Sunday, June 30, Copenhagen

Immigration at the Copenhagen airport was just a cursory check of our passports, a stamp and a smile and we were off to baggage claim. A representative from Holland America was there with his clipboard and directed us to the baggage carousal. My bag arrived, Lois' did not. The rep was very helpful in filling out the forms, but since the next day was at sea, there is no way it will reach the ship until the next port which is Tallinn, Estonia.

We are lead through a gauntlet of people waiting for arrivals, virtually blocking the exit and unfortunately oblivious to that fact. It made getting to the HAL desk rather difficult. Somehow our names were not on the transfer list, but the lady said it didn't matter. Not an auspicious beginning! By this time we had probably been in the airport about an hour. Danes are tall...or at least those at the airport.

We then deposited our bags, or rather my bag on the double decker bus and waited at least another hour as passengers from other flights joined us. The drive to the ship was about a half hour through the center of Copenhagen. The architecture was interesting, the dock area less so. It certainly is not walkable, well not easily anyway. Check in was easy since we were the last group to board. Departure was at 5:00 and we were nearly at the 4:30 mark.

We found out later we had missed the 4:00 lifeboat drill and we had been re-scheduled for 6:00 pm. I unpacked, Lois read the piles of paperwork left in our suite. We had upgraded twice so there was some confusion on our suite amenities package, which we had cancelled...and unfortunately with that the alcohol that came with it. Our concierge, Jennesa, in the Neptune Lounge solved that problem..."just call room service" and presto, gin and tonic, rum and coke.

Somehow, we never did find our 6:00 lifeboat drill. We were looking for crowds. Sometime after that we realized we had the tardy briefing and the drill had already occurred prior to our boarding. Duh.
We were still listed for open seating in the dining room, hadn't had time to make reservations, and the line was long. We decided to hit the Lido deck buffet. It was steak night. By the time we got there, it wasn't even crowded. There was steak as well as salmon, mussels and clams, and several other entrees. We started with salad and worked our way down the serving line. It was all served as the buffets do not become self-service until after the first 48 hours, when the risk of sickness has lessened.

We returned to our room and although still light, had another glass of wine and went to bed even though it was still light. We are far enough north that it hasn't really gotten dark. The sea is very calm and there are boats everywhere. Several other cruise ships it looks like and lots of container traffic.
Time change tonight.

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