“The round the world cruise that was stranded in Belfast. After months of delays, the ship finally set sail. Find out how the passengers stayed upbeat while their trip of a lifetime started with the stress of being stuck in Northern Ireland. We hear from those who are calling the cruise home for the next three years.” —BBC
Well, close, anyway! Some will be here for the next three years. Some will be done well before then. And some (as you will even hear in the video) are here “for life.”
Kit and me? Well, we hope to live beyond the estimated 15-year-plus life of this ship, so the plan for now is to move onto the second, or even third, Villa Vie ship at some point. We “never say never,” but we have no plans to go back to full-time land life.
It’s 19 minutes long.
The Documentary
Our Involvement?
Even though we were interviewed for several minutes by BBC News, of which maybe 20 seconds aired, we aren’t in this one. I was contacted by the researcher for this piece asking if we might provide some video, but I was tired enough that I chose not to take on any extra tasks since I’m still working full time.
I’m thus pretty sure that no matter how hard you look, you won’t see us.
All in all a very nice piece, and I have no real quibbles with its accuracy. Nice job, Chris Page!
Update Already
Not to be left behind, the London Independent did a similar retrospective in photos and text, and you can definitely find us in this one: Timeline of the Odyssey cruise ship: How the four-month Belfast ordeal unfolded before it set sail.Last Updated October 25, 2024 Originally Published October 25, 2024
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Very nice video. Quite a positive attitude in the story line.
Now that you are under way and currently en route from Casablanca, could you explain how passports and visas all work? Do you have to go through passport control every time you get off the ship? Do you have to worry about posting your passport off for visas or all they all now applied for online?
And for that matter, what do you do about post and you need to get something from Amazon…? Do you have to use Poste Restante or does Villa Vie provide a service?
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We haven’t needed any visas yet. MOST countries that require them allow online application. Mostly, you don’t even need your passport when you get off the ship, but you better get back to the ship before it leaves, or things get difficult. VVR will forward mail for free, but it’ll probably take a couple of months. Packages are forwarded with a fee by weight. -rc
I am so interested in your journey. What do you do for health care; dental, eyes, emergencies, etc? Also, aside from touring exciting new places won’t each day turn in to “groundhog” day? I know from experience I’m ready to come home and chill even after the most enjoyable cruise.
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We go home every day! You just learn how to pace yourself, and you’ll probably learn that pretty quickly. I did, which is one of the reasons I didn’t go into Casablanca. There is a ship’s doctor (and two nurses). A dentist will visit. -rc
I agree — Chris Page’s piece was a LOT more accurate than the others, and pretty upbeat. Seems folks just can’t resist using “stranded” in their descriptions, though.
Agreed, good coverage. It would be good to get them to do an update sometime soon that can cover all of the “problems” that have occurred since then and that they were not serious and things have been good.
What’s been really annoying about the recent coverage has been that it leads with one or two problems from the first couple of days, rather than the non-problems of the subsequent weeks… even though most of the people quoted say “we’re fine”, and even the complainer who prompted the headline later said (and they quoted) “things are going pretty well”.
But focusing on problems gets clicks, and focusing on “everything is OK and we’ve been to six ports and had fun and the food is good”… doesn’t.
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Just so. And that’s where this site is really different from what has become “journalism” — I’m fine with telling it like it is, such as in the previous post that there were, indeed, problems. But they were short lived and, in general, things are going darned well. -rc
Randy, is that your head in the film of someone working at a computer in the business center?
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I skimmed through it and didn’t see the business center. If you spot it again let me know the mm:ss so I can look. But I noticed I’m in the pic of the group at City Hall, very briefly. -rc