Sailed in right on time today – but then had to wait again while the captain slowly propelled his way to the dock. No matter though, we had to wait an hour for the shuttle anyway. Town looked very cute from the ship – like a miniature Funchal in Madeira. Great architecture, beautiful stone buildings and a cool looking fort at the end of the docks.
We hopped off the ship and got the first shuttle, which doesn’t really take you very far, but far enough for right now. Ed is having a terrible time with his shoes and his feet are killing him, so walking very far has become an ordeal – and our first order of business is to find new shoes!
It was extremely early on a Saturday in Porta Delgada, so most everything was closed. We wandered through the town, scoping out shops and restaurants and the cute little pedestrian streets (or what we thought were pedestrian streets! They are all so pretty and cobblestoned that they look like walking streets, but are actually for the cars!!!)
Found some signs for a big liquidation sale and discovered that a bunch of the merchants had gotten together for a warehouse type sale starting at 10 at the marina. Bonus! Shoes! So we had some cappuccino and waited until 10.
In the meantime, we watched the Solstice sail in and take the primo dock position – no shuttle for them! By then it was time for the sale to open – and we did end up finding a cheap pair of sneakers for Ed. They seemed better, if not 100% – at least they were much lighter than his others and hopefully will help.
Afterwards, we just continued to wander – soaking up the sunshine and the atmosphere – crowded as that atmosphere might be with cruise passengers! Found free wi-fi at the mall (of all places) and then had a great lunch at a restaurant called the “fish market” where they showed us all their fresh fish caught right off the island. We passed on a huge lunch, and opted for appetizers – they had a great antipasto platter and octopus salad – which made Ed very happy! A small bottle of wine and a beer later and we were ready to head back to the ship.
We plopped ourselves up on the top deck to watch the sailaway and I promptly fell asleep in the sun. Oh well! Ed woke me up in time to go to the enrichment lecture - “confessions of a customs agent”. Reputedly a hilarious look at the speakers 20 years as a custom’s agent. We both promptly fell asleep! Oops!
Fortunately we woke up in time for the final trivia match of the cruise. We thought we were doing so well! But in the end we lost by 6 points. Bummer! The team with the most points – ended up not being the team with the most points! Oh well, just means we don’t have to get up on stage to accept our award. I’m good with that!
later went to dinner at Oceanliners, the specialty restaurant aboard. It was a fabulous dinner and experience – but OMG – way too much food. There is no way we could eat like that every night – I was sick afterwards! So, very nice, the goat cheese soufflé as good as ever, the chocolate soufflé the same! But that’s it for the big splurge.
We stayed awake for the awards show and watched our trivia adversaries collect their award. Then headed off the the 2105 lounge (our cabin!!!!) for a night cap and a good long sleep.
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