The Great Escape
I am nearly beside myself this morning worrying about Sunny’s family, the 5k, money, lawyers, money, my health, Starr’s health and money. Pacing wont help, (is it too early for a glass of wine?) so I thought I might travel back in time to when life was good. When life made sense.
It was the summer of 2004, my parents had been wanting to do something fun with Starr before she got too involved in high school, college, and life. Dad was always keeping his eye out for things that he felt would be both fun and interesting. After looking at the ports of call on this cruise, he knew, this was it. They invited us on a month-long cruise. We jumped at the chance to join them and had the trip of a lifetime.
Aboard Holland America’s ms Rotterdam, we left New York City, and stopped at the following: St John’s, Newfoundland; Reykjavík, Iceland; Tromsø, Norway; Honningsvåg, Norway (North Cape); Trondheim, Norway; Stavanger, Norway; Hamburg, Germany; Amsterdam, the Netherlands; Dublin, Ireland; the Isle of Man; Stornoway, Isles of Lewis, Scotland; Lerwick, Shetland Islands, Scotland; Tórshavn, Faroe Islands; Akureyri, Iceland; St. Anthony, Newfoundland; and finally Corner Brook, Newfoundland before returning to New York City.
Amazing! We had a blast. We learned so much about places and people that we probably would never of had the opportunity to experience. We did lots of walking, sitting around in local eateries, observing and talking to the residents. And taking pictures, we all took tons of pictures! I plucked a few from my “cruise” file to post here. All of these pictures were taken by my mom. She was the only one with a digital camera. I took rolls and rolls of film…ah, remember that?
We settled easily into ship living. In fact, we were so settled, it was really hard to leave, it felt like home. We had our friends among the staff and fellow passengers, Starr had her small group of friends that she spent time with. In addition, we had a great time time with my parents, and they enjoyed being around Starr! It was a rare opportunity, and one that we always treasure.
See the green roofs? That’s grass!
