We got off to a good start on this one, having been rebooked onto a direct flight to Lisbon and finding that our luggage, which had been shipped two weeks earlier, was at the ship waiting for us.
First stop was Porto and we ran to the Pingo Doce for supplies: toothpaste, mouthwash, port wine. On walking tour in A Coruna, we discovered their sense of humor.
We missed Biarritz again because it was too rough to tender, but we did get to see the Guggenheim in Bilbao.
What a building. And outside, of course, The Puppy.
We took a walk around the marina in Lorient, France.
We anchored at Concorneau in France and lowered the tenders, but the first one in found the mouth of the harbor blocked by eco-protesters in kayaks. They didn't seem to want us there! We are polluters, apparently. Coulda fooled me, what with all the steps that cruise ships take to not pollute. We pulled up the tenders and left in a huff.
In Brest, France, we toured the countryside and the beautiful estuaries.
Onward to St. Peter Port, Guernsey. It was a tender port, so guess what? Right! Too rough to tender. Both Honfleur, France and Bruges, Belgium greeted us without incident. We went to historic Rouen, where Joan of Arc was burned at the stake for not conforming to mob rule.
In Bruges, we bought chocolates. It was wall-to-wall tourists. Challenging. Last stop on the segment was an overnight in Antwerp. First day, we took an excellent tour that included the cathedral:
The train station:
And the view from the top of the MAS (whatever that stands for) museum is neat, but the ground floor is:
Second day, it poured rain as we threw out all but 61 passengers and brought the newbies onboard.
Occasionally, you get a sunset.
