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Today’s stop was Portsmouth, on the south-central coast of England. Nicknamed “the Great Waterfront City,” Portsmouth bills itself as “the only island-city in the United Kingdom” (whatever that means). This is where King Henry VIII watched his battleship The Mary Rose crash and sink. This is where the Allied forces embarked for the D-Day invasion of France. And this is the closest we will get to London on this trip.
Unfortunately, Gail has caught a cold. She was scheduled to escort a four-hour excursion to “Historic Winchester & Its Glorious Cathedral,” but she had to cancel. Russell also cancelled his free excursion to “Panoramic Portsmouth.” Instead, we took the free shuttle from the port into town to get cold medicine.
We went to the Gunwharf Quays, an outlet mall that had a Boots Pharmacy. This at least enabled us to get glimpses of the HMS Warrior (a gigantic battleship) and Portsmouth’s signature building, the Spinnaker Tower. We also stopped in at “The Cornish Bakery.” We are no longer in Cornwall, but this gave us an opportunity to have a meat pasty and a scone with clotted cream.
Gail spent her afternoon in the steam sauna, the dry sauna, the snow grotto (this is a Norwegian ship, after all) and sleeping in the cabin. She says this cold is going to be a bad one. Fortunately, her wool spinning demo is done and she has no further work obligations on the cruise.
Our dinner companions this evening included Miles, the guest jewelry designer, who is only 30 years old. Our table got into a deep and lively conversation about philosophy and politics, and we ended up closing the restaurant well past 10:00 pm.
The forecast predicts rainy weather for the remainder of our cruise. We will lose an hour tonight when we set our clocks ahead. Gail has already cancelled her escort excursion tomorrow in Le Havre, France. And tomorrow evening, Russell will host his second lecture!
