A rocky start to our ‘Chance’ summer cruise.

One of our last “tasks” before leaving Selsey for the summer on ‘Chance’ was …….

……. to walk to the end of the road and inspect the repairs and improvements to the sea wall.  We now have a new path and a cast concrete wall with curved wave breaker top to it and topped with a bit of railing to stop us falling in.  The landscaping is being completed so by the time we get back in the autumn the grass will have grown (and the first of the winter storms may have taken it all away again!

A JCB has put the beach back where it belongs so we now have a clear path to walk on.

On Thursday morning we packed all our stuff in the car and set off for Packet Boat marina in West Drayton.  Early in the journey, three miles from the Peugeot garage which supplied the car (lucky!), it decided to throw a wobbly and, with a bit of gentle coaxing, we managed to make it to the garage.  Cutting along story to a reasonable length the car needs four new fuel injectors (which are on back order) so they can’t give us a date for when the car will be fixed!  However, the good news is that the car’s still under warranty and they set about providing us with a replacement car until they can fix ours.

The not so good news was that we had to transfer all the boat stuff (and all boaters will know how much stuff that can be!) into the new car – and it was a new car, with only 20 miles on the clock! Here we are - all our stuff, so neatly packed in the first place, now bundled unceremoniously into the replacement car so that we could continue the journey.  We got to the boat four hours late but as we were not intending to leave the marina until Friday things didn’t work out too badly in the end.

Over the next few weeks on ‘Chance’ we are taking part in the St Pancras Cruising Club’s tideway events so, at first light today (Friday) we set off towards Paddington where we hope to be for a few days before the first tideway event.  Arriving in Little Venice, who should we bump into (not literally!) but Jaq and Les on nb ‘Valerie’.  Delighted as always to see them it was a short chat as we were going in opposite directions.  It was lovely to see you both looking so well and we look forward to seeing you both later in the summer.

Getting into Paddington Basin there were several empty spaces so we chose the one with the grandstand view of the role up bridge (which gets tested each week on Fridays at mid day).  The first job was to finish cleaning the boat (which James started as we journeyed down from West Drayton) to get rid of the after effects of the dust storm which plagued London a couple of weeks ago.

The “Great British Sail Away” Party!

Last Tuesday saw our last sailaway party on “Ventura” as we left Monte Carlo.

With the fabulous Casino de Monte Carlo in the background the party got started as “Ventura” left port.

Our entertainment team –Kayleigh, Laurie, Jane, Ally, Richard and Lauren work very hard to lead the celebrations.

The party atmosphere gets everywhere!

There should be a competition for the greatest number of Union Flags you can wave at the same time!  Michele and our new ‘glampacker’ friend Maree and James (about to do himself a mischief).

We had to show this one of Nigel!

With the party over we finish off the last of the Pimms before dinner – Michele, Maree, Doug, Graham and Nigel - the last people standing!

Sunset over Monte Carlo – it’s Au Revoir but not Goodbye.

It was our last dinner that night and very fitting to have this shot with our wonderful waiters (and friends) Eric, Fenney and Anil who we blame entirely for any weight increase during this trip!

After dinner we had a quiet farewell drink (with whoever was able to keep up) – Graham, Doug, Maree and Max …….

….. and the last shot goes to Maree and James for this perfect ‘selfy’ by Marie.
The next day (Wednesday) we disembarked at Genoa for a somewhat  shambolic session at the airport before flying safely back to Gatwick.
Well, everything comes to an end and we look back on the last three weeks (our longest cruise so far) with great affection for all the people we met, both passengers and the ship’s company, that made the cruise so enjoyable.  We look forward to keeping in touch with a lot of them!
The next few days are being spent catching up with some land-based friends and then getting ready to board “Chance” for our own summer cruise – we’re itching to get started!

The “Hi Life” comes to an end.

Our last two days on board “Ventura” have been no less fabulous than any of the others.  This is just a taster of what’s been going on …….

……. we’ve had just a little bit of rough seas which is best demonstrated by the swimming pools!

Fenney, one of delightful table waiters, has continued to look after our every need (well almost!)

We’ve celebrated our friend Nigel’s birthday with a couple of bottles of Champagne before dinner ………

…….. and then Doug accompanied Michele for a dance (his knee has now improved enough to withstand the punishment) ……….

……. and then the birthday celebrations finished with the four of us going to see the excellent Elton John tribute act. Michele (with no prior warning!) was asked to accompany him with “Don’t go breaking my heart”.  The two of them brought the house down with a brilliant performance and we’re still in shock!

After the Elton John experience we met up with ‘cruise buddy’, Graham, which took us into the early hours of the morning (again!).

On Monday we docked in Toulon – which was not remarkable for anything, except a submarine lurking in the harbour as we left, so we’ll skip on to better things …..

….. like the wonderful sunsets which continue to to enthral some of us each evening.

