Bob and Janet's Excellent Adventure: Greenwich mean

Now back at home, after being laid low for a week by the respiratory scourge of the Viking Sun, I'm finally getting around to the final (maybe) post.

We arrived at our Thames River mooring early in the morning. I should have gotten up to see the sights as we made our way in to Greenwich, but needed to rest up for the next day's early call of 3:45 AM for transit to Heathrow.

We were anchored in the river, tied up to an immigration barge/office. We exited the ship onto the barge and onto awaiting river taxis to carry us to shore. All very efficient.

Perhaps it was a mistake, but we decided to skip the bus tour of London, saving it for a return visit, and focus on Greenwich. We headed for the Royal Observatory. We took a meandering route past pubs and quiet residential streets and parks. A lovely, and no doubt, a pricey place to live.

The Royal Observatory self guided audio tour was just okay. Great views and we had a photo op with feet in two different time zones. Folks were queued up behind the ubiquitous oblivious young Asian girl who insisted upon a gazillion poses from her obliging devotee.

We strolled back down to the river and stopped for fish and chips and a beer at a pub before taking a tour of the Cutty Sark. I'm not sure how Cutty Sark became associated with whiskey, but the ship was noted for it's transport of tea between England and the Far East. It's been restored and has a glass visitors center surrounding the hull.

Taken through a porthole on The Cutty Sark

Bob heads back to the ship while I spend a couple hours wandering the streets and walking the Thames River pathway. We'll come back to London someday, and Greenwich seems like a good spot for an AirBnB home base.

We're concerned about baggage handling. We each have two large duffels, packed full, plus carryons and computer bags. Our big bags have to be in the hallway by 10 PM for transport to shore. We have a 3:45 AM call to tender ashore where we are to identify our bags and see that they end up on the bus to Heathrow with us. What we're unsure about is how we'll be able to heft them to the bus ourselves and how we'll get them from the bus to baggage check at Heathrow. Not to worry-everything went so smooth. There were porters at the baggage tent that helped us to the bus and handcarts available at Heathrow to get us to baggage check. Done.

Now relax in the business class lounge. Wow. I had no idea this was a thing, or else I would have made sure to be a few hours early for our flight to Miami back in December. Mimosas, wine, bloody marys, breakfast, snacks, newspapers, comfy chairs, polite attendants. I don't think I can go back to steerage. More of the same treatment on the plane. We had our own comfy pods and way too much food. I was actually able to sleep a little. Watched two movies, The Post (not so good) and Molly's Game (good mindless crime drama.)