The Dr Who Cruise Part 7

Saturday, 10/28 – Day at Sea

We didn’t have any reason to get up, so we didn’t set an alarm, and got up when we woke up, which turned out to be about 8 AM. We went to the Main Dining room for breakfast, where Hubby was able to get Eggs Benedict, which he couldn’t get in the buffet. After hanging around our cabin until 11:30, we went to deck 5 to refill our beverage cups with soda at the pizza place. Then we went to the deck 3 Main Dining room for lunch.

After lunch, we watched a little tv in our cabin, then decided to go to the hot tub. Once I got into a swimsuit, Hubby confirmed that I had a bruise along my upper back/lower neck. Left-overs from the massage I’d gotten two days earlier. We found room in an infinity-view hot tub in the Solarium, a section that is for adults only. I tried to get my bruises submerged in the water as much as possible, but I had to hang on and squat, and the movement of the water tended to move me this way and that. The water was agreeably hot, and after about 25 minutes, I decided I was done.

While I was getting out of the tub, I noticed a man come into the Solarium with his daughter in a stroller. He paused right in front of the sign saying guests 18+ were welcome to rearrange the towels in the stroller so that his daughter would nap. Then a woman came in with her toddler son and stopped to stare at that sign. She turned to me and asked, “This is for kids, right?” I told her it wasn’t, and she turned around and left. The man with the stroller was still there, and later, as Hubby and I walked to the other side of the Solarium in search of towels, the man came pushing his stroller among all the adults as if his daughter belonged there. Some people just don’t believe the rules apply to them.

Then we went back to our cabin and packed as much as we could. As usual, we decided to carry them out ourselves, so we could toss the last few items in in the morning. Hubby decided to go walking, and I decided to catch up with my writing. (Blogs don’t write themselves, and neither do Works in Progress.)

After a while, Hubby returned with two photos. One he had bought from the couple who had organized the semi-group photo the night before, and a copy of the official group photo from D, which was part of our membership. He told me he had been told that they had had the readings and autograph sessions at 3 PM, and nobody had known how to get hold of us to tell us, because D didn’t know our cabin number. This was usually held after dinner on the last night, not the middle of the afternoon, but the last day wasn’t usually a day at sea. So we missed that activity and were saddened, but we had the photos.

We took the photos with us to dinner, and Hubby borrowed a sharpie from Jon (monster) and flitted from table to table getting autographs. In fact, two or three of the monsters approached him to give him autographed photos that they had prepared for us. We came back to the cabin with more photos than we had taken, which left us feeling happier. Eventually, D will edit all the video and audio he took during the cruise into a CD, and we will get a copy of that CD as part of our membership. That will include the reading of the stories/scripts, so eventually, we’ll get to hear those, too.

So we set the alarm to get us up to get off the ship and turned in.

The Dr Who Cruise Part 6

Friday, October 27 – Mexico

The alarm got us up at 6 AM. We crawled out of bed and got to the buffet for breakfast by 6:30. After eating, we slogged back to our cabin for bottles of water for the excursion. We each confessed that we were tired, and debated if we should even go on a 4-hour walking tour of Mayan Ruins. So we went down to the ship’s conference center, where the group was meeting, to tell D we wouldn’t make it to the ruins. Then another elevator ride up to our cabin, where I fell into bed.

About 2 hours later, I woke up and climbed out of bed. Again. We had about an hour before lunch would be served in the buffet, so we went to the card room, where I wrote. Hubby was done with his DW script and had turned it over to D on the only thumb drive he had brought with him, so he didn’t feel he could write. He tried to play solitaire on the laptop but got frustrated when it didn’t react as quickly as he thought it should. He took the laptop back to our cabin and walked until lunch time.

We were joined in the buffet by 2 other DW people, so we had conversation during lunch. Back in our room, we watched “Night at the Museum” (#1) to pass some time before we needed to head for the Music Hall, where Dominic would give a musical recital at 3:30. Dominic is a composer who has worked with the DW show.

