Follow the soap opera of on board life......

Hello from Aurora!

I’m so excited to back to the blog after a year of hopping around the fleet from ship to ship. We all love the soap opera of on board life don’t we?

Since I last wrote the blog for you I’ve been to the American/Canadian eastern seaboard to see the ‘Fall’ on Aurora, I’ve sailed round the world on Arcadia, and I set up the Port Presenter role on Adonia ready for her Maiden season.

For those of you who haven’t had the opportunity to see Adonia yet, she’s unbelievably beautiful. Much like a country cottage hotel with richly coloured carpets, lots of dark wood, and gold trimmings, she’s small but elegant and incredibly friendly. If you get any opportunity to go on board to have a look at her, do make the most of it because I think you’ll be impressed.

So, I’m back to my favourite ship, Aurora, and we’re on our way to Greenland (after calling into Cobh and Dublin in Ireland). I’m actually writing this from my bed at the moment because I’m not very well. Would you believe that I’m a Port Presenter which means that in theory I’m paid to talk, - and I’ve lost my voice!! That’s why I this is the first blog instalment I’ve written for you since being on board.

Thankfully my voice held out for the presentation on Greenland which took me nearly a week to research and write, but it’s got worse and worse as the week’s gone on and now I’ve lost it completely.

Thankfully we have the fabulous Natalie Brady (Loyalty and Future Cruise sales manager) on here at the moment and she really kindly offered to help me out. So, I sat up through the night writing her a script and she stood up in front of my lovely 800 strong audience and delivered my presentation for me. What a hero! She saved me from desperately trying to struggle through 45 minutes of information about Reykjavik and let me relax in the audience and let my voice recuperate.

The people I share an office with are having a wonderful time enjoying a nice quiet few days. I’ll make up for it when I’m back to full health and fighting fit again! He he...

Anyway, we’re all very excited on Aurora at the moment because we are able to offer a Shore Excursions programme in Greenland for the first time in years! Tickets have flown off the shelves because we have a coach based highlights tour, an introductory walking tour, and a whale watching fjord cruise all on offer in Greenland’s capital city, Nuuk. I’m hoping to join a couple of the tours running there on Sunday – all in the name of research of course! – so I’ll make sure that I get some pictures downloaded for you so that you can see what it’s like. We’ve heard that there’s a lot of snow and ice in the area at the moment so we’re hoping for lots of lovely wildlife to be running about.

Speaking of wildlife, with Adonia’s ability to get into all of these new and exciting ports of call that none of us have ever heard of, I was lucky enough to visit a Norwegian port last month called Bodø (pronounced Buddha). This is a relatively new port to the world of cruise ship destinations and was certainly the first time a P&O Cruises ship had ever called there. I didn’t really know what to expect to be honest with you but it was fabulous!

For those of you who’ve never heard of Bodø, it’s just within the Arctic circle in the Norwegian county of Nordland. It’s not the prettiest town in the world (because it was completely flattened during WWII and all of the current architecture dates back to the 1950s), but it’s a gateway to some incredible natural sights.
Around 33 kilometres to the southeast, is one of the world’s strongest known tidal currents called the Saltstraumen Maelstrom. In a 3km long, 150 metre wide strait, the 6 hourly changing tides cause one of the nearby fjords to drain into another. This forced current creates almost the equivalent of a waterfall at sea, and over 400 million cubic metres of water rush at a speed of 20 knots creating whirlpools of up to 32 feet in diameter.

I actually sped through these currents on a high speed RIB (rigid inflatable boat) whilst searching for Moose and white tailed eagles. I saw both Moose AND White tailed eagles (amazing!), although I can honestly say that the boat part had me holding on pretty tightly to the man sat next to me – Poor guy!

I think these new small ports of call are the best thing about cruising on a small ship like Adonia. You’re treated to destinations that others rarely get the opportunity to visit, and experiences that others rarely get the opportunity to enjoy.

So anyway, back to the lovely Aurora and we’ve got another day at sea before we reach the icy realms of Greenland. We’ve got two Greenlandic ports in this itinerary before we head across to Iceland and Norway, so I’ll keep you updated with our progress and make sure that you know what’s going on.

Any questions about Aurora or any of the other ships (I’ve sailed on all of the current fleet), or about any destinations around the world that you might like to visit, please feel free to drop me a line. I’ll try to post a blog instalment every couple of days and I look forward to sharing all of our experiences with you.

Thanks for having me back! I look forward to hearing your comments,

Jo