Le marché de Louhans

Louhans is a small town of around 7000 inhabitants, situated at the end of the navigable part of the Seille river (a tributary of the Saone). Everyone we spoke to about our proposed trip up the Seille mentioned two things – how pretty the countryside is and the market at Louhans. Since most French towns and villages have a market, it would need to be something a bit special for so many people to comment on it. It was.

We knew that the market only took place once a week – on a Monday – so, once we had M+M on board we decided to head straight for Louhans with a minimum number of stops along the way to make sure we would be there on the Monday. As it turned out, we had time to spare and could have arrived on the Saturday. Instead, we decided to do a little side trip to Branges, which was around 6km from Louhans. It was a picturesque and pleasant stay once we’d managed to find a space in the Le Boat port there. It doesn’t pay to arrive in hire boat ports on the day their boats go out but the port people were happy enough for us to tie up to one of the fleet out of the way while they gave their clients their 30 minute training and sent them off. Once several had left, we were able to move into a spot on the quay.

Because we were so close, we were able to arrive in Louhans mid-morning without having to get up at the crack of dawn, and we were comfortably able to find a mooring space. Had we arrived later, we may have had more trouble. By the end of the day, there were around 15 boats, moored cheek by jowl, perpendicular to the pontoon. We obviously weren’t the only ones to have heard about the market!


After doing the laundry and hanging it out to dry, we set off for a walk around the town to see if we could find out where the market would be the following day. As it was Sunday, all was very (VERY) quiet and we enjoyed a stroll around the centre of the town. It turns out that it is also famous for its 157 arches that run the length of the covered walkways housing the shopping precinct. There was very little open but the Tourist Information was, so I went in and asked where the market would take place. The girl behind the counter kindly didn’t snort with laughter at my request but gave me a brochure, which showed that pretty much every bit of the centre of town would be occupied by some part of the market the next day.

And so it was. The transformation from sleepy Sunday strolling to Monday market mania had to be seen to be believed. There were cars parked everywhere, and people arriving by the busload. The population of the town must have multiplied several times overnight and the place was absolutely humming. The brochure told us that the market was both one of the oldest and the biggest in France. The first historical record of it was in 1269 and some 150 stall holders from outside the town set up there each week. There were the usual food and clothing stalls in large numbers, as well as those selling everything from grandfather clocks to mattresses, pet food to cleaning products – mops seem to be a particular speciality!


The other speciality is livestock – in particular, poultry. I think this was the section that fascinated us all the most. There were the expected hens, ducks, geese and quail – all in a choice of egg, chick and young adult forms – but there were also guinea fowl, pheasants, partridges, canaries and peacocks. Not only were there birds, there were also rabbits of every imaginable kind, goats and pigs for the farm, and all manner of animals for pets. We’ve been to a lot of markets in France over the years but never seen anything quite like this one! It wasn’t only the animals that fascinated us but also the people. A lot of them somehow looked as though they had just walked out of the 1950s.


Although we left the live animals where they were, we did make some purchases: a new polar fleece jacket for Marlene, a black, dress jacket for Margaret, some fresh fruit and vegetables, a pink scarf for C (as if se needed another one!), some “crystals” in ball form that you add water to and can use to grow plants or keep cut flowers in, and a corniotte, a local pastry speciality, to share. We also came away with a couple of great shopping bags that the market people were giving away to those who had made purchases.


To add to the pleasure of the day, we decided that we would not hurry off in the boat that afternoon as we suspected all the other boaties would. Instead of competing with them for moorings at the ports within striking distance down the Seille, we had the port of Louhans entirely to ourselves. We were treated to a glorious afternoon in the sun, a gentle and perfectly still evening, a magnificent sunset and a beautiful, misty sunrise the following morning. Those others will never know what they missed.

