Two sea days after Salalah

Wednesday April 15 2009 - First day in the area subject to pirate attack and we were disappointed, this morning that we didn‘t see another single ship. By 10.00am the captain announced that we were now in the corridor protected by an international task force and around 02.00pm we saw a destroyer, don’t know which country, as it was too far away. There was a flurry of activity, mostly by passengers with cameras and binoculars, when a couple of small boats appeared ahead of us, was this finally the pirates, they turned out to be only fishing boats, but they could have been pirates disguised as fishing boats. At 03.00pm we went to a free wine tasting seminar, where we learned all there is to know about fine wines, 2 white, 2 red and an ice wine sample, trouble was there was a long discussion between each sample. We went out on the promenade deck after dinner tonight and our lunch time waiter had been drafted as a security person patrolling the deck with his eyes focussed out to sea, we felt so much safer.



Our location on the stateroon tv



Thursday April 16 2009 - No pirates in sight, in fact no ships of any kind in sight, we’re 1000 miles away from our next stop, Safaga, in Egypt. Currently, 09.00am, the coast of Somalia is about 50 miles South of us while the coast of Yemen and the town of Aden is about 30 miles North, if all goes to schedule, we should pass through into the Red Sea by the end of today.

Canadian Navy to the rescue



Around 11.30am the captain announced there were several navy vessels ahead of us, too far for anyone to identify, then within 5 minutes from behind the ship, we could see a helicopter approaching, a Canadian Sea King flew by, I was on the top deck and could clearly see a crewman standing in the open doorway waving as the big copter flew the length of the ship before peeling off to the port side. We never saw any of the ships ahead of us, presumably they moved off to other locations. We went Sabatinis, the special restaurant, for an English pub lunch of fish and chips with mushy peas, the food was good enough but the portions were small so we headed straight to the Panorama buffet after, for desert.

Next Post

Salalah - Sultanate of Oman

Our one and only Frankincense tree - in the distance, the black spot is a military group, training



Tuesday April 14 2009 - Is it Salalah or Salalah, we were up early for a 07.15am start to our tour ‘Jobs Tomb and Frankincense Trees’, Salim, our guide, met us dockside and we were soon underway in this second largest town in Oman and birthplace of the Sultan, Qaboos Bin Said. The countryside around the dock was scrubby desert in all directions and soon we were at our first stop, the Frankincense trees, or I should say the Frankincense tree, as we only ever saw one. We had only stepped from the bus a few seconds when he sound of automatic gunfire startled everyone, the guide was quick to explain that the area was also a training ground for the military and about 200 yards across the wadi, a large black vehicle with several black clad individuals, could be seen. I kept one eye on them, one eye on our bus and one eye on the guide as he explained how Frankincense is collected.


Mughsail Beach




This rock outcropping reminded me of wee Spammy



We piled back onto the bus and headed to our next stop, Mughsail Beach, a picturesque 2 mile stretch of beach with interesting cliffs and rock formations, I walked down to the blowholes while Izzy took a shady seat, it was 85 degF and still only 08.15am. Unfortunately since it was low tide, the only thing coming out of the blowholes was air.

The mosque at Job's tomb




Izzy makes friends with a camel, we called him big Spammy



Next we drove a long distance into the mountains to the site of the tomb of the prophet, Job, or one of the tombs as our guide told us 2 other countries also claim to have Job’s tomb. After visiting the tomb, we made friends with a local camel, who allowed Izzy to approach him, then we took the long trip down the mountainside avoiding stray camels on the road. In town, we stopped at the souk and Izzy bought two Arabian style robes before we returned to the ship, just in time for lunch. After dinner, we watched a comedian, Jack Wilks, he’d missed the ship in Dubai and just joined us today at lunch. I realised after a few minutes, I’d seen him before about 15 years ago and he was still doing the same act, still funny even the second time.

Next Post

2 sea days after Dubai

Sunday April 12 2009 - I have a chest cold and cough so we just had a quiet day at sea - slept in late and had dinner by room service. So I’ll take this time to post pictures of some of the greatest people who have become a large part of our journey.












