Disembarkation in Southampton, UK

 August 12 - Disembarkation in Southampton, UK

It’s always a letdown to reach the final day of a cruise, but this time it was bittersweet!  We loved the ports we visited and, of course, we were happy to be back on a ship,  but the last few days were not a whole lot of fun!  We arrived back in Southampton and docked around 6:00 AM on a sunny, warm, Friday morning! 

It is a busy port with ferries constantly coming and going.

And with other ships already berthed.

A tanker has already moved in to start the refuelling process!

Breakfast was delivered at 7:30 and then we had to wait to be ‘escorted’ through the disembarkation process!

Each stateroom had it’s own escort and elevator and we were taken to the luggage hall to claim our bags.  We, along with 10 others, were then loaded onto a 50 seater coach for the trip to our Heathrow hotel.  While waiting for everyone to board, people got chatting about their infection and it seems we all tested positive within a few days of each other, and several have been doing rapid tests themselves, and no one is yet negative.  Some had one person of a couple test positive, but not the other until a few days later. So I am glad we have postponed our return until the 10 day mark!  Hopefully by then we will have a chance for a negative result.

We left the cruise terminal about 10:15 and we were at the Radisson Blu a couple of hours later.  Two ‘greeters’ came onto the coach to welcome us, give us an information package, hand out our keys and tell us about local eateries, etc.

The hotel is rated 4 stars with a luxurious lobby; our twin room is small, but comfortable ( probably about the same size as our cabin, minus the balcony).  When we looked out our window, we got a surprise!  We had  a very sunburned friend to greet us! It is so hot here in London - around 35°C! No wonder Big Red looks like that!  LOL

There are no rules!  No one is wearing a mask!  We are free to come and go!  The contradiction is that the package of information we received about the hotel contained instructions about how to bag up our towels, how to order from room service and how to call them to pick up the dishes as we cannot put them out in the hall. And no one will be coming into our room to clean during our stay!  We will continue to wear our masks in public spaces,

It is so hot!  I doubt we will be doing much sightseeing if it stays like this.  We did venture out in the late afternoon to look for a meal!  It was a very long walk in blazing sun, but we did enjoy the meal at another hotel.  And then - we had to face the long walk back!  We have walked 4938 steps today!  

So we have settled in for the night and tuned in to the BBC news! I think it will be ‘lights out’ early!  

We are doing well, and are one step closer to getting on our homebound flight! We may not have much to report for the next few days, so if you don’t see a post, don’t worry about us!