Aldeer.com Forums Alabama Deer Talk Aldeer General Forum Transatlantic European Boat Ride...

We just got back from a whirlwind European cruise and then a week at the beach for our twin grandson's 16th birthday bash. This is our first day home so it's going to be just a chill day at the cabin. Being that I thought I would share a few pictures and a few thoughts from the trip.

We flew from Atlanta Hartsfield to LaGuardia in New York to get on the boat. It was a huge ass boat I think they have something like 5000 guests and about 2000 crew on the boat. We sailed out of New York Harbor the first evening and I was able to get some really nice skyline pics and pics of Lady Liberty.

This is going to be a lot of pictures, but I'm going to do it in stages based on the city.

First off is New York, we didn't get to spend much time there, because we had to get on the ship and that was a cluster F^&k because it was late and they had to disembark everyone and clean before we all could get on.

The happy couple in New York Harbor.



New York Skyline pic...



Y'all know who this is... First time I've ever seen her in person.

Next day was a day at sea and then we docked in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

We visited the maritime museum and there was a large display about the huge explosion that happened in Halifax Harbor during WWI. It destroyed most of the town and killed a lot of people. You can read more about it here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halifax_Explosion

This is a pic of pieces of the ship they found more than a mile away from the explosion...



There's also a bunch of stuff about the Titanic there, including the cemetery that we visited. The museum had one of the most impressive collection of ships models i have ever seen. This was the Titanic's sister ship...



It was cold by the time we got to Halifax. This is us at the harbor...



Somebody patiently waiting for her lobster roll...



We did a tour of the town in a vintage British double decker bus and that was pretty fun and the tour guide guy was very informative.

Nice pic of a harbor lighthouse...



Pic of some of the rocky shoreline...



Once we leave Halifax it's 5 days at sea crossing the Atlantic. Most days we were running at about 20 knots. Which I felt was hauling ass for such a big ship.

I wasn't sure i was going to like 5 days at sea, but we both ended up really liking it. We met a bunch of new friends on the ship and ended up going out to eat with them and going to shows together and just hanging out and shooting the chit. It was fun.

The food and the service on the ship was impeccable. There were days that we just went to workout and then went to the big Garden buffet in our workout clothes and then there were other days that we got dressed up and went to the nicer restaurants and had a 4 course meal.

My sweetie about to dig in to one of the best fillets we have had in a while...



Typical breakfast at the Garden Buffet...



Some friends we met on the ship... Peggy and Don to my left and I can't remember the other couple's names. Don was an aerospace engineer for Boeing. Interesting guy.



This is Jesse and Sonya. More new friends we met on the ship. He is a shuttle bus driver at the Louisville airport. Apparently you make good money doing that. Real good money.



This is Marie. All those pins represent cruises she and her husband have been on. They've been on 32. She is a retired school teach from upstate New York. She was the first female engineering student allowed to enroll at Cornell University School of Engineering. Really amazing woman.

Sounds like an enjoyable vacation. Thanks for sharing!

Made it to Ireland. We got to see our first land in 5 days after some pretty rough days at sea. Neither one of us ever go seasick, even those the waves one day were over 14 feet high. The rocking of the ship and the sliding glass doors on our balcony open to the sounds of the sea made for some really nice naps in the afternoons on board the ship.

Our normal days during the crossing were: Wake up, go get coffee, enjoy coffee, go work out in the ship's gym, go get breakfast, change into swimsuits and terry cloth bath robes, go to one of the many hot tubs, drink Bloody Mary's or Screw Driver's, go get dried off and take a nap, get up go eat lunch, hang out with friends, go to shows, socialize, then dinner and maybe a late show and bed time. It was great.

Land ho! In Dun Laoghaire (Pronounced: Done Leery) Neat little town. I badly needed a haircut, so we stopped at this Turkish barbershop. It seems like that's the only kind of barbershop they have in Europe.





Typical street scene in Dun Laoghaire...







My first Guinness in an Irish pub... Bucket list checkoff moment...



Prices were really reasonable for all the food and drink in Europe. I was surprised.



Just a cool pic from the pub... These must be some famous local people like ball players and stuff...

There's more... I'm just now getting to the European parts.

On to Dublin. We had to take a bus to Dublin, It's a little ways away from the port.

We were hungry after spending the morning in Dun Laoghaire and found a very nice pub named Lincoln's Inn and had fish and chips and Mrs. Irish had the Guinness beef pie. Total meal with the drinks was like $30. Very reasonable. No tipping in Europe either.



Flower shop in Dublin...



Big jewelry store has Mrs. Irish excited...



There were lots of walkable places in all of the European cities that we visited. Most places you can just get dropped off in the historical district or the city center and have plenty to do just walking around and checking everything out. Lots of cafes on every street, where you can get a beer or coffee and just hang out and people watch. We did a lot of that.

Lots of beautiful cathedrals everywhere you look. Most from the 1200's on and most are in the process of some kind of restoration.



Famous Molly Malone statue. Apparently folks like to rub her ample assets.

More about her here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molly_Malone



The Oscar Wilde statue. it was in a large park in the middle of Dublin. Not too far from Trinity University.

