"Tanks" for the memories Portland

While this transatlantic cruise was mostly comprised of sea days, we took a variety of approaches to our times in port. In Vigo, Spain I simply got off the ship and walked around the area. In Bermuda, we had done a wonderful tour from Winsome Tours that covered the entire island during our first visit. This time, I chose to get off and walk around the port area and do some shopping. For the port of Cherbourg, France (given that we'd just come off a cruise with all the D-Day themed experiences we could ever want), we did our own tour on the spot that I'll cover in another post. Also in that post, I'll cover the private tour we booked for our stop in Ponta Delgada in the Azores.

For this post, I will share the one Princess sponsored ship excursion we chose to do. The tour in Portland, England was called Relics from the Great War: the Bovington Tank Museum. This 3.75 hour tour costs $124.95 per person. We used part of our on board credit (OBC) to cover the cost for both of us. To read the tour description at Princess' official page, click here.

Our stop in Portland occurred on day 2 of the cruise. By the time we came back to our cabin from dinner on night 1, there was a letter in the cabin explaining that the timing of our port stop coincided with the Bovington Tank Museum's annual hosting of their Christmas Craft Fair. The letter warned of extra crowds due to the fair and the fact that it might take longer to move through the exhibits. What our tour guide didn't even realize was that the craft seller's tables and displays would be set up within the exhibits themselves versus taking over a conference room or lobby. It led to a lot more crowding due to people standing around the tables and physically blocked portions of the exhibits from view. I also would have liked to see some option in the letter from Princess that allowed you to get at least a partial refund and still attend or switch to a different option given that we couldn't help but be already within the 48 hour window for cancellation on our own. 

Once we arrived at the museum which was a good drive away from where the ship docks, we were given a brief overview of what was where and a time of 5PM to meet back at the bus. This gave us about 2 hours to walk around. After that, it was up to us where to go, what to see, and how much walking we felt like doing. We first headed down a long ramp into an exhibition hall filled with the various tank exhibits. One minor frustration is that the elevator at the bottom of this exhibition hall was out of order. Only options to get back to the main level were steps or heading back up the long ramp we first came down.

What our perspective of the area was like as we headed down the ramp - everything that wasn't a tank in this picture was a craft booth. At least there was nothing stopping you from walking between the tables and the tanks if you could get past the crowds. Only a handful of tanks on display had signs asking you not to touch due to their age and condition.

It also gave me lots of practice framing a picture that doesn't include too much of the crowd.

The museum had a mini scavenger hunt option for kids to seek out all of these little friends positioned on various tanks throughout the exhibits.

There were also boot prints painted on the floor to give the impression of following in the soldier's footsteps. I thought this was a pretty creative way of showing the route for walking through the exhibit zones.

The exhibits empty out into a large hanger with picnic tables, a play area, and some of the bigger tanks that allow climbing up to pose for pictures. The cafe our guide told us about turned out to be more of a concession stand. We took some time to rest at a picnic table before we sought out a quieter place to kill the remaining time. We spent some time at the mobbed gift shop where I picked up a magnet showcasing Rosie the Riveter and Dad picked out a new T-shirt. They had tons with funny and punny sayings such as "I like big guns and I cannot lie." 

By now, the sun was starting to set. We still had some time to kill before the meeting time so we headed outside to sit at one of those picnic tables. 

I shared this picture below with my neighborhood Facebook group jokingly asking if the HOA would let us bring home this Christmas decoration to display in the front yard.

Once everyone was back on the bus, the sun had long since set. Our tour guide insisted on taking us some long way back to the ship through back roads in order to "see" some local writer's childhood home. He talked about this writer and the sites we were passing for the longest time until one of the passengers asked if we could turn off the bus' interior lights because no one could see anything out the windows except our own reflections. The guide and driver agreed to turn off the lights and those of us on my side of the bus got a brief drive by glimpse of a roof through the trees of this house. The rest of the drive was very treacherous with the driver having to follow blind curves in the pitch dark on these tree lined back roads taking chances on whether there was any oncoming traffic. If there was, he'd have to wait and let them pass before he would have enough room to drive around the curve. I think the entire bus breathed a sigh of relief when we reached the highway again.