We left our cabin about 2:50 and went to deck 8 to stroll through Central Park, which took us right to the Music Hall. We got there about 3 PM. The hall wasn’t open yet. We talked with a couple other early-birds for maybe 10 minutes, then Hubby wandered off into Central Park. I followed him until I found a table where I could sit and continue writing. It wasn’t long before Hubby returned with a couple desserts, which we devoured at my little table. Then back to the Music Hall, where we could now get in and choose our seats.

Hubby picked seats located in front of a small stage set to the left of the main stage. D asked us to move because the small stage was where Dominick was going to be. So we moved to seats at the bar, about 3 feet from where we had been sitting.

The music started at 3:30 and continued until 4:33 or thereabouts. It was great fun, a composition based on DW music. After it was over, we all had to beat feet to the Aqua Theater on deck 6, so the photographer could get our group photo taken. After that, I stopped at the candy shop to buy some jelly beans, and then we returned to our cabin, where I convinced Hubby to lay down for a nap.

About 7, we headed for the social hour at the chosen bar. We traveled aft via deck 5, where we found several members of the DW group waiting to get a group photo, so we joined them. After the photo, we went to the floating bar, which periodically rises very slowly to deck 8. By the time we got off on 8, it was after 7:30, so Hubby and I took an elevator back to deck 5 and joined the crowd collecting in front of the doors for the Main Dining Room. At 7:40, those doors opened, and for once, we were not the last ones to our table.

The Dining Room was offering lobster tails. I think everybody at our table ordered one. Some—like me—also ordered a 2^nd main dish. The lobster tails were served, and several of them were then handed off to people who had ordered one, but wanted a second. (The ship was charging for a second lobster tail, but not for other second main courses.) So, for 20-30 minutes, I sat with a lobster tail in front of me as a favor for my husband. I was hungry, so I ate the carrots and broccoli, which I wasn’t sure he would eat anyway. When Hubby finally finished his first tail, we were exchanging plates when the waiter grabbed the empty plate and whisked it away, then brought my actual main course. It was cheese tortellini, and I enjoyed it a lot. I hope Hubby enjoyed his lobster tails as well.

The Dr Who cruise - Part 5

October 26, Thursday – Roatan

We got up at 7 with no shore excursion to do. Hubby did have a 9 AM appointment with 2 other fan writers to collaborate on a short story. The DW guests would do a table reading of the freshly written stories on the last evening of the cruise. Since he had that appointment, he opted to go to the buffet for breakfast. I wanted to go to the Main Dining Room. I like the Main Dining Room for breakfast and lunch because it’s less noisy, less confusing and less hurried than the buffet.

After breakfast, I went to the card room to do some writing. This would give the steward a chance to clean our cabin.

We had appointments at the spa for a couples massage. We arrived almost ½ hour early and had paperwork to fill out. For some reason, when it was time for our massages, they decided it was too soon after his stent was put, and they could not do a massage on him. Who knew one would effect the other? So I was the only one to get a massage after all. I knew I’d been dealing with a lot of stress, but she was really working my muscles hard! Afterwards, she told me my leg muscles were as hard as a wall. A few hours later, I realized my calves were sore, and my upper back/lower neck felt bruised. (Hubby confirmed that I was bruised there.)

Hubby came back after my massage, and the two of us went to the buffet for lunch. Then we went back to our cabin to write, but Hubby seemed restless and kept going off to walk about. One time when he came back, he brought the 2 women from Australia who were the rest of his writing team. He had made a change to their script and wanted to get their opinions on it.

The two ladies had found themselves with nothing to do for the afternoon. D had told them to just take a taxi to the dolphin experience, and everybody would meet there. They went to the taxi stand, but couldn’t get a good deal, so they just came back aboard. We had a nice chat, they approved the change to the script, and then they gave him their email addresses so he could send them a copy of the script once he got home.

