Catlover54

Thank you for posting. It is unclear what will happen after 9/28 in St. Johns (assuming we actually get there), per the app, e.g., if we will be duplicating QC and Trois-Rivieres originally scheduled 10/2 and 10/3, or if they will try and add something else for us (hard, short notice). My guess is that SB Square will be crowded with people trying to rebook excursions once they know where we are going and when.

Last night we heard thunder. But this morning, all is well, at least for now, and though I cannot see the port from our hotel window, online I found the Quest is indeed in the harbor. Early morning view from our suite over part of the town:

Right next to the market is SAQ, a wine and spirits store where you can get good quality wines to bring on board (allowed on SB), in anticipation of the included wine not always being the greatest.

We booked a tour offered on Viatar via Tri* Adviso*. Ours was called "Private walking tour of Old Port", (guide was Elise but they might not send her). You can book private, group, half-day or full day tours to your interest (walking, driving, just in town or also going out of town, food or architecture focused, even a Jewish food and history tour). I had come close to booking with Tours by Locals, but their "Local" first claimed she could not promise a car three months in advance, then raised the price, and was generally acting unreliable, so we bailed without cost.

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The basilica is beautiful and well-maintained

Mount Royal, the highest point in twon (buildings are not allowed to be built higher)

A former bank, now Crew Cafe Regent in Harbor with Habitat 67 on top Great Farmers Market (closes at 6) Overview of port area.

Bank, energy, and insurance buildings with art deco construction . And yet somehow a chunk of the Berlin wall managed to get inserted into an upscale shopping mall. The black tumorous like attachment to the grey skyscraper is the bank's vault. Mohlson building (origina) The birds sit on electric wires in the energy building

Typical Montreal neighborhood boulevards Bank of Montreal, opulent Art Deco with panels commemorating WWI and WWII casualties on walls Francophone (looking with contempt at Scottish bank) Anglophone (looking with contempt at French Catholic church) their dogs just look at each other elaborate piggy bank from the 1800's

Montreal has abundant outdoor public art:

Though our drive to the market was less than 4 miles, due to traffic and construction, it took our Uber over a half hour to get there. Our elderly Uber driver from Viet Nam was bored so he started chatting, as the neighborhoods we traversed got seedier and increasingly decorated with grafitti of varying quality. He sadly asserted "100% of the Natives on the street are alcoholics and drug users" (as we passed one sitting on the sidewalk with hand extended, with oddly manicured fingers and blue nail polish). He claimed he has been here 30 years, and his income, local and sales taxes are too high, and his social security monthly payment is too low ($1700 Canadian), so he still has to work to make ends meet, though he is over 70. We nibbled on all of the goodies while sequentially working on our less than ideal monitored Emed covid screening. It only took an hour and a half (the first proctor was apparently dyslexic and transposed my month and year of birth and refused to let us go forward ; when we called back, having confirmed we were right and she was wrong, all was well until we tried to get the pdf for our covid results and got error messages; turned out we had to transpose my birthdate day and month, i.e., create a falsehood, to make it readable). And so the senseless comedy continued. The next day we went to the Basilica to hear a 50-minute organ concert, which started with the theme from 2001 Space Odyssey and ended with Bach's Tocatta and Fugue in D minor. A vigorous and scenic walk on Mt. Royal, followed by dinner at Brasserie 701 (the best mushroom ravioli I have ever had, though the service was spotty and we could not hear each other), completed the day. Meanwhile we had two more Uber drivers, an African immigrant playing cello concertos on his car stereo, and an Armenian Lebanese refugee here for the last 20 years because he was tired of listening to explosions in Beirut. We feel fortunate to be boarding the Quest, regardless of what problems we may encounter.

We are too early for exploring fall colors, so after settling into our complementary upgraded hotel suite on the 19th floor of a chain hotel in downtown, with stellar views, we started our reexploration of the town (not my first time here) with lunch at a traditional French bistro, Modavie. There I had escragots and my coveted boudin noir with apples, bacon, and mashed potatoes, accompanied by a French pinot noir. Then came a private guided walking tour of the old town, with our guide showing us a lot of the old Art Deco buildings inside and out. View spots revealed a Regent ship simultaneously in port and near where we will embark soon. In the background, the dark outlines of the Habitat 67 condos revealed themselves (I had first sailed by them in 1975 when they were all the modern rage, on the Stephan Battory, a Polish basic transport ship from Montreal to Europe). The guide said some of her tour guests have asked what those "ruins in the distance " are (million dollar ruins). Then it was time to buy dinner supplies at the farmer's market in Little Italy (Marche Jean Talon). We secured fine wines at the wine shop SAQ, where a very knowledgable assistant voluntarily helped us select exactly what we wanted (if only he would be a somm on the Quest). Our haul included a baguette, berliners/beigners (plum and apricot), a chocolate eclair with real cream for DH, a cream cake for me, misc. decadent cheeses, kolbasa, caramel cake, and finally some old-fashioned chocolate chip cookies for DH.

