Day 56 - Panoramic Boston

The Viking Sea berthed in Boston early this morning. It was a lovely sunny day and we were ashore by 8.30am for our included Panoramic Boston tour. Our driver was very competent and personable, and our guide extremely well informed and articulate.

I try to get a front seat in the bus because it is better for my travel sickness. We hopped  on our allocated bus and there was one seat available at the front next to a female passenger. When I asked if I could sit in the empty seat by the window, she said she would prefer it if I didn't. She was clearly not going to be much fun to sit next to for a couple of hours touring around Boston, so we got off and were the first to board the next bus. We sat in the front seat and had the best driver and tour guide so the weird woman did us a favour!

There are lots of historic buildings in Boston. The oldest is Paul Revere's house built in 1680 before he was born. He was the revolutionary who rode his horse through the night in 1775 to alert the militia the British were coming. There's a famous but historically inaccurate poem called "Paul Revere's Ride". He was also the first person in America to roll copper into sheets. He was a silversmith and industrialist when he was not pestering the British.

Most of the old warehouses and large buildings in Boston have been repurposed as offices or apartments. In some streets the building facades cannot be altered due to their historic significance.

In the 1960s several public buildings were built in the brutalist style of architecture, mostly from formed concrete. The name comes from the French bréton brut meaning raw concrete. However, even some of these chunky concrete buildings are being remodeled into apartments.

One of the very clever things Boston did was remove about 2 miles of the raised highway Interstate 93 that passed through the city, and put it underground. In its place the Rose Kennedy Greenway was built, all at huge cost with delays, allegations of substandard work, leaks and legal disputes. The 10 year anniversary of the Greenway was being celebrated today and thousands of people were out enjoying the sunshine.

The city also had to build ventilation shafts to ensure the air quality below the city was not dangerously polluted.

More Portland

Back at our ship we had to wait while this liferaft was being deployed over the side of the ship, presumably as part of the US Coast Guard inspection that was happening onboard. These liferafts are in the white canisters that can be seen on the left of the first photo. They inflate automatically but the crew had to deflate it and put it back in its cover.

The sun came out in the afternoon while we strolled around the port area. Most of the buildings are historic but this first photo shows the old and the new.

This Holy Donut shop regularly sells out each day. There can be queues up the street but service is quick. The secret ingredient is Maine potatoes, which apparently add an interesting texture and moisture to the donuts.

 
We watched the sunset as we sailed away from Portland. The map shows our location but we still have great phone and internet coverage - much better than the ship's WiFi.

Day 55 - Portland, Maine

We woke up in Portland, Maine on the east coast as opposed to Portland, Oregon on the west coast. It was a cold drizzly morning so we were glad to be doing a bus tour and not walking around. Everyone on board had to be cleared by US Customs before going ashore.

The bus was an improvement on Gaspé's school buses. Our African American driver Brother Reed was quite a character. Our guide was well informed and described the extent of Portland destroyed by the great fire on 4 July 1866. Most of the buildings had to be rebuilt so from an architectural perspective the city is predominantly Victorian architecture.

We drove through Portland only able to take photos through the bus windows. Here are a few passable pictures of stately homes where I have edited out the bus driver's head. Most of these once large homes have been converted to apartments.

There are some impressive public buildings in Portland. The red tower survived the great fire through the efforts of the owner and his workers carrying buckets of water to the top and pouring them over the outside of the building. The tower was built in 1807 to see ships approaching the harbour. This gave about three hours notice to prepare for the unloading and reloading. It is the last standing maritime signal tower in the country.

The peak of the fall colour is about a week away, according to our guide. The odd maple tree has turned red and some other trees are yellow. The coastal rose bushes are covered in red rose hips.

The bus stopped at a coastal park where this lighthouse still operates. The drizzle had stopped but it was cold.

Day 54 - Another Day At Sea

We are in the North Atlantic Ocean heading for Portland, Maine tomorrow morning.

We spent another day reading and eating. Anita made the effort to go to the hydro pool but I finished my Jack Reacher book.

I bumped into Roy Tan at the coffee bar and emailed my photos of him with the red umbrella as he is keen to show them to his wife. He did an impromptu performance in the atrium which has better acoustics than the main stage.

Day 53 - At Sea

After leaving Gaspé we had the first of two days at sea. Fortunately the sea was calm. We spent the day reading and eating. As it was a quiet day I am posting some more photos from Percé.

Cruise ship terminal at Gaspé

This new factory employs 500 people in Gaspé making fibreglass arms for wind generators which are mostly sent to Texas

This is Indian Rock. According to local folklore he wouldn't face the sea as his love had been drowned

Percé Rock and historic buildings

Day 52 - Gaspé and Percé

We went ashore by tender, which really means by lifeboat but it seems the lifeboats are called tenders except in an emergency. Fortunately the ride each way only took 10 minutes because we were crammed in on narrow seats, with many seats requiring passengers to sit facing each other so close it is difficult to avoid knocking knees.

Our land transport comprised a fleet of school buses. The ship was anchored in Gaspé Harbour and the city of Gaspé is a long way from other cities and does not have lots of buses available for cruise ships, especially when two ships are in port the same day.

Our first included tour was to the
Forillon National Park which was only mildly interesting. We visited an historic shop and paused on a bridge to take photos through the bus windows of this moose eating shrubbery in the creekbed.

The mostly French speaking citizens of Gaspé are anxiously anticipating the opening of moose hunting season. Only the males can be hunted, except one in ten hunting groups is permitted to take a female moose, which apparently provide more tender meat. Neither of our English speaking female tour guides shared much enthusiasm for this tradition which culminates in a parade of vehicles driving around the streets of Gaspé displaying moose heads. When the season first opens hunters can only use bows and arrows, but later guns can be used. No hunting is allowed in the National Park but that is being reconsidered because the moose population in the park is too large.

Our second trip was five and a half hours long as the drive from Gaspé to and from Percé took an hour each way. The main attraction is Percé Rock which is a UNESCO recognised geological formation just offshore. We were driven up to a viewing platform in smaller shuttle buses.

The viewing platform has some glass flooring so we had to remove our shoes to prevent scratching the glass. The view was impressive but the glass platform didn't add to the experience.

We had missed lunch so queued for 20 minutes at a café for Croque Madame, coffee and hot chocolate. At least we were out of the cold 4°C weather. After a cursory visit to a couple of the tourist shops we headed back to catch our return bus. The pick up location had been specified as the tourist information office. The day before a fire had destroyed the nextdoor motel and another building so we we lucky not to have been caught up in that disaster.

Percé is an historic village focussed on tourism. Over winter only 150 people live there, with many houses boarded up until next June. It is quite an attractive village.

We were probably a few days too early to see the peak of the fall colours, but there were some attractive vistas. The red berries are on native dogwood trees.

Our ship's internet connection has been very unsatisfactory. It was out altogether for 24 hours. This part of our cruise is described as scenic cruising but there is no scenery only water. This Viking cruise has not lived up to the standard set when we cruised the Norwegian coast and the Baltic a couple of years ago.