Unexpected pleasures

It is not at all surprising to find sculptures in France of famous people and many recording significant events. What is surprising is the number of ‘sculptures’ and other works, whose sole raison d’être is to surprise, delight and amuse. Two examples of such whimsical pieces of fun are photos of…


1) A bronze sculpture taken in the Médiathèque courtyard in Besançon.


The photograph needs a little explanation. It was not possible to attach all the photos needed to make the scene self evident but it does tell a delightful story and brings joy to the observer. There is a camera (not shown) recording an everyday event. The man is using a hose and is looking at the nozzle, clearly puzzled because no water is coming out. Your eyes follow the several metres of hose back towards the tap and you spy a mischievous lad with his foot planted firmly on the hose. However, as you, the observer, walk towards the man, you activate an electronic eye and water spurts into the man’s face. It is very amusing.

2) The canal tunnel at Thoraise.


There are waterfalls at both ends of the tunnel that spread across the entire entry (and exit). As you approach the entrance, the water stops and you enter a little magic land with fairy lights all the way down the tunnel roof. The water at the far end keeps falling and stops just before you exit the tunnel. It just makes you smile at the effort and expense someone made to increase our enjoyment of navigating on French canals.



These are only two of many examples we have seen that have made us smile. They are such fun.

Return to Chalon sur Saone

Some of you may remember our first attempt to visit Chalon sur Saône a couple of years ago. It was at the end of our first season of navigating and was also our first experience of navigating on the Saône, a major river, if not one of France’s big five. When we came down off the Canal du Centre late in the afternoon, we found the river running with some force and a good metre higher than its normal levels. We tried to get into the port at Chalon but were turned away by a singularly unhelpful port official because it was full. Getting out of the port involved a hairy time getting through a low bridge with the water running strongly against us. J swore then that she didn’t ever want to go back.

So here we are in September again and our friends M&M, who were with us during that first aborted visit, are with us again. On our way from St Jean de Losne to Louhans, on the Seille river, we had to pass through Chalon but we were expecting, even planning, to stop elsewhere. However, as we approached the time when we needed to make a decision about mooring, J decided that she needed to face her demons about that port and try again. This time – fortunately - things could not have been more different. The day was a gloriously sunny one and the river was quite benign. We moored up to the guest pontoon and received a friendly welcome into what turned out to be an extremely well-situated and well-run port. We were allocated a mooring spot and once we were securely moored up for the night, laughed to find ourselves neatly tucked in between two other kiwi boats. We’d met Simon and May on Joie de Vivre about a week earlier at Dole; the other boat was a hire boat with a group of eight on board. In one of those “you wouldn’t read about it” moments, it turned out that one of the occupants was a Wellington primary school principal that M+M have had a lot to do with over the years. It was hilarious to see Marlene do a double-take when she realised that actually knew the person that she had just said hello to!


During our short stay, we were able to have a wander around the old town at night and decided we’d like to see more of it. We also visited one of the bigger supermarkets we’ve seen in France, the wine section of which was particularly impressive, and were able to do a quick email check at the nearby McDonalds before heading away. We would happily have stayed longer but we’ve been told that the market in Louhans is not to be missed and since it’s only held on Mondays, we needed to hoof it to get here in time. We’ll make our way back in a more leisurely fashion and will look forward to a return to Chalon – as long as the weather and water conditions remain fair.

The cruise – post-script

Some final random facts and thoughts about the cruise that we forgot to mention or that didn’t really fit with anything else:

• We could have bought an “unlimited drinks” package for the cruise at a specially reduced price. It would have cost us €237.50 per person (that’s around $450 each), instead of the usual €279.50, and if one person opted for it, the other would have had to as well. That’s significantly more than we would spend on all drinks in the whole time we are in France – and we do enjoy a drink or two most days! What’s more, while the quantity may have been unlimited, it only applied to certain drinks – in particular, non-alcoholic drinks by the glass, house wine and the house beer. For most others (bottles of wine, cocktails, most beers, spirits), there was still a supplement to pay

• It cost €10 per adult to visit the bridge of the Orient Queen, which was a shame, because we’d have loved to have a look and the opportunity to ask a few questions. Apparently it was free up until last year. Did they want to discourage visitors or was it seen as another money-making opportunity?

