Adonia 2015

By Ian Parkinson and Richard Williams

A day by day journal about our cruse on P&O Adonia to Ireland, Iceland, Faroe Islands, Scotland and the Scilly Isles. Read all about our days onboard, the cruise experience and the mountains of food we ate. Join us on our excursions ashore and sample the highs and lows of cruising. Ian and Richard tell you what happened every day, from rough seas to fabulous food.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Aug 30, 2015
• ISBN: 9781326406530

Ian Parkinson

Ian Parkinson is the New Wine North & East Regional Leader. Ian leads All Saints' Church Marple, Stockport, a multi-congregational church meeting in three very different communities, one urban, one suburban and one a village. His passion is to support and resource leaders and churches as they seek to reach their communities with the gospel.

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Adonia 2015

Adonian Sagas

July 2015

© 2015 by Richard Williams and Ian Parkinson. All rights reserved.

Saturday 18th July 2015 – Journey to Southampton

Day 1: Sunday 19th July 2015 – Southampton, UK

Day 2: Monday 20th July 2015 – At Sea

Day 3: Tuesday 21st July 2015 – Killybegs, Republic of Ireland

Day 4: Wednesday 22nd July 2015 – At Sea; sail past Rockall

Day 5: Thursday 23rd July 2015 – At Sea

Day 6: Friday 24th July 2015 – Reykjavik, Iceland

Day 7: Saturday 25th July 2015 – Isafjordur, Iceland

Day 8: Sunday 26th July 2015 – Heimaey, Iceland

Day 9: Monday 27th July 2015 – At Sea

Day 10: Tuesday 28th July 2015 – Torshavn, Faroe Islands

Day 11: Wednesday 29th July 2015 – At Sea; sail past St. Kilda

Day 12: Thursday 30th July 2015 – Portree, Isle of Skye

Day 13: Friday 31st July 2015 – At Sea

Day 14: Saturday 1st August 2015 – St. Mary’s, Scilly Islands

Day 15: Sunday 2nd August 2015 – Southampton, UK

Saturday 18th July 2015 – Journey to Southampton

We arose at 8 o’clock in the morning.  The weather was bright and sunny and we were looking forward to a pleasant drive to Southampton before embarking upon our cruise on Adonia the following morning.  As we had both been working this week, we hadn’t done very much packing, so that was the first task.  Richard had ironed the casual clothes for daytimes, but not the smart shirts for the evenings as there hadn’t been enough time: the plan is to iron what we need when on board.  The packing went quite smoothly and we left home at 12.30.

The intention to have a pleasant drive dissolved fairly rapidly.  The satnav and matrix signs very quickly informed us of heavy congestion on the M6 and a temporary closure between Junctions 12 and 11, owing to an accident during the night: a lorry had caught fire and the road surface had also been set ablaze.  Having consulted the atlas, Richard planned a route that would take us through Staffordshire, leaving the motorway at Junction 15 near Stoke-on-Trent, and travelling on A-roads towards Lichfield.  Before we could even do that though, we hit a rolling roadblock and had to stop to allow the highway patrol to remove a burst tyre!  Some clever driver thought he could nip in ahead of us, earning him a telling-off from the officer.

After that, it was relatively smooth driving to Stoke, where we left the motorway and took the A51 towards Stone.  The satnav was unimpressed by Richard’s navigation, and kept trying to lead us back to the M6.  After much persistence, she eventually gave up and conceded that our route was the best.  Most of this part of the journey was on single-carriageways, with the occasional dual carriageway section, but we did quite well and because of the long route managed to avoid a lot of the other problems caused by the closure.  However, it was still nearly 3 o’clock when we re-joined the M6 Toll road, following a brief stop at a handy McDonald’s for lunch.

We then took the M42 and M40 towards Oxford before joining the A34 heading south.  This part of the journey was remarkably quiet and we made good time.  Clearly, the bulk of the traffic was still stuck on the M6 or the associated diversions.  We finally got to Southampton at 5.15, where we checked into our Ibis hotel for the night.  A large cruise ship, the Anthem of the Seas, was just leaving as we arrived.

It had been our intention to go shopping in Southampton and we were worried that the West Quay centre would be closed: fortunately, all the shops remained open until 7 o’clock so we were able to buy some new pyjamas from Marks and Spencer’s, as well as some shoes and t-shirts, and a few toiletries from Body Shop.  We then went back to the hotel to partake of a complimentary drink: this is a benefit of Richard’s loyalty card.  Ian had a kiwi and lime cider and Richard had a glass of Shiraz.

We then set off to find somewhere to have dinner.  The shopping centre was closed so we went down to one of our regular restaurants: this year we decided to go to the Rancho steak house, opposite the Italian we ate at last year with Liz and Rachel.  Even though we didn’t have a reservation, they were able to seat