Saturday – London Tilbury

Today, we boarded the good ship Magellan, at London Tilbury Cruise Terminal.

I’m pleased to say that, so far at least, everything has gone according to plan. Tracey and I drove down from North Yorkshire yesterday and spent the evening in a Travelodge. Since embarkation would be starting at 10:45am, much earlier than we’re used to, we figured it would be preferable to setting the alarm for stupid o’clock and making the drive South in the morning, with all the potential setbacks associated with such cutting-it-fine scenarios (I’m thinking back to last year, when I sat in stationary traffic on the M25, only 20 minutes away from Tilbury, and telephoning the ship in a panic, hoping that they wouldn’t leave without me).

So; feeling refreshed, and breakfasted (there was a Little Chef conveniently situated right next door to the Travelodge), we travelled the 15 miles to Tilbury, arriving right at the very start of embarkation.

Boarding a ship at Tilbury is relatively hassle-free, and having off-loaded the car at the long-term parking lot, picked up our cruise cards and done the ‘checking-in’ thing, we were in our cabin before 12 noon.

When we first stepped into our cabin, we couldn’t believe our eyes. In all the years I’ve been working on cruise ships, this was the first time I’d been allocated a cabin that actually had two separate rooms. I’ve always worked on the basis that I should be grateful for whatever I end up with, but this far-surpassed anything I’ve stayed in previously. We have a separate lounge-com-wardrobe room (featuring a comfy sofa), and separate bedroom, with a real door and everything. Not only that; the bathroom is quite spacious, and sports a proper, full human-sized shower cubicle… absolute luxury! We even have two TVs!

This is our first time on the Magellan, which is much larger than any of the other ships I’ve worked on. As such, our first job was to take a walk through the ship to see what’s what, and to familiarise ourselves with its layout. Our first impressions were good; the ship has several lounges, two large dining rooms, an informal bistro and an impressive show lounge that takes up two floors! There’s even a casino (‘Casino Royale’)… For fresh air, there are many different decks to choose from, including a rather neat ‘garden’ terrace right at the back, with fake grass, a water feature and outdoor heaters. The terrace exudes relaxation, and I can’t help but think they probably paid a real pukka fung shui expert lots of money to design it.

Above all, the thing that impresses us most of all is the sense of space. It’s a large ship, to be sure, but it also feels like its been designed to accommodate the 1250 passengers with the greatest comfort possible within the surface area available.

After the passenger emergency drill, a meeting was held for the entertainments team to introduce each other and discover how our various skills and contributions are to be divvied up over the coming fortnight. Its also nice to see a few familiar faces amongst the crew… all-in-all; it’s all a very encouraging start…