Tuesday 18 January

We’re here in the port of Castries in St Lucia. 

I’m not sure if it’s because P&O booked a berth late when our berth here was about the last one available or if they booked it because it was the cheapest available, but we’re definitely berthed in the port’s commercial area.

We won’t be able to sit out on our balcony for as long as we’re here, I fear because noisy container-moving vehicles are revving up and manoeuvring about.

The information we were given yesterday now seems to have been updated.  As we’re not booked on a ship’s tour, we can now only stay within the terminal area and we are advised that our temperatures will be checked on the quayside and that we must wear a mask at all times and in all places or face an on-the-spot fine.

The fact that the rules are the harshest we have come across says more about the situation on the island than about us as a cohort of cruise passengers.  If levels of vaccination are so low that they have to impose these rules, then we don't want to be exposed to a possibly high level of infections on land here.

Enough is enough and we will be staying on board. The trouble is, we’ve had a good walk round one of the upper decks and it was noisy everywhere we went, so we will need to think how best to pass our time here until we leave at 1730.

One thing we are booked in for is the latest showing of ‘No Time To Die’ in the ship’s indoor cinema at 12 noon.

On our look around the ship, I realised that there is almost nowhere to berth a ship here and that we seem to be in the only normal berth available.  Celebrity Silhouette is moored opposite us, but it doesn’t seem to be a normal berth and the port police boats had their work cut out ferrying mooring ropes back and forth to the side to get the ship tied up.