Still on the boat
Tonight will be our 18th night on the boat. Yes, we had planned to leave today but more changes to flights meant a delay. We leave tomorrow. Jeremy has a plan A and a plan B for tomorrow, so we are happy with the arrangements. But don’t uncross your fingers and toes yet. Messages are filtering back to the boat, from people arriving home in far flung places. Dorette is arriving in Amsterdam CS as I write. Despite the disorderly disembarkation yeaterday, with 3 people left temporarily on the wharf, everyone who left boarded a flight out of Uruguay. This was not something we could assume as the bus left at 3.10 and some passengers had 4 pm flights.
Today there are two disembarkation, with the first group already departed. There was a lot of waiting, With many changes of timing and arrangements but a convoy of 5 coaches with passengers from the sister ship Ortelius and another big cruise liner further down the wharf left at 2.10 for scheduled 3.50 pm flights. Progress! For us, and particularly Jode who loves to arrive at the airport early, very early, the waiting and delays will prove taxing tomorrow!
So far we have had no disembarkations for morning flights, but apparently about 20 of us are leaving on the 11.46 am LATAM flight to Santiago tomorrow. I sincerely hope they are practised enough by then to do a morning ‘corridor sanitaire’ run to the airport.
As I write this the next coach has arrived early and the luggage is now loaded. It is only 3.15 for 7 pm flights. So we will see how long this takes. You can see we have a very narrow focus at present. Life is all about flights, only flights. And saying goodbyes. We have now done kisses and hugs with our Dutch friends Rose and Ruth three times. It is becoming a bit excruciating. Aah, the authorities have just arrived (4.15 pm) so we will once again make our way up to the deck to wave and cheer as each person walks down the gangway and enters the bus. The deckside cheer squad is diminishing in size and tonight’s dinner will be much smaller and quieter.
We are ready for ‘Project Jen and Jode Home’ to be over. I am starting to think 2 weeks in self isolation could be bliss.