GETTING THERE IS HALF THE FUN

CRUISE:  We are starting our traditional November cruise; this year going around the Mediterranean prior to crossing the Atlantic for disembarkation in Rio.  However, finding our way from Antigonish to the ship was somewhat of an adventure in itself.

After an uneventful flight to Toronto we boarded our Air Canada plane for an overnight to Munich.  Just before take-off some passenger inexplicitly left the plane.  We then sat for two hours at the gate as the ground crew searched for the guy's suitcase.  This, of course, caused us to miss our flight connection.  Upon arrival in Munich we spent the next 10 hours sitting in the airport before catching a Air Dolomiti flight to Nice.

Despite a mere one-hour flight, this small Italian airline served us economy passengers good food and a wonderful glass of Barbera from Piedmont.  Air Canada should be ashamed of its offerings of juice or water.

Our original plan was to meet up with our good friends Gerard and Marie-Claude Gleize in Nice.  They drove from their home in Aix-en-Provence and planned to take us sight-seeing prior to dinner at a local restaurant.  We, of course, didn't make it to Nice until 11:00 p.m.  Nonetheless, our great friends stayed around and met our flight.  We had a brief catch-up on the drive to our hotel.

The next morning Gerard and Marie-Claude had a social engagement back in Aix so we spent a rainy Sunday re-charging after the long flights and lack of sleep.  Nice is full of great restaurants and a sidewalk lunch of moules/frites and grilled sardines was a treat.  In the evening we scored a reservation at the restaurant which we had missed the night before.  This tiny family-run place had great food and we greatly enjoyed watching the quite ancient matriarch  terrorize staff and patrons alike.

Poor weather resulted in the next small glitch in our travel plans.  We were suppposed to board in Monte Carlo but the ship couldn't dock.  Thus, after sharing a van ride from Nice to Monte Carlo we boarded a bus for a 3-hour ride to Marseille, the closest port available to our ship.

Once aboard I saw to dinner reservations for the next few evenings while Betty spent an hour-or-so hunting for her misplaced room key.  We just managed to make our early reservation at our favorite French restaurant.  Perhaps Betty's leg brace served to jog memory traces, but in any event, the staff at Jacques remembered us from a previous cruise and we were greated like long-lost relatives.  The meal (Chilean sea bass salad, followed by lobster thermidor, and then crepes suzette) was wonderful; no doubt digestion being aided by a a couple of glasses of Champagne and then many glasses of an excellent Californian Merlot.

After dinner we went to a piano concert.  The young Italian pianist (known as the pianist with the hair, and who will be returning to Carnegie Hall in January) played familiar Chopin and Beethoven finishing with the three movements of the Moonlight.  The selections were interspersed with hilarious monologues.  Unfortunately only a few cruisers bothered to attend, having no idea what a great event they missed.  In the morning I met the pianist and his wife in the hallway.  They apparently are on the ship "on vacation" and I assume the concert is footing the bill.  They left me in charge of drumming up patrons for his next concert which will be in a couple of days.

Today our ship managed to dock in Monte Carlo instead of the scheduled Livorno.  We had a nice Livorno tour scheduled but fortunately our tour guide has very kindly transferred our booking until tomorrow.  As you can see travel plans are never as firm as one expects.