Today was a most exceptional day, as we docked in Monte Carlo as the last port of call in our cruise and first visit to the Principality.

Initially we took a tour bus to get our bearings – everything seems to be exceptional in Monte Carlo even to the point of forests on the roofs.

The casino was to prove lucrative a bit later in the day!

The ship looks monstrous against everything else in the harbour …….

…….. even some of the enormous yachts we saw.

The changing of the guard at the palace was a bit “frugal” compared to Buckingham Palace.

A wonderfully sunny day and overlooking the harbour from the rock on which the palace stands gave us great views across Monte Carlo.

Down to the casino and Doug has the pick of the cars outside!

We also had a quick peep in the Hotel du Paris (without getting caught!)

Super cars are ten a penny outside the casino!……

….. and who should we meet up with at the casino but DJ David and Laurie from the Entertainment team who joined Doug for a quick flutter.  When they came out they were (miraculously) a few hundred Euros heavier!

Well – Monte Carlo was all it was cracked up to be and more.  We’ve had a fab day and a fab cruise. Tomorrow we’ll be in Genoa and ready to catch the plane back home.  All good things come to an end!

Quick visits to Palma and Barcelona

Over the last couple of days we’ve continued to be entertained and to entertain.

We been treated to a couple of brilliant performances by Jimmy James – famous from many years ago with the Vagabonds.  Although he’s the best part of eighty he’s still a great performer.

We continue to enjoy late nights with whoever is still awake.  On this occasion we had dinner with the lovely Marie, who’s “Glampacking” her way around Europe and decided to take a last minute cruise, and then met up with the equally lovely Max, one of the ship’s photographers, for a late night drink. Marie, James, Max and Doug.

We’ve taken to sporting some rather swish colours of late – James’ cummerbund has ridden up a bit high hasn’t it! 

We docked in Palma, Mallorca on Friday morning and had a delightful walk around the city to familiarise ourselves.

The Cathedral, as so often is the case, is too big to get in view! ………

…….. but getting out of the city we got a better view of the Cathedral with the Palace de la Almundaina next to it………..

………. and before we returned to the ship for the evening we were hunted down by Laurie and David, a couple of the entertainment officers, for a pre-boarding drink.

Once on the ship it was straight up to the sailaway party for some fun and games before dinner.

This morning (Saturday) we docked early in Barcelona.  As it was our first visit to the city we used it as a familiarisation exercise as we’re going to be returning to the area in the next few weeks and will have more time for a better look around this beautiful city.  The cathedral is massive as usual but we were not allowed in as we were wearing shorts! 

The Gothic Quarter is full of the most amazing narrow streets………

…….. and, after a quick ride on the metro, we arrived at the spectacular and bizarre Temple de la Sagrada Familia which is still being built and restored.  It’s one of many works in the city by Antonio Gaudi and one we’ll definitely be visiting properly on our next visit.

The weather today has not been great but we still kept our shorts on (unlike everyone else who seemed to think winter had returned).  The wind has been very strong and the cable cars, which we’d like to have used, were not in use. And due to strong winds, the sea conditions outside to the port looks pretty choppy for the next leg of journey to Toulon. Tomorrow is another day at sea…

Mediterranean meanderings.

We entered the Mediterranean in the dark yesterday evening with the lights of Tangiers twinkling at us from not too far away………..

……. but the sea day before was a big day for James.  He won his first shuffle board competition! Watched by Ian, Dave, Liz and Chris he was overwhelmed by the success (and had to lie down!) After four cruises he’s finally won his first gold star (and a very expensive gold star!).

At 6 o’ clock that evening we attended a concert in the Atrium by “The Ventura” Singers – made up of 100 passengers who had been practicing for this occasion for the last two weeks - and very good they were too.

We had a lovely elephant to come home to that night.

Berthing in Malaga for the day on Wednesday we started by having a walk around the central part of the city.  The cathedral is so big you can’t get a proper perspective of it as the streets are relatively narrow.  There was chilly wind blowing and, as there was so much shade due to the high buildings, it was a bit uncomfortable to walk around.

So we headed out of town (Doug posing with a lovely specimen of his favourite flower the Bird of Paradise) and took a taxi to the nearest beach………..

…….. which was wonderfully deserted and where we could enjoy the sunshine and a beer……….

…….. and a good walk along the mile or so of beach all by ourselves.

We took the local bus the 8 kilometres back to Malaga ………..

……… past Malaga’s own very quiet beach …….

……. and back “home” for dinner with friends Michele and Nigel.

2500 passengers left “Ventura” today (Wednesday) and they included virtually every single one of the lovely people we’d got to know over the last two weeks.  We’ve still got some wonderful crew members who we have great fun with so we’re not quite “Billy No Mates” but it does mean we’ll have fun fishing out some nice people, out of the 2000 that joined the ship today, to enjoy the next leg of the journey with.  We are now doing a very leisurely 12 knots towards our next port of call, Majorca.