Monday April 13 2009 - This morning we had breakfast on the open deck at the back of the ship. It was a beautiful morning, 25 degC (77 degF) and sunny, as we sailed down the coast of Oman toward our next stop, Salalah. There was a notice in our daily patter that there would be a ‘practice pirate attack‘ alert and around 09.45am as I sat reading on deck 5, a 5 second blast on the ships horn followed by the announcement ‘code papa, code papa, code papa, sounded out. I passed by the casino, collected Izzy and we went down to our cabin and propped the door open as per instructions , shortly the captain announced we were being followed by a fast boat accompanied by two small skiffs and that some fast manoeuvring may be required. After being checked by a crew member, we sat and waited for the captains ‘all clear’ announcement which came about 10.05am, the drill was completed and all passengers accounted for in 18 minutes and 36 seconds, we had successfully outrun the bad guys, the passengers went wild with excitement………….. just kidding about the passengers getting excited, the only time the passengers get excited is at meal times…….

Tonight at dinner, the captain announced that we would be staying in Salalah longer than originally scheduled. Arrangements have been made for us to be accompanied by a couple of warships through the area most susceptible to pirate attacks, we are to meet at a pre-arranged location at 10.00am Wednesday morning so instead of leaving Salalah at 05.00pm we’ll stay ‘til 10.00pm.

Next Post

Dazzling Dubai

Saturday April 11 2009 - No customs or immigration for Dubai, all we had was a landing card handed to us as be departed the ship. The forecast for the day was 38 degC (100 degF), fortunately our driver, Jameel, was right there to greet us, with a 15 seat air conditioned van which made it very comfortable as there were only six of us, Shell & Bill, Lucy & Jim and me & Izzy. We had a loose itinerary worked out and after discussing it with Jameel, we took off toward our first stop the Jumeirah mosque.
The mosque has tours for non-Moslems at 10am, 4 days a week and I’d hoped to take the tour, but our timing wasn’t suitable.

Jumeirah mosque



I found out later that the tour was a closed door, hour and a half event with long descriptions of the finer points of Islam, so it’s probably fortunate that we missed it since our time in Dubai was already limited. Next we moved on to the Bastkiya district, mostly reconstructed buildings in the ‘old Dubai’ style, the area was originally settled by Iranian traders, now it’s pretty sterile and we didn’t find much of interest.

Entrance to dubai Museum



We left the Bastkiya district and drove through heavy traffic to the Dubai museum and fort, a mix of basic reconstructions and video presentations, the undersea depiction of pearl divers was quite well done. We spent 40 minutes walking through the successive areas, plenty of time for a quick look. Jameel was waiting at the exit and suggested we take a 10 minute walk to the Dubai Creek where we wanted to hire a river taxi for half an hour. The walk was interesting in itself, as we skirted the ‘old souk’ area, absorbing the everyday business of life. I was surprised that there were so many people walking on the street, though I don’t recall many native Dubai-ers, it seemed to be mostly Indian/Pakistani and Europeans. All of the everyday work is done by temporary workers from other countries, the original Dubai-ers ‘work’ mostly in government positions.


Izzy and me at the Dubai Creek



We waited in the shade while Jameel negotiated our river taxi cost, 60 dirham (about US$17) for all six of us. The dock area was packed with people and boats coming and going, all full of travellers, so we had a strange feeling when our large boat pulled in and a path through the crowd was cleared for just the six of us to board, others who attempted to board were prevented. We pulled clear of the dock and headed out into the river, the boat would normally accommodate 20 to 25 people, it was no more than a wooden deck about a foot above the water with a long back to back bench down the middle, an engine in the centre and a canopy overhead. It was a great way to see the city from the water and we were free to move around for photographs, though it required some care as there were no rails or anything to hang on to.

sailing up the Dubai Creek on our water taxi




Izzy on the water taxi



After 25 minutes, we pulled into the dock at the spice souk, paid the boatman and wound our way back and forward through the alleys, Jameel had provided some directions on where he would meet us. The spice souk gave way to a more general souk and after heavy but friendly bargaining I took advantage of an offer from a small clothing vendor and bought a thobe, the long Arabic robe, complete with ghutra and lgal (head cover and rope type thing).

The spice souk



We continued on into the gold souk where the ladies did a lot of window shopping ‘til suddenly Jameel was there, he had found us amongst the thousands of busy shoppers. After a bathroom break, we decided it was lunch time and soon Jameel dropped off at the main entrance to the Mall of the Emirates.

The mall houses a massive winter setting complete with ski slope, while the temperature outside may be 38 degC, inside it’s a constant minus 4 degC, we spent some time enjoying the winter scene and thinking of home where it had snowed just recently, life is tough. We found a food court and made our choice for lunch (New York fries for me) and after some shopping, we met back at the mall entrance.

