The nice thing about having low expectations is that you’ll rarely be disappointed -- today was one of those days. The threat of a ferry cancellation dissipated as Cristobal zoomed off into the North Atlantic hurricane graveyard. So, I had a 14 hour ferry ride with minimal driving and time to myself. The only potentially serious problem involved my stomach and vestibular organs. In my advancing years I’ve proven to be disappointingly vulnerable to motion sickness. Not only can I not go on twisty roller coaster rides but also bouncy boats. I decided to take my chances and not bring Gravol along for the ride…
The Loading of the MV Joey and Clara Smallwood (named after the 1st premier and his wife of post-confederation Nfld.) went pretty smoothly. Now, for those of you who haven’t gone on long ferry rides, usually the first thing you do after parking your car is to make a mad dash to the cafeteria to try to beat the lineups since most people forgo breakfast in order to line up early at the ferry terminal. Surprisingly, there was no lineup when I arrived so I was able to sit down and have breakfast while we were still docked – no sea-sickness so far! The meals were cafeteria quality but priced like restaurant entrees. Not surprising since there is a food monopoly on board the ship with a captive market.
I’m pleased to report that visiting all those museums had a very practical use after all: at the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic in Halifax, the Titanic display taught me about where the various classes of passengers were located. The first class tickets were right in the middle of the ship where the pitching and rocking was at a minimum. The progressively lower classes were bunked farther and farther away from the middle with the worse seats (the 3rd class rooms for single men and women) at the bow and stern of the ship (and directly over the noisy engine room). So, I camped out in the middle of the ship for the whole trip and, although I had some brief and vague sensations of queasiness after meals, I wasn’t seasick for the whole trip. Nonetheless, there was a little choppiness to the ocean and you had to watch your step.
So, my whole trip consisted of the following: eating, napping, several walks around the ship, several movies, watching some TV, and reading “The Shipping News” given to me by my sister (which is quite good – I’ll have to try to rent the movie). Unfortunately, 2 events conspired to cause a very late arrival at Argentia: 1) We were 45 min late in departing North Sydney and 2) we were only running on 3 of 4 engines as they were doing maintenance on the 4th. So, what should have been a 14 hour ride morphed into a 19 hour marathon from terminal-to-terminal. I was wondering why they would use the crippled ferry on the longer of the two ferry lines (the North Sydney-Port Aux Basques run is only 7-8 hours). I guess the Port-Aux-Basques ferry has a busier (i.e. daily) and thus more strict schedule.
After leaving the terminal, I quickly pulled into the B&B which was just 10 min. away. It was 3 AM and I crashed for the night.
2 comments:
did you sleep in your car or did the ferry also have rooms?
No, I didn't reserve anything because I was expecting the ferry to arrive at 10 pm! Also, you're not allowed to sit in your car (although several times throughout the trip they let people down into the car deck to get stuff).
So, I basically hung around the main deck which had plenty of seating between the cafeteria, bar, and various lounges.
For extra cash you can get access to some more exclusive lounges and you can even get private cabins. While the cabins are quiet and will give you privacy, they looked a little run down and were quite basic (4 bunk beds).
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