On board the MS Fridtjof Nansen

Our friend drove us into town so that we could get our outrageously expensive lateral flow tests at the Harpa. A test kit costs 2 € in Berlin, a test at a test center 3 €. They charged us 50 $ per person for the tests! I got my results within the hour, WiseMan‘s didn‘t come at all, so we trudged back and had them re-send it and print it out. Luckily, both of us were negative, so on with the adventure!

We were able to dump our suitcases early, and at 12:30 were able to board. First we showed all of our medical documentation and had our temperatures taken. Then we went through a metal detector, and joined the pure chaos that was behind that station. I had already fought with the ArriveCAN app that the Canadian government insists that you use to register coming to Canada for quite some time. It could use a usability overhaul, and maybe a proper update: Our ship was not on the list of ships entering a port of Canada. And without choosing a ship, you couldn‘t go on. You also had to put in the first landing in Canada and the date and time. I had written to the reception desk to ask and they sent me a place with a silly date, the day we are to land in St. John‘s, far away from Goose Bay.

We were, of course, not the only ones with problems, which were exacerbated by the Internet on board not working. You could get the ship WLAN, but it was not connecting to the outside world. I managed to get the app to talk to me and to FINALLY fill out all the fields. Then I pressed SEND, and it didn‘t go through. I must have pressed SEND a dozen times, it took a while and then timed out. I finally managed to turn off the WLAN and coax my mobile phone plan to speak with the Internet. Hey, 1&1, when you tell me I can use the Internet like home I didn‘t expect you to export all the connection problems like we have back in Germany as well!

It was also clear that many older people do have mobile phones, but they don‘t know how to use them to do anything other than phone. They don‘t know how to download apps, they don‘t know how to log onto a WLAN, and it scares them to not know what to do. We computing people really have to get better at this.

But of course with all the chaos, we were unable to get someone to understand that we have two cabins but both want to get into each of them. It took another two visits to the reception desk before their computers were working again and they were able to issue us additional room cards.

We now have our red signal rain coats, we have been through the safety instructions, and we have emptied the bottle of champagne that was in the suite :) Dinner was nice, although there are far too many people serving. It seems that the boat is only half full, which is actually good for us. 

Tomorrow we will be at sea all day, crossing the Straits of Denmark!