Driving down the trunk of the Palm




Contrast in Dubai, bikini clad woman next to burqua clad woman in the Atlantis hotel



After a drive-by of many of the royal residences and more affluent neighbourhoods, we headed out onto the Palm, a massive man-made island/peninsula in the shape of a palm tree jutting out into the Persian Gulf. We drove down the length of the trunk, under the tunnel at the end and arrived at the Atlantis Hotel, the building furthest out into the ocean.

Me outside the Atlantis hotel on Palm Island



We took twenty minutes to check out the hotels interior and then headed back to the mainland and along to the Burj Al Arab for a brief stop at the entrance and then on to Jumeirah public beach for further views.

Me by the Burj Al Arab



The Burj is the iconic, sail shaped building, known world wide as the only 7 star hotel in the world, we couldn’t confirm that claim as entrance to the interior is strictly limited to paying guests and at $120 each for afternoon tea, we decided that a view from the main gate was good enough.

Burj Dubai (from 2 separate photos)



Our last stop was possibly the most spectacular, the Burj Dubai, 818 metres (2684 feet) of gleaming steel and glass, tallest structure in the world, it was awe inspiring, unbelievable to see how high it stretches above all the other skyscrapers in the area, I didn’t expect to be so impressed, but it really is impressive. We stopped at the Palace hotel which afforded great views of the tower and had nice grounds of its’ own, we were too close to the tower to get it all in one picture, so I took it in sections for joining later. By then it was around 05.00pm and we were ready to get back to the ship, so about 40 minutes later, Jameel dropped us off back at the dockside, he was a great driver and we were very happy with his service, he went way beyond driver duties and made our visit stress free.

Dubai is truly dazzling, everywhere is new and sparkling, presently there‘s $93 billion in construction underway according to our guide. Entire areas are just a forest of cranes and new construction, the opulence of palaces and royal households and new buildings, one trying to outdo the next, is amazing

Back on board, I fell asleep and didn’t waken ‘til sail away around 09.00pm when I went up to have some pizza, Izzy had already eaten with Doreen and Bob.

Next Post

Second & Third sea days after Mumbai

Thursday April 9 2009 - Our main focus of today was to make a decision on our tour in Safaga. At the moment, we‘re booked with Princess for a full day tour, but we‘ve been offered the same tour plus extras, by private vehicle, for less than half the Princess price. Looks like I’m going to cancel the Princess tour and go along with the private tour, there will be ten of us in a private vehicle supplied by www.memphistours.net . We won trivia this morning after a tie breaker ‘what acrobatic move does a skunk make before spraying?’ we collected our coupons, added them to our others and exchanged them for valuable prizes (ie ‘junk’). I spent some time in the sun and the pool in the afternoon and In the evening, we watched the movie ‘Valkyrie’ which was on the theatre yesterday and on television today, the movies onboard have been very good, surprisingly, with a lot of recently released titles. Things I missed today, ‘a tour of the galley’, ‘a special lecture on Dubai’, ‘the passenger talent show’, oh well you can’t see everything.


Friday April 10 2009 - This morning according to the ships info channel we’re 216 miles from Dubai, it’s 26 degC (79 degF) and the sea is calm. The water has been amazingly flat crossing the Arabian Sea, today we will pass through the Strait of Hormuz, that’s the narrow gateway to the Persian Gulf where the Arabian peninsula juts out toward the Iranian mainland. It’s a busy area as it’s the only access to the oil rich areas of this part of the world, I expect we’ll see more than a few tankers. I spent my usual couple of hours in the sun in the afternoon, then ran around with Izzy arranging a last minute private tour in Dubai, we got a ten seater bus with driver for $250 for ten hours and we needed some more people to share the costs, fortunately that didn’t prove too difficult. In the evening we went to see comedy impressionist, Tony pace, he was very good.


Maintenance guys work on the new equipment



During the day I noticed some unusual activity on the lowest outside deck, the promenade deck about twenty feet above the water. Maintenance guys were rigging pipes with spray heads on them, clamped to the railing, overhanging the edge of the ship. It seems that they are being readied to spray the sides of the ship with water, without someone actually standing there, it would appear designed to make it more difficult to climb up the side of the ship. Tonight, I noticed, for the first time, a security guard patrolling the same deck.

The new nozzles installed every 20 feet or so













Hose lies waiting for attachment












PS. The answer to yesterday’s trivia tie breaker was ‘a handstand’

Next Post