Review of Visits to Norway/Iceland/Greenland on Fall 2018 Cruise.

[GeorgeCharlie]

The museum also features the oldest women's boat ever found. The boat dates back to 1440 and was found in 1948. It is also longest boat ever found in Greenland, with a length of 11 metres (36 feet).

 

This type of boat had a driftwood or whalebone frame pegged and lashed together, over which walrus or seal skins are stretched. These large open skin boats were normally referred to as umiaks, as opposed to the much smaller boats being called kayaks.

 

Traditionally they were used in the summer to move people and possessions to seasonal hunting grounds.

 

It was called a women's boat, as it was women who rowed the boat, while the men sailed alongside in their kayaks.

 

Loaded as it was with household implements, children and perhaps dogs, summer tent, etc. - it carried all the family's possessions. There were usually four women rowers and sometimes a sail was used for propulsion.

 

I don't believe this is the oldest women's boat, but it is of similar style of construction and size.

[GeorgeCharlie]

Some pictures from the doctor's house.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited November 25, 2018 by GeorgeCharlie

[GeorgeCharlie]

On the museum grounds very friendly dog attached to a long rope. Seemed to belong to a nearby house.

 

 

The dog seemed like the company of a young girl.

 

 

But after she left, the dog decided chewing on my hand was a fun thing to do.

 

[GeorgeCharlie]

The dock could only handle one tender at a time and with only a short time to visit - long lineups for people to return to the ship soon developed.

 

When we did finally get on the tender, we were talking to some people who had just came over on the tender and once they saw the long lineup, they decided to not even get off.

 

Once we returned to the ship, they were announcing that due to the long tender waiting time for people returning to the ship, passengers would no longer be allowed to go ashore.

 

Edited November 25, 2018 by GeorgeCharlie

[GeorgeCharlie]

On the museum grounds there was a plaque mounted on a rock honoring Hendrik Lund, who was born in Nanortalik in 1875. 

 

 

 

 

He was a Greenlandic lyricist, painter and priest. He is remembered for writing the lyrics to the song which was adopted as the national anthem of Greenland.

 

It is interesting to note that his wife Malene was still alive in 1975, when the plaque was placed commemorating a 100 years since his birth.  Malene Lund was born in 1877 and died in 1979.

Edited November 25, 2018 by GeorgeCharlie

[Krazy Kruizers]

Just got caught up with all your wonderful reports and pictures.

[GeorgeCharlie]

In the early afternoon of September 7th, we departed Nanortalik for our trip down Iceberg Alley.

 

It is colloquially referred to as "Iceberg Alley" due to the numerous icebergs that traverse the North Atlantic waters between Greenland and Newfoundland, Canada.

 

It is considered one of the best places in the world to view icebergs and we did see a number of them.

 

It was difficult to determine the size of the icebergs (about 90 percent of an iceberg is below the surface of the water), as understandably we did not pass close to any of them. It appeared like the portion of some of them sticking out of the water, was at least as large as our ship.

 

These pictures were taken by Lynne using her optical zoom settings. They were so far away that to the naked eye you could hardly make out any of their features.

 

 

 

Edited November 25, 2018 by GeorgeCharlie

[GeorgeCharlie]

To give you an idea to their size, this what they looked like to the naked eye. We were likely more than a mile away from them.

 

 

[GeorgeCharlie]

 

As I mentioned at the being of this review - this cruise had a number of "interesting events" - and we were about to get hit with another!

 

After a sea day, we were scheduled to dock in St John's, Newfoundland at 11am on September 9th.

 

We were couple hours, or so, out of St John's and I was relaxing in the Lido - reading and having a coffee. As Lynne joined me, I happened to notice the sun was now on the same side of the ship as we were - whereas earlier it had been on the other side. We both agreed it appeared we had turned around.

 

Just a bit later, the Captain made an announcement - saying some people may have noticed the ship had turned around and what was happening was the Canadian Coast Guard had ordered the ship to turn around and assist in search and rescue of a passenger overboard from another ship.

 

It took us a couple hours to get to the search area and start the search pattern. Besides the Zuiderdam, there was also the ADIAluna cruise ship (the ship the passenger had fallen off of), a helicopter, and a fixed wing aircraft, involved in the search.

 

At around 3:30 pm, two Canadian Coast Guard ships arrived and the Zuiderdam has released.

 

The Captain then made an announcement regarding our planned visit to St John's. 

 

 

So 'bye-bye' to our plans for visiting St John's.

 

[GeorgeCharlie]

This change in our itinerary to assist in a search and rescue of a passenger overboard, had a bit of Deja vu for some passengers. The previous day, the staff of the ship put on a demonstration at the Lido pool - on how a person is rescued from the water!!

[GeorgeCharlie]

A picture of the AIDAluna as we passed by each other while doing the search.

 

 

A printout of our path showing where we turn around just short of St John's. My rough estimate is that we were about 50 nm from St John's when we turned around. The search area was reported to be about 200 km (110 nm) north of St John's.

 

 

A printout showing our planned search pattern (red) and the portion we completed (black) by the time we were released.

 

 

[GeorgeCharlie]

Brief summary of the "interesting events":

 

- Missed Seydisfjordur, Iceland due to weather.

- Delayed an extra day in Akureyi, Iceland due to weather in our next port - Isafjordur, Iceland. To make up for this delay, the first port in Greenland (Paamiut) was cancelled.