• We witnessed some very impressive bus driving on the narrow, winding roads to and from the beach in Corfu. J could barely watch but it was obvious that the bus driver knew the dimensions of his bus to the millimetre!

• In Venice, we watched in wonder at the “organized” chaos of the boat traffic. We couldn’t make out any rules about keeping right or left, or giving way but somehow it seems to work (survival of the swiftest?)

• C was very slow to remember that you have to specifically ask for HOT coffee in Mediterranean places – the default option is to serve it lukewarm.

• J was surprised at how short Sicilian men were (even shorter than the French) – and thought the Sicilian women were welcome to them.

• The use of the euro made life easier for us. Of all the countries we visited, only Croatia was not in the euro zone. (Their unit of currency is the kuna). We are still a bit mystified as to how Montenegro came to be in the euro zone however – will need to do a bit of research about that.

• It’s not hard to see why some people do become addicted to cruising. Everything is taken care of for you and there is no work to do – no cooking or washing up; no cleaning; no little jobs around the house or boat. The food is great and you can be entertained at just about any minute of the day (if you like that sort of organised fun).

• We didn’t manage to get a single stamp in our passports to show for the whole trip – not even in Dubrovnik, where we had to go back to the ship to get them and we especially asked.

• In Rome, we think we found the ultimate in male model calendars, although all of the models were modestly dressed…in soutanes. Whether they were actually priests or not, we never managed to find out. Our Italian wasn’t up to the task!



Meanwhile, back in Besançon…

It’s been raining steadily for nearly two days, which has allowed us the time to write up our thoughts about the cruise in a less hurried way than we might have otherwise. We know some of you have been enjoying the sudden spurt of posts but our apologies to those of you with less time, who might be feeling a bit blogged down in it all by now.

We’ve been a bit under the weather figuratively-speaking too: C has been fighting a head cold and J has been battling a slightly squiffy tummy, so we’ve been happy enough to hunker down and do indoor activities. We have had enough fine weather to get the washing done – twice and to do the supermarket shopping (a bit of a mission here). The glazier has been to suss out the job and will be back as soon as he has the material to do it (ordered on Monday; expected in 3 days) and suitable weather. The forecast for the rest of the week is looking better, so we have our fingers crossed that he’ll have the time (and the skill) to get the windows sorted before we need to head back to St Jean de Losne, where we are due to meet our friends M&M next Wednesday afternoon. We also have a lunch date with Christian.

J has been doing some small sewing repairs (we bought a little Janome for €99 in our first year and have used it often) and C has been doing some repairs to the wall around the fridge in the galley and painting out a little more brown. There is pleasingly little of it left now, especially since we replaced the vinyl on the galley floor earlier this year.

Our cruise – in port (Part 2)

There were lots more good moments on the cruise as well as those mentioned in the previous post. We had an unexpectedly lovely time in Marseille before we even embarked as we met our friend, Warwick, and his (local) friend Marc-Olivier at the railways station and enjoyed a few hours with them eating and doing a lightning tour of some of the city’s highlights in the few hours available before boarding time. Little did we know at the time that this was setting the tone for the days to come: too little time to see everything, lots of speed walking (in the heat) around the old part of the city, lots of up-and-down steps and a couple of church visits for good measure. As mentioned in the previous episode, we particularly enjoyed our visit to Notre Dame de Garde and during our visit (at 3:30pm on the 25th of August), the church bells rang to commemorate the liberation of Marseille from the Germans some 66 years earlier. The side of the church still bears some of the scars of that battle, where bullets had damaged the stonework.

