NO18 Cruise - Day 2 continued

From Solent Sky we made the mistake of thinking Ocean Village might be a marina with shops and places to relax. In fact it was a jumble of expensive flats....

Instead we ended up at Town Quay and parked there. It was very hot still with the car registering over 30°C still. We ended up in Starbucks near the Red Funnel ferry terminal.

The local football team were at home judging by the variety of different Southampton shirts on display on everyone from kids to old blokes. Good to see so many people supporting their local club.

Starbucks was air conditioned. A couple of fraps went down well.

I'm glad I had the Canon with me to capture things... Problem being that the 1100D doesn't have WiFi to transfer pix off the SD card.

Our parking ran out at 2.20pm and our check in time was 3.30pm before the added hour and a half from the email informing us of the delay.

Rather than hang about we decided to go to the Ocean Terminal and see what happened.

It was 2.35pm when we joined a queue, mercifully in the shade, and we had a wait of a out 25 mins and we were called forward. Luggage taken off us and the car booked in and driven away. By 3.20pm we were on the ship and in our cabin.

With no lunch had yet we checked out the pool decks. The band, Pulse, were playing (loudly) and we had a snack and a drink.

The passenger safety briefing at our muster point was at 5.30pm and sail away about 6pm.

On our wandering we signed up to one of the gourmet restaurants, there are two at supplement, and if we ate at 6.30pm we got a free bottle of wine, we signed up. Of course.

So it was a rush. In the evenings there is a dress code. Smart casual on most nights and two black tie or at least suits for men.

We'll see how this actually works as there were loads of shorts and tees all evening.

Saturday was smart casual.

Once we had learned to out on a lifejacket and dump it back in the cabin we were already moving. We hurried to the pool area on deck 15 for our champagne.

There's less fanfare than when we went with Saga in 2013. Then all the other ships sounded their horns.

We had time to go to the Epicurean Restaurant. Arriving a little late as we found that the decks and entrances from outside decks are asymmetrical. A door on the port side not necessarily replicated starboard.

The meal was superb. Three courses well crafted and I had the biggest prawns I have ever seen. Photos at some stage.

And then to the cabin to recover from a long day with little sleep the night before in the B&B hot box room.

One last picture before the sun went down.

Sunday we'd be at see all day making for Stavanger.