Getting There to the First Atlantic Crossing

I am WAAAAAYYYYYYYYYYY behind on this, but you will know everything at one point. Be calm.

There will be no photos added to the blog until I am back in the states!

Today Im in Belgium, YES I KNOW I AM INSANELY BEHIND!  

Anyway, lets start with packing

Packing:
Honestly packing is not that difficult to me. My mom may disagree because I spend a good amount of time “pre-packing”.  I make about 5 different lists and go through and edit them until I am completely satisfied.

So I had a list, which I thought was WAAAYYYY too long, but when I got on the ship I had a little moment of panic where I thought I might not have packed enough clothes.

Since being of the ship for 2 weeks I have paid to have laundry done once, and I have washed my own once.

There were people who brought their entire closet and more, but you really don’t need that much. The ship is casual and you will feel ridiculous getting dressed up daily. Also 98% of the people on the ship are wearing clothes more than once. I have some friends that wore the same pair of pants for 1 week because all their other pants were VERY dirty. As long as you don’t smell you are within acceptable limits.

I have found febreeze, downy wrinkle release and bounce ironing spray all very useful!!! Febreeze is great for the bathroom and letting clothes air out. Downy wrinkly release helps me feel like im not homeless, and I just like the smell of bounce!

Bring the travel size spray bottles. Your roommate will love you and so will the people sitting beside you in class.

Getting to Halifax:

My next escapade was flying to Halifax. Let me remind some of you who don’t know me too well that I am from Alaska. I didn’t think Halifax was too far from Alaska because I’ve never really thought of the East coast as being really far either, BUT LET ME TELL YOU! That was the longest time I have spent travelling in my LIFE!

I had 4 different planes to catch. Anchorage to Vancouver was no big deal and Air Canada is very comfortable.

Vancouver to Edmonton was fine until we got within landing distance of Edmonton. When we got into Edmonton there was a lightning storm going on and we weren’t allowed to get off the plane for an hour and a half! Everyone was sent to their planes because they were safer than being in the terminal. I agree with that statement because I watched the terminal get struck and lose power a lot, it even happened when I finally was allowed to switch planes.  When we initially landed I was really worried I would miss my next flight to I DON’T EVEN REMEMBER WHERE because we sat on the tarmac for 3 more hours! After 3 hours the red alert was lifted and we left Edmonton…WITHOUT MY BAGS!!!!!!!

-.-

Needless to say when we got to wherever the heck I was getting on my next flight I had missed my plane and I was DELAYED ANOTHER 12 HOURS! At this point I was already supposed to be in Halifax about 2 hours ago…I was ready to beg a hotel to let me sleep in a room just for a few hours.

I went to the air Canada customer service representative and probably looked miserable and asked if there was somewhere in the airport I could lay down and get some sleep. The lady shook her head no and gave me the awh you’re a lost puppy look. She got me onto an earlier flight tried to have my bags located and make it to Halifax with me. I was just happy to be on a flight that was 2 hours earlier.

When I got to Halifax I found out my bags were in different cities. I explained to Air Canada that I was getting on a ship the next day at 11:00am and needed my bags well before then. They apologized and put a rush on my bags and I got all of them by 2:00am

Embarkation Day:

There isn’t much to say about embarkation day honestly. I met my roommate Zoe and she is awesome and we’re getting a long great. We spent a couple hours unpacking and then spent the rest of the time meeting people and talking. It was a really great day.

Atlantic crossing:

The first day at sea is essentially orientation and we spent all day in the union going through safety, honor code and rules and regulations. We got a break for lunch and then just kept going till 5:30pm.

Classes started the next day and we were all finding it really hard to concentrate because of all the rocking. I didn’t get throwing up seasickness, but I did get VERY tired, nauseous and a headache. Just about everyone was feeling the same so we just enjoyed each other’s company and tried not to focus on our seasickness.

A few days we had 16ft swells and people were falling out of chairs and draws were banging in rooms. By day 5 all I could think is “I can’t wait for a day Im not constantly moving involuntarily!”

The ship spent 7 days getting from Halifax to Ireland and it was completely unnecessary to spend that much time! The ship went off course and avoiding getting to Ireland. I know we have a certain number of class days we have to get in, but with the rough seas it was just pissing everyone off!

We were all begging to see land!

AND I KNOW YOU’RE BEGGING TO KNOW ABOUT IRELAND, ENGLAND AND BELGIUM, BUT YOU’LL JUST HAVE TO BE PATIENT.

Im kind of busy these days =)