Crossing The Atlantic

There is a biannual occurrence dreaded by almost every form of entertainment on board a cruise ship.  Crossing the Atlantic consists of 8 long days at sea broken by only one port and with the constant threat of bad weather or storms.  Passengers on this cruise have picked their tickets up cheap but they're still not prepared to suffer in silence.  The entire entertainment department is under pressure to prevent boredom, sea sickness and all forms of domestic dispute.

The all important port is that of Madeira, a tiny Portugese island off the coast off Africa best known for its fortified wine and for its cake.  Wine and cake, gotta be a good place. Our first stop on this abridged tour of the major Madeiran sights is the tobaggon baskets.  We take a cable car to the top of the hill before pelting back down at quite astonishing speed in a big basket steered by two Madeirans in traditional dress. Sounds unlikely but not one word of lie.  I imagine this to have been a Medieval alternative to Alton Towers. Either that or a way of making rush hour far more interesting - a fatal cross between bumper cars and conkers.

Adrenalin having stirred up our appetites we dine on steak on the stone.  This is yet another Madeiran tradition in which the hopefully hungry punter is presented with an oven heated slab of concrete on which is placed about 2lbs of raw beef looking like it was gouged out of the cow in the last half hour. The task of cutting, cooking and avoiding third degree burns and spit marks is then made all the more exciting by the addition of a healthy dose of sangria. Sangria is of course an optional extra.

After such an exciting stop I am able to settle into a few days on board fairly comfortably, the sea air will help to digest all that beef which I am sure still rests fairly heavily on my stomach.  I video games of coits out on deck and attend the 70's night party happily snap snap snapping away at couple gyrating to the sounds of their youth.  We are hit by no major storms and enjoy a couple of good crew bar parties.  All in all the crossing hasn't been too horrific but you can't imagine my bliss when Tortola comes into view. I am sitting out on the crew deck with a group of friends in the early hours of the morning enjoying the balmy heat when we sea land looming up ahead. We could almost have been Christopher Columbus and his merry men considering the amounts of joy and relief we display.  Land at last.  Three hours later its boiling hot and we all head to the beach with its fine, pale sand and warm blue ocean. Cabin fever schmabin fever, I'd endure that anyday.