kochleffel

Thank you! Alas, in the week after a cruise I usually don't drink at all, having imbibed rather freely during the cruise. But I may conclude that an exception is warranted.

When it comes to fighting, it’s often better to procrastinate. Mrs. Roosevelt is right—my work engenders frequent worry about what people will think and it’s always pointless. I pass on the menu, cocktail, and wine suggestions, but would like to visit Skye. I got home just before midnight on Sunday, at which point I had been awake for 24 hours. I fed the Junior Cat, went to bed, and slept for ten hours. Today I woke up at 4:00 a.m.

In DTW airport. From all the coughing, sniffling, sneezing, and wheezing on the flight from AMS, I suspect that half the passengers were ill, some seriously ill. I tried to stay masked but was too hungry not to eat.

At CPH airport waiting for the gate to be posted.

Our guide in Aarhus today ventured into a delicate topic today when she tried to explain why no homeless people or beggars are seen on the streets there—except Greenlanders, who are Inuit. Her explanation was that police roust everyone else, but tolerate Greenlanders because Danes (guide was a Hungarian immigrant to Denmark) feel guilty about having introduced alcohol to Greenland. I have only been panhandled once in Denmark, in Copenhagen, not by a Greenlander. I had just left the dentist and wasn’t sympathetic.

What is an Eskimo Pie called now?

Some posts here have suggested that the shipping company might not allow liquids, but you can ask when you’re setting it up. If you have to take full sizes on the plane they’ll need to be in a checked bag. From posts in other forums, you might want to use a suitcase instead of a box, if you have an extra one, so that you can use it for purchases, unless you never shop when traveling. DISCLAIMER: I do not meet your stated requirement of having done this myself, so feel free to ignore this reply, or report it if you must.

I’m to fly home tomorrow on KLM and Delta, and the latter wants me to upload various documents to something called FlyReady. But the site won’t load, NONE of the documents is actually required for my travel, and one of them seems not even to exist. They also want me to check in online, which isn’t going to work….

At Aarhus/Århus. Visited the Moesgaard Museum and Den Gamle By. Tour bus unintentionally amusing when remembering that "buss" used to be American slang for "kiss."

Grüner Veltliner is grown where I live, and I drank plenty of it as a student in Vienna, decades ago. Varieties from that region tend to grow well in the Finger Lakes.

At Skagen in Denmark. Walked out the sand spit that separates the North Sea from the Baltic. As far as I am concerned, eels should stay where they belong, which is in rivers and the ocean. And Royal Caribbean should not label a dish "pasta with salmon" and then put shrimps, no matter how tiny, in it. And autocorrect should not change eels to feels.

Unanswerable question: why do people whose goal is to talk constantly and loudly choose a venue where there is live music to do it? And: why do people push their way into an elevator before others can exit the elevator and make room for them?

Rabbit, rabbit. I stopped myself before saying that to a server in Café Promenade— the menu there is limited and certainly doesn’t include rabbit. I particularly like ginger (red tabby) cats but don’t have one. This is the only sea day and I am sprawled on a lounger in the solarium. I have no interest in, or talent for, music trivia, which there seems to be a lot of, or in a half-price sale on t-shirts depicting ports that the itinerary doesn’t visit.

About trains: if you don't need a car at the port, regular Amtrak trains go from NYC, DC, etc., to Orlando, Fort Lauderdale, and Miami.

Yes, or 2024.

I would be interested in sailing from Port Canaveral, and have done on aNother Cruise Line. It’s convenient for me to fly into SFB.

At Kristiansand, Norway, today, and rode the Setesdal railway. Many people were complaining about the short train ride (and longer bus ride to get to it), but the description was clear about the length of the surviving part of the historic narrow-gauge line. A beautiful sunny day, although things were damp from rain overnight. I don’t have the ideal mix of clothing. Outdoors is OK, but I didn’t expect the public areas of the ship to be as frigid as they are.

Today I visited the Norsk Folkemuseet. It needs more than a day, maybe more than a week, and I barely got back to the ship in time. A question that is not specific to HAL, but applies to every cruise line in my experience, including HAL: is it typical for crew members to address a passenger as Mr. Firstname, or does it only happen because my surname is difficult?

NCL has offered this in their app for a while and I liked it, although I wouldn’t be happy if paper were discontinued. I’m on the Voyager now and I don’t think it’s offered. I’ll try not to comment on those who are ostentatiously proud of locking their phones in the safe, leaving them at home, or still using a phone where you wait for an operator to come on and ask, “Number, plee-uz.”

On the Jade in May, it was stated explicitly that this wasn’t allowed. I had no reason to try.

Today I visited the Munch Museum. I’ll save pix for when Oslo is the port of the day. While I was there, I received voicemail and email from the dentist’s office in Copenhagen, trying to confirm an appointment for 5:30 p.m. today. It was a mistake: when I called on Saturday, the receptionist didn’t understand that I needed an appointment the same today, and put it down for today. When I explained and the dentist agreed to see me in an hour, the Tuesday appointment stayed in the file. I emailed back, thanking them for seeing me on Saturday and saying that I was OK (and in Oslo). It’s a good thing that the Junior Cat doesn’t go out, because if she caught a bat she would probably bring it in alive and ask me what to do with it.

Docked in Oslo. Bravo call to deck 1 and it was several minutes before they announced that it was only a drill. I slept until 9:30. Now having coffee and a croissant with smoked salmon in Café Promenade.

Tonight I had beef pie, made with Guinness, and did OK but chewing only on one side. In the roll call we were discussing the addition of both main-course pies and Indian dishes to the menus -- I remember that a Baltic cruise on the Serenade in 2019 had many British passengers, although no specifically British food. Also many passengers from Spain, but everyone I've heard speaking so far who wasn't American was speaking French or German.

I boarded the Voyager OTS at noon. So far I find it annoying, but that’s typical for embarkation day. OTOH, it seems to be less refined, more glitzy than the Radiance-class ships — and also freezing cold. I wish I could post a photo of Addison and Fergus, littermates who are now reunited at the Rainbow Bridge, but I don’t have one on any device that I brought. Many thanks for inclusion in the cares list. No pain or bleeding, so I think I’m OK.

The worst aspect of the dental emergency was not being able to eat lunch until late afternoon, when it would have been too close to dinner. Food in Copenhagen is too good to miss a meal voluntarily. And not being able to eat Danish bread at breakfast this morning, because it demands chewing.