We’d never heard of either Kotor (see photo above) or Lipari (below) before the cruise and both places were delightful. Kotor is a fortified town, whose fortifications are still completely intact. It’s like a small version of Dubrovnik, really, although the buildings seem older and the fortifications are perched on a steeper hillside. Like Dubrovnik, it depends on tourism for its existence, and so it has lots of tourists. With two cruise ships in port the day we were there, it was pretty crowded but we were still able to find some quiet zones. Lipari is one of the Aeolian Islands (along with Vulcano, Stromboli and others) to the north of Sicily. It was a bit like the Corfu of 27 years ago. Because access is relatively difficult (only smaller cruise ships like ours could enter the harbour and there is no airport), it hasn’t developed in the same way that other towns have. It has kept a laid-back atmosphere and the pace is relaxed. It was easy to escape the hordes and find some quiet time in the cathedral, the citadel and especially, in a café at the port, where we spent nearly an hour happily watching the comings and goings of various boats and people. Delicious! Apparently the island has some stunning beaches too, so maybe one day we’ll go back and spend a couple of weeks there beside a beach, swimming in the Med every day – it’s an idea that appeals to us both.


In both Kotor and Lipari, the Orient Queen was unable to dock in the port – in Kotor because another cruise ship had the only space and in Lipari because there isn’t a quay suitable – so we anchored in the harbour and were transported to shore by ship’s tender. The life rafts are used for this purpose. Although it’s a slower process than the usual gangway to a quay, it was more fun – and we really enjoyed this “extra” boating experience.


It wasn’t only the small places we enjoyed – we had a fabulous day in Split and would happily spend more time in that city (or at a beach nearby). As it was a Sunday, the city was quite empty in the morning – some people no doubt having a lie-in and others evidently at church. We had a tranquil walk up through some of the old parts of the city to a park which offered great views of both city centre and the very busy port. For a long time, we seemed to have the park to ourselves. We were able to find a different route back, which took us past the delightful (but disused) St Nicholas’ Church and led us to a café with a terrace, affording brilliant views. We enjoyed those, along with a very reasonably priced coffee and a comfort stop before heading down into the old part of town, which, although busy, wasn’t unbearably so. It was a bit of a revelation to find such extensive remains of Roman buildings in the city centre, as well as loads of other buildings of interest.


And then, we loved our time in Rome as well – and I think we were both a bit surprised by that. C had been there 27 years ago and remembered it to be impressive but dirty and over-crowded and with loads of traffic and aggressive driving. It was J’s first visit. On our 80 minute bus ride in from the port of Civitavecchia, our guide gave us some useful ideas about a possible itinerary for the day and talked about Rome’s hills and referring to walking time rather than distance because of the need to keep the uphill/downhill nature of the pace in mind. We were let off outside St Peter’s Square and, along with a fellow passenger, Graham from Southampton, we decided to do the walk in reverse. We took a taxi to the Coliseum (a snip at €7.50 between 3 of us) and walked back to the Vatican from there, taking in the Piazza Venezia, the Trevi Fountain, the pantheon, several columns / obelisks, the Piazza Navona and several other sights en route…and it was just fabulous! We didn’t find it dirty or crowded but then we didn’t try to get into either the Coliseum or St Peter’s, and it was September rather than July or August. School is back in most of Europe by then! The traffic wasn’t too bad and, although the drivers don’t actually stop for you if you’re on a pedestrian crossing, they do go out of their way not to hit you! The architecture and monuments are simply breath-taking and the place exudes history in a way we simply never get in NZ. When we’d finished our wandering, we sat down opposite the Castel Sant Angelo and enjoyed a pizza and red wine for lunch. We’ve had better pizzas but it was still a good thing to do and we got back to the bus in plenty of time, very happy with our day in Rome. Oh, and as for the hills – well, we’d been walking for a good couple of hours, maybe longer, when J commented to me that we hadn’t seen a hill yet! In fact, throughout the whole day, we had to look really hard to find anything that could be considered even a rise!