- Missed St John's, Newfoundland due to being tasked for search and rescue of a passenger overboard from another ship.

- Pier change in New York due to pier being damaged by another ship.

 

In my humble opinion none of the above reflects negatively on HAL. Changes due to weather is a common occurrence in the cruise industry - as it is with all other travel businesses. Having to participate in the search and rescue was something HAL was required to do.

 

Even with taking into consideration there was little HAL could of done to make these events better, they still gave every passenger a Future Cruise Credit equivalent to 15% of the net value they paid for this cruise, plus a $50 OBC to be used immediately. 

 

For us, missing the stop in St John's was the most frustrating. We really wanted to see St John's and the cost to now go and see it will be a whole lot more in the 15% credit we received. But again, I do not fault HAL and we sincerely appreciate the credit we received (we have just used it on another Zuiderdam cruise we will be taking in about six months).

 

We found Captain Bart Vaartjes to likely be the best Captain we have ever had on a cruise. He seem to keep everybody up-to-date as he received information. He was very visible around the ship and many times was at the gangway greeting passengers as they left to go ashore - including being there to thank us for sailing with HAL when we were disembarking in Halifax. 

 

Overall we found the cruise to be very enjoyable and would highly recommend it to anyone who is interested in seeing some sights before they become too commercialized by the tourist industry.

Edited November 27, 2018 by GeorgeCharlie

[GeorgeCharlie]

I'll close off my review with a tongue-in-cheek comment regarding another weather event which happened to us on this trip.

 

When we got off the ship in Halifax we flew home to Alberta the same day and this is what greeted us.

 

A very early snowfall. It soon melted, but a couple more snowfalls came before it finally dried up somewhat. Its two months later and there still isn't as much snow on the ground. As Mother Nature says - if you don't like the weather you can always go somewhere else - and She can assure you that you will find something wrong with the weather when you get there!!

[trixiee]

Thank you GeorgeCharlie!  What a great review.  This is the cruise I hope to be able to take when my husband retires!  Although I sincerely hope that we don’t miss St.Johns!

[Ineke]

Thank you so much!  I traveled along by means of your posts and they’ve whetted my appetite for this cruise even more - such a fascinating itinerary!  I really enjoyed it and appreciate your descriptions and Lynne’s pictures so much.

[sandyss]

Thank you for taking the time to post this wonderful review and the fantastic photos.   We are looking very forward to a similar cruise next year.

[puppycanducruise]

Thank you for the fabulous review and pictures.

So many places I'd like to visit too.  Maybe someday.

[kftw]

Thank you so much for a wonderful review.

 

[TomBeckCruise]

HAL should send you a certificate for a free cruise.  Excellent narrative, and wonderful pictures that brought back the excitement and natural beauty we experienced during the cruise.

Thank you for posting your review.

[sandyss]

Question for you.  How well did the internet work on that cruise, since some of the ports were quite isolated?  Not sure if we want to get it for our cruise next year.  Thanks.

[GeorgeCharlie]

2 hours ago, sandyss said:

Question for you.  How well did the internet work on that cruise, since some of the ports were quite isolated?  Not sure if we want to get it for our cruise next year.  Thanks.

 

We didn't try and use internet on the ship, as our past experiences haven't been the best with shipboard internet.

 

I noticed a posting (#10) from Turtles06 on the following forum, where she comments on her internet experience while on our cruise.

 

https://boards.cruisecritic.com/topic/2609835-data-caps-on-the-new-hal-unlmited-internet-plans/

 

 Hope it helps some.

Edited November 28, 2018 by GeorgeCharlie

[sandyss]

Thanks so much for that link GeorgeCharlie.  There were actually 3 people from your cruise posting about the internet, and it sounds like it was working for the entire cruise - although slow at times.  But then again, I am used to slow - we currently have AT&T internet at home, which is really pokey.  Tomorrow we are switching to Xfinity - fingers crossed that it is an improvement.

[GeorgeCharlie]

12 minutes ago, sandyss said:

Thanks so much for that link GeorgeCharlie.  There were actually 3 people from your cruise posting about the internet, and it sounds like it was working for the entire cruise - although slow at times.  But then again, I am used to slow - we currently have AT&T internet at home, which is really pokey.  Tomorrow we are switching to Xfinity - fingers crossed that it is an improvement.

You're welcome and best of luck on your new internet service.

 

We live in a rural area of Canada and we're happy to get a consistent 25Mbps - once kids get home from school (and adults from work) it's about half that.

[sandyss]

54 minutes ago, GeorgeCharlie said:

You're welcome and best of luck on your new internet service.

 

We live in a rural area of Canada and we're happy to get a consistent 25Mbps - once kids get home from school (and adults from work) it's about half that.

We’re currently getting about 12 mbps - and we live in the heart of Silicon Valley.   We’re tired of promises from AT&T, and decided that it was time to try Xfinity. Keeping our fingers crossed. 

[TomBeckCruise]

9 hours ago, sandyss said:

We’re currently getting about 12 mbps - and we live in the heart of Silicon Valley.   We’re tired of promises from AT&T, and decided that it was time to try Xfinity. Keeping our fingers crossed. 

Internet was extremely slow during the day on this cruise. Decent between 1 and 5 a.m.

During the day it was worse than dial up.