About 7, Hubby told me to go down to the Schooner Bar and he’d catch up with me. I said I would first go to the pizza place to fill my tumbler with pop so I’d have something to drink at the bar, and he said okay. With such a large group, we very nearly took up all the seats at the bar, so I sat down with the first batch of DW people I saw, thinking I would see Hub when he arrived. A short time later, Tim came by and told me Hubby was farther into the bar, holding a chair for me. So I went to join him, but if he was ‘following’ me, how did he get ahead of me? Why didn’t he call to me when he saw me come in? Is it any wonder we lose each other?

We went to dinner, and the guest at our table tonight was a companion of the Troughton DW way back in the late 60s. Unexpectedly, another table complained that there were too many people at their table, and not everyone could sit down. So D went over to see what was going on, and even though he had already been at our table once, Ross came over to join our table. Double fun! And there was no soup drama tonight, although the servers did break out into a dance. And those diners who were so inclined joined in.

Others at our table were going mini-golfing after dinner, while others were going bar hopping. But our group shore excursion the next day started at 7:30 AM, so we went to our cabin and to bed.

The Dr Who Cruise Part 4

Oct 25, Wednesday, - Cozumel, Mexico

We got up at 7 and had breakfast in the buffet. We had a shore excursion to learn about Mexico’s Day of the Dead. We needed to be on the shore by 8:45 at Station 4. Just before we left the ship, Hubby realized that he had left the camera in the cabin and ran back to get it. Sensory overload hit me as I reached the end of the dock and tried to find the sign for Station 4. I finally found it, hiding behind Station 5, which was hiding behind Station 6. Oberto was our guide, and he had paperwork for me to fill out. I found a table and chairs in the shade and started filling out the paperwork. Hubby showed up, so I started filling out the paperwork for him, and showed him where to sign in.

At 9AM, Oberto gathered us all together and walked us out of the crowded business section to a place where buses and taxis were waiting. He divided us into 4 different groups and put each group into a taxi van. The taxis drove us to Playa Mia, about 10 minutes from the terminal.

At Playa Mia, there was a tour put together by a cacao company, and that was what we were there for. We walked along a wandering path through a small patch of jungle. Along the way, we were shown a ‘typical Mayan hut’ and given a tiny tostada with a daub of filling as our first taste test. We were shown examples of the various spice plants they add to their cocoa drink and given a small wooden spoon with some cacao candy on it for our 2^nd taste test.

 After that, we climbed to the 2^nd floor of the cacao shop and were given a few minutes to decorate an altar for the Day of the Dead. Then we got to cross a bridge to the 2^nd story of the next building. They handed out small wooden skull faces that we could color using sharpies. And when we finished that, they had more things to taste; enchiladas, toquitos, a deep purple water made by boiling a certain type of flower, regular water, and some Mayan cocoa. The food was okay, and I wasn’t sure how I’d feel about spicy cocoa made with water and not milk, but I tried it, and it was good.

We were given 20 minutes to shop in the various stores, and there were several in the area. Hubby went down the street far enough to find 2 swimming pools and the shoreline. Then we were put back in taxis and sent back to the terminal

Sensory overload again as we made our way through the first building and its myriad shops. When we came out into the sunlight, I asked Hubby where he wanted to go, and he said ‘to the ship’. I said, “Come on, it’s this way,” and he said, “Go ahead, I’ll catch up.” I thought he wanted to find a bathroom, so I walked forward about a short block, and then waited for him to ‘catch up.’ I must have waited at least half an hour before I decided he was a grown man and the location of the ship was obvious, so I made my way to the dock and walked most of the way to the ship, then paused to sit on a bench and rest for a moment. And that’s where he found me. He was angry that I’d ‘gotten lost’ when he had OBVIOUSLY told me to go ‘back to the ship’. Not the way I remembered it at all.

Having found each other, we went to our cabin for our special tumblers, and then went to the buffet to hydrate and eat some lunch. That’s where we found A, another DW cruiser, so we sat and talked for a while.

