The ship docked early this morning in Trondheim, followed closely by sister ship, M/S Midnatsol (on her way south). The weather and scenery are spectacular; the ship is quiet, with seemingly few passengers.
Had a hard-boiled egg for breakfast, which reminded me on the cabin scene from the Marx Brothers' film, "A Night At The Opera" - see .
Am reading Bob Carr's "Diary of a Foreign Minister", which is hugely enjoyable.
Last night we boarded M/S Trollfjord in Bergen after a crappy flight from Copenhagen to Bergen on SAS (flight full of crying babies), and a night of broken sleep in Bergen, due to drunks partying outside our hotel window at 2:30am.
The M/S Trollfjord is a mighty ship/ferry, and it's comforting that it is operated by descendants of Vikings. Not sure why that is though. The boarding process was more cruise ship than ferry, complete with room cards that are linked to credit cards for payment on board. These are a very easy way to spend way more money than you expect, especially as everything in Norway is so expensive. (Norway makes Denmark look cheap by comparison, although the Australian dollar is buying 5.5 Norwegian kroner, compared with only 4.5 Danish kroner.)
Our cabin is very definitely more ferry than cruise ship though - two bunk beds plus a single bed with electric height adjustment. The bathroom is bigger than the bathroom in the wheelchair cabins on the Spirit of Tasmania though, and the door has an automatic door opener, which is a bonus. We have a window also. And we slept beautifully.
We splurged last night on the buffet dinner - shrimp, mussels, cold smoked salmon, hot smoked salmon, steamed salmon, smoked trout, smoked cod, crab on boiled eggs, salmon on blinis, fish roe in bowls for scooping plus roast Rudolph (reindeer) for something different.
The average age of ship passengers appears to be 60+ with lots of Germans and Norwegians, so despite just turning 40, Tova feels quite young by comparison, as it's a bit like sailing in a European retirement village!
There was a minor mutiny though at breakfast this morning (another buffet with cheese, sliced meat, smoked mackerel, meatballs, boiled eggs, fruits etc) when coffee and water were unavailable. At the same time, there was an announcement that we were travelling more slowly than normal due to technical problems, so it seems possible that one of the ship's diesel engines (which also power on-board desalination plants) might have had a few issues. Speed has since picked back up to 14 knots, so hopefully the Viking mechanics got it sorted.
We're in port at Ålesund now for a couple of hours. Most passengers have disembarked for tours, but we've opted to enjoy having the ship to ourselves.
Awake early ... just waiting for the local bakery (http://www.lagkagehuset.dk) to open at 7am so Tova can go down and buy rundstyrkker (rolls) for breakfast.
That is the question.
Today, we caught the train to Helsingør (Elsinore) to visit the Maritime Museum of Denmark (http://mfs.dk/en) and Kronborg Castle (Hamlet's home).
The Maritime Museum of Denmark was only opened last year and is built into a former dry dock. The building itself is quirkily interesting; the museum is surprisingly post-modern, with discussions on sailor sexuality. Not really like any maritime museum I've been to before.
Not unexpectedly given that the museum is supported by A P Møller, it has a focus on the contribution of container shipping (especially big, blue Mærsk line container ships) to global commerce and trade, but no discussion of the impact of having a shipping workforce that is mostly poor and from the Phillipines, India and Pakistan. See Rose George's "Ninety Percent of Everything: Inside Shipping, the Invisible Industry that Puts Clothes on Your Back, Gas in Your Car, and Food on Your Plate" for a discussion of this.
After visiting the Maritime Museum, we wandered over to Kronborg Castle in absolutely freezing winds, and walked around the castle. They perform Hamlet there with puppets - seems wrong somehow.
The Danish army was priming the cannons against an imminent Swedish invasion, which seemed a bit fruitless, given that Swedes cross over from Helsingborg by ferry hourly to buy cheap(er) booze in Helsingør.
Originally posted to Posterous on 7 November 2012
Obama's victory speech - wow! Listened on my way home in the car. Why doesn't Australia have politicians of such oratorical power? He might not come from a Southern Baptist tradition, but his speaking style owes much to that tradition. So much so, that pauses in his speech tonight seemed to call out for "Can I get an amen to that, brother?".
My favourite bit (from http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2012/11/07/transcript-obamas-victory-speech):
"America, I believe we can build on the progress we've made and continue to fight for new jobs and new opportunity and new security for the middle class. I believe we can keep the promise of our founders, the idea that if you're willing to work hard, it doesn't matter who you are or where you come from or what you look like or where you love. It doesn't matter whether you're black or white or Hispanic or Asian or Native American or young or old or rich or poor, able, disabled, gay or straight, you can make it here in America if you're willing to try.
I believe we can seize this future together because we are not as divided as our politics suggests. We're not as cynical as the pundits believe. We are greater than the sum of our individual ambitions, and we remain more than a collection of red states and blue states. We are and forever will be the United States of America."
Originally posted to Posterous on 29 July 2012
Just treated myself to the purchase of a GoPro HD Hero 2 camera (http://www.gopro.com). Here's my first video effort - Walking my kelpie/collie cross dog, Haighs, at Semaphore foreshore. Video was taken with the camera mounted to the front of my Mobility Plus manual wheelchair using mounts from RAM Mounts (http://www.rammount.com).
Originally posted to Posterous on 29 June 2012
