The Road Trip :: Mississippi

Post Graceland we decided to go due South through Mississippi. We also decided that since we had bee-lined it for Graceland that we earned ourselves some 'back roads time'.

We took Route 1 from Northern Mississippi all the way to Southern Mississippi.  This region is known as the Mississippi Delta.  From here on out I'm going to write The Delta - only to save my little fingers the strain of M-i-s-s-i-s-s-i-p-p-i.  (For the record I practiced for hours in the Hilo YWCA yard after school how to spell that state perfectly.)

Our first night was spent in Clarksdale.  For the record, I don't recommend an overnight in Clarksdale...sorry lovely folks of Clarksdale.

Personally, the highlight of The Delta was Vicksburg.

Vicksburg was full of historic buildings, it sat right on the Mighty Mississippi and most importantly, there was good food to be had.

We dined at Walnut Hill which was an incredibly well preserved older home.  The menu was a little limited but, I always love a place that knows what they make and make it well.  Can we say, 'Fried Green Tomatoes'?  Why yes....yes we can.

The Delta was miles and miles of cotton fields.  I am ashamed to admit that at first I couldn't figure out what their crop was.  I KNOW.  duh.

I kept seeing white stuff and I kept thinking in my head...'so messy'...

We kept commenting on the crops.  I think Canadiaunt and I looked at each other at the exact same time and exclaimed, 'COTTON'!!!!

I ended up becoming fascinated with the cotton and wanted to stop at EVERY SINGLE field I found.  Then, I happened upon a field that still had the plants in them.  (To be fair, Canadiaunt spotted and I whipped the shitty to go back.)

All in all?  Mississippi was a lovely drive.

Of course there's more!

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The Road Trip :: GRACELAND

The reason we powered through Kentucky was that we were eager to get to Memphis, Tennessee. After visiting Fallingwater in Pennsylvania I started thinking of other famous homes. Then it dawned on me....

GRACELAND!!!!

I've always found Elvis amazing - seeing his home made his life seem more real.

They've preserved the site beautifully and the attention to detail was amazing.

My favorite parts:

• Seeing the tiki bar in the Jungle Room. Such class.
• Elvis in an aloha shirt for Blue Hawaii and realizing I have a dress with the identical print!
• Peacock stained glass in the formal living room.
• The pool room beautifully covered in material.
• TCB. Taking care of business in a FLASH!
• The mirrored ceiling in the television room - with a FLASH on the wall of course!
• The jet Lisa Marie with a full size bed that required a belt

I won't go on and on about our time there. Instead I'll share TONS of photos!

Please...enjoy more! There were too many for me to pick a favorite!

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The Road Trip :: Kentucky

We sort of blew through Kentucky. We lallygagged through Pennsylvania and felt like we needed to make a little bit of time up.

Our only real stop was in Lexington where we took a walk through the Arboretum.  It was nice to get out of the car and stretch our legs!  We also made a stop in town to take pictures of older homes...you know me!  I love peeking in unsuspecting strangers windows!

Lexington was really pretty.  It was majorly a college town but, that didn't detract at all from it's gracefulness.

As we pulled into town there were people in blue everywhere.  When I say people in blue I mean a lot of people in a lot of blue.  Turns out the University of Kentucky had a basketball game going on.  These people had team spirit!

The Arboretum was clearly a well loved place.  Lots of joggers, lots of kids playing.  We loved it too.  It was right in the middle of town but very quiet.

Lexington had some kick butt older homes.  I mean truly kick butt!

Best part of our drive through Kentucky?  The hot pink sunset for sure!

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Suez Canal :: Battle Day

The Suez Canal.  Transiting the Canal is an almost indescribable experience. Preparations for the Canal Transit begin days before actually arriving in Port Said.  The atmosphere on the ship is resigned.  It feels like perparing to enter a battle.  Provisions are set aside, security points are reinforced, doors are locked, and things that can be stolen are hidden.  Schedules and timelines are established, paperwork is completed, affairs are put into order and then everything gets checked one last time.

