Mumbai to Jordon 7 - 17 June

Friday 7^th June – Mumbai, India.  Curency Indian Rupee (INR).  

We sailed into Bombay Harbour early in the morning and moored at the terminal at 1100hrs.  The weather was overcast and very humid as we walked down the gang plank toward the bus, we travelled through down town Mumbai towards the ‘Gateway to India’ on our way to the Elephant Caves and Island.

Gateway of India was built to commemorate a British royal visit in 1911; the majestic Gateway of India stands 85 feet high on the waterfront.  The area around the gateway is a meeting place for 1000’s of people and of course beggars and sellers of everything, we had to walk through the crowd to get to our boat for the 20 mile boat trip to the island.  

The guide had suggested that we leave our bags on the bus and I foolishly believed her when she said that it wouldn’t rain.  

The boat was old and similar to all the boats around Asia, the trip to the island was not to choppy. 

Elephanta Island is sitting in the harbour and is famous for its Elephanta Caves where Hindu deities were caved directly into the stone wall perhaps as far back as the 5^th century AD.  There were 120 stairs leading to the cave and as it was still raining, the stairs were really slippery, so not only was it a steep climb it was slippery and water pouring around your feet.  Not pleasant.  The carvings were depictions of the Lord Shiva and a lot of damage had been done over the years to the statues by Portuguese soldiers taking ‘pot’ shots. 

We spent about 1 hour there and thank heavens the trip down the stairs was a lot easier as the rain had eased.  During the trip back to the boat we had to run the gauntlet of hawkers selling their wares.

We climbed into the boat and set off for the trip back to the wharf and of course it started to rain and the weather was so rough that we kept getting soaked with the waves and after about 5 minutes we were soaked to our underwear and covered with salt spray, thank heavens it wasn’t cold.  

We had a further 40 minutes to go and by then there was thunder and lightning as well, we then had to scramble of the boat and crawl up a wall, climb stairs that were flooding, walk through the throng of wet Indians to our bus and a trip through the peak hour traffic back to the ship.  

Believe it or not we had a great day.  The hot shower was wonderful when I got back.

Our group met up in the Pizza parlour later that evening which was a great way to end a fantastic day. 

Saturday 8^th June – at sea across the Arabian Sea towards the Gulf of Oman. Cloudy and rough seas.

I had booked an Ultimate Ship’s Tour for today, I had heard about it from other passengers and although it was $175 I thought it would be worth it.  Was it? Absolutely.  We started the tour in the medical centre and looked at the most expensive room in the ship which is the ICU ward and we looked at the morgue and of course met the medical staff. 

We then scrambled all the way down to the lowest desk and looked at the laundry area, it was really hot down there.  The volume of washing done each day is extraordinary, between the passenger’s linen, the dining rooms, passengers and crews clothing and dry cleaning, it is a 24 hour operation.  The sheet machine was amazing to watch, the wet sheet goes in one side and by the time it comes out the other side it is dry, pressed and folded. 

From deck 1 we then climbed the stairs back to deck 7 and went to the Theatre where we met the production staff, the chief dancer and the entertainment team who told us about their work, the chief dancer goes to Florida to learn a new production and then she teaches her team.  We went down to their dressing rooms to have a look at the costumes and they have to clean them themselves.

While we were on deck 7 we went to the stern of the ship where the Staff Officer showed us the anchor and the mooring ropes etc. which was very interesting, the anchor was very huge.  

A trip to Deck 4 took us to the engineering room which was full of screens and switches and the man in charge sounded like ‘Scotty’ from Star Trek.  We were given lots of facts and figures.

The printing room and the photolab were also on the same deck and I was given a writing pad with my name on it.

The food storage section was our next stop; once again the quantity of food consumed by the ship over the 104 day cruise was amazing.  The ship takes on fruit and vegies in some of the ports and also freezer containers from America are picked up as we travel around the world.  We have had durian, rambutans, mangos, dragon fruit, and 5 corners since leaving Singapore.

