Merry Christmas from the Deep South!
It has been another unusual year for weather here. The worst of it was almost non-stop rain through August. By the end of July we had a full year’s worth of rainfall. Another weather anomaly was that March was colder than January, which is typically the coldest month here. There were a few times in April, May and August that the coldest high temperatures were recorded. Things started to dry out in September. October was wonderful with lots of sun, blue skies, moderate temperatures and low humidity. We had some surprisingly cold weather in November. The 2014 winter forecast is predicting a milder and drier winter than normal. I hope so because we had way too much rain in 2013.
We really enjoyed baseball this year. The Braves were very strong all season long, being first in the NL East for all but a day. They made it to the post-season, only to be defeated by the Dodgers in the NLDS.
Throughout the year we have spent time with Kristin, Jim, Alexis and Keira. After we saw them in April, we spent some time at the King and Prince resort on St. Simons Island. The only downside to this trip was some unseasonably bad weather. We did manage to get some rain-free time by their new and beautiful pool, but we were dressed in long pants and windbreakers instead of bathing suits because it was so cold and windy! At the beginning of October we spent time with them again to celebrate birthdays – Keira’s and mine. Keira is a little doll at age one. She is such a happy child. Alexis is almost three. She talks a lot and speaks clearly, so it is easy to have conversations with her. Eric was recently promoted at Samsung. He and Amber still live in Dallas, but they moved to an apartment that greatly reduced Eric’s commuting time to Richardson and back.
We left for Europe on August 24th. We flew to “the dreaded JFK” via Delta; we had a few hours before we boarded our Icelandair flight to Reykjavik. We purchased what Icelandair calls “economy comfort” tickets. This allowed us to use their lounge at JFK which was lovely and fully stocked with nice food, beer and wine. As it turned out, economy comfort was nicer than what the US airlines call business class. At Reykjavik we had a bit of a wait to board the Icelandair flight to Amsterdam. Once again we were able to use the Icelandair lounge. We had a few days in Amsterdam before we began our cruise on the ms Eurodam. This gave us a chance to get over jetlag and do some sightseeing in Amsterdam. I had been there before, but Mike had not. We stayed at the Marriott in the “museum district”. It was an easy walk to the Rijksmuseum, the Van Gogh and Stedelijk museums. We spent the greater part of a day at the “Rijks”. It is huge and contains art from the 1100s to the present. Because the weather was nice, we walked along many of the canals in the various neighborhoods. The downside to walking in Amsterdam is competing for foot space along with bikes, which use the streets and sidewalks. As pedestrians, we found this daunting and dangerous. Bikes are unregulated and they take priority over all other forms of transportation because they are “green”. In the evenings it is common to see women in high heels and cocktail dresses pedaling around with evening bags in their bike baskets.
We had a nice stateroom with a verandah on the ship. Unfortunately, the weather was really bad for the duration – almost three weeks! The sky did not clear until we reached Halifax, Nova Scotia of all places! We knew beforehand that the North Atlantic is not known for good weather, but we did not expect it to be as bad as it was. Still, we were off the ship at each port and saw and did many interesting things.
The first two stops were in Norway at Stavanger and Bergen. Norway is flush with oil money now, and it shows in the high standard of living. It is extremely expensive to live there. Anyone for a nondescript $50.00 lunch?!? The natural beauty is amazing and it is further enhanced by being very clean. You almost don’t see litter in the streets. Stavanger is Norway’s fourth largest city. We went on the Lysefjord – Pulpit Rock excursion. Fortunately, we could see the stunning scenery and the 1500 foot high promontory of Pulpit Rock before the rain and fog moved in. Of the top five countries in the world where people say that they are the happiest, Norway and Iceland are two of the five. The next day we were in Bergen. This is Norway’s rainiest city, and it did live up to its reputation when we were there. We took the cable car to the top of the 2110 foot high Mt. Ulriken. This is the highest of the seven mountains that surround Bergen. The terrain is pretty rugged at the top. Mike walked more of it than I did. The view would have been spectacular, but low hanging clouds made it almost impossible to get the full panoramic effect. We walked over much of the central city area of Bergen, which is very pretty, being between the water and foothills. After all was said and done, Norway was the one place that we would like to re-visit. Holland America has an interesting cruise that includes Spitsbergen which is above the Arctic Circle. The ships that sail there typically have to turn around at about 80 degrees north because of polar ice.
