Embarked Oosterdam

TK2313 landed at IST at noon.

It took us another hour to taxi to the terminal, get bussed to baggage claim, collect our bags, walk to the metro station, and hop on the next train traveling from the airport in the direction of Gayrettepe. Since the metro line has not been completed to the last station yet, we hopped off at Kağıthane and hailed a cab to Galataport. By 3:00p, we were at the cruise terminal … glimpsing Oosterdam on approach, maneuvering to squeeze into its berth between two other cruise vessels.

We had a bit of a wait while the ship completed clearance formalities and disembarked passengers for their shore excursions. Shortly after 4:00p, we were on our way to the ship.

Since we would become “transit passengers” once we embarked Oosterdam, first we had to go through immigration formalities to exit Türkiye. Then onto the ship, where we went through the check-in formalities and received our keycards for the cabin. Yay!

We had no trouble finding SS6052, our suite on deck 6 … our bags standing outside the door. In a previous footprint, explained why we are in a signature suite on this cruise, so I won’t go into that again. Suffice to say that our corner suite is quite spacious … and even better, has an oversized veranda. The decor is dated, however, and the wear and tear wrought by the passage of time since we were last on Oosterdam in 2018 is quite apparent. No matter. We will enjoy the extra space for the next 24 days.

We did not dally in the cabin to settle in. Instead, once we had the luggage inside, we headed right back out to enjoy a bit of sightseeing and food.Read more