High Seas

High Seas.
Up bright and early this morning – bags out at 6.30am. The bag count is now up to 75, yes, 75. Your nearest & dearest has either taken the smaller suitcase out of the larger one, OR, bought another one!
This incredible number of pieces of luggage was not a thing of joy and amusement to the bus driver we had this morning. In fact, it seemed to put scales on his liver! Boy, did he ever mump & grump as he loaded the bus. Being the wonderful women that we are, we had whipped around for a tip for his hard work. Got to tell you that after his rude comments we did not give him a penny!
The drive out to Calgary Airport is only ‘aboat’ 20 mins, so just long enough to give everyone the final rundown on bags, tags etc.
Check in at Air Canada was a breeze. Finally a Group check-in desk with an operator, Kim, who knew what she was doing. No silly weighing of bags, just tag ‘em and put them on the conveyor! Several people were slightly nervous of what weight their bags might have been, but no worries.
I made my way down to the Brewster office. They are the Canadian Tour Company that we have been travelling with. I filled in a complaint form about Mr Grump, while one of the Travellers filled in a claim for a broken bag. Joy, joy, joy!
Strapped in, on the plane, ready for the seat belt lecture and what did we get? Well, we got a special welcome. Of course today is Mother’s Day here, so we were all greeted for that, but then the ‘Quilters of New Zealand’ received a special greeting too. The delight was having it in English, then in French.
Smooth flight, easy landing – after all we were just sitting there! Uplifted 75 pieces of luggage, PLUS hand luggage, and outside to meet the coach.
Commentary from Sabina as we drove through to Canada Place and voile` - there’s this BIG white cruise ship in front of us. Very impressive.
We all off loaded and joined the first queue of the cruise. Two cruises are departing today so around 3,000 passengers and all of the hangers-on that go with it. Big long zig-zag of passengers. Then through the first checkpoint to sort out the North Americans from the Rest. The Rest, had to sit for an hour or so and wait to proceed, in groups of about 40, through Immigration. Then the next queue (much more exciting) was Boarding. Here we were issued with our On-board I.D. cards.
(Imagine a fanfare now) Up the gangway and, ta da, we’re on! Mad rush to check out the cabins, unpack and then time for Lifeboat drill at 4.15pm. There we all are standing at our respective lifeboat stations for Roll Call. Damn Photographers everywhere.
With much chiming of bells it was chucks away (or whatever the nautical equivalent is). Sliding gently away from the berth, in no time at all we were going under the Loins Gate Bridge.
As I write this, we are ‘purring’ along just nicely, with mountains & islands out the windows. I have a window, not a porthole. It’s square, not round. There’s still snow up on the tops, but the weather is magnificent. Clear, clean & sunny. We are suffering a bit from the long daylight hours. Oh for an early night!
Tomorrow is an ‘at sea’ day. I’m having a spa treatment in the afternoon, but I’m sure a sleep-in is called for.
Keep the Comments coming. We love them.
Ps, we’ll be keeping an eye out for pirates and mermaids! Might be more likely to see floating logs and seaweed.