We had two days at sea before we reached Reykjavik, Iceland. This is when we experienced some of our wildest weather on the ship. We had gale force winds which kept us inside, as it was too dangerous to be out on the decks. We had to divert from the planned course to avoid 25 foot seas around the Shetland and Faroe Islands. Things didn’t improve a whole lot when we arrived in Reykjavik, the world’s northernmost capital. The first day we did the Golden Circle excursion which included the Geysir geothermal area, Gullfoss (Golden Falls) and Thingvellir National Park. We were caught in wild wind, rain and very cold air. Mike and I were among the few people who were dressed for the cold and wind, but we still got soaked. Old Faithful is much more impressive than the geyser we saw; the waterfalls were spectacular, but it involved walking along a treacherous trail to see them. Thingvellir is the site of Iceland’s first parliament, dating back to 938 AD. Parliament meetings were held there continuously until 1798 when it was relocated to Reykjavik. The North American and European Tectonic plates bisect the park. This is one of the very few places on earth where the tectonic plate split is visible at the surface. The second day in Reykjavik was spent touring the city itself. It is a very walkable city. Even though it was cold and blustery, there was no rain, so we could do a lot of sightseeing. We visited the Church of Hallgrimur, a Lutheran parish church and the largest church of any denomination in Iceland. Wool and knitting are prominent in all kinds of Icelandic clothing. There are shops throughout the city which feature an extensive variety of handmade local woolen goods.
There were two more days at sea before we reached Nanortalik, Greenland. The second sea day was scenic cruising along Prince Christian Sound. Having a verandah stateroom was wonderful for days when cruising “inside passages” like the Sound. You have the feeling of being in the live version of the National Geographic. The Sound has beautiful scenery with steep mountains that are approximately 3700 feet high. This area is full of glaciers; when they calve (break apart), icebergs result. The Prince Christian Sound connects the Labrador Sea with the Irminger Sea. It is about 60 miles long and very narrow. There is only one settlement of 125 people along the Sound, Appilatoq. The Eurodam participated in a humanitarian project there by dispatching small craft loaded with food, clothing, books, toys and games for the inhabitants. From there it was on to Nanortalik.
Nanortalik is in southern Greenland. It has roughly 1400 inhabitants, making it the tenth largest town in Greenland. The name means “place of the polar bears”. This was another port of call with inclement weather – foggy, drizzly and temperatures hovering in the low 40s. We walked the entire town and spent a lot of time at the Nanortalik Museum. This is a large collection of buildings that at one time were homes, the school, the doctor’s office, radio center and church of the Inuit. The information in each building was extensive, so we learned a lot. Today, the area’s main industries are crab fishing, seal hunting and fishing. We saw the place where whale blubber is processed. We found Greenland to be a fascinating place. For all of its vastness, extremely few people live there and very few people have visited there. The landscape is a pristine wilderness. Despite the fact that the island is called Greenland, there is not much green to be seen as there are virtually no forests and little grassland.
There was another sea day before we arrived in St. John’s Newfoundland. It is the capital city of Newfoundland and Labrador and is the province’s largest city. Situated on the Avalon Peninsula, it is the easternmost city of North America and is known as the place where the “sun rises first”. There is some debate about this as there is a town in Greenland, which is considered North America, which feels that it is the easternmost. St. John’s became famous in 1901 from Marconi’s first reception of radio signals across the Atlantic at Cabot Tower on Signal Hill. It was another day of wretched weather, so we headed to The Rooms and spent a half day there. This is Newfoundland and Labrador’s largest public cultural space. The Provincial Archives are there as well as a museum and art gallery. The special exhibits gallery had a collection of clothing and accessories from the Art Deco era. Being a huge fan of Art Deco, I really enjoyed that.
We hit the highlights of Halifax. The last port of call was the first time we had sun for a full day. We spent most of our time at the Old Burying Ground, Public Gardens, which are considered to be one of the best examples of Victorian gardens in North America and the Citadel. The Halifax Citadel is a National Historic Site showing over 200 years of Canada’s military history and heritage. The tour was very interesting and we happened to be there for the firing of the Noon Gun, a tradition that has continued, every day except on Christmas since at least 1856. We also saw and heard the kilt-clad bagpipers and drummers of the 78th Highlanders perform traditional regimental tunes. We wish that the itinerary had time to include one more stop on Nova Scotia’s south coast at Lunenburg. This is reputed to be the most scenic town in all of Canada.
We cruised a total of 4086 nautical miles, or just under 4700 statute miles. The cruise concluded on September 12th when we arrived at West 50th Street in NYC at 6:30 am. We thought we might miss seeing the Statue of Liberty as the ship would pass by at 5:00 am. We are not usually awake at that time, but we did see it and were surprised at how close the Eurodam was to the statue as it sailed by. We had never seen the Statue of Liberty all lit up, so it was quite a sight to see. We were off the ship by 10:00 am and had another “adventure” trying to get a taxi to take us to La Guardia for the flight to Atlanta. For a time I thought we might actually miss our flight, but we eventually got a taxi and we made it to the airport with a little time to spare. Security lines were long; there was extra scrutiny of passengers since it was only a day after 9/11.
Since we have been home we have kept the suitcases busy. We went to Callaway Gardens in Pine Mountain, GA and to Savannah. We will be spending time between Christmas and New Year’s with Jim, Kristin and “our girls”.
We hope that all is well with you. We wish you Happy Holidays and a wonderful year in 2014.