We walked past the vegetable and meat preparation rooms on our way to the galley which was a huge area of stainless steel and met the head chef and told all about the menu preparation and how the ships galleys worked to look after all the restaurants.  We were given a drink and then went up to the bridge to meet the Captain.

The Captain welcomed us and showed us over the bridge and we were shown all the various sections, it was fascinating and at any given time there is a 1^st and 2^nd Officer and 2 Boswains on duty.  It was funny, it was raining and they had big windscreen wipers going on the huge windows at the front of the bridge.  We were given a glass of champagne and chocolate strawberries and the trip was completed, it took nearly 4 hours.  

When I went back to my cabin later that day, I found a lovely bathrobe, apron, photoframe and 4 group pictures that we had taken during the tour.  Very nice and certainly worth the money.

We all got dressed up for the Formal before Dubai, to say goodbye to the 250 passengers who were disembarking on Monday.  I wore my new necklace that I bought in Mumbai, our table of 6 lovely ladies looked beautiful.

Sunday 9^th – at sea and crossing the Tropic of Cancer and entering the Gulf of Oman.  Weather cold and wet.    

Distance Mumbai to Dubai 1147.7 Nautical Miles, average speed 18.84 knots.

Monday 11^th June – Dubai.  Currency –  Dirham.

The sun is out and it is 30 degrees and it is lovely at 0800.  We were met at the terminal by the same guide that we had last year except this time instead of being in shorts, she was in full black as we were going to Abu Dhabi to see the largest Mosque in the world which has only just been completed.  

We were told to wear long sleeve shirts and long pants but of course half the bus hadn’t taken any notice and we had to stop off at the guide’s house for her to pick up some black robes and scarves.  

The trip to Abu Dhabi took about 2 hours and it is a different territory, it is a very oil rich Emirates and was just desert 10 years ago.

Before we arrived at the mosque people started to change into long pants and dresses  and it was quite an exercise as the bus was full and all the jockey seats were taken so moving at all was an adventure and pulling on long pants over shorts was funny for everyone except the dresser.  I had long pants on and a long sleeve shirt so all I had to do was cover my head.

The mosque has just been completed at a cost of over $2 billion plus heaps of donations, it is truly amazing.  

Our first sight was breathtaking, it is made of over 30 types of white marble from all over the world, and no expense was spared.  It is impossible to describe the opulence, there was Mother of Pearl from New Zealand, 7 metre wide Swarovski  crystal chandeliers, carpets that were hand knotted and took over 2 years to make by1000 workers, gold, ceramics and optic fibres everywhere.  

The main prayer room could hold over 3000 men and there were two smaller prayer rooms for the women.  

The Carpet

On the wall

The courtyard was also huge as it was made to take the overflow and as it was out in the sun and we had to take our shoes off there we thought that we would burn our feet but no, the tiles were small squares and there was a gap between them and water collected under the tiles and keeping them cool.  

Very clever.

The ladies ablution area was larger than Palmerston shopping centre and contained two areas for washing and toilet area

We spent over 1 ½ hours walking around the mosque and then went back on the bus for a drive around the city, stopping off at the Ferrari Theme park where every boy’s dream can come true involving a fast racing car. 





There is so much money here and there is still over 100 years of oil underground.  Dubai and Abu Dhabi are quite progressive with a lot of the population wearing western clothes and not a lot of women in the black robes, the change from sand to cement has been dramatic and in such a short time.  

Our trip back to the ship took a little longer than expected and we arrived back with less than ½ hour to spare, we all had a great day and I loved the heat as it was hot but not sticky.

I had some postcards to send and the Post Office only took local currency so I had to go to the ATM to draw out cash, I had no idea of the exchange rate, so drew out 1000 dirham and just before it gave me the cash it showed the exchange rate and I had drawn out the equivalent of $280 Aust for 3 stamps valued at 120 dirham.  

Fortunately I had 10 minutes before we sailed and I exchanged the dirham for $260 US which can be used almost anywhere. 

The ship actually sailed out on time from Dubai, we always seem to have to wait for passengers who are running late or just forget to sign back in.  We had 250 passengers leave the ship and 270 come on board, a lot of new faces.

