Tracy-Shane-Trips

Pretty day. The weather was friendly and not too hot. We slept until 8am but were still really tired. Bodies not on UK time yet, I’m sure. We both napped a couple of times. Now at 830pm, we just went to see a planetarium presentation of the Aurora, and Shane fell asleep in the dark and missed the whole thing. I’m sure they will show it again.

Today we went ashore and had our first excursion. It was a walking tour of Greenwich. The tour guide was this nice old pensioner who knew a lot of history and really loved to talk… a perfect job for her, but we ended up sitting around a lot and hearing about all of Henry’s wives and like that… you get my meaning! See photo:

Shane and I actually peeled off and went to Greenwich Market. We didn’t find any flip-flops, but there were loads of food stalls and crafts. See photo:

Then we headed over to the Maritime Museum, where there were some pretty cool old figureheads and we walked around for about 30 minutes checking everything out. This is an early racing boat and a cool, huge engine from 1933.

After that, it was the Queen’s House and Chapel. No, I don’t know who any of those people are.

Then, last but not least, before we boarded again was the Cutty Sark. A really cool old tea clipper ship built in Scotland, the fastest ship of its time. It went at a “clip,” which is where we get the word clipper. Here’s the history: “Cutty Sark” is an old Scottish term for a short shirt or nightdress. It comes from the famous 1791 poem by Robert Burns called Tam o’ Shanter. In the poem, a young witch named Nannie wears a revealing “cutty sark” while dancing.

Captain Shane

We even got to go under the ship, which is where I tested out the new selfie stick.

We were back on the ship by 1pm. Shane thought about going to the nice gym, but we both took a nap instead (haha). I woke up and saw Shane on the balcony and joined him about 330pm and realized that we were underway to our next destination, Dover.

Shane relaxed in the room for a while, and I went to the bow to see where we were going. We were still in the skinny part of the river, but now we are in the North Atlantic Ocean heading for Dover.

No shore to be found anywhere.

Cool windmills in the middle of nowhere!

So then to dinner… the buffets here are amazing. I had crab, shrimp, steak, salmon cakes, salad, and potatoes. Everything in moderation, of course… It’s a pretty small plate. No photos of dessert because it disappeared so quickly, but it was panna cotta with strawberry coulis, apple crisp, chocolate/Baileys and coffee gelato. We’re definitely going to the gym tomorrow! 😛

So anyway, it’s 9:15pm here and pretty chilly out on the balcony, 65F. I’ll say gnite and see you in Dover, where we are going to the Spitfire and Hurricane museum at Manston, then to Ramsgate for a tour and lunch at a local pub, and then to the White Cliffs.

Love, TR