Of course, not everything on the trip was perfect and it’s pretty obvious that if you are on a cruise ship with around 700 passengers on it, wherever you go, those 700 or so people go too. If there is more than one cruise ship in port, as is often the case, then those numbers increase accordingly. It can be hard to get away from the madding crowds. Nowhere was this more evident for us than in Dubrovnik. It’s a beautiful city but it was heaving .There were simply too many people packed into too small a space for us to be able to appreciate the sights. We spent as much time on the edges – at the old port and beside the water outside the town gates as we did within the city walls. It’s hard to feel we did it justice. It didn’t help that we had passport difficulties there too. As non-European citizens, we were required to hand over our passports to the ship’s personnel on the first day and were told that they would take care of all the immigration procedures. We wouldn’t need our passports until our return to Marseille. This was indeed the case – for everywhere except Dubrovnik. After a 10-15 minute walk to the exit of the port, we found we had to produce our passports in order to get out, which meant another 10-15 minutes back to the boat, 5 minutes getting to reception to retrieve the passports and yet another 10-15 minutes back to the gates. With a total of less than four hours in port, we had lost nearly a quarter of our visiting time before we even got out the gates. We were not impressed! Still, we shared a taxi into town with a lovely German couple (not from our boat) and had chilled out a bit by the time we got there. They spend a lot of time in Dubrovnik and love the city. We could see why but there is no doubt in our minds that you need to stay there – preferably out of the tourist season – to see the city at its best.

Dubrovnik was the worst example but we did find some of the shore stops too short. We needed either more time in port to find our way around in an economical and efficient way – or to have done more research about such things on the internet in advance. We’ll be wiser next time… if there is a next time.

The jury is still out on that one. We thoroughly enjoyed our cruise and don’t regret it for a moment. We’re not addicted (yet) as many people warned us we would be but nor have we ruled out the possibility. If we do go on another one, we’d
• find out about the gratuities policy in advance
• check to make sure there was a non-smoking area outside
• do our own thing in port (mostly) as e did this time but do more internet research on transport and sightseeing options in ports before departure
• find out more about the position and configuration of the cabin in advance
• take binoculars (I can’t believe we left them on our boat). There are loads of times when they’d have come in handy
• also take sea sickness pills with us in case of rough seas –we were lucky this time!
• book in school holiday time!! (There had apparently been over 200 children on the cruise before ours.)
• opt for a cruise with longer stops and probably more swimming opportunities (think Blue Lagoon Cruise, for example)
but more than anything, the price would have to be right!

Our cruise - on shore (Part 1)

A quick recall of our itinerary: the cruise took us from Marseille to Messina, Kotor, Split, Venice, Dubrovnik, Corfu, Lipari, Civitavecchia (“Chee-vee-ta-vekkia” for those trying to read this aloud), which is the nearest port to Rome, and back to Marseille. It was in many ways like a smorgasbord of Mediterranean / Adriatic sea ports – a taste of many without a full helping of any. There were many similarities between a lots of the places we visited – they were generally coastal port cities (the exception being Rome) with the kind of architecture and vegetation (pines, oleander, olives, and cypresses) that goes with a hot Mediterranean climate, although Venice was the exception there with different architecture and a different climate (markedly so the day we visited!). We loved the colour of the sea – sometimes turquoise and sometimes the colour of Stephen’s Radiant Blue ink.


