

The magnificent cathedral is way across the bay, but I was playing with my telephoto lens, resting the camera on top of my camera bag on the ship's rail to steady it for a quite long exposure.

The drool-worthy yacht apparently belonged to the King of Spain. We were sitting at the blunt end of the ship or "aft" as the ship's officers prefer to call it. There's a grill restaurant there and also people can take out meals from the main Beachcomber Restaurant, to sit and eat al fresco on the deck. This is our only glimpse of a port after dark. All other nights during the holiday we will be at sea before it goes dark.

Back on the main Pool Deck they were starting to think about their Welcome Aboard Party. We decided we'd have a listen to the band and join in the fun!

By the time we joined the party there was already a full compliment so we stood by the rail on the upper deck above the pool and along with a few score of others, swayed, danced, and waved from there! The band were quite good but the blokes doing the mixing didn't quite understand that voices were supposed to be heard over the instruments and the guitarist may as well have packed up and gone home. He may have been a bit uncertain of his prowess - when there was any sort of guitar solo it was played by the bass player, high up on the neck of his 5-string bass. Once this was done with and one or two people had fallen over each other, we were divided into two teams - port and starboard - and had a singing contest to see if starboard (that's us!) could remember more words to 1970s hits than the port side could remember to 1980s hits! By now we were at sea and the terrible caterwauling didn't disturb any sensitive Spanish ears... After YMCA we gave up and staggered down to our cabin... I mean... how do you top that???

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