Sunday Aug 7, New York, USA

With the excitement of approaching New York we were up early to catch any photographic opportunities.   As you can see it was rather foggy as we came in, so we went off for breakfast.   It wasn't much better afterwards, the fog had cleared but it was drizzling instead.   It looked real stormy, although the forecast was hot and humid.

By the time we could see the Manhattan skyscrapers it was beginning to clear.   There were no excursions laid on for back-to-back passengers, and to make matters worse we were at the Brooklyn Pier which is not really convenient for getting into New York.   We thought it rather mean of Princess line to not lay on a coach tour of the New York highlights, but it might have been because they were busy with their certification inspection by the US authorities.   We were now half way, but we noticed that many of our American friends had become more subdued as their cruise neared the end.   This was the most contemplative and quiet that Julie had been on the whole trip.   Not that she was noisy, but she was normally bubbly and a joy to be with.   Being on a back-to-back cruise is supposed to give you a warm feeling at the end of the first leg, but we will be sad to see our American friends leave.   Everybody is busy with packing and goodbyes and it was rubbing off on us.

Gail had bought a beautiful orchid in Antwerp but could not import it into USA because of the regulations, so gave it to us.   The poor plant is now in our cabin, devoid of light, and we can't take it with us at Dover for the same reasons.  We will have to look for someone on the next leg who is doing B2B, or at least has an outside cabin, that we can pass it on to.   We found a couple at the Cruise Critics Mett and Greet the next day who had balcony, so passed it on to them.   If it had been acquired in Holland we could have named it the Flying Dutchman.

Once we docked we had to assemble in the bar and be escorted into the terminal for a face to face with immigration.   Once we got there we were kept waiting for about 40 minutes with nothing happening.   Even the immigration officials were getting fidgety, eventually two more "transit" passengers arrived.   Despite the information in the daily handouts, and the announcements, they thought they could just stay on the ship, and had to be searched for.   It only took about 10 to 15 minutes to process us all and we were then escorted back, with the exception of the two late comers who had now decided to have a look round.   This did mean they would now have to wait until boarding started before getting back on.

Once back on board we found that one side of the ship was closed due to bunkering; another opportunity for some more photography.   This is the tug that had brought the oil barge alongside.   We couldn't stay out long however as it was now getting rather hot and sticky, the forecast weather had arrived.   After lunch under the shade on the Panorama deck we posed briefly for our pictures in front of the Statue of Liberty and then retreated to our air-conditioned cabin to watch a DVD.

By late afternoon it was not quite so hot and we had cooled a bit so we did some more photography.   If we thought we were hard done by being in Brooklyn rather than Manhattan, another cruise liner that had come in with us in the morning was moored up over the other side in the Bayonne area of New Jersey.   I did manage to sneak a photo of the Empire State building from the ship using telephoto, but there was a lot of heat haze around.   During the afternoon the ship began to fill up with the new boarding passengers.   We escaped the emergency drill having done it on the outward leg.   It wouldn't come amiss though for some to have a second go at learning how to don a life jacket.   I presume the drill is just lip service to matitme regulations and the cruise lines are resigned to the fact that in an emmergency the crew will need to help and advise passengers at a loss as to what to do.   Let us hope they are trained well for this.   We were soon off again on our sailaway with a whole ship full of new companions for our return crossing.   As we left the pier we saw the Veendaam coming out from Manhattan but she soon left us behind.