THE REGENT SEVEN SEAS EXPLORER IS WONDERFUL

These long travel itineraries generally draw the most readers.  Many will not get to Dubai or take a cruise on Regent Seven Seas.  Living vicariously provides sufficient satisfaction for some, as they've now been to the top of the Burj Khalifa and visited the largest mall in the world.  On the other hand, it's still best to live vicariously through your own life.

After an up and down Dubai stop, which included highlights like the tallest building in the world and low lights like food poisoning, we headed off to the port in seven buses, first passing the Queen Elizabeth II.  If you keep up with these things, the city of Long Beach in 1967 bought the Queen Mary, which was converted into a museum, restaurants and hotel.  It was closed in 2020 and might never be again re-used.  The Queen Elizabeth II entered service in 1969, was retired in 2008, and acquired by Dubai World, which had plans for a 500-room hotel.  It was opened to visitors in 2018 as the new QEII Heritage Exhibition and Hotel.  Accor of France purchased the ship this year, and plans to have 447 rooms, 9 restaurants and 60,000 square feet of outdoor event space., keeping the ship in Dubai

We boarded the Regent Seven Seas Explorer, and if there is a Heaven, this certainly is one possible scenario.  Check-in was flawless, and in consideration of all the visa and vaccination protocols, quick. Started with a champagne greeting and lunch.

Ended meal with Glenmorangie on rocks at 3PM, then wandered to our room to see if it was ready.  Only one of five bags was there, but not a concern, for we saw all of them unloaded into our bus.  The cabin is something else.  King size bed, bathroom with shower and bath, huge walk-in closet with loads of drawer space, a kind of living room with large TV screen and a lanai that was double, if not triple, the size of other cruises ships.

The ship was scheduled to depart at 5PM, so we went up to the observation room and ordered glasses of Glenmorangie, Glenlivet and Glenfiddich to compare them.  

The direction of the Explorer shifted, so we went back to our room to see the Dubai skyline fade away.

For our first night on the Explorer we selected the French Chartreuse, probably the best restaurant on the ship.

An excellent meal, where the best dish was a mushroom truffles confit soup, with the entrés being lamb and foie gras/truffes filet.  We had finished lunch at 3PM, and began dinner at 6:30, so the full enjoyment was compromised by supersatiation.

Then for breakfast this morning, the usual.

The ship docked in Bahrain just as we finished breakfast.  As this stop was only because we couldn't go to Qatar, we were the first Regent to visit the country.  A marching band greeted us.

All tours were taken so we will just spend the day on the ship.  Dinner tonight is at Prime7, a steakhouse.

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