It is one week before we leave on this transatlantic journey, and we are pretty well set with our overall plans for the ports of call.
We have finalized our route for the sights we plan to see in the Normandy region of France pertaining to the D-Day invasions. We purchased a new Garmin GPS with both European and US maps, and route planing software that enabled us to plan the route on the computer and then upload that route to the GPS. Route Planning is something new for us, so we will have some other information with us in case we run into troubles with the route following function on the GPS. All of the sights we plan to visit are visible in the GPS, so we should be just fine with this navigation. The entire route, round trip from Cherbourg, France is about 135 miles.
We are still panning to visit the town of Brugge in Belgium when we stop in the port city of Zeebrugge, baring any further developments with the potential for terrorist activity in Belgium.
For our stop in Rotterdam, we have two plans that we are considering, one is to go to Amsterdam, and the other is to visit the gardens at Keukenhof. Both require us to get tot he Rotterdam Central Train Station, and take train from there to either of these destinations. Keukenhof is in the general direction of Amsterdam, and some of the non-direct trains that go to Amsterdam also stop in the city closest to the gardens, Leiden. From Leiden, there is a dedicated bus to the gardens. Overall, it takes about the same time to get to either Keukenhof or to Amsterdam. The gardens are is full bloom right now, and pictures of them we have seen on the internet are magnificent. Since we have all of the information for either of these two places to visit, we will make the call on where to go when we are closer to our arrival in Rotterdam. If the weather is bad, the outside gardens may not be the best place to visit. Here is a link to the Keukenhof Gardens website.
We are still putting together a listing of the sights we want to visit during our time in Copenhagen, but it is apparent that getting a “Copenhagen Card” is the most economical thing to do since it includes admission to all of the places we want to visit, and also includes all transportation services on buses, trains, and the Metro. We hope to be able to purchase these in the cruise terminal at Copenhagen after we disembark the ship. This will allow us to utilize “free” public transportation to get to our hotel. If not, we just plan on taking a taxi, which is probably an easier option anyway since we will be dealing with our luggage.
Early forecasts for the weather in Ft. Lauderdale for our cruise departure are not the best right now, but the forecast is likely to change, hopefully getting better, this many days out. It is not terrible right now, but may be mostly cloudy with showers.