There was an abundance of churches, sometimes an over-abundance, many of them magnificent. One of our favourites was Notre Dame de Garde in Marseille, which dominates the city from its hilltop position and is dedicated to the protection of the city and its sailors. With its stunning views over the city and sea, and its close association with sailors, it was always going to appeal to us. We also really liked the light, airy, restrained cathedral at the top of the cliffs in Lipari and a lovely, little chapel in Venice dedicated to St Michael the Archangel. It wasn’t featured in any of the guide books but had lovely, modern stained glass windows and ex voto (messages of thanks to saints, usually inscribed on plaques) engraved on silver hearts. We didn’t need to go into the church at Messina to appreciate its special qualities – it has the world’s largest astronomical clock, which is so accurate that it automatically makes a minor adjustment once every 400 years. It also comes to life daily at midday with mechanical figures and music in a performance lasting 10 minutes. It did strike us as odd that we were required to cover shoulders and knees to visit many of the churches in Italy and Croatia when the art work in those same churches often featured people in a much greater state of undress, if not complete nudity.

Of course, one of the things that will always strike NZers in Europe is the age of the cities and towns, with buildings and/or ruins dating back to the Roman Empire. The Venetians seem to have been everywhere as well. It’s not surprising, then, that most of the cities had fortifications of some kind, the most spectacular being in Kotor and Dubrovnik. Generally, we like to walk around the city walls as they offer spectacular views but were put off by the price (€10 each) and a lack of time in Dubrovnik, and by the precarious state of the paths in Kotor. The last thing we wanted was to turn an ankle or break a leg in our second port of call! Actually, that would have been easy enough to do at any time as the steps and cobblestones in most of the old town centres required careful negotiation. And we were wearing sensible shoes! Mediterranean women seem to have a penchant for outlandishly high heels. We were astounded by the number of shoes shops we saw and the ‘one outfit’ nature of many of those shoes. Ours tend to be a bit more versatile. Sunglasses galore were available in all manner of outlets from shops to street stalls….obviously an integral part of the Mediterranean look for both genders.

Cats, too, seemed to be everywhere and it was hard to tell if they were wild or domesticated as they were invariably scrawny little creatures. We found them in the streets of old Split, at the citadel gates in Lipari, poking out from a hole in the lower part of the ramparts in the port at Dubrovnik and hiding in and around the fishing boats in other ports.


We were lucky to have fine weather for the vast majority of the cruise; hot, sunny days, often accompanied by enough of a sea breeze to keep the temperature pleasant. However, there were a couple of days when the sea breeze got up enough to make things uncomfortable on deck and on the sea. Unfortunately, one of those days was our only real beach day – in Corfu. We really, really wanted a swim in the Mediterranean and so we’d opted for a shore excursion (organised on board) and were taken by bus to a lovely beach about 30 minutes from port. The bus delivered us to a hotel (run by the same company as the cruise ship) on the beach, where there were sun loungers, beach umbrellas… and a Force 6 or 7 wind. We quickly noticed that the sea at the far right hand end of the beach was much calmer and headed straight for there- a good move. For a start, we lost most of our fellow passengers, who dutifully stayed where they were dropped off, and we lost most of the wind. We were able to spend an enjoyable morning of sunbathing, reading and swimming, although it has to be said that the wind had cooled down the temperature of the water to what could at best be described as “refreshing”. Another advantage of that end of the beach was that there was an outdoor shower – a simple arrangement linked to a hose that ran across the sand to one of the restaurants or hotels. Because the hose was long and the day sunny, the water that came out of the shower was gloriously warm.


The other let-down on the weather front came in Venice. Showers were predicted, so fortunately, we had our rain jackets with us but when they came the “showers” turned out to be downpours. There were two of them during the course of the day – for the first, we were able to take cover under an awning and stay relatively dry as we waited for it to finish. The second, however, caught us just as we were crossing the Piazza San Marco heading for our vaporetto (water bus) back to the boat. We got utterly drenched! Still, it was at the end of the day out and we were able to get back to the Orient Queen reasonably quickly and have a shower to warm up and a change of clothes. The sun then made an appearance for one of the highlights of the cruise. Our departure from Venice had us cruising through the centre of the city right past San Marco, the Doges’ Palace and the Bridge of Sighs, the height of the deck being about level with the rooftops. It was spectacularly beautiful; magical even.

