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Our trip started in the San Francisco Bay Area with our dear friends Lani and Roger. We had a direct flight to London and arrived early in the morning. Several young representatives of Oceania met us holding up signs with the name of our ship: Regatta. And there we stood, no answers about when we would depart for Dover, just wait with all our luggage near the exit doors. Two and a half hours later we could finally board a bus. Not a good start and a bad first impression about Oceania's organization. This was to be our first cruise with this company. On the plus side was meeting new friends Jerry and Lorraine who would join us in several of our adventures. |
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The bus ride took about two hours (on the wrong side of the road, of course) and we arrived in Dover about 11:30 am. We were able to board the ship and have some lunch early, but it would be after 3:00 pm before we could go to our cabins. What to do during that time? After a quick call home to make sure all was well, we decided to take a taxi to the castle and the underground tunnels high up above the cliffs of Dover. |
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Dover castle is perched on top of a hill overlooking the English Channel and the harbor below. There are numerous buildings that you can explore on your own, including the main building with passages going every which way and a magnificent view from the top. |
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In the court yard we found a trebuchet, a type of catapult used in medieval times to throw boulders and flaming torches across castle walls during a siege. I have built a model of this and recognized the mechanism used to launch large objects. Go to trebuchet to see my model and more details. |
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From the top of the castle we could see our ship in the harbor. But it would have to wait for us a bit longer. We still had to visit the underground tunnels and walk back to port. |
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The entrance to the tunnels is right near the castle and is included with the ticket price. Unfortunately our time slot was for 4:00 pm which was too late for us. Perhaps another day. |
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The walk back to the ship took us down a long sets of steps. The railing was covered with the entrance tickets, so we added ours. From there it was an easy walk along Castle Street into the down town area. We had heard about a pub called Eight Bells and found it along a side street from the main square. It was time for a pint of English brew. |
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I have included the following map taken from Google Earth so that anyone interested in doing this has some idea of the route we took. The last part of the walk was not very interesting but at least we could see our ship all along the way so we had a target. I realize it is not very clear and would suggest going to Google Earth to get a better perspective. Note that I also show a Somerfeld supermarket located just behind an old church, a block away from the pub we visited. It was a good place to buy a couple bottles of wine. They also have beer and hard liquor.
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So now it was time to unpack, relax and enjoy our journey to the Baltic. Our first port of call was to be Zeebrugge, the harbor of Bruges in Belgium.
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