Day 2 – Dublin Ireland

OzsTravels 2022, 2022 North Atlantic, Cruises, Food, Food & Wine, Ireland, Wine , , 0 Comment
Day 2 – Dublin Ireland

We arrived in at the port of Dún Laoghaire after our 420 nautical mile transit from Southampton on time on our second day.

I was surprised that we were not going to be docking at Dublin Port, today we would be transferred to the port using the ship’s tenders. The reason for this was that the Port of Dublin has been closed to Cruise Ships since the start of Brexit as the cargo traffic increased significantly and therefore the decision was that cargo was more important that tourism.

Dublin, Oz's 2022 North Atlantic Adventure, North Atlantic, Ireland, Dublin Ireland
Samuel Beckett Bridge

I am fine with tenders, though a number of other passengers were not as comfortable with them. Not sure if this meant that a number of passengers decided to stay onboard, the tender I was on was full.

Dublin Highlights Tour

I would post the tour description, but what is in the provided the materials was for a different tour that sounded like a combination of my morning tour and my afternoon tour.

My morning tour was about 4 hours in duration and was a coach trip around some of the historical landmarks of Dublin.

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Day 1 – Sailing to Dun Laogharie (Dublin) Ireland

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Day 1 – Sailing to Dun Laogharie (Dublin) Ireland

The first day of my North Atlantic Ocean and Arctic Ocean cruise was a sea day!

Southampton to Dublin crusing the English Channel and Irish Sea

Day 1

From Southampton England to Dun Laogharie (Dublin) Ireland is approximately 420 nautical miles (about 778Kms) which took us about a day and half to sail.

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Departure from Southampton

OzsTravels 2022, 2022 North Atlantic, Cruises, Food, Food & Wine, Oz's Cruise Tips, Wine , , 2 Comments
Departure from Southampton

After a great night at the RAC it was time leave London and head to Southampton to join my home for the next two weeks, SS Voyager as a part of my North Atlantic Ocean and Arctic Ocean adventure . Traffic in London is always a challenge, especially for a 40+ seat coach.

Transfer to the ship

Our coach arrived at the Landmark hotel about 20 mins late and then had to deal with a lot traffic before getting to one of the ring roads around London and then onto Southampton. There were roadworks as we neared Southampton, slowing us even further. This meant that we arrived about 90 mins late. Not the greatest start to the trip and it was about to get worse.

Check In

At the port, due to the delays we experienced on the way from London, we arrived at the same time as a number of other buses so I was expecting a decent queue but not 90 mins worth of one. The queue was due to the checking of everyone’s Covid-19 related documentation, test results and vaccination status. I think it could have been handled a lot better by streamlining the process and having us line up once and checking everything at once as well as check us in.

Also, not a great idea having us all queue up with everyone pre-checking everyone’s Covid-19 test results, no physically distancing in sight….

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Dinner at the Royal Automobile Club

OzsTravels 2022, 2022 North Atlantic, Cruises, Food, Food & Wine, Wine , , 1 Comment
Dinner at the Royal Automobile Club

What has become a tradition for me when I am in London is to have at least one dinner at the Royal Automobile Club, RAC, on Pall Mall. I get access to the great club through a reciprocal club benefit from one of my club memberships in Australia. As the Great Gallery is regularly booked out, you need to book as early as possible for most nights.

This is what I considered would be the start of my North Atlantic and Arctic Ocean Adventure, and a great start it was.

Pre-Dinner Cocktail

To start with @ the RAC you need to visit the Cocktail Bar. Usually gentlemen are required to wear a jacket, though this had been relaxed when I was there due to the heat in London.

My first drink of the night was something new for me a Cigar Boulevardier, Dalmore Cigar Malt whisky with Antica Formula vermouth and Campari, infused with smoke. I gave this a 3.5 out of 5

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Singapore to London

OzsTravels 2022 North Atlantic, Cruises, Flights, Food, Food & Wine, Wine 1 Comment
Singapore to London

The first part of my 2022 adventure was getting to London. Even though it was about 30 hours of travelling on what should have been a 13 hour trip, it was  pretty good once I got onto Emirates.

Singapore to Jakarta – Jetstar

I had been warned that there are probably going to be issues with baggage handling so I was not unhappy about having to collect my bags in Jakarta and to go through Indonesian Immigration and Customs.

Having decent status with Qantas does not help with excess baggage on Jetstar, my two bags were 5kg over my baggage allowance, so had to pay the SGD100 excess fee for the first leg, not a problem with Emirates as they do recognise QF status, thankfully.

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The North Atlantic – at last

OzsTravels 2022 North Atlantic, Cruises , , 2 Comments
The North Atlantic – at last

Shortly I will be embarking on my first new adventure since before the craziness that is Covid-19. I will be cruising the The North Atlantic.

Thanks to Research Gate for the image

Getting to London in order to board the ship in Southampton added a bit of an extra challenge to mix. You would expect that flying direct from Singapore to London would easy to arrange as there should be an abundance of flights at an “affordable” price, not so.

Whilst I was searching for flights to and from Europe with 4 to 5 days the prices increased by around 40%. In the end the best option I found was to book flights from Singapore on Emirates and back to Singapore on Thai. It did not help that in May 2022 British Airways cancelled all flights between Reykjavik and London.

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