Tuesday It Must Be Belgium — That’s What The Cunard Shore Excursion To Stonehenge/Salisbury Was Like 9/4/12
I have long ago memories of being rushed around Europe on three week tours by bus when I was in high school. I relived those memories on July 13 when we landed in Southampton. We had to report to the Royal Court Theater by 8:00AM. We were given number 3’s to put on ourselves. The number 3 tour leader led us up the stairs to deck 3 to the point of disembarkation. Suddenly we were in an underground garage full of buses of the teeny, tiny variety, nothing like America. Fortunately it was a cool day. The A/C was very poor. I could hardly see the front window from my third row seat. It was difficult to take videos, but I valiantly plowed on as we got started late, pushing our way through traffic to ride through the New Forest to see the ponies and then on to Stonehenge. There were so many tight traffic situations with the narrow lanes where the bus had to wait for cars to move that it was unbelievable. We were told that we were stopping at the bathroom in Salisbury so we wouldn’t have to go at Stonehenge. I rebelled, not wanting the tour director to dictate when I went to the bathroom. I found my own bathroom in Stonehenge and refused to follow the tour director. The rain came pouring down. My husband and I congratulated ourselves that we were the first back on the bus. The tourists who followed the tour director were soaked. At Salisbury we didn’t stand outside with the tour director. We ducked inside the cathedral to eat in the cafeteria, avoiding the rain. We did our own tour so we could be back on the bus by 2:15PM, the Cinderella witching hour by which time he would leave without us. We ended up in some sort of pre-rush hour going back to the ship. He forced us to drop off the Queen Elizabeth passengers first. Then we had to go through security to get back on the ship.
On the way back to Brooklyn on July 27 we said no thanks to the shore excursion to Windsor.
I have long ago memories of being rushed around Europe on three week tours by bus when I was in high school. I relived those memories on July 13 when we landed in Southampton. We had to report to the Royal Court Theater by 8:00AM. We were given number 3’s to put on ourselves. The number 3 tour leader led us up the stairs to deck 3 to the point of disembarkation. Suddenly we were in an underground garage full of buses of the teeny, tiny variety, nothing like America. Fortunately it was a cool day. The A/C was very poor. I could hardly see the front window from my third row seat. It was difficult to take videos, but I valiantly plowed on as we got started late, pushing our way through traffic to ride through the New Forest to see the ponies and then on to Stonehenge. There were so many tight traffic situations with the narrow lanes where the bus had to wait for cars to move that it was unbelievable. We were told that we were stopping at the bathroom in Salisbury so we wouldn’t have to go at Stonehenge. I rebelled, not wanting the tour director to dictate when I went to the bathroom. I found my own bathroom in Stonehenge and refused to follow the tour director. The rain came pouring down. My husband and I congratulated ourselves that we were the first back on the bus. The tourists who followed the tour director were soaked. At Salisbury we didn’t stand outside with the tour director. We ducked inside the cathedral to eat in the cafeteria, avoiding the rain. We did our own tour so we could be back on the bus by 2:15PM, the Cinderella witching hour by which time he would leave without us. We ended up in some sort of pre-rush hour going back to the ship. He forced us to drop off the Queen Elizabeth passengers first. Then we had to go through security to get back on the ship.
On the way back to Brooklyn on July 27 we said no thanks to the shore excursion to Windsor.