Greetings once again from the Love Boat or the SS Startled Face.

We left Bilbao yesterday and on our way out of the harbour Captain Stubbing advised us that the swell was going to get increasingly stronger on our way to Lisbon. Consequently I woke up at about 3.00am this morning gripping the mattress and trying not to fall out of bed. This was not another “bench” episode as I’d been asleep for hours – promise. In fact yesterday was a pretty easy day. Couple of wines at lunch time, couple of beers in the afternoon, couple of gin and tonics with dinner and a couple of scotches before bed. Pretty much an alcohol – free day really.

Something we learnt when we were in St Jean De Luz is that they are famous as fisherman, having hunted whales in the 17th and 18th century as far away as Newfoundland. But they were also famous as pirates. Apparently the French king was happy to give them privateer status in return for 50% of the booty. And they attacked British ships. They never told us that in the history books. It was all Sir Walter Raleigh and Sir Francis Drake and how useless the Spanish and French were. But then again, they may have been lying.

Bilbao was a revelation. As some of you may not have heard of it, it’s in Spanish Basque Country, not far from the French border and was famous for producing steel. It is now a haven for architects. You’ll see some incredible buildings in amongst the obligatory history and 12th century cathedral. And it has a Guggenheim Museum which is magnificent. There are three Guggenheim Museums in New York, Venice and…….Bilbao (???).

So the city’s done a good job creating new industries as steel went backwards and their unemployment rate is significantly lower than the rest of the country. Notwithstanding we did see a number of now obligatory (in Europe) wind turbines at the end of the harbour – monstrosities that need subsidies of $500,000 per job in the renewable energy field and destroy another 5 jobs along the way. They put billions into this at the behest of the greenies so no wonder Spain is an economic basket case. Enough of the rants.

After we turned left and headed down the Portuguese coast to Lisbon the swell got to 15 ft. But it was going in our direction so we could to surf the last 300 miles.

This is our second and last full day at sea out of 12. The great thing about these cruises is that you stop almost every day but a day to chill after a lot of walking and happy snapping is welcome. Also, I’ve had a chance to scope out the clientele and have concluded there are no gangs of geriatric Man U or Millwall supporters on board so I am proudly wearing the Manchester City shirt I purchased at the City shop in Manchester. And I found out their official nickname is actually The Citizens and not The Blues. You wanted to know that didn’t you.

It’s now 2.30pm which is almost beer time.
Back soon.

 

The first of a series describing a trip from Southampton to Seville by boat.

I’ve had two attempts at starting this missive except this time its daylight and the rum bottle is now empty. Part of the deal on this ship is that you get some free bottles of booze. I’ll start on the scotch tonight and the vodka later. The gin probably won’t figure unless I can locate some tonic.

I am looking out over the bay in St Jean de Luz. It’s a beautiful spot just down the road from famous playground, Biarritz. We’re in Basque country which isn’t a country as such (try telling the Basques that and see how far you get) and neither is it France or Spain (technically we are in France) according to them. I’m sitting on our “suite’s” (this ship doesn’t have “cabins”) balcony back at the ship after a trip up La Rhune (you’ll have to look it up) this morning. The two things to note about this place are that it’s high so you can almost see the coast through the haze and you can stand with one foot in Spain and one foot in France. Technically, there are a few hundred kilometres of border where you can do this but the photos in this spot are rather spectacular (apart from the aforementioned haze).

We got on the boat on Friday in Southampton after a great couple of days with relatives in various parts of north west England. First stop was Guernsey where we met up with more relatives who knew the lay of the land. Actually, all they really needed to do was point us at a decent restaurant with a spectacular outlook and they achieved that admirably. We had a long boozy lunch after about five minutes of sightseeing. Laughed ourselves stupid, some of it at my expense as I had fallen backwards off a bench (thinking it was a chair….no really) the previous night on the boat. This sent the staff into a blind panic because I don’t think they had lost a guest for weeks.

Incidentally, with all of these family reunions I’m reminded of our family get-togethers in Brisbane. Can’t imagine what it would be like with all of them together in the same place at the same time. Near death experience I expect and we’d certainly need a much, much bigger fridge.

We did Bordeaux earlier in the week (after Guernsey and before St Jean de Luz) and went to four or five wineries. I have new found respect for French red wines which I had previously considered somewhat insipid – red cordial without the impact. Either I was drinking the wrong ones or the “complexity” was beyond my primitive palate but this new found respect will be reinforced regularly from now on. We saw an olive tree at Chateau Pape Clemente that was planted in the year 206 (that’s not a typo). This is what we love about Europe. As the name suggests this winery was owned by a pope – Clement the 4th (or 5th) in the early 1600’s. Catholics drink – who knew?

The child bride and I had a go collectively, at ordering lunch in French while in St Jean de Luz. It was good. I had fried rubber and mashed gravel and Jan had seaweed ice cream and a piece of wood. We tried ( and failed) to find a restaurant with an English menu (and this is a tourist Mecca) and only managed to find a book on the area written in English as we were walking back to the boat, having looked unsuccessfully for two days. The French determination to make French the universal language continues apace.

When the CB finishes washing the salt out of here hair we’ll need to make a crucial decision – which bar to go to. Life’s tough.