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Detailed travelogue on visiting the remotest inhabited islands in the world (Tristan da Cunha and St Helena), also South Africa, Malaysia, Indonesia. Very interested read, and indexed.
Remotest Islands in the World St Helena, Tristan da Cunha + S. Africa, Malaysia, mor
Larry2006-05-27 03:20:07
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the voyage.
There were two policies on the RMS which I didn't particularly like: the
seating proceedure for dinner and the lack of any decent non-smoking areas.
As far as dinner seating is concerned, while you're free to sit anywhere for
breakfast or lunch (which is served both downstairs in the galley as well as
upstairs in the sun lounge), you're given a specific seat, table, and time
(either 6:45pm or 8:00pm) for dinner. There seems to be some confusion as
to what determines your dinner time though, with one brochure asking you to
indicate which sitting you'd prefer, and another mentioning that all
passengers staying in budget-grade cabins would automatically be given the
earlier sitting. The Captain, most of the crew, and all dignitaries are
assigned to the later sitting, and while changing from the later sitting to
the earlier one usually isn't a problem, they generally don't allow those
assigned to the earlier sitting (ie, budget passengers) to switch and join
the later one. I suppose this class separation is an example of the
Britishness of the ship, but to me (as an American), it seemed absolutely
ludicrous here in the 21st century -- though for some strange reason I was
actually given the 8:00pm sitting!
Because of my assignment to the later sitting, I had dinner with the
upper class of the ship for the first two nights, and hated every minute of
it. First, the type of people on this sitting weren't exactly the best to
share a meal with: while nice, most were what I would consider to be the
stereotypical upper-crust weathly Brit -- not the kind of down-to-earth
person I prefer having a conversation with (as well, there was a loud, drunk
Dutch writer assigned to my table -- she was always either smoking or
drinking somewhere on the ship, and had a voice that could give anyone a
headache).
...
See photographs from:
Indonesia Gallery
,
Malaysia Gallery
,
Singapore Gallery
,
South Africa Gallery
