We're on the Rotterdam Heading Toward the USA

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Geo: 51.9226, 4.47075

We get up for the final time before moving to the ship. Mom's excited about not having to move the suitcases around anymore. She's excited? I'm ecstatic! Karen has a hard time pushing hers around. It gets caught on cobblestones, curbs and train tracks. I tell her to push it at the bottom with her foot but she struggles. I'm glad to see them go. We get our free hotel breakfast, pack our things and check out of the hotel.

The reception calls a taxi for us which we will meet outside on the street. We see other fellow cruisers checking out as well, identified by the same Holland America luggage tags fastened to their bags. Our driver shows up and off we go. It's a short ride to the port, costing €15 portal to portal. The port of Rotterdam is the largest in Europe. It was once the world's busiest port when, in 2004, it was superseded by Shanghai. Now Rotterdam is the fourth biggest port in the world.

We dump our four checked bags outside the Holland America cruise port, sign in and we board the ship. Our room, 6222, is a balcony suite. It's larger than balcony rooms we've had before and even has a Jacuzzi tub. We never use it. Located near the aft of the ship, it's a preferred location for us, being convenient to the dinning room, Lido and Explorations Cafe, our most frequented venues. Best of all, it's a free upgrade with a value of several thousand dollars..

Walking around the ship, we check out the different decks. The Rotterdam is basically the same ship as the Amsterdam, our ship from our South Pacific Adventure last year. It's the same layout and we're familiar with it. At 3pm, we have to attend the mandatory life boat drill. We arrive promptly but, as usual, we can never complete the process until all the guests manage to follow instructions and arrive at their assigned lifeboat station. At the drill, we met our friends from Belgium. We met them on our South Pacific cruise and were looking forward to seeing them again. We chat for a while until the deck is clear and then return to our room to change for dinner.

We had a nice dinner tonight, a table for two. It's prime rib with apple strudel and ice cream for dessert. Much better than last night's Top Ramen. There is no show tonight, just a movie "Kidnapping Mr. Heineken", about the Heineken kidnapping of the brewery heir. I think we'll skip it and I'll just add it to our Netflix list for home later. We just return to our room and relax. I work on the blog some more as I'm still behind about three days and Karen putters around our stateroom.

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Comments

[Alan and Min]

To solve your luggage transport issues perhaps next time you could just take one suitc..... Oh never mind.