The other moment to rival that one for magic was our departure from Kotor (Montenegro). The arrival, on a sunny morning, had been splendid enough as Kotor lies at the end of the Boka Kotorska, the only fjord on the Mediterranean Sea and listed by UNESCO as one of the 25 most beautiful bays in the world. (It IS beautiful but we do wonder what the judgement criteria might be…). However, it was dark when we left and the night was perfectly still. We were in the best possible position on the boat – in the middle of the foredeck on Level 7 of the boat with surprisingly few other passengers for company. In that spot, you hear no engine noise at all. The illuminated ramparts were beautiful, as were the lights of the towns and roads beside the fjord. There was just enough light to see the shape of the mountains towering overhead. No-one said a word as we slipped silently out of the harbour, enjoying the quiet movement of the boat, and the awes-inspiring beauty of the passing land- and seascapes. It was as though we were sharing something sacred.

On board the Orient Queen

We have just completed our first ever cruise – 11 days on the Mediterranean / Adriatic with Louis Cruise Lines on the Orient Queen. Like our boat in France, the Orient Queen is an older vessel – built in 1968 when ships were built to be solid and safe rather than sleek and speedy. At 15,781 tonnes and 160m x 23m, she is much smaller than many of the other cruise ships we have encountered but she is well-maintained, clean and comfortable, and she looks like a real ship (rather than a multi-storey hotel-on-the-sea).


She takes around 700 passengers (although the theoretical maximum is 912) and a crew of around 300. She has 364 passenger cabins, 2 restaurants, 3 bars/cafes, a casino, a fitness centre, mini golf, sauna and 2 swimming pools. I’ve never given much thought to the design of swimming pools of boats before but these two were tiny – about 5m x 3m – 1.8m deep and filled with salt water, which was changed every day and the pools cleaned. (we wam in Mediterranean waters even hen in the swimming pool!) They were really more just dipping pools for cooling off because swimming was hardly possible, but they are an essential in the hot Mediterranean climate. There is a reasonable gap between the top of the water and the top of the pool to allow for a certain amount of sea movement. Once the sea reaches a certain state of agitation, however, the pools simply have to be emptied or the contents would slosh all over the decks.

We didn’t have huge expectations of our cabin as we got a “pay for one, get one free’ deal on our tickets and we chose the cheapest category of cabin – an interior one (i.e. on the inside corridor of the ship with no window / porthole out to sea). It pretty much met our expectations – compact and clean, and comfortable enough, mostly thanks to the air-conditioning, but with no frills. Of course, you don’t have to spend that much time in the cabin - there are lots of other spaces on the boat: lounges, bars, deck spaces… However, at around 9pm on our first night, we realized that our cabin was positioned directly underneath the stage of the “Stars Lounge”, the venue for the floor shows that took place twice a night (9pm and 11pm) every night for the duration of the cruise. “Ah ha!” we both thought, “That is why our tickets were so cheap.” Fortunately, despite the song-and-dance routines going on above our heads, we always managed to fall asleep sometime during the first performance and were blissfully unaware of the second. What we did hear of the shows did nothing to tempt us upstairs to actually watch. We caught a snippet of one show one night and we both thought that we’d seen far better performances at school shows.

The ship has an excellent system for tracking people and charges. At the start of the cruise, we were issued with a personalized swipe card, which is linked to a digital photo taken as we came on board and to our cabin number. The card acts as a key for the cabin, a charge card for all transactions on board (which are settled by cash or credit card right at the end) and as a very quick way of checking on and off the boat while in port, allowing the staff to know straight away when all passengers are back on board and, if necessary, who is missing. Because we were able to deposit a cash advance – with the promise of reimbursement if it wasn’t used, we also used that system as a sort of safety deposit box instead of forking out 25 euros to use the safe in our room for the duration of the cruise.

