Vancouver -Heathrow-Marseilles-Avignon


 A long but smooth travel day. We travelled with British Airways in World Traveler Plus, their Premium Economy. The seats have been upgraded since the last time I traveled with them, and were very comfortable with both a leg rest and foot rest. Decent food and I even managed some sleep. We had a 4 hour layover at Heathrow, but as we had to change terminals and go through security we were glad to not have to rush. Then a short flight to Marseilles, arriving early to a very quiet airport. We stayed the night at the Holiday Inn Airport, a quiet and very convenient hotel with a free and quick shuttle. About 10pm by the time we got to our room, so time for bed!

After a fairly good sleep we had breakfast at our hotel, then I went for a short walk. A sunny day, and about 13 C to start and warming up to about 17C. An 11:30 shuttle from our hotel to the nearby Vitrolles Airport train station for the train to Avignon Centre.

It's a reginal train, journey time about 1 hour through industrial then rural areas. From the Avignon Centre Station an 8 Euro taxi ride to the Viking Hermod. We arrived just before 1:30pm, cabins were available and lunch was being served. Then at 2:30pm a 1 hour introduction to Avignon walking tour.

Back to the cabin to unpack and look around the ship. We have a Standard , which means the window is quite small and high on the wall. Today we're tied up to another ship, so it really doesn't matter! The cabin is compact, but enough storage and well lit. Bathroom floors are heated, a nice touch.

A fairly lengthy welcome address, but off-set by interesting and fun meetings with sympathetic American passengers. Lots of great conversations!











Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Chioggia

Image
  We continued north in the Adriatic this morning. It started out rather hazy, but cleared up as we neared the coast of Italy. Because Cruise ships are now barred from Venice, they are choosing other ports. Azamara is using Chioggia as an alternative. It's a town about a 45 minute drive south of Venice. We found it a very charming city, with canals and bridges like Venice, but with-out the crowds or prices. The cruise dock and terminal are quite small, and only the smaller cruise ships can dock here. We arrived just before 1pm (arrival times are governed by the tide). The Venice lagoon is quite a large area with 3 entry points. Chioggia is by the southern entry. All 3 are now protected by a tidal floodgate system (MOSE) which is activated at high tides to prevent flooding. It works, but is now causing some environmental issues. Karen, Aaron and I walked through the town to a marina where we met the small boat for our tour of Chioggia by Bosetti Tours. Our young guide was very passi...
Read more

Mestre and Venice

Image
  A sad goodbye to the Azamara Quest this morning after breakfast. We really had felt like it was our home for the last 12 nights! We had a driver pre-booked to take us to the Plaza Hotel in Mestre where Ian and I are staying for 1 night. Traffic was fairly heavy and it took almost an hour. It was too early to get our room, so we left Ian to read in the lobby and Karen, Aaron and I took a taxi in to Piazzale Roma. Their hotel was about a 5 minute easy walk. The Papadopoli Venezia looks to be a lovely hotel, I'll need to get a report from them later! They dropped their bags and we headed out for a walk around. We tried to stay off the busier streets, and wandered through narrow streets, over bridges and through squares getting a bit lost as one does in Venice! Again the day turned out warm and sunny despite the forecast. I've been to Venice before, and didn't feel the need to go to St Marc's square as I'm sure it would be very busy. The access fee for Venice is in ef...
Read more

Arles

Image
  The Viking Hermod was underway from Avignon to Arles when we woke up this morning. We both had a good sleep, and were ready for breakfast by 7:30am. It was lovely to eat breakfast and watch the riverbank slipping by. We arrived in Arles just after 9am, and disembarked through the Ama Kristina that we were docked beside. It's a lovely morning, mainly clear skies and about 13C. About 3 days ago the Mistral wind was blowing, winds up 90km. I'm glad we missed that! For our included walking tour of Arles this morning, we were separated into groups of around 30 people. We had an excellent guide for our 3 hour tour focusing on Roman Arles and Vincent Van Gogh. It's about a 15 minute walk along the river to get to the downtown area. There are many places that Van Gogh painted, and often there will be a copy of the painting at that spot. It's a very pretty small town with lots of winding streets full of restaurants, shops and hotels. Tourism is the main industry here. The Roma...
Read more