I've got to go lift some weights and do some other stuff. I'll come back to this tread and finish posting. We have Belfast, Amsterdam, Brussels, and Rouen, France left and a couple of those are my favorites. More and better pics coming soon.

Thanks for sharing. I've enjoyed this post.

Next stop was Holland to see some windmills (They actually call them "watermills" in Holland.)

We had to first cross a good portion of Holland by going through a large canal... They have a lot of modern windmills in Holland, but they still use coal too.





Our giant cruise ship was traversing a canal and there was in interstate running under us.



Lots of nice farmland along the canal. A lot of nice farm land in the Netherlands period...



One of the many windmills, and a bit of a perspective of it next to a large cargo ship that was passing us in the canal.



These are some of the small garden plots for the locals that use available land near industrial sites on the canal...



People live in these areas too...



Amsterdam blends the old and the new. Some really cool architecture there.

I’ve got to make it to Ireland. Beautiful pictures

On to the interior pics of Holland. By the way Holland is a part of The Netherlands, but all of the Netherlands are not Holland. This is one of the most picturesque places I have ever been to. it's just beautiful. And clean too. I hardly ever saw any trash anywhere. Super squared away folks too. Everything is very well organized.

Just a country scene..



This is an area known as "Waterland" it is the first reclaimed land in Holland. How they did this was build dykes around watery areas that they wanted to reclaim and then build "watermills" to pump the water out and into canals that were higher than the bottom of the lake was. An early watermill could only pump up 1.5m of water due to the design and the Archimedes screw that they used. The Archimedes screws they used were made of wood planks and must have taken some serious carpentry skills. The watermills themselves must have taken some serious carpentry skills...

These little ditches at the bottom of the reclaimed land route the water towards the watermills to get picked up and pumped out. The Dutch call them "Ditches." I kid you not.



Various assorted beautiful watermills...









If you had areas that were over 1.5m deep you had to use more than one watermill...



The shaft transferring power from vertical to the 45 degree Archimedes screw...



Looking up at the main shaft...



The Archimedes screw that they used...

Always wondered what the inside guts of the watermills looked like. Insane it is mainly all wood. Shim it here and there.

We have several Shark Guards in the Netherlands too. Crafty volks.

Thanks for sharing. Looks like you are having a great time (as usual).

Just a beautiful place...



Speaking of beautiful, Broek in Waterland is just a beautiful little small town that is so typical of Holland... We spent quite a while just walking around and exploring the little town. I could live here.



In a few pictures we go into the church on the right in this picture. it was built in the 1400's.



Interesting thing about this church. All the tiles on the floor are about 6'x2' slate pieces with lettering on them. Under the entire floor is dead rich guys. Each one buried under their own piece of slate.





Time really slows down here...





I could have taken a million pictures here. This chit's everywhere...

On to Amsterdam. This was easily my favorite city of the trip, although I really loved Rouen and Brussels too.

I guess it was my favorite, mainly because if it's mystique throughout the years for me growing up as a hippy kid in the 1970's. It was an edgy city with a lot of different cultures represented (We only saw a few Muslims the whole trip. They weren't as prolific as I would have thought.) Amsterdam is both new world and old world and it all comes together very well. Food and drinks like the other European cities were very reasonably priced.

A note about Amsterdam if you go. Bicycles have the right of way. ALL THE TIME! And you better watch your ass in any kind of bike lane, because you will get run over. Bikes are EVERYWHERE in the Netherlands and the Dutch are serious about bicycles. Just a fair warning.

Our first stop was the Jewish market. This church was one of the first landmarks we passed. A little reading about it here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozes_en_A%C3%A4ronkerk



Mrs. Irish checking out all the street vendors at the Jewish Market. Notice all the bicycles...



And let me tall you Americans don't know what good Fries are the Europeans love their fries. And no that's not soft serve vanilla on those fries it's what you think it is, and it was damned good too! Mrs. Irish is a cutie and I am a lucky man...



The Dutch got rich by shipping and trading stuff.





Mrs. Irish having the time of her life...



Could you imagine living on one of these houseboats along one of the canals?



This is one of the main canals in the middle of the day on a Friday. I was surprised at how busy all the canals were.

They love their gardens in Holland...



One of the main squares in Amsterdam. Not as much weed smoking as I thought it would be.= and not as many stores selling it as I thought either.



Rembrandt...



Typical street scene in Amsterdam. You could make this black and white, change everyone's clothes and easily be back 100 years ago...



Back on the ship...

Here's the cool thing about doing all this on a cruise ship. you never have to pack and unpack your things. you always have your "home" on the ship and no matter what city you go to you're always going back to the ship and to your bed every night and you always know that your breakfast and dinner is going to be taken care of everyday.

This was just just chillin and resting up from something like 15000 steps that day. Nice to have a cocktail and watch the city go by from one of the many cruise decks...



By Amsterdam. What was another cool thing is that big ass cruise ship NEVER used a tug in any of the ports or through the big canal in Holland. The ship's captain was damned good. This pic was taken while we were having cocktails and watching him to a 3 point 180 degree turn in this canal running through the port of Amsterdam.

Thanks for posting. Looking forward to checking it out tonight 👍