Over the Bounding Main---With All the Cars!

Little did we know that "the bounding main" is a very real thing when you are in the North Atlantic on a flat-bottomed car transport freighter! We bounded, rolled, tilted, thumped, crashed, ande creaked our way from southern England to the far eastern reaches of the Mediterranean and back. We also glided quietly along in the lovely sunshine all of which offered a great deal of variety and adventure to our 36 nights at sea on the Grande Europa.

The following pictures were planned to be in a somewhat orderly arrangement, but you are going to have a bonus as there are two that sneaked in--????

Our "cabina" (remember, we were on an Italian ship!) had cozy bunks (my bottom bunk even had the Virgin Mary on the wall over my head!) It was about 10 X 14 feet, including our nice little bathroom. There was a wall of hooks for hanging coats and hats, one chair, and reading lights over each bed. (I wonder why we think we have to have such large bedrooms in our houses?)

and adequate storeage for our clothing and other effects. It should be noted that the dresser drawers and closet doors locked for our convenience. The first night of rough water we did not know what that convenience was---the drawers and doors took turns banging most of the night. The next night we were smarter! There was also a pull-out shelf for writing. Note also the bar across the front of the bookshelf to keep things in place during the rocking and rolling It worked!

Here is the Grande Europa of the Grimaldi Line, of Naples, Italy. (It's actually the large yellow and white ship in the background---not the skiff in the foreground. I'll bet you wondered!)

The ship was 588 feet long, rather like a large floating parking garage. It had eleven levels with all the living quarters on level ten in the front of the ship.

Here is my travel mate, Ruth Ann, walking across the ramp at the stern to get back into the ship. The entire ramp lifted up, hydraulically, to close for sailing---the ramp weighs 150 tons!

The ship is built to carry 2500 vehicles or more, depending on size. To a couple of mountain ladies, it was BIG!!!!

Picture #1 that sneaked in---a street in Setubal, Portugal. Note the lovely mosaic pavement, all made from local marble. This is where we fell in love with Portuguese Muscatel wine. Try some! We were only there in the morning so we started drinking it at about 9:30!

This was the bathroom in our cabin. At the left, with the stars and fish pattern, is the shower curtain as there was a tiny little shower in the corner. It worked quite nicely, however. I did wonder how Travis would ever be able to use it but the Italians are rather short! Note the handle on the wall over the sink (right hand side)---we laughed about that at first but it came in handy when the water got exciting!

Another "extra"---this was a Rumanian deck hand who tied down all the cars on the decks. We thought that would be an exhausting job. He had a tie-down that hooked into the wheel and then hooked to a loop on the deck. All four wheels were tied. Imagine if the ship was full of 2500 cars---that would be 10,000 wheels to tie!

Here is our life-boat, hiding behind two cars. It was made to lower by cable to the sea, 10 floors below. However, the Bulgarian officer told us that if it wouldn't lower properly, it would have to be dropped and then rope ladders hung off the side for descent. No thanks!

This vision is me in my hard hat and life jacket, complete with reflective tape. I am holding my blinking light and my whistle and hanging off to the side was the bag containing my heavy neoprene immersion suit. In case of an abandon ship alarm we were to show up at our muster station in our suit, wearing our lifejacket and hardhat as well. I am not sure I could have walked with all that on! I did try on the immersion suit at one of our drills---I could hardly move once it was on let alone climb stairs or down the ladder into the life boat!

This photo was taken off the top deck of the ship in the huge container port at Ismir, Turkey. The containers were stacked with "streets" sectioning them. I'm not sure how you'd ever find a missing container!

Limassol, Cyprus:

Ruth Ann and I visited a Medieval Castle which was remodeled by the Ottoman Turks. It was where Richard the Lion-Hearted rescued and married his fiance'; the locals still have a big blowout every year to celebrate!

Yes, that is me all bundled up to be on deck on a sunny day as we sailed past the Rock of Gibraltar! I remembered studying about it in 5th grade geography and you would not believe how many pictures I have!!! (The rock is off to the right behind me!)

Several people have asked about the ship's water. The Europa had her own desalinization system but the water was still quite salty. We did not notice it when we drank it but soon we discovered we were developing little bags of water around our ankles---so then we drank bottled water. Here are the deckhands lifting a pallet of bottled water on to the ship. All our food was brought on this same way from the dock below.

Lunch on my birthday started with this fantastic antipasto spread. On the left was octopus salad which was absolutely wonderful!!!! Our food was quite wonderful and much too plentiful. After all, we were eating like sailors!

The morning of my birthday was spent sailing past Gibraltar. The afternoon was spent in the sunshine on the deck---knitting, reading and snoozing. What a great way to be 66!!!

Most of our 37 days at sea ended with a glorious sunset like this one. What an interesting, informative trip we had. Freighter travel is not for everyone but it was a huge success as far as Ruth Ann and I were concerned. Come visit me and see the rest of the 300 photos I took!