The night before the transit I went to bed knowing I'd only get a few hours of sleep and that when I woke up all hell would be breaking loose.

We anchored around 0100 while waiting for our convoy to begin.  While at anchor we received food stores, water, and disposed of plastic garbage.  The boat arrived at 0300 so that we could heave anchor and be underway by 0530. 

The first of many challenges.  The stores crane was broken.  It wouldn't start. 

An hour of trouble shooting later and our transfers have been made.

Stage two.

Approach the canal.  The battle commences.

Boats come alongside honking their horn.  Arabic is being yelled.  Demands for cigarettes are being made.

The Pilot wouldn't board the vessel until the Pilot Boat had received two cartons of cigarettes.

Stage three.

The Officials arrive.  Peace talks commence.

The Agent wants paperwork with original stamps.  The Suez Canal Inspector wants a stowage plan.  The Electrician wants someone to heave up his projector lamp.  The Electrician is also very angry that he is not being given a stateroom while aboard the vessel and is demanding to leave.  Six cartons of cigarettes later everyone is happy.

Stage four.

The mooring boat and mooring boat crew arive.  Strategic Planning commences.

The mooring boat must be hoisted using the ships stores crane and lashed to the side of the vessel during the transit.  The vessel will eventually need to moor in the canal while waiting for the north bound convoy to clear.  The mooring boat will take our lines to the sides of the canal.  We now have Egyptians scurrying around the vessel and our Roving Security watch must be extra deligent to not allow them in the house.

Stage five.

The vessel must moor.  This requires lowering the mooring boat and sending them our lines.  There is no tug available so, this evolution must be extremely well controlled.  Once moored we must now raise the mooring boat back up.

Stage five point five.

Unmooring.  One of the lines gets burried on the drum.  We are unable to pay out slack as this line is now incredibly tight and on the verge of parting.  The Bosun and Myself run from the Bow to the Stern when our lines are safely aboard.  The Stern lines are heaved up quickly so that the prop is clear and the Captain uses the engine to alleviate strain on our burried line.  We are able to manually heave this line in since the winch is of no use.  No one was hurt and the line didn't part.

Stage six.

We are nearing the end of the canal.  The pilot disembarks, the mooring boat crew leaves.

Stage seven.

We need to pick up our security team as we exit the canal.  There is a net full of gear.  Again, our stores crane is broken and won't slew.  The security team boards the vessel and heaves all their lines by hand.  They are amazingly efficient.

Stage eight.

The vessel takes departure.  Sending departure messages takes about an hour.  The mileage while in the canal can be extremely convulated and some our voyage efficiency softward did not like our numbers.  This is NOT what you want to be doing at midnight thirty after a full day of battle.

Stage nine.

Bed time for four hours before waking up again for watch.

I did manage to take a few photos with my phone....

(also, I apologize but, this post was not proofread...)

Vancouver, B.C. :: A Magically Sunny Wonderful Day

My Cousin Rhainnon sponsored a Nautiemermate Adventure while I was in Vancouver.  It was impressive. I landed at her doorstep and was given a whirlwind tour of her new apartment.  (For the record...she calls her place 'the little apartment that could'...I was like, 'ummm...this is a sweet ass modern apartment in the city...'.)

We left as soon as I snooped through her closet and looked at her shoe collection (I should have totally taken a photo of those...I don't know what I was thinking!).  It was coffee time.  She lives in Gastown - I've decided that Gastown has good coffee.

So, I've already mentioned that she lives in Gastown.  There is no trip to Gastown complete without looking at the steam clock....am I right?!

