On Board!!!

WOO-HOO, we are on board the Royal Princess, a really small ship, but a very nicely appointed ship. It has really nice woodwork, carpets and an exceedingly polite and gracious crew. Our quarters are nice, not too small and we have a tiny deck on the port (left) side of the ship. The port side is always our first choice, as when in port, the town/city is out our window. We won’t be using the deck until the snow stops blowing by sideways!

We left Montreal before 10pm Wednesday and were in Quebec City early Thursday. Quebec is a very nice and clean town. The streets are cobbled, traffic is minimal and the shops are varied. Some are very much like the tourist traps in Vancouver and Victoria, close to home. Others have unique, locally made items. There is a lower town, the old town, and there is a massive, beautiful hotel/castle on the hill. Six hundred steps will get you up, or…you can take the tram. We did! It was cold both down and up, but the wind on top made it miserable and difficult to enjoy the views and shops.

Internet connectivity on board is really slow, especially AOL. Please use our cojohnmclean@yahoo.com address if you want to email us while we are on this trip. It works much better than AOL and we may not see AOL messages! Co did learn today that there is free wi-fi in the Quebec terminal building ashore and we found it to be as fast as DSL at home. Much nicer. Co was also told that 12 of our 14 ports of call have free wi-fi in their terminals. If true, it will be a real treat and our updates will come from ports cities.

Happy Halloween. We were at sea Friday, our next port is Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island Saturday.

We’ll write again.

John and Colleen