Day 8&9 at sea and Kagoshima

Day 8&9 at sea and Kagoshima.

We had our first at sea day traveling between Kobe and Kagoshima, we started by have breakfast in the Metropolitan dining room and then chilled for and hour before heading back down for a behind the scenes tour of the galley and meet and greet of some of the key food and beverage personnel. The Millennium is rated the best ship in the Celebrity group for quality of meals, the staff seem to loyal stay with the group with one team member having 35 years service with the company through its various brands. We then went and checked out a future cruise presentation which took the form of a quiz then a sales pitch regarding the destination dealt with in the question. Jamie won a bottle of wine and Jenny one a international power adaptor.The tour got us ready for some Lunch after which we headed for the spa for some afternoon relaxation we checked out the evening Show which was Steve Carte an illusionist and comedian who’s had some good lines though he did go overboard with a participant from the audience, a young mother who had her children in the audience. We then had dinner in the Oceanview restaurant and had coffee in the cafe before retiring for the night.

We arrived in Kagoshima at 7.00 am and had an early breakfast before leaving the Ship and taking the free shuttle bus for the twenty minute drive to the ferry terminal which was adjacent to the centre of town. The Japanese ports have been fantastic for the service the offer. After leaving the bus we took the ferry across to Sakurajima island / volcano, this volcano is active over 800 times a year and the island that it is situated on has a circumference of around 40 kilometres. We were advised to buy a Cute travel card which would give us unlimited travel on the ferry bus and tram services available. The card was only $14 dollars so it represented good value. After arriving on the Sakurajima island we hopped on the bus that circled the island with a heap of other tourists from the bus. The bus had around a dozen stops on the route with three of them allowing you time to get off the bus and take photos at the nearby observatory points.

James was thinking of hiring a bike and riding around the island but was glad he didn’t as the climbs were very steep. The. Bus  was struggling to get up the hill and the driver seemed to take the bends on two wheels to keep the momentum up. After taking the photos at the stops we caught the ferry back to the mainland and rather than catch the local bus with the other tourists and we found the tram line a couple of blocks over. 

We felt like real tourists on the Tram we certainly stuck out as we were the only westerners on the local tram. We went  about five stops to the central shopping precinct and browsed through the stores until we found a local coffee shop to have a cuppa. Once replenished we thought it was about time to head for the Ship it was around 2.30 pm, we needn’t of hurried back as once we returned we got stuck in a line to clear immigration. The immigration officials wanted everyone of the Ship before they commenced to process the departure from Japanese territory. We ended up being in line for over an hour, but you cannot hurry immigration officials so we just sucked it up.

We eventually got on board around 3.30 and Jenny went to grab a late lunch while James went to the gym for an hour. We then had a coffee before catching up with Lee and Maureen for a late tea in the Oceanview cafe and then another coffee in the cafe before retiring for the night.