Bermuda

This morning brought us to Bermuda. At sunrise, we were off the west end of Bermuda, and traversed through the channel on the northwest side of the islands to berth at Dockyard, the old naval port for Bermuda.

We were about an hour and a half late in actually getting berthed, but it matched up better with the Ferry schedule to St. George’s. It was a bit windy, with the temperature in the 60’s in the morning. The high for today was forecast to be about 68 degrees.

We purchased our transportation tickets at the information booth right at the port, and walked a few blocks to the Ferry dock. The ferry arrived at 9:30, it was a water jet powered catamaran that looked like it could hold about 200 passengers.

The winds were out of the NW, which is not the normal prevailing wind direction (Normally SE), so the seas were a bit rougher on the North side of the island than normal, but it was still a fairly smooth 25 minute ride over to the city of St. George’s.

Once we departed the Ferry, we walked around the town, and we visited an old Anglican Church. We then headed out to walk to Fort St. Catherine. Unfortunately, we did not have a good map of St. George’s, and got just slightly lost. We eventually got directions to the fort, and took a longer, but very scenic route.

Some of the areas of the fort were undergoing some restoration, but most of it was open, and it was very interesting to see the underneath levels of the fort; places where all of the food was cooked, weapons were stored, and where the powder and shells were stored.

We then made our way back to the city where we got on a bus for the 35 minute ride to Hamilton, the largest city on Bermuda. The entire island was much more elevated and hilly that we had expected, and the roads are very narrow and winding. It was nice to be able to see different parts of the island as we traveled to Hamilton. We actually passed through the airport terminal area on our way.

Once in Hamilton, we walked around a little, mainly trying to find a place to eat lunch. We found a small sandwich shop and had some very good Panini’s. Afterward, we boarded another bus to ride to the south shore of the island, where most of the famous beaches are located. We stopped at a beach called Jacob’s Cove, known mostly for its rocky shoreline.

We walked from that beach to another more famous beach called Horseshoe Beach. The entire area is a string of beaches tied together by trails through the dune areas, mostly used by joggers. Stephanie collected some of the “pink” beach sand Bermuda is famous for.

It was a long uphill walk back to the main road from Horseshoe beach, where we got back on another bus for the 45 minute ride back to the Dockyard. We arrived about 4:00 pm, and had enough time to walk around and take a few more pictures before we re-boarded the ship at 4:25.

We did not realize that we were about the last passengers to get back on board, even though we were still earlier than the 4:30 pm time that was posted as the required time to return to the ship.

We guess that most of the passengers just got back early. By 4:50 pm, the ship cast off and we were once again underway. We again navigated the channel around the north side of the island, and then we were out to sea.

The seas were rougher that they had been at any point so far.

We spent about 30 minutes in our usual hot tub near the spa area and then returned to our cabin to get ready for dinner. By the time we finished dinner, the seas were quite rough, and continued that way for most of the night.