Ready for the ship transfer by 11 we all waited in the lobby for the buses. Regent hosted their passengers in Beijing at the Peninsula, so there were a number of passengers waiting to board. There was bit of a crush on the first few buses, so we hung back to avoid the mad dash. It was almost a 3 hour transfer to Tianjin via bus with a planned "happy" stop in the middle. Alas, no toilets at all... just holes, but I did survive. Since there is never any paper in the bathrooms, I was prepared, but there are usually one of two stalls with real toilets, but not this time. Back on the bus for the rest of the trip with an hour or so ETA.
Approaching the port of Tianjin we were amazed to see how huge the area is - the roads (deserted) looked as wide as runways, and there was no other traffic. It took close to 20 minutes to get from the entrance of the port to reach the ship. Then there was Chinese Immigration, and our "face to face" inspection while the immigration police inspect your passport, look at you, look back at your passport, and back at you... actually this can go on for 2 minutes or so; thank heavens I had the same hair color as in my passport photo or I'd still be in Tianjin! Additionally, two copies of our passports with all sorts of official looking red stamps with the date hand written by the inspector. So now you have three critical pieces of identification. They keep one of the stamped copies, give back one stamped copy, and then stamp your passport! And we're told to guard the stamped copy as if it was your passport!
Finally aboard the ship, a little lunch, a little wine, and everything looks better! Hallelujah! Bags that were shipped by Luggage Free have been delivered to the cabin before our bags from the hotel. Wow! That's service! Little do they know there will be one more bag on the return. Unpack, hang up, organize and we settle into our home for the next 18 days. Life is good, champagne is good and we're under way!
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