We weren’t surprised to find that everything on board cost a lot – there is, after all, a captive clientele. However, many people we talked to considered the prices reasonable compared to other cruises. A haircut or massage in the Beauty Salon would have cost around 2-3 times the normal price – but we never intended to indulge in either of those anyway… A bottle of water that we would pay 28-30c for in a supermarket cost €2.85; a coffee or a glass of house wine cost €3.85 – we pay around half of that price (sometimes a bit more) for a bottle of better quality wine! The cheapest bottle of wine in the restaurant was €19.95. Needless to say, we didn’t buy many drinks! We did have a couple of glasses of wine during the Happy Hour (5pm-6pm) and were very glad that we had brought along our own bottle of Pastis, so we could have the occasional pre-dinner drink in our cabin at an affordable price and we were happy to make do with tap water during dinner.

The biggest shock in terms of cost, though, came during the information meeting on the first day of the cruise: each passenger would be charged €8 per day for service charges / gratuities, which would be added to our on-board account unless we specifically requested a form to adjust the amount. For us, that would amount to €176 – a not insignificant amount, and one that we hadn’t budgeted for. We talked to a lot of people about it over the duration of the cruise, many (in fact, most) of them more experienced than us in terms of cruises. It seems it is common practice for all the cruise lines to add a service charge on top of the cruise price - and it isn’t always possible to opt out or to adjust the amount to be paid, as we were able to do. The company line is that the practice encourages better staff performance but we weren’t convinced that the staff ever saw the tips, except through their standard wages (which apparently are pretty low) and that, even if they did, there was no guarantee that the money would go to people from whom we had received good service. In the end, we decided to opt out of the system completely and paid some tips on the last night to those people we felt we wanted to particularly reward. In future, we will know to ask about service charges BEFORE we commit to a cruise.

All meals were included in the cost of the cruise, although you had to pay extra if you wanted room service or a snack outside mealtimes – we didn’t. A buffet breakfast was generally available from 6.30am until 9:30am. It covered the expectations of most of the nationalities on board: eggs (hard boiled, scrambled and in omelettes), sausages, bacon, mushrooms and cooked tomatoes; cheese, cold meats and smoked fish; pancakes, toast, bread rolls and pastries; cereals, fruit, yoghurt, smoothies… washed down with orange or apple juice, tea or coffee. At lunchtime, there was usually a choice of a buffet lunch in the restaurant on the aft deck or a 3-course dinner in the restaurant proper. We always chose the latter – partly to avoid the “bun fight” involved in finding a table and queuing for food and partly to avoid cigarette smoke. Smoking was allowed on all the outside spaces on the boat, reflecting its Cypriot port of origin and mainly French and German clientele. (That’s another thing we’ll ask about if we are considering another cruise!). Dinner always took place in the restaurant proper and there were two sittings – one at 6:45pm and one at 9pm. Anyone who knows us will know that we opted for the early sitting as we’d be falling asleep in our main course if forced to start dinner at 9pm! We had an allocated table for dinner, the same one each night, so our dinner companions were always the same and all, fortunately, able to speak English: Jo, a retired English teacher from Marseille and a Flemish family, Winnie, Regnier and their 35 year old daughter, Katya. We particularly enjoyed the company of the Belgians and hope to catch up with Regnier and Winnie again next year, when we think we might take the boat north and into Belgium, possibly leaving it there next winter. We also met some lovely French people, notably Yvette from the cabin next to ours, who lives right at the old port in Marseille and would LOVE to show us more of her city, if we are ever back that way, and Jean-Claude and Christiane, who, with their friends, Marc and Ghislaine, had to cancel a planned trip to NZ a couple of years ago because one of their parents became ill but are hoping to re-schedule in the near future. We’ll enjoy seeing them again if they manage to do so.



That’s more than enough information for one posting – we’ll write more soon. We are happily back on our boat in Besançon and expecting the glazier to visit tomorrow to discuss our leaking window situation. Both they and we are hopeful that they can rectify the problem. Fingers crossed…