FIVETRIBE

Right. Back to the bullet points I referred to in this post. But first, a disclaimer.... I am not a princess. I do not need 5-star accommodation and wireless internet and 24hr cappucinos. Please realise that while a cruise sounds *divine* - this one was seriously flawed. I was not alone in my disappointment - many, many passengers were unhappy. So, let us begin: 1. We all get sea sick to varying degrees....except Hooli - who is totally immune! I think that is fairly self explanatory. The ship receptionist was handing out motion sickness pills like smarties....but it did little to alleviate our nausea. Fortunately none of us were actually physically ill, thank God! The Melody is a small ship and they should mention in the advertising that SIGNIFICANT motion can be felt even in calmish waters. 2. We do not enjoy sharing holiday time with 1488 other people. We queued for breakfast. We queued for lunch. We could never find 5 chairs together. We couldnt get into the entertainment areas ...

We arrived in Walvis Bay 3 hours late which was a blight as we had planned to meet with the Man's family. Fortunately we still had time to shoot through to Swakop and spent 3 hours with them. We went and had seafood at this great new restaurant; just built at the end of the Pier. You can see by the sea that bad weather was heading in... The Man and his dad Kinda novel to be seated on a piece of glass above the sea; must confess to it giving me pause! So great for the kids to see their cousin albeit only briefly. It was quite surreal to just be there for the day and then be heading home again. We shot back to Walvis to board the ship again by 4pm. The wind was absolutely howling and it was extremely unpleasant. And it didnt get any better as the days went by. :-/

This will be a photo post - it was the best day we had on the ship and the photos speak for themselves. Blogger feels the pics look best right justified...so we will leave it at that okay? hanging at the pool - the water was frrrrreezing as its seawater. Duh. Only figured that out later. doff chick. Kids checking themselves out before the Captains dinner. The man and I - more spruced than usual. j My gorgeous trio. They found an empty stage and couldnt resist! Soaking up the sunset. A day I will not forget! This is the way things would have been all along....if the storm hadnt ruined our fun. Grrrr. :-)

On Monday we boarded the Melody. Embarkation took a good 3hrs...going from one queue to another queue. This was not fun but the anticipation of new things and a week away kept us in (relatively) good spirits. Once we managed to find our way to our cabin we droppped our stuff and headed up to the sun deck to wave CT goodbye. It was all rather magical really. Shortly after our 20 minute deck exploration we had to then all file through to various checkpoints on the ship for a drill (with our life jackets on) and listen a lengthy talk on what will happen before we die. Not a great start. Especially after a 3hour embarkation process. Hooli lost it and lay on the floor and quietly wept. I tried to do the same but people wouldnt move out the way for me. Tsk! We returned to our cabin, unpacked and became acquainted with our new surrounds. The cabin was lovely, small but comfortable with plenty of cupboard space. The bathroom was well designed and I could even lie down and read my book in ther...