Proof of Greenland, Part 6

We left Nuuk around 5PM. I think, despite expectations, I liked Nuuk the best of the places we visited. The culture was so different than what I'm used to. The seal skins in the store were real, not faux. The whale meat for sale at the market, and the friendliness of the people (even the drunk man who helped point us in the right direction). Nuuk was small and isolated, but illustrated quite clearly the old and new coexisting in harmony. People did speak some English because there used to be a US military base that employed many of them years ago. We also visited the National Museum that housed a small but informative exhibit about the natural and cultural history of Greenland. The main attraction were some mummies that had been perfectly preserved, including a baby. We also saw the tourist trap in the city - a gigantic mailbox that is Santa's mailbox. Supposedly, this is the "North Pole" when letters are addressed to Santa. When we left Nuuk, a whale saw us off. He repeatedly tail slapped the surface as we sailed away. Very cool.

I've also included a few life-aboard-the-ship pictures. Unfortunately, most of these revolve around food. There was plenty of other things to do besides eat, but the eating pictures lent themselves to photography more than just sitting around working puzzles or listening to lectures about opera. (Which were very good by the way!)



There aren't the typical cruise-line buffets around the clock on Crystal. But they do pull out all the stops for a luncheon Grand Buffet, which consists mostly of seafood. This is just the dessert table. There were also tables full of lobster, shrimp, and oysters.



This is after we picked through the Grand Buffet for lunch. We're seated in the main dining room sipping our complimentary mimosas. Yum.



Every sea day at noon, mom and I, and frequently dad, went to the Palm Court - all the way forward above the bridge - to play team trivia. Only we couldn't technically play since dad is an employee of the company, but we went to listen and play on our own. We also liked the Palm Lounge for reading (admittedly, I did very little reading), working the crosswords, and just looking at the water. We had many Perrier's with lime here.



A shot of the sea as we were coming down the coast of Canada. This is actually when we were passing to the west of a hurricane that had just come up the East Coast. I can't remember the name of the hurricane now, but we were all quite concerned about it on board. Luckily, this was about as rough as it got the entire time. Later that night, we did have a few really strong rolls, one that knocked dad off his bar stool, but nothing too bad. I wore a anti-motion sickness patch the entire cruise so I didn't get sick. But after I took the patch off on land, I got sick. Go figure.