Our twelve day cruise

We started this cruise in the cold weather of Quebec. When we left the temperature was in the high 30s and the skies were overcast. The ship’s swimming pools had been drained due to the high winds. We were soon off on our Royal Caribbean 12 day cruise aboard the Legend of the Seas to from Quebec City to Fort Lauderdale.

CHARLOTTETOWN, PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND, CANADA

Our first port was Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, Canada. This was a charming small town of 38,000 people. The town was being kept open until the cruise ship left, then all the snowbirds would head south. We noticed signs in different shops saying that the shop would remain open through November 6, which is the day we were there. So, we closed their tourist season. We walked around the town, enjoying the sights and the old, historic buildings.

The city had put these mice statues around town for the tourists to look for and find for some reward from the tourist office.

HALIFAX, NOVA SCOTIA, CANADA

This port we missed due to high winds. The winds the night before were 75 miles per hour and they had not calmed down much by morning so the captain called off this port.

BOSTON, MASS.

This was our first time ever in Boston, Mass. From the ship we took the Subway Silver Line, which is a bus, running both on the street and in a subway tunnel. It was also a combination diesel and electric bus, part of the area having overhead electric lines and part being regular city streets. Anyway, we took this bus to South Station, where we caught the real subway to the Museum of Fine Arts where they were having a special exhibition on the Spanish painter, Goya. 

Laura went to the exhibit while Jim walked around the city for a couple of hours. She even found a painting by Joohn Steuart Curry, the man who painted the murals in the Kansas Capital. 

Then we walked around downtown Boston, enjoying the many historical sites. Finally we took the subway back to our ship.

The Boston subways need some upgrade on their rolling stock. The cars were old and very well used. 

The Silver line looked like Boston started a new subway line and ran out of money, or something. First time we ever rode in a bus in a subway tunnel.

The Museum of Fine Arts was near Northeastern University so it was fun to walk around their campus. This was a wall near the university.

After leaving Boston we finally hit warm weather. On day eight of our cruise people began to go to lounge around the outside pool area. Before that the pool deck looked empty like this.

BERMUDA

We docked in a different part of Bermuda than we had on our two previous cruises here. This time were docked at King’s Wharf, across from Port Hamilton where we had docked before. To get to Port Hamilton was either a one hour bus ride or a twenty minute ferry ride for four dollars. We decided to stay in the new port and check out the area and then go to the Museum of Bermuda the following day. We saw the damage that the last two hurricanes in October had caused the island. The port area shops and docks were mostly repaired but there was still storm damage visible.

Jim liked this bird, but has no idea what it is.

Jim also like this white Bird of Paradise.

  The second day we were in Bermuda we spent at the old British Colonial fort.

Some of the inhabitants of the fort were very pregnant.

As we left the fort, Bermuda was getting ready for Christmas.

From Bermuda it was a two day cruise to Fort Lauderdale. During this cruise we lost electricity in our section of the ship for about half an hour. Was interesting seeing the emergency lighting along the floor. Now we know where the emergency lighting is, if the ship is ever sinking.

Today we are going on a twelve day cruise down the St. Lawrence Seaway and the east coast to Ft. Lauderdale, Florida. We will not be blogging much because of the high price of the internet on cruise ships. We really enjoyed out short stay in Quebec City. Would be a really beautiful city a little earlier in the year while the leaves are still on the trees.

And, to end, here's one of Laura's bicycle photographs from here. She will be having a show of her bicycle photographs in Topeka next summer.

We are in Quebec City, Canada. This is the only walled city in North America.

To get here we took U.S. Air flights from Kansas City to Philadelphia and then another from Philadelphia to here. Even though the planes said "U.S. Air", the first flight was operated by Republic Airlines and the second flight by Air Wisconsin. Both flight were on jets, with the first plane being an Embraer 175, the second a smaller Bombardier CRJ 200. We arrived on a cloudy, overcast day, when Quebec City is expecting it's first snow of the year overnight. Our hotel is in the Quartier Saint-Roch.

After arriving we went walking around the area. While wandering through a local grocery store, which one of Jim's favorite activities when we travel, we discovered a gluten free beer, brewed in Montreal, called Glutenberg. Glutenberg makes five different varieties of gluten free beer, and only makes gluten free beer. We bought the Red and took it back to our room to try it. It was very good. It's made from water, buckwheat, millet, molasses, chestnut, candi syrup, quinoa, hops and yeast. It turned out to be so good that we then tried the India Pale Ale, which is made from water, millet, buckwheat, corn, black rice, candi syrup, corn maltodextrin, hops and yeast. Only three more varieties to go. The Quartier Saint-Roch is undergoing urban revitalization with a lot of trendy restaurants, bars and boutiques, and still some older buildings. It is in Lower Town Quebec. Our first meal in Canada was Thai.

We spent our first whole day here wandering around the old walled city part of Quebec. Our first stop though was for breakfast at Chez Aston. Which is, as Wiki describes it:

"Chez Ashton is a popular fast food restaurant in Quebec, Canada famous for its poutine. Chez Ashton's origins can be traced to a traveling snack cart started by Ashton Leblond in 1969. It was not until 1972, however, that poutine was first offered. Ashton hooked his customers by initially giving free samples of his poutine. The enterprise grew in popularity until Leblond was able to open a restaurant with a dining room open year round in 1976. Today, the franchise has grown to include 25 restaurants in the Quebec City region."

The breakfast was pretty good. You order then take your tray and stand, waiting for the food to be cooked to order, then you take your breakfast and sit down to eat. They also have newspapers for you to rent. If you want to read the newspaper you leave a deposit, which you get back when you return the newspaper. They also proudly serve egs without hormones or antibiotics. Their menu was only in French, but we have already learned a few words in French such as: hot-dog, hamburger, cheeseburger, BBQ, bacon, and sandwich. 

After breakfast it was off to the old town and the most photographed hotel in North America, the Fairmont Le Chateau Frontenac.

Quebec City really celebrates Halloween.

And, here's the train station.