REFLECTIONS ON A CRUISE

 from 40,000 feet with free internet on Singapore Air. Let's see if it can deal with blogging.

Miscellaneous thoughts in no particular order.

3000 people on ship, bit overcrowded at entertainment. Quite rewarding to see 150 people doing line dancing in the piazza with the ship rocking & rolling. Dunno about that, it's a nightmare typing up here in the bumpy air. Food service has been suspended, all staff strapped in. The spell check has been having a field day with all the mistypes.

Had a nightmare on the first day, rushed to the loo, big dump, got up & turned around. Hell of a mess getting all the poo out, and there where to put it! Linda put me right.

Breakfast with character, I like my fry up and the waiter always tried a different approach, you have to admire the expressions.

The last one's chowder in bread.

The plane is bumpy again, but eased so food service could start again. I thought, right let's get the boa flight socks on. No sooner had I got one shoe off and one sock off then the food arrived - diddle diddle dumpling, eh. See I am speaking Canadian now. Still one foot's chilled.

Dealing with immigration & customs has been a nightmare, how can I spend one ten thousandth of my life waiting in queues. I'm never going to get that time back.

I've been doing impressions Jürgen Klopp, I've met his wife Klippety you know, she's very nice.

Still haven't got a sock on!

Highlight for me was Japan, would like to go back. Especially Shimizu, get to so those Geishas, try an onsen, see the tea plantation lady. What was that car?

Got a drink problem, just tipped wine over Linda, and earlier in the hol got this espresso martini all over me. Thank goodness for the onboard laundromat.

HO CHI MINH - OH

 ......what fun. Had to be up at silly o'clock to meet in the ships theatre at 7:15. Phone alarms on for 5:45, need to get the body & bowels prepared for a 2 hour coach trip to HCM, formerly Saigon. Nice light breakfast & caffeine rich coffee in the cabin to get us started. Sitting in jim jams at 6:20 Linda put the telly on & noticed ship clock said 7:20, both phones said 6:20. Panic ensued, Linda left me on the toilet, no make up, blouse on back to front in what passes for a run towards the theatre. I caught her up in the lobby where the is always a scrum for the lifts. No need for rush, it was pandemonium in the theatre, everything was running late, immigration staff on board checking landing cards, getting through gangways a nightmare. All in all we boarded the coach about 9:30. I discovered later that our phones knew it was daylight saving in the UK and decided to change time automatically for us - very helpful.

Weather good not too hot & humidity OK. By-passed the tallest building in Vietnam on the way. Lots of construction going on, new international airport & roads being built, it was similar yesterday in Cam Rahn, where loads of international chain companies were building swanky resorts along the coast. Traffic heavy, stop start most of the way.

First stop was at the relics museum, not what you might expect compared to British Museum relics.

They had more weaponry in there than the British army & RAF can muster. Very one sided story, I spent the hour there fighting the evil French, Americans & their allies. It had nice photo records from war photo journalists, but not enough time to do it justice.

Next stop lunch in an excellent Accor hotel. French influence meant delicious pastries.

For some reason an old Post Office is always on the tour, Hong Kong as well?

Presidential palace where South Vietnam ran the war from. Weaponry seems a big thing there, lots of smaller places cashing in on the tourist trade. The underground bit of the palace was pretty hot & humid. Final stop to pay tribute to uncle Ho, I'm not sure he ever visited his city. Nice part of the city, busy with markets & shopping malls cheeky by jowel.

NHA TRANG

First a sea day, nice after all the hectic coach tours. You don't actually dock at Nha Trang, I think the docking area was deemed unsafe for tendering and the ships are now docked at Cam Ranh. This is a military naval base complete with armed guards, barbed wire, the full nine yards. There is no just wandering off the ship. 

Took a ships tour on cyclocabs - these are like the pedal rickshaws you see around London. You can flag them down just like a taxi.

Very busy, difficult to decern the rules of the road, lots of motorbikes and very noisy.

They don't have Uber, their equivalent is Grab. They have Grab bikes as well as cars. You just use the app, the bike turns up and gives you a helmet. I don't know if they take 2 passengers on a bike, you do see bikes with three people riding.

There was a communist festival of some sort going on. They lit a fire in our honour.

We finished our tour at a craft centre for a Vietnamese buffet lunch. This is a large outdoor centre where artists & crafts people come together to work and sell their products. There were painters, sculptors, basket weavers, jewellers and many other crafts people. All of the work was excellent. They had tables, solid wood probably 25ft x 10ft and 9 inches thick - beautiful.

Interesting little game - the sitting folk bang their poles together to music, the dancers try to avoid getting their ankles trapped, count the bruises at the end to see who's won, 10 point bonus for a fracture.

All the cane furniture was made by them, wine as well.

DAY2 HONG KONG

 Refreshed, refragranced in the fragrant harbour. Ships tour Highlights of Hong Kong. Really nice weather, warm but not too humid.

First stop on Hong Kong Island at Aberdeen for a sampan tour round the harbour. Lovely old lady captain with single cylinder engines sampan. Floating restaurants, house boats, plenty to see. Next off to Stanley to visit the craft market.

Nice little town surrounded by beautiful sandy beaches where millionaires live in mansions overlooking the sea. On to the peak.

Nice outlook over the harbour, nice place to visit with breezes when it's really hot & humid. Drove up in the tour bus, but went down by tram. Very steep track, all the seats face up the hill as you fall out of you seat facing downward. Got to the bottom and discovered we had left a couple of Muppets behind at the top.

Still like their bamboo scaffolding here.