Civitavecchia

Saturday 8th

This was the halfway point of our cruise. Many people were getting off the ship at this point and many more people were joining us, but we still had another week to go. It made for a busy day on the ship and at the port.

I heard various noises and announcements but refused to allow myself to wake up properly with them. I just kept turning over and going back to sleep. David slept through it all until I was horrified to discover it was 11:30 and said something. Then I realised that I had not yet changed the time zone on my iPad and it was only 10:30.

The port in Civitavecchia is huge and a shuttle bus from the ship to the edge of the port is mandatory. Because of all the people boarding, a tent area had been set up near the ship where new passengers could embark and where existing passengers could wait for the shuttle bus.

Arrangements had changed since my last visit, with shuttle buses dropping us at a car park instead of the port gate, leaving me somewhat disorientated.

We set off to explore and found our way to the market and the shops but could not find a shop to purchase vodka and coke. We asked at the tourist information centre and she sent us back to the market area – where we were told that it was closed for Siesta! More walking in the heat. David loved it but I was sweating and exhausted.

We found a wine bar with free wifi and sat down to communicate with the world.

Then came the problem of finding our way back to the shuttle bus. We walked into the port area and could see other buses but not ours. We asked in a shop and were directed to wait outside, but that did not seem right either. We walked back to the tourist information place and asked. She told us about 4 different options. She said she had been there in the morning when the shuttle buses stopped, so she knew what we meant. The simplest option was to walk to a close bus stop and flag down a public orange shuttle bus. However, we discovered we were standing at a car parking ticket machine, not the bus stop. Well, she had said to look for the ‘Metro’ and that had ‘Metro’ above it! The next option was to walk to the train station to get the orange shuttle bus. We got there and found that there were regular buses. You had to buy your ticket before getting on the bus and it cost €2 each. When we saw where the shuttle bus took us, we knew we could never have found that car park by ourselves. In fact, it looked totally different from the one where we had been dropped that morning, and in a different area. It was a relief to get back to the ship safely.

That night at dinner we had two new people at our table, Julie and Chris, but the last couple did not turn up. 

There is a restricted programme on the first night. We had to fill in a couple of hours before going to the 9.15 dancing session – again very poorly attended. We were happy to stop dancing early and go to the theatre to see the welcome show (very good!) before going back to the ballroom for the last hour. We did quite a few dances during the evening but again I was not dancing my best. I don't know if it's the ME/CFS and weariness, or if it's the distraction of having other people on the floor (again, the inability for the brain to process too many things at once because of the ME/CFS), or if it's nerves from knowing everyone is watching us because David is so good to watch.