Well, it will be live tomorrow. We have to use up the SB points we acquired after being unceremeniously booted off the Encore when Covid hit March 2020, and this part of Canada had been on our bucket list for a while, so here we are. The cruise (assuming Hurricane Fiona does not sidetrack us), will be 12 days, including ports Montreal, Havre-St. Pierre,L'Anse aux Meadows, St. Johns, Saint Pierre and Miquelon, Cap-aux-Miquelons, Quebec City, Trois-Rivieres, back to Montreal. Meanwhile we have enjoyed three nights of pre-cruise Montreal, a lovely, relatively safe pre-cruise city with mostly friendly shop and restaurant personnel, excellent dining options, and easy places to walk. It is a lot like France, sans the attitude. I would like to encourage anyone else on this cruise to not be shy and please also chime in with thoughts and comments as the cruise goes along.

The Venetians long ago decided they no longer need visitors to stimulate their economy, as they are well-fed enough, housed, have utilities, and social welfare retirement funds. Good enough. Cruisors have gotten the message to stay away -- so we will!

We just wasted 1.5 hours of life each doing Emed for a cruise going out of Canada. First we had to reregister each of our accounts because it had been a few months since we used Emed (and the last time we tired, we got an application error so I'd had to hunt down a foreign pharmacy open on a Sunday that would do it, very inconvenient), apparently Navica just deletes old passwords after a few months.Then the gal in Fili who answered our call transposed my month and year of birth (likely due to dyslexia) and declared my attempt at a test ineligible because my ID did not match what they had on file and told me to edit my birthdate and call back. After reaffirming my birthdate was correct, and not in need of editing, we called back, and the new gal in India proceded with the test, which was completed as negative, but then when the certificate was sent online I could not get the pdf with results to open using the birthdate as password because the system had apparently again transposed the month and year of birth (so on a guess we entered the likely transposition, and it worked). . DH also had to set up a brand new account, and got dumped off several times. Finally, we have our e-results. What a waste of time and money. We already knew we were negative (or as negative as you can be) from self-testing for this cold virus, on top of lack of symptoms. At least we no longer need a test to get back to the U.S. post-cruise (we'll see how long that pleasantry lasts).

What a confusing, useless and unproductive theatrical mess. Our TA proudly informed us a couple weeks ago that per new SB rules, we do not need to provide proof of a test for our upcoming Canada SB cruise (though we like to do our own personal, and cheap, testing before any major trip to minimize risk of being sick and landing up quarantined). Then I come here (after a refreshing respite away for a few weeks, to detox) and get pages of contrary information. Post #75 is the most useful so far, thank you Laylam.

One thing to keep in mind, however, for pax who do "not feel rushed" (not necessarily meaning you): *When the ship is full*, the small venue fills up almost immediately, and then others have to wait until the early, prior guests clear out. One cannot ,unfortunately, make reservations. So if one comes early, as a general courtesy, if others are waiting, I think it would be polite to not just sit around for an hour after the meal chit chatting (one can do that elsewhere, like in the lounges). That would free the table up for other guests who are waiting, so they can also enjoy the venue. Staff will of course NEVER tell you to move along. Given the understandable popularity of this small venue, I think they should move to a reservation system for it. On luxury Hapag Lloyd, I like the set-up where the smaller dining venues are reservation only, and then the table is yours for the evening, so there is no rush at all when guests are there (guests can come early or later, and can stay the entire evening chit chatting even if not eating). But with planning a reservation , everyone could experience it at least once if not more often. If people with reservations come early and finish within 2 hours, (typical, including the chatting), then others could still drop in without reservations later on. I say this as someone who, arriving 5 minutes after opening, has waited in frustration a long, long time, while people are not eating and are just occupying the table . I understand it is currently set up to make people think it is just fine to have a " first come first served and we're not leaving" approach on a luxury ship, because no one tells them otherwise.

I am greatly enjoying reading and sailing along with your photojournalism, each morning with my morning coffee 🙂 Post #204 describes all the fresh fish available in Bergen markets. Do you know if any of those were purchased by the ship's chef and then served as fresh fish specials to pax that evening or next in the dining rooms, or if this is ever done on Regent? Some luxury lines make a special point of doing this, though of course with the right chef and preparation, even fresh frozen fish can be wonderful. I only have a handful of Regent experiences and had problems, for the price, (pre-Covid), compared with other luxury lines, but have been tempted by blogs such as yours and a couple others that provide both positive and negative, to try again, for the right itinerary, and in a higher level suite so as not to worry about getting the excursions I would like. Looking forward to more, thank you for your efforts, I know it is a lot of work (especially when internet goes on strike).

