What I did on my Spring break

You all know how much Mr. Gadget and I love to cruise.  Here's the rundown on our latest one with the main points mingled with a few shop pictures taken in the lovely little French town of Honfleur.

We embarked from Houston on April 19, I mean April 20.  Houston had a record-breaking rainstorm and the harbor master closed the port. Fortunately, we were on the ship by then.

Two days later we arrived at Ft. Lauderdale....where we picked up more passengers, more fuel, and more sugar (for those fancy desserts....the ones for which cruise passengers will throw their sensible eating habits overboard.)

After two more days we arrived in Bermuda. I found a little shop with beads and other treasures I will use to embellish my crazy quilt squares.

We then spent seven relaxing days at sea enroute to Liverpool....with a brief interruption about midway for a helicopter evacuation of an ill passenger.  

We took a city tour of Liverpool which, of course, included many sights made famous by the Beatles. As we rode along Penny Lane our tour guide pointed out the locations of the "barber showing photographs," "the banker with the motorcar," and "the shelter in the middle of the roundabout."

Our next scheduled stop was Holyhead, Wales, but it wasn't to be.  Rain, wind and rough seas kept us out of the port.

After three more sea days, and a 7-hour approach down the Elbe River, we arrived in Hamburg. The city was in the midst of a big harbor festival. The weather was perfect.
The fireboat, with hoses at full force, greeted our ship, and the tall ships were in town.  There was a lot of beer- drinking.

One more sea day to LaHavre in France where we boarded a tour bus for the trip to Honfleur.

Then it was just a 100-mile journey across the English Channel to Southampton and the end of the cruise.  Since our flight home was not until late afternoon, we took a tour to Stonehenge.  Again, the weather was perfect....which is a real bonus I've been told.

 

And here I am looking perky...before the 7 hour flight home, and the 5 days of jet lag.  I've been known to swear off traveling at that point.  But it's a condition that always passes....kinda like a nasty case of the touristas...