We left the resort in St. Malo early. There were several hotel room freebies to bring with us but we are at the end of the trip and luggage space is at a premium. I did, however, take my brand new blue and white swim cap! Free swim cap. Now that's a perk. After some confusion about where and how to drop off our dear rental car (turns out you need a code to get into the lot and a French man, unaffiliated with the car rental place, but allegedly affiliated with the port terminal, gave me the secret code on a post-it note), we hung out at the terminal, eating possibly our last pain au chocolats of the trip.
After rolling two suitcases uphill for three hours (or 5 minutes - seemed like forever), we settled into our room for the ferry voyage to Portsmouth, UK. Anticipating end-of-trip fatigue, Mom had booked us a bedroom for the 8 hour voyage, and boy did we take advantage of that. I lay prone for almost all of the voyage, sleeping some, watching downloaded episodes of Poirot, and enjoying all the luxuries that Brittany Ferries had to offer (we had our own bathroom!). Most passengers on the ferry brought their cars with them, so embarking we really didn't see many people, since we were walk-ons and they were drive-ons. And then when we ventured out for lunch, the place was pretty quiet, despite the fact that there was allegedly an entire menu of entertainment available. We missed it all, preferring our little room and our comfy boat beds. Oh also - I was also excited to see that Queen Elizabeth was on the ship when we boarded. She was looking rather thin.
Disembarking was yuck due to three flights of rolling downhill with suitcases attached to my arms, but we survived. Then, it was customs time. Problem though. There were no customs agents. The place was locked, lights out, no one home. It took some time to get sorted and situated and stamped, but finally we were on our way. Our original plan was to take a taxi to the train station, take the train from Portsmouth to Southampton, and take a taxi to our hotel. But then we realized that that would be awful and stressful, especially because we had Zoom appointments to have supervised Covid tests at 9:36 (very specific). Last minute, we ordered a private transfer from the mouth of the port to the hampton of the south. This last minute change resulted in another tipping emergency. I had a total of 5 Pounds left and 3 Euros. Mom also had Dollars. The Pounds really weren’t enough for a private transfer tip. What to do? Mom and I spent a good part of the voyage ruminating about this tipping dilema, in an attempt to avoid panic tipping. Solution? I just broke the news to our driver, asking if he wanted the Pounds, Euros, or Dollars, or all of the above. He said, "a tip is a tip!," so I gave him all three. The tipping trifecta. The ultimate tipping triumph. A tip for the ages. Savvy tipping by Ali. Tips R Us. A tip to remember.
Finally at our last hotel of the trip, called the Jury's Inn, we prepared to swab our nasal passages to prove we were free of the plague. It was a frenzied few minutes on the phone with a call center nurse, but we were certified Covid free and ready for transport. During the Covid prep we also discovered a very damp section of floor in our room right by the bathroom. A cheerful chap came up to the room and felt around on the floor. He postulated that the wet was a result of carpet cleaning earlier in the day due to a spill. Big spill, I guess. And a damp spill. We elected to ignore our damp room in lieu of moving to another one since we'd been throwing Covid testing supplies all over the place and had our jammies on. So tonight we sleep in the company of mystery dampness and we are too tired to care.
Tomorrow, we are back on the QM2, where the food is plentiful and the internet is...not. It may result in an interruption of regularly scheduled programming.
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