LOL! DH and I met with our financial advisor (from a very large firm) yesterday in a nice restaurant. We do this routinely on a regular basis, part business, part social, and having just finished reading the latest issues of the WSJ, all had a good laugh about the new redefinitiions of *two sequential quarters of negative growth*, after decades of one steady definition. Then we got down to the business of 'buttoning down the hatches' to prepare for the upcoming "transitional" ride, (while enjoying the now 50% or so extra cost or "transition" inflation since last year of the identical meal we order each time every 3 months ). We can fortunately still afford our cruises, as well as the outrageous overseas business airfare, and have done multiple cruises since Covid (another one is coming up in September, for Canadian fall colors, and DH's camera is ready!). But as I've said before, the logistical barriers and major inconveniences the pandemic has created take a lot of the joy out of planning and executing the trips, waste time on unproductive tasks (e.g., trying to figure out which airport you're least likely to lose your luggage at, which airline is least likely to cancel you short notice, which country is most tolerable for a quarantine, which country will require suffocating N95 mask usage *even when outside* (like we experienced on our Panama Canal cruise), where and when you can get tested pre-cruise etc.) and create unhealthy anxiety (and it is *not* anxiety about dying of Covid, despite my age and immunosuppressant medication). Ironically, we booked our next cruise (to timely use up some SB FCC), for Canada several months ago , thinking that if we got stuck in another sudden lockdown or quarantine, we would be able to "just rent a car and drive home", now that we are both retired, as we have time. Then when we investigated (three months ahead of time) booking a private countryside driving tour with a guide pre-cruise, we found out from her that there is a major shortage or rental vehicles -- the guide asked if we would consider just a walk around town instead.

Terrific itinerary, "spaz" 🙂 It may of course be very hot, but you're probably used to that where you live and know how to tolerate it. I would love that itinerary in the quiet and cooler winter, though I know there would be more rain and storms, but of course SS does not do it (and neither does any other luxury line).

And yet, your leaders (with approval by the subjects) could close the borders back up very quickly with any new health concern twist (monkeypox, anyone?), which would make it a long and expensive and tedious hard-to-get and uncomfortable trip home for some of us. I was on a ship mid-cruise in Australia when the Covid lockdowns hit -- our five-figure round trip airfare, paid in order to justify having a several week trip, was unreimbursable even though we only had 8 days there, because technically we had "enjoyed" the flights, even though we would never have taken them for such a short cruise. Risk/benefit calculations on how-to-get-home-if-there-is-a-new-lockdown, wasted business class travel costs, and tolerance for severe lockdowns by destination governments (to try and achieve "zero Covid") factor into decision making for us, now that it looks like an eternal-Covid-variant environment (and new viruses on the horizon). You have a hauntingly beautiful, stunning country there , and with friendly people (I was fortunate to see it on a full cruise a few years ago on Silversea, and you had, until recently, been on my list for a return, but it's going to take a while to regain my confidence. I am glad you (and Australians) can now move about more, and you locals will probably be packing the cruises in that area. Enjoy while it lasts!

Gentlemen who perspire a lot when it is warm in dining rooms remove their jackets, to avoid excess sweating and the odors of non-gentlemen, which ladies do not like. 🙂 Thank goodness there is no SS rule against removing one's jacket at a table if one is very warm, but I understand the old tradition of not doing so and just sweating it out to be more civilised.

It is just one more thing to keep track of, to make sure the refund happens, and is credited properly (usually yes, in my experience and that of others, sometimes no, and then you have more headache fixing the error if that happens) We like to take some ship excursions (and use our loyalty % discount option on the excursions), even though SB's are not the best priced or the best organized compared with other luxury lines. Having to prepay for them months ahead of time, when you're not sure they'll even run or even if the cruise will run, or that you'll still be using that credit card, is not my favorite part of SB, though it is minor. The other luxury lines do not have this odd prepay system and I prefer to pay closer to time of the event to track things more easily, since I also deal with other lines and do many excursions (we typically cruise not just to sit on the ship, but for the ports). But SB has other good things, (at least they did so far) and SB Square customer service is a highlight: being able to sit down in a civilized manner and be comfortable when dealing with various service issues, instead of standing while someone behind you breathes down your neck at reception on other lines, is wonderful for those of us with muscular problems where prolonged standing is uncomfortable. However, staffing needs to be maintained at the desks, otherwise you land up standing waiting for a desk to open.

" The only water excursions on the lakes that were unaffected were those that involved the Special Operations Boats (fondly referred to by the crew as SOBs). They are a hoot and highly recommended by those of us who were able to book one" I have not done Viking Ocean but am considering an expedition, and am keen to understand. what determines who is and is not able to book SOBs? Is it random lottery, first come first serve, top cost suites get first choice, contingent on who-knows-who who is in charge, reserved for VIPs, or something else? SOBs are of interest to me because you can board before getting into the ocean, e.g., if someone worries about climbing down into a wobbling Zodiak, an SOB alternative (and I think only VIking expedition ships have them) sounds great. Thanks in advance.