Virgin Valiant Lady Day 6: Funchal, Portugal

I decided not to go out this morning and ordered room service at 7:20. The app said it would deliver in 40 to 60 minutes. It arrived at 8:10 as promised.

The app pinged me to let me know I could go ashore and that shuttle busses would take me to the center of town.

I finished my breakfast and made a game plan for the day. Although the food is absolutely amazing on board, the coffee is terrible. Apparently Intelligentsia coffee is like Dunkin donuts coffee to me. I don't put sugar in my coffee so it really matters to me what it tastes like. I will go on a quest for the holy grail- good coffee today. If I am not successful I could forsee 8 days without Internet or coffee.... perhaps that would be a nice cleanse for me and alter the course of my life. 

Funchal is a lovely resort town with lots of photo ops.

Virgin provides a complimentary round trip shuttle bus to the center of the port towns which is very convenient!

I successfully completed my quest to find coffee makings. I'll do a blind taste test tomorrow.

The ship is always beautiful.

Unfortunately, there is no access to the front of the ship to take pictures unless you have a rock star suite. So even though the ship is beautiful, I feel the design could be much improved. There is a nice aft balcony for dining behind the Galley restaurant. There is a lovely walking track. There is even the perch with a maze of twisty secret feeling passages to get there. Once I get home I'll see if I mentioned it before, but the public decks only have one mens restroom and one womens restroom (plus a handicapped.accessibke bathroom) and it seems like it is always a long hike away. If they are expecting us to use the handicapped bathroom then at least put the mens and and womens beside each other.

I have heard the new NCL prima has a similar design. I managed to use the Starlink Internet long enough to vefify that Prima seems to have a nice observation lounge in the front of the ship. Also, there seem to be ample restroom facilities on board. I can't give a true review until I have sailed the Prima.

Once again, dinner at the Wake (steakhouse) did not disappoint.

Tonight the only real show is Bingo with the Diva and I saw much more of her than I wanted to last night. The blues band is playing in the Theater night club.

Happy Cruising!