Friday 16 December 1983 – Leaving Southampton
We slept
well at the Polygon, with the heating off and the windows open. We were all
awake at about 07.00 and watched BBC Breakfast TV for an hour or so. Very
interesting, but as Rab said, she would never get any work done if she lived in
the UK
as she would be watching TV all the time. (This
judgement of course was based on a comparison with Zimbabwean television.
Having experienced Australian quality TV years later, the judgement was
withdrawn.)
We decided
not to have breakfast in the hotel as it was a little pricey at £7 for an
English breakfast and £3.50 for a Continental, so we drifted off down town and
found a very pleasant little coffee shop where Rab satisfied her craving for a
sausage roll. The café was run by a genteel English gentlewoman who had been
educated in Durban
and seemed to have fallen on hard times. She was wearing, rather incongruously,
a pink straw hat on a chill winter’s day.
Her coffee
was good and, fortified, we went on our way to do a bit of last minute shopping
and to buy a new pen for me. (I bought a
fairly cheap Shaeffer fountain pen which used ink cartridges and had a number
of italic nibs. I still have that and use ir regularly – not bad after forty
years!) The shops were quite crowded but very nice. Matt got a few more of
his toys (and found that his radio controlled cars would have been a little
cheaper here) and Rab got, surprise, surprise a new handbag. We also popped
into the Post Office to see about posting Rab’s dress materials home. We bought
one of their Jumbo boxes. Just as well, because we filled it. It weighed 8.5
kilograms and we sent it by sea mail for £15.95. (The same parcel would cost over £100 today although it would be sent
airmail) we had a pleasant lunch of fish and chips at a café just off the
main street at a reasonable price then back to the hotel for a taxi.
We were all
pretty excited at the prospect of boarding and had tried to get a glimpse of
the ship as we wandered around during the morning but couldn’t spot her,
although we had been told she would be sailing tonight. There were lots of
people from the hotel who were also boarding, so we thought we would set out
early. We got back to the hotel at about 15.30. the porter called a taxi – we
were third in line – and before too long we were on our way, one suitcase on
the roof, with a chirpy driver for a change. Apparently all hell was breaking
loose in the taxi world. Because the university students were going home, two
ships were sailing and for some reason, he said, the hospital had been very
busy too.
I was a bit
worried about my case but the driver assured me that it would not fall off
until he got up to 70 kph – adding that, mind you, when he was taking a student
out to the airport this morning the suitcase had come off and when the student
had told him he wanted a new case he told him where to get off. So that wasn’t
much comfort for us. It took us about fifteen minutes to get to the docks and
then we were there! Matt was very excited.
 |
| Finally aboard |
Boarding was
not a problem because we were early and avoided all the lines so we were aboard
by 17.45. we found our cabin without any problem – right in the bows and on the
third deck down. Rab’s first impression was that the décor in the arrival foyer
was rather grim. Bright lime and purple, so she said. My first impression was
how long the ship was. At our level the passageway goes almost the entire
length of the ship – and it seems to go forever. It was about 100 yards from
the staircase to our cabin.
 |
| Cabin 3008 |
The cabin
décor was pleasant and it was bigger than we had thought it would be with, of
course, a shower and toilet en suite. (Our
previous experience on ships had been on the mail ships to South Africa and a cruise to South
America. Cabins on those voyages were very small and none had en
suite facilities.) although we had been told that our luggage would be
aboard before us, it wasn’t, so we set off for a preliminary exploration under
my expert guidance.
We didn’t
get too lost too often and found most of the major places. Matt was agog – it
is not quite what he imagined it to be – and that is about all he will say but
will not expand. We could not help but notice though how tatty the ship is in
so many places. It is also clear that the refit carried out recently has not
yet been completed. Because there are pots of paint, spare panels to be fitted
etc etc all over the place. I mentioned when talking about the Polygon that we
had a similar feeling there – luxurious at first glance, but patched up (rather
badly) on closer inspection.
 |
| The Double Down Room where we spent a deal of time |
There was a
bit of a messup with the baggage. Two out of our three cases finally arrived at
about 18.15 but the last one took another hour or so to get there.
Coincidentally, it was the missing Zurich
case which of course had all our shipboard clothes in it. Anyway it turned up
so all was well.
 |
| The, rather elegant, dining room |
We were
feeling a bit peckish by then and as the captain had announced that we would be
sailing about an hour late – at 20.00 – we thought we might as well eat before
we sailed. It was free seating so we landed up at a table with a very pleasant
American woman, who had lost her voice,
and a really annoying Welshman – Cliff – who wore a ginger Sirs hairpiece.
Real bloody know-all, look you, he was; complaining about everything.
Admittedly things were shambolic but it is a half price trip and quite
obviously being used as a “shake down”. We had a couple of bottles of wine and
the food was good. A pleasant meal spoiled only by the Welsh Whiner. Matt was,
I could tell killing himself with
suppressed laughter at having Jip at the table. (I used to read the Dr Doolittle books to Matt with different accents
for the characters. Jip the dog had acquired a Welsh accent.)
The ship did
not sail at 20.00 after all. There was another announcement during dinner from
the Captain saying that we would be leaving at 22.00 because we were still
taking on fuel – a likely story, we thought. After unpacking we we went up to
the Double Down Room where the band was playing and dancing was in progress.
The Teen Room was adjacent and Matt was in there like a long dog because it was
full of arcade games – all free!
Rab and I
settled down to watch the passing show killing ourselves laughing at some of
the sights, including one couple with the man in his tail suit and the woman in
a full length white lace dress. We finally sailed at 22.00 at which stage there
was a good comedian on stage, so we never actually saw the parting from the
land. The cabaret was pretty good and it was darn cold out, so we just watched
the passing lights through the lounge windows and didn’t go out on deck. Matt
gave up playing games and enjoyed the rest of the show with us.
We lose an
hour a night on this voyage so although we eventually got to bed after 23.00 it
was actually only just after 22.00.
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