Island Hopping in Alesund

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We seem to be getting into our groove, starting with breakfast in the Lido. I got two of the demitasse cups of Swiss Muesli and some rolls, cold cuts and cheese for my “Continental Breakfast”. Sharon is sticking with French Toast because it’s not a “Waffle Day”.

Alesund is the main island of a group comprising a region of islands. James Arness has grandparents who emigrated from this area, and during his hey-day on Gunsmoke visited Alesund a couple of times. Since the 1980’s, following the discovery of North Sea Oil, tunnels began connecting many of the islands. The seabed and terrain encasing the tunnels is solid rock. A few bridges also connect some islands; but, this can limit access through the waterways for ships like the Koningsdam. The longest undersea tunnel that we went through was about 4.5 kilometers. Although the weather had predicted a possibility of rain, which I think is the daily standing prediction for this region and seldom changes, we in fact had rain-free skies with scattered clouds but windy in places. We stopped by an old lighthouse for scenic viewing and took some pictures. We crossed to another island and along the shore there were a number of “summer cottages” built one next to another. The locals rent these out to people during the summer to earn some extra money. We also visited the island whose name translates to “Good Island”, and we thought that that was appropriate. It seems that many of the more affluent Norwegians live here. Prior to the discovery of North Sea Oil, Norwegians were per capita among the poorest countries in the world. Now, they are among the most affluent! Again we learned that those who farm often have a second job. The farms are not large; but, Norway feels that it is important to produce as much of its food as it can. Because it is so difficult to farm profitably, Norway subsidizes its farmers, you guessed it, with some of that North Sea Oil money. Off one beach our guide noted that some locals went scuba diving not too long ago and found a sunken treasure of some 40,000 gold coins dating back to the days of the Spanish Armada. She noted that these three Norwegians don’t need to work any move after being allowed to keep 80% of the treasure. Our final stop was at a promontory overlooking the harbor of Alesund where we were docked. It was a fantastic view of the area but parking for most people would have been a nightmare. Our guide said, “These bus drivers know what they’re doing. As long as the police don’t show up to try and help, things will be fine.” And they were. How they handled these big busses, sometimes needing to back them around blind corners with a cliff on one side I’ll never know. There were drivers in cars that needed to get out and let a bus driver move the car for them because they’d simply lost their nerve. And then there was the driver who simply refused to move his car when he decided to stop in a spot that made it so nobody else could move. We got back to the ship and went up to the Lido to eat.

Sharon grabbed a burger from the Dive In while I got a pizza from the NY Pizza and Grill. And we both got some gelato after lunch. Sharon went to mass because it conflicted with Trivia. I arrived at trivia and only one of my teammates was there to help defend our perfect streak. Christina was already in the Billboard Onboard Lounge when half of our missing team arrived, and the last two arrived before the first question. Trivia started well enough, we knew who said “There’s a sucker born every minute.” And after that we knew the nickname for the Beijing National Stadium. Who can forget watching the 2008 Olympics in Beijing at the “Bird Nest” stadium. But then she wanted to know in what country Reichenbach Falls is located; or, what is on the “tail side” of a Canadian Nickel. Things started going downhill fast after that! Our streak was in real jeopardy. Sharon could have helped with “Who is the teenage detective who lived at River Heights?” Our scribe had already written down “Encyclopedia Brown” despite most of the rest of us thinking it was “Nancy Drew”. We just didn’t want to have another “Earl Grey/Orange Pekoe” moment. Sharon would have known though. I learns something about her everyday… she read all of the Nancy Drew books. We had trouble with “What is a ‘Funambulist’?” We went with hiker. I guess that is only true if you do your hiking on a tightrope. And I was pretty sure that the next question was a repeat; but I couldn’t find it in my catalog of previous questions. “What country opened the world’s first McDonald’s with a ski-thru lane?” My memory of having previously answered “Switzerland” and remembering that it was a Scandinavian country put me on the right track. Maybe I thought this was the obligatory “Norway” question for a Norwegian cruise. The answer was Sweden. The bonus came down to two names worth one point each. “Name the sister ships of the Titanic.” Our scribe wrote down “Oceanic & Britannic”. We got one point for Britannic. The other should have been Olympic. We got a paltry 8 out of 17 possible points, not even 50%. The winners got 12 points and seemed quite proud. We’re blaming the dismal collapse of our perfect record on Sharon; although, she’s now taking credit for our other victories.

