May 18, 2018

   Today is a day at sea as the ship was returning to Dublin, Ireland from Lerwick, Shetland Islands.  During the morning the ship was cruising through the Hebrides islands off the northern coast of mainland Scotland. After passing the Hebrides, the ship entered the Malin Sea as it turned into the calm waters of the North Channel during the afternoon and into the Irish Sea toward midnight on the way to Dublin.

    The whole day was overcast and misty, starting with a temperature of 5°C.  When we were walking, in winds of about 30 to 40 km per hour, on Deck 14 in the late morning we had to cut the walk short at 40 minutes due to driving rain pelting down in large drops. We had logged 5.1km. By late afternoon some clouds had parted and the sun shone, but it was still windy and just around 9°C

   We booked a transfer to Dublin airport for early on Sunday morning, a few days ago for $55 US. Then two days ago the Excursions Concierge said that an early Celebrity transfer was being arranged and would be a few dollars less.  There was a message to phone this morning and we were told the early Celebrity transfer was cancelled, but there would be a small bus arranged for the few guests needing to get to Dublin airport for morning flights at a cost of $125 US, so we booked it.  We will be ready to get off the ship Sunday morning at 6:30 am, only 15 minutes early than when the first transfer was scheduled to depart.

   We had a light lunch in the Oceanview Café buffet before joining Peter and Karen for an afternoon playing the card game Five Crowns.

   We joined them for an early dinner. The appetizers chosen were Scallops Rockefeller and Halibut Filet with rice and Beef Wellington with mashed potatoes, cooked carrots and green beans.

   After dinner we all went to the 7 p.m. show, Euphoria, performed by the acrobatic team, dancers and singers.  There were scenes with huge inflatable white parachute material puppets some over three meters long requiring two people to hold up, like the dragons in Chinese dragon dances.

   We stopped at Café al Bacio for cake and coffee.

    Tomorrow is a full day back in Dublin.

Distance 8.29 km