Total Distance Travelled from Sydney to Dubai 7,962 Nautical Miles.

Tuesday 11th – Saturday 15^th June at sea heading towards the Red Sea passing the coastline of Oman, Djibouti, Eritrea, Yeman, Saudi Arabia, Sudan arriving at the coastline of Egypt on the afternoon of the 15th.  

We are still in pirate waters and the security is 24 hours a day and quite often we have a naval patrol boat travelling along with us, there are over 20 counties providing naval protection, yesterday we had a South Korean patrol boat sailing along with us.  

The weather has been really rough all the time and we have been running along the edge of a monsoon; the weather is hot when the sun manages to come out from under the clouds.  

It will be hot in Safaga tomorrow, I am not going to the Valley of the Kings tomorrow, I have decided to just go to the sea resort with some of the ladies from our table.

I love the sea days, we never seem to do much but manage to fill in the time and by the time we finish dinner at about 2130 and see the late show it is about 2300 and we always seem to be putting back our clocks 1 hour almost every second night, I think we are about 10 hours in front of Australia by now.  The ladies are always Skypeing their families and waking them up, aren’t you lucky I am not into Skypeing.

Sunday -16th June. Safaga – Egypt.  Currency Egyptian Pound (EGP) 

The Sea Princess arrived in Safaga almost 1 hour late at about 0700 and most of the passengers left the ship almost straight away as they were going to the Valley of the Kings and as I know from last year they were in for a long day and not due back until 2000 that night.
 

I had decided that I would not go this time and spend the day in the city of Hurghada which is the foremost tourist resort of the Red Sea. 

We caught a taxi from the Port Terminal after agreeing on a $70 US return fare and we drove through sand and small resort towns for about 1 hour to the town of Hurghada, had a cup of coffee and wandered through the Bazaars and bought some perfume and oils and a couple of post cards.  

We stayed there for a few hours and them went back to the ship in time to watch the entertainment provided by a local folk group, the best part was the Twirling Dervish who is a male dancer who turns around without stopping for over 15 minutes whilst twirling various items.

We all gathered later that night to swap stories and to have a quick meal before we went to bed to get ready for another busy day off shore tomorrow.

Monday 17^th June – Aqaba – Jordon.  Currency Jordanian dinar.  

We left Egypt 2100 hrs last night and we travelled between Egypt on our port side and Saudi Arabia on our starboard side then Israel and Jordan as we made our final approach to Aqaba. 

 Aqaba is on the Red Sea which is really a beautiful blue; one of the stories of why it was called the Red Sea is because of the red coral found in the sea.  

One of the reasons we stop in Aqaba is to travel to the city of Petra and the beautiful Treasury.  I went there last year and fortunately for the passengers the weather was at least 10 degrees cooler this year and therefore the walk would not be too bad.

I decided that I would go to Wadi Rum which is the stomping grounds of the Bedouin people which is on the way to Petra and is famous because it was the headquarters of Colonel Lawrence during the Arab Revolt in 1917. 

Much of the famous film ‘Lawrence of Arabia’ was filmed there.  Fresh water springs made Wadi Rum a meeting centre for caravans heading towards Syria and Palestine.  

We all climbed into the back of very old battered utes which had a very thin shade over the top, there were 5 people in our ute and after the difficulty of climbing in the back (not me) we set off over the dunes making a number of photo stops and calling into a number of Bedouin tents for cups of tea and of course shopping stops. 

The rock formations were formed during the time the land was under water and the  Seven Pillars of Wisdom mountain is the centre piece, the landscape reminded me a lot of the Mac Donald Rangers at home.  

It was very hot but I had a ball being bounced round in the back as we travelled over the sand and unfortunately after 2 hours we arrived back at the busses for our return home to the ship and the cool airconditioning.  

The passengers did not get back till after dark and a lot of the older passengers were exhausted but pleased with themselves for managing the long walk into Petra and back.  

Beverley, from our table who is 83 did the walk, with a little help and a donkey ride back up the hill, what an effort but worth it.

The ship went to be early that night.