Ending and Beginning

The yoga mat went back in the box on Friday morning. Way back in January, Michael, the very kind yoga instructor for the Reunion Voyage, told me to keep the yoga mat I used for his class for the rest of my time on the ship. After Johana's gentle and imagery-filled yoga class on yesterday's final sea day, the happy yellow yoga mat went back into the ship's collection. It was a nice way to mark the beginning of the end of our time aboard the MV Explorer.

There were a lot of "lasts" in the past few days. I shelved my last book in the shipboard library, had my last pre-port, had my last dinner on the 5th deck, had my last diet 7-Up at the piano bar with Ingrid (the best bartender ever), and said goodbye to many, many crew, voyagers, and staff. This morning, we departed the ship in Dover, England and got on a shuttle to London. With the exception of a bit of drama when one of our suitcases was picked up by another voyager, and a lot of traffic due to a huge international soccer match in London, we survived debarkation pretty well.

The flat we are renting in London has many things we have missed on the ship:

- fast internet

- a living room

- two bedrooms

- a tiny kitchen and washer/dryer

Funny how stuff like that is a treat. Soon enough, I'll be wishing I didn't have to do laundry or grocery shop, but we are enjoying it now. For example, we bought blueberries at the grocery store down the street and could wash them in the kitchen before eating them, and yesterday evening we were able to get online to see that the Tate Modern museum is open on Saturdays until 10pm, so we went for a late evening visit.

Of course we have been thinking about our voyage in big terms the past few days. Not just where did we go, but what it has meant to us and how we have changed as a result of these experiences. Here is a list of all of our ports, in order:

San Diego, California

Ensenada, Mexico

San Diego, California*

Ensenada, Mexico*

Hilo, Hawaii

Yokohama, Japan

Kobe, Japan

Shanghai, China

Hong Kong, China

Singapore

Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

Yangon, Burma 

Cochin, India

Port Louis, Mauritius

Cape Town, South Africa

Takoradi, Ghana

Tema/Accra, Ghana

Casablanca, Morocco

Barcelona, Spain

Monte Carlo, Monaco

Livorno, Italy

Cadiz, Spain

Casablanca, Morocco*

Lisbon, Portugal

Le Havre, France

Antwerp, Belgium

Amsterdam, Netherlands

Leith/Edinburgh, Scotland

Belfast, Northern Ireland

Dublin, Ireland

Dover/London, Englad

*not a typo, we really did go these places twice on different segments.

We will be in London until Tuesday morning, then home. There might be a few more blog posts after we get home, or this might be the end of the blog. With regular internet access, I might have to go back to actually logging in to Facebook and Twitter instead of automatically posting. I have resisted logging in to those services just yet, so we'll keep the blog open for now. Thanks for reading!