Maritime History & the Napoleonic Wars
Departs 21st April 2008, from Dover, for 11 nights.
Overview l Lecturers l Shore Excursions l Itinerary l Price l Deck Plans
Leaving Dover on a spring afternoon, you'll enjoy a relaxing day at sea before arriving at La Rochelle. Founded in the 14th century, this fashionable fortified French resort of elegant shopping and notable 16th century mansions enjoys 2,400 hours of sunshine - as much as the French Riviera! Your excursion takes you the southernmost of the Ponant Islands, Aix Island, site of Napoleon's last three days on French soil before his banishment to St.Helena.
An evening sailing from France delivers you to the Spanish city of Bilbao at breakfast time. Renaissance and Baroque buildings nestle together in the city's old town and your exclusive excursion takes you around Bilbao's panoramic sites, as well as its Maritime Museum.The museum is in the old Euskalduna shipyard in the revitalised Abandoibarra area, also home to the city's iconic Guggenheim museum.
A day at sea precedes your arrival at Lisbon, Portuguese capital since its 1145 capture from the Moors.The city's elegant boulevards are in marked contrast with its Moorish Amalfa district, which survived the city's 1755 earthquake and retains much of its orginal layout.Your excursion takes you to Jeronymos Monastery, constructed in commemoration of the 1500 voyage of Vasco da Gama and to the city's notable maritime museum charting Portugal's impressive naval heritage.
Sailing overnight we reach the Spanish capital, its old town dominated by the city's twin-towered cathedral. From Cadiz your excursion takes you to Cape Trafalgar, where in 1805 Napoleon's fleet was defeated by the innovative tactics of the Royal Navy commanded by one of its best ever Admirals - Horiatio Lord Nelson - for whom the battle also proved fateful. After which we return to Cadiz for a panoramic city tour.
A day's cruising brings us to La Coruña, scene of a famous 1809 British rearguard action during the Peninsular War which cost the life the army's commander General Sir John Moore and also site of a notorious attack by Sir Francis Drake, who the Spanish still regard as a pirate. Here you'll enjoy a tour of this ocean-surrounded 'ciudad cristal' (city of
glass), so called because of its many houses with glassed-in balconies and also famous for its 2nd century Roman lighthouse, the ancient Torre del Hercules.
From lively L'Orient your Civilisations tour takes you to the historic town of Pontivy, once named Napoleonville. Because of its support of the Republican cause, the Emperor made the town a centre of commerce and an important military centre and laid it out along model lines with a vast square designed to hold 10,000 soldiers.
May Day sees us in St. Peter Port, Guernsey for an exclusive tour, which takes in a conducted visit of Sausmarez Manor by its owner, whose ancestor, the privateer Admiral Philip de Sausmarez was responsible for the capture of the world's largest treasure ship, as well as a visit to the Martello Tower which guards Rocquaine Bay. Sailing late afternoon we return to Dover the following morning.