Oh and by the way, I always thought that Gastown was called that because there were gas lamps that got lit up at night.  I have a feeling all you native to B.C. are thinking, 'oh-my-god what?!'.  Apparently, 'Gassy' Jack Deighton, who was a steamboat captain, arrived in 1867 and opened the areas first saloon.  (Thank you Wikipedia.)  Cousin Rhi, if I didn't love your new neighborhood before, I TOTALLY LOVE it now!  I mean Hell-ooo Gastown - who is named afer a drunken sailor!

Next, we toured the Woodward's Building (again, thanks Wikipedia).  Cousin Rhi was instrumental in the renovations of this Vancouver landmark.  I don't really know how to fully explain her role in the project....'she made it look awesome' is the best I can do.

From Gastown it was off to Downtown.  We got a bite to eat and met up with some of Rhiannon's friends for a hike.  As we're getting ready to leave for this hike I'm all like, 'do you think I can wear my slippers?' Rhiannon says, 'I think you might need shoes'.  Does she say, 'Megan, you need shoes, you need to change out of your jeans and put on your lululemon pants....oh yeah, and leave your purse and camera in the car...'?  No she does not.  Needless to say, we go on this hike - with some cross fitting amazon women who like to run while piggy-backing grown men.  I might have been out of my league....which might be why 'the fresher the better' is my new mission.  Cross fitting amazon women.  That is all I have to say about that.

The good news is that the hike was gorgeous.

From hike to yummy lunch and from yummy lunch to Granville Island.

Granville Island is the bomb.  Truly the bomb.  It's like a whole other world right in the heart of Vancouver.  You're on the water, the views are gorgeous, the public market is full of pretty things, there is music, and most importantly there is Gelato (as I quickly learned).

I may have mentioned Gelato.  I'm not a Gelato connoisseur but I like it a lot.  One of the ladies we were with was a connoisseur.  I mean she was serious.  We looked at ALL the Gelato.  ALL OF IT.  Then we did another round before she picked the best stand.  I may need to take some Gelato selecting lessons from her.

My favorite photo of our Granville Getaway is below.  Bad ass biker dude feeding a seagull.  Cute right?

On our way home from Granville, Cousin Rhi pointed out her Cinque Terre Vancouver connection.  Priceless.  Loves it.  Loves it.  Loves it.

My last photo of the day.  No seriously, this is the very last photo I took.  It actually ended up being one of my favorites.  I think it epitomizes Vancouver.  A little city swagger mixed with a group of people with amazingly good hearts and some North West soul.

The day was capped with a delicious salmon dinner - I mean, hello, we are in B.C. - that means we eat SALMON.

The day was:  FUN.  FRESH.  FRIENDLY.

Cousin Rhiannon, you done good.  Nautiemermate Adventure Success!

(While this post was photo packed - there are more!  See below!)

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Feodosia, Ukraine :: No Shore Leave For Me

Feodosia (also known as Theodosia), Ukraine was a pretty quick stop.  I spent most of my time on the bridge while in port prepping for the next leg of our voyage.  I'm not complaining.  It felt good to get some work done.  I always work really well with a deadline - and a port stay has a built in deadline - so it works perfectly for me!  The highlight of the trip for me was getting a bar of dark chocolate when we were leaving port.  (I mentioned in my most recent Nautie Tidbits post that the Pilot gave me the chocolate in celebration of Womans Day.)

On a more academic note - it was an incredibly neat mooring evolution.  We backed into an offshore mooring station using our anchors.  We sent our lines out to four mooring buoys.  Attached to each mooring buoy was a metal thimble, our lines passed through the metal thimble (all three stern lines on one side of the vessel went through the same thimble).  While these lines were being tended the anchors were being adjusted - both of them at the same time.  Tres cool.

We left Theodosia and headed to Russian waters....where we wait....I'm not going to lie....I'm getting a little antsy.  Our next port will be my discharge port.  Woot woot.  (I'll probably talk more about this later....what it feels like to go home....it can be quite strange really....)

Catch ya later Nautie Friends!!!!

Since everyone knows I didn't only take four photos.....enjoy this gallery with more of the same!

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