Journey to Dover

Today is a day that nothing really happened except to get from one place to another.

I just wanted to lie in bed this morning. Oh, did my body ache. But it was packing and moving day today, so no rest for the weary. Upon surveying the wreckage of our luggage, Michael and I decided that we surely did screw up packing because everything we needed to wear or use for cleanliness was either in the bottom under loads of clothes, sandwiched in between, or scattered among the bags. Then we decided it was not our fault that the packing job was so sloppy and that it didn’t take into consideration the two days before we boarded the ship before we could unpack everything at once. No, it wasn’t our fault – it the fault of the airlines! We packed in order to distribute the weight among the suitcases so we had to do some last minute juggling of “stuff.” It’s bad enough that the airlines don’t feed you anymore, now they also screw up your packing!

While I was packing and arranging our exit strategy, Michael took himself a good walk to Buckingham Palace, Westminster Abby and down to Parliament. He returned in enough time to get in the taxi. Good timing, huh!? We went to Victoria Coach Station to catch our bus to Dover and it looked like we had luggage for ten people. In total, we had ten separate pieces: backpack, computer case, box of books, purse, big purse and five suitcases. The bus driver asked how many people were travelling and Michael told him two; the driver muttered and said something about charging for all the extra bags and could not believe that two people could have that many bags. Fortunately, he didn’t or forgot to charge us.

As I reported in my London post, the bus drivers here are very aggressive. The driver told us to put the seatbelts on as it was required; being the scofflaw that I am, I decided that I didn’t need to wear one on the big bussy because I couldn’t fly too far if he suddenly stopped. Oh, how wrong I was. Navigating through London was like playing bumper cars. Drive fast, swerve, slam on the brakes, and then repeat sequence. I tried to eat my sandwich and drink my diet coke, but I couldn’t hold on to them. And this bus was not an express; it stopped at least six times before we even got to Dover. When we finally arrived at the bus station in Dover, we then had to find a taxi to take us and all our sh*t to the ship. Again, we got the look (“oh, you must be kidding – that’s all yours?!”)

Boarding was a snap and only took five minutes from the time we left the taxi until we walked on the ship. Our luggage came to the room about 20 minutes later (to view pictures and read description of the room, click on the link to “Day at Sea“ April 29, on the left handside under Blog Archive). From now on, we plan on boarding the ship just before sailing time – no lines and no waiting for bags. We both experienced a weird feeling after unpacking: we were home. We have slipped right back into our routine. That is downright scary because one must spend a lot of time in one place to feel that way. We calculated that from April 2010 to April 2011, we will have been aboard a ship for 146 days! Why do we have two homes?