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The RMS St Helena has announced its final runs prior to decommissioning in February 2018.
There is a last Tristan da Cunha run put together and I am booking it. The ship departs Cape Town 29 Dec, stops in Tristan 3-5 Jan, then arrives in St Helena on 10 Jan. That lines up well for the 14 Jan St Helena flight to Johannesburg. The inaugural flight to St Helena arrived yesterday.
I’ve never been on a cruise and it is a long time to be offline when my livelihood depends on my being online. This is a piece of travel history that there won’t be another chance to experience. Also, alternatives such as repositioning cruises frequently fail to land on Tristan for one reason or another, and chances should be higher for the RMS St Helena and its 3-day stay.
The Tristan fares are not online so they sent me a price sheet. I booked cheapest available 2BI (2 person share, no private bath, no exterior view) for £947/person, no single supplement.
For the two nights on Tristan, you can shuttle back and forth and pay extra to stay onboard (£100 for 2BI) or seek accommodation on Tristan. I have applied to the Tristan government for a homestay and have not yet heard back.
The ship continues to Ascension though only for a same-day stop and overlaps with the monthly St Helena flight (the RAF Air Bridge is suspended for runway repairs) so you will have to continue with the ship back to St Helena or have a long stay in Ascension. Or, for short visits, you can fly St Helena to Ascension on 13 Jan and back again 14 Jan.
Those visits are too short for my taste for the cost and I want to have the air bridge experience so I will wait to 2019/20 for the hoped-for resumption of the RAF Brize Norton – Ascension – Falklands route.
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[…] in the best way possible! Anyway, I first learned about the RMS (Royal Mail Ship) St. Helena from a blog post on Rapid Travel Chai. Though I had no idea what he was talking about, there were several points that caught my […]
A google search (cruise critic) shows that the active ingredient in OTC Bonine is 25 mg of mezicline hydrochoride, which l Bonine is more expensive that dramamine but results in less drowsiness, as it is chewable.
I get too woozy on the over the counter stuff.. If Dramamine works for you otherwise, you may be ok with that. I’d slip a few bags of ginger tea in your bag too. (In case you don’t want to partake in the daily “beef tea” ritual, you can drink the ginger tea instead!) For me, the meziclin does work. Try to take the pill (or at least a part of one) when things start to get rocky and rolly, not when you’re on the verge of getting really sick. I’ve not tried the patches, but I have met others… Read more »
My wife has a supply of sugar free ginger tea that I will raid!
Stephan, Please consider getting some prescription seasickness pills for your cruise. . . just in case. I get Meziclin 25 mg, take 1/2 at a time (I’m 105 1bs) and don’t get the drunk effect that I get from some others.
Thanks for the tip, I have been remiss at looking into this, some people have been talking about patches I should get, too? And the difference between Rx and OTC on these pills is significant?
I’m a frequent reader, but rare commenter. I heartily disagree with Shannon. The blog hasn’t been going downhill. In fact, the quality has always been there. It’s simply that the postings have been fewer lately. However, I fully understand that people have lives, and if the blog doesn’t provide income it totally makes sense to drop the frequency. Wish I could go on this trip, but I’m a mom to a small child so I just live vicarously through Stefan’s interesting travels. 🙂
[…] you’re interested in taking one of the last Royal Mail Ship runs to St. Helena, consider joining Rapid Travel Chai in January. His adventures and perspective on the many […]
I sorely wish I had the time to do this. What an adventure! Have a great time.
What do you mean your livelihood depending on being online? If so, it doesn’t seem to be this blog as it has been a dusty corner. Or you have some other online projects? Anyway, hopefully there would a little more useful info like before. This blog has been downhill for a while… Sorry for being so candid but couldn’t figure out a better way to say.
Yes, other projects that pay the bills.
Yes, you are correct, I have not been able to devote the time to this while working to replace income going from corporate to independent, blog is a very long tail to really monetize to be a living and I am not comfortable with the affliate-heavy route that generally entails. We are getting over the hump on a lot of things and I hope to bring quality back to the blog.
Why don’t you post a PayPal link that readers can donate so it might be less burden to write?