There were a couple of appetizers that caught my eye, so I ordered myself the quinoa and pomegranate which I enjoyed and Sharon ordered me the pan fried pork dumpling (with a Russian or Polish sounding name). I also enjoyed the cannellini and lentil soup. My entry was the sausage fettuccini. Sharon had the beef clod tenderloin with a baked potato. We enjoyed dinner and I topped it off with a very tasty hazelnut mouse cake while Sharon had the crème Brule.

Still reeling from our Team Trivia debacle we show up in the Crow’s Nest and our teammates have found a booth on the other side and cattycorner from where we’ve been sitting. Another family is sitting there and a small boy is among them, so he can see us through the end table opening separating the seating sections. We hear him say “Look Mama, It’s the Frog People.” He recognized the Tiger People as well. Tonight we have a new Assistant Cruise Director, they lady that’s been assisting Juip all week at trivia and bingo. Evidently Juip will be leaving us in Amsterdam when we return. First she wanted to know “What company’s slogan is ‘Live to Ride, Ride to Live.”? Our scribe had already recorded “Harley Davidson.” And nobody was going to talk her out of it! “What type of marine animal is a Medusa?” There were several half-hearted suggestions; but, I wrote down “Jellyfish” on the back of my sheet, and that was that. Then came the “Soccer” question. This is where you need somebody from Great Britain or Australia on your team. Christina and Juip haven’t been asking soccer questions and I thought that we might luck out on this cruise. Our new ACD is evidently a soccer buff, and schoolteachers aren’t going to be able to help us out much here. “The first FIFA world championship was held in 1930 and was hosted by what country?” We went with Great Britain. It was Uraguay. She asked next “If you suffer from ‘xenophobia’, what do you fear?” I wrote down “people”. One teammate said “foreigners” and that is what we went with. The correct answer was “Strangers”; but, foreigners and people were also acceptable. This new ACD also seems to like company slogans. “What is the slogan of Apple Computer?” We had no clue. Sharon complained, we’re Window-geeks. The ACD was looking for “Think Different.” She continued with a distinctly European flavor, “Besides the cue ball, how many balls are there in a game of ‘Snooker’?” Again, no clue. There should be 21. Although, some of the questions were tough, we felt that they weren’t overly specific and good for a general trivia game. Take for example, “What is the color of a black box on an airplane?” She acknowledged that this might be a trick question. Our teammate knew that it was orange. “In music, what is the opposite of ‘Legato’?” Sharon jumped in and said that her piano teacher would kill her if she missed this one, and wrote down ‘Staccato’. When it was time to grade papers, we handed ours to Juip to grade, and he seemed tickled to check our sheet. We wound up with 14 out of a possible 17 points and retained our streak of 4-straight “Evening Trivia” victories. And today the new ACD was handing out the good brass pins.

Sharon decided to go listen to “Music from the 1960’s” in the piano bar and the late show of Frozen Planet Live. I decided to go take a nap for a few hours and rise and go play blackjack at midnight when the casino opens on this late day in port. I was asleep when Sharon returned and I asked her what time it is and she said 11:50PM. I bounce out of bed, wondering why I didn’t hear my phone alarm and realize that it is only 10:50PM. Thanks Sharon, for the false start. When I finally did get up to the casino just past midnight, the two other blackjack tables were busy and full of players. My table was empty and I went and stood by it for a while. Nobody looked my way. I watched one of the blackjack tables for a while. They did a shift change at the blackjack table. A bit later I noticed that they had opened the farthest table from me, but not a blackjack table, and that nobody was playing there. So after being pretty much ignored, I decided just to go back to bed. I had an early morning tour tomorrow anyway.

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