Hello readers, oldest Whyte daughter Jennie here! As you’ve seen on this blog, my parents love to travel and they passed that love onto me. My preferred style of travel is quite different from theirs!
For some background on the trip I’m going to share, I went to London, England on a school trip when I was 17. I absolutely fell in love with the city and have wanted to go back ever since. So when we saw that British Airways announced a direct flight between Heathrow and Pittsburgh, we decided to book a trip. Our plan was to spend the whole trip (about 5 days) just in London exploring as much as possible. And, of course, eating lots of good food. Sounds great, right?
Unfortunately, British Airways had other plans and our flight was cancelled as we were sitting at the gate ready to board. We got an email with our rebooked flights which left Pittsburgh the next day, then had a really long layover in NY, then we wouldn’t get to London until the day after, so we decided to cancel the whole thing.
We ended up going to the Omni Bedford Springs Resort for a couple days to recover and discuss future travels. Mike said at one point “we’re going to try again to go to London, but next time we’re taking a damn boat!” After a while, I started thinking we should really do that. We have loved cruising ever since we did a Caribbean cruise for our honeymoon. We had only ever done cruises in the Caribbean, but knew that we would want to do a transatlantic cruise at some point. I began researching some options, and found a cruise with Royal Caribbean that would leave from NYC and end in Southampton, England with stops in the Azores and France along the way. Mike thought it sounded good, so let’s do it!
Our cruise left out of Cape Liberty Cruise Port in Bayonne, NJ. I was really paranoid about flying in the morning of the cruise and having a flight cancellation, so we decided to take an Amtrak train the day before from Greensburg and spend the night in Newark. The next morning, we had an easy 20 minute Uber ride to the port. Once we were on the ship, we had some great views of Manhattan and the Statue of Liberty.
All ships leaving the NYC area have to pass under the Verrazano Narrows Bridge. With the large cruise ships, they sometimes have less than 20 feet of clearance!
After that, we were in open ocean and would not see land for another 6 days. It is a very strange feeling looking and seeing only ocean. We did not see another ship or even a plane in the sky for days. I can’t imagine how the old explorers felt traveling across the ocean with no idea what was out there!
The nice thing about the large cruise ships is that there is always so much to do on board. Royal Caribbean ships all have an adult only indoor pool area which is where we spent a lot of time reading and relaxing. We did have a stateroom with a balcony, but as this was early May, it was too chilly to spend a ton of time out there. Our ship also had bumper cars, rock climbing walls, a skydiving simulator (RipCord by iFly), wave machines (Flowrider), ping pong tables, a gym, a spa, plus stores for shopping and many bars and restaurants. They also had a lot of educational talks, trivia, live music, or shows almost constantly on sea days.
The coronation of King Charles III happened on one of our sea days. As we were heading to the UK and there were a lot of Brits onboard, the crew hosted a coronation celebration with a balloon drop and a dance party featuring British musicians.
On day 7, we woke up docked in Ponta Delgada in the Azores. We booked an excursion to go to Fire Lake for some great views of a crater lake, the town of Ribeira Grande, and then finally to a pineapple plantation. Unfortunately it was very foggy and cloudy that day (normal weather in the Azores) so while we did drive to Fire Lake, we couldn’t see more than a few feet in front of us. Once we descended the mountain and arrived in Ribeira Grande, the sun poked out a bit and we were able to enjoy the scenery.
The Azores have no native human population and were colonized by the Portuguese in 1427. They are also nicknamed “the Hawaii of Europe” as they have similar landscapes. It was really neat to be on a volcanic island and surrounded by so much Portuguese Gothic architecture.
As we arrived back to the ship, our guide asked “what the hell is that thing on top of your ship?!” Royal Caribbean calls it the North Star and it there is no extra charge, so we booked a time to ride. It offers some great views of the ship and surrounding scenery.
As we arrived back to the ship, our guide asked “what the hell is that thing on top of your ship?!” Royal Caribbean calls it the North Star and it there is no extra charge, so we booked a time to ride. It offers some great views of the ship and surrounding scenery.
After a couple more days at sea, we arrived in Cherbourg, France. We booked an excursion to visit the town of Sainte-Mère-Église, Omaha Beach, and the American Cemetery and Memorial in Normandy. The area is absolutely beautiful and it’s hard to imagine what it would have been like on D Day.
The next day, we docked in Le Havre, France. I was not feeling well so we cancelled our original plan to take a bus to Paris. Instead, I recovered in our stateroom while Mike got off the ship and explored the area around the port.
The last leg of the cruise was a quick trip across the English Channel to Southampton, England. After disembarking the ship, we got a train right into central London. All that travel made us hungry, so we dropped our bags at the hotel and headed out in search of fish and chips.
We spent the rest of the day just wandering around town, then had dinner reservations at Rule’s- the oldest restaurant in London! They specialize in game, so I had duck and Mike had rabbit and both were really good.
On my trip to London in high school, we went to the Tower of London but we were not able to go inside every building as Vladimir Putin happened to be there on a state visit. I knew I definitely wanted to go back, so we spent most of the next day there. This time we were able to go in every area open to the public. We also saw the Crown Jewels that had just been on King Charles’s head the week before! The central tower (the White Tower) was built in 1066 by William the Conqueror. It was originally used as a royal residence but has since been a prison, an armory, and the home of the royal mint, among other things. It’s amazing to think of how much history has occurred there! Also nearby is Tower Bridge and a section of the original London wall built by the Romans in 200 AD.
We spent the last full day of our trip wandering around the city. The sun came out so it was a great day to be outside! The city was still decorated from the coronation the week before.
As it was a Sunday, we knew we wanted to get a traditional English roast dinner. We later finished the night with pies- Mike had a meat pie and I had a lentil and carrot pie.
We headed home the next day and were finally able to take advantage of the direct flight from Heathrow to Pittsburgh. It was a great trip.
Where should we go next???
JEN & MIKE