Afterwards, we went to our cabin and worked on our stories for the afternoon. I laid down for an hour nap, and Hubby got up and went walk-about a couple times. He’s not one to stay sitting for long periods at a time. I also took a quick shower to wash away the sweat from our shore excursion, but by the time the ship pulled anchor and left Cozumel, I was deep into my writing.

When I decided to go to the group’s social hour, the boat was rocking. I felt like I had lost my sea legs. This was a bit alarming because I ‘lose my balance’ entirely too often, even on dry land. But I got to the Schooner Bar safely and found a seat on the fringe of our big group.

Before long, it was time to go to dinner. We had 2 go down 1 deck, and the elevators were mobbed, so we walked down the stairs, some of us gripping the banister as if our lives depended on it. When we got to our table, we found that Tim and George were the ‘monster’ guests for our table tonight. Tim is very outgoing and lots of fun. George has worked with Tim on lots of DW episodes, but this was his first time on the DW cruise. He seemed to be warming up to the group’s off-beat camaraderie.

We did have a touch of drama during our meal. Apparently, a server somehow dropped a bowl of soup. Some of the soup bounced as high as the ceiling, other splatters landed on 3 of the diners at our table. Hubby had a couple drops land on him. The lady next to him went through two cloth napkins wiping off splatters that hit her. Tim got so much soup on his shirt that he went back to his cabin to get a fresh shirt. Many jokes were made about the incident.

Several members of the table decided to go do the onboard zipline. I don’t know if they got their nighttime zipping done; the ship may have been swaying too much for that activity to be available. If not, they were looking forward to barhopping after that, so I’m sure they had lots of fun. Hubby and I didn’t have a beverage package that included alcohol, so we went back to our cabin to write, but that didn’t last long before we started yawning and decided to go to bed.

The Dr Who Cruise Part 3

Tuesday, Oct 24 – a Day at Sea

This was a day at sea, and we were supposed to sleep in, because all the breakfast venues opened an hour later than usual. We got up at 7 and went to the Main Dining Room for breakfast, only to find they weren’t open yet. So we grabbed an elevator to the 15^th deck, where the buffet was open.

Half an hour later, we headed back to our cabin, and at 9:30, Hubby headed for the conference center for a 10 AM meeting with his writing team.

About an hour later, I went down to see how they were doing. D, the organizer of the cruise, was there and was listing the days and times that he had activities planned. Lo and behold, some of the actors who usually get cast as monsters in DW were giving a presentation at 4 PM THAT DAY on their work, complete with photos, videos and props. I made sure of the presentation time when the meeting broke up, and then Hubby and I went to the card room (there was no library aboard the Wonder) to do some writing.

Around noon we went to the Main Dining Room for lunch, then back to our cabin to relax. We considered going to the hot tub, but opted to stay in our room and write.

At 3:30, we started for the conference center, which should have been an elevator ride straight down 7 decks, but we decided to walk to the aft (back) of the ship to check out a venue on deck 12 we hadn’t seen yet. It turned out to be an expensive restaurant with ‘imaginative cuisine’. So now we knew.

While we were waiting for an elevator, we met up with D (our cruise organizer), who started telling us about some of the hassles of having such a large group. Then we realized we were aft, and the conference center was forward, so we had to beat feet to get there.

The ‘monster review’ was 2 hours long and great fun. Ross, Tim and Jon had photos and videos of various roles they had played, and not only in Dr Who. The photos included them in the make-up chair, usually getting lots of prosthetics put on. The videos included such things as a group of monster actors practicing walking in unison, in whatever strange style had been worked out for them. Tim even brought a mask that fit over his head, and the hands that went with it for one of his monsters.

Before we knew it, it was 6 PM, and since this was a formal night for dining, we needed to return to our cabins and change. I had brought a dress to wear for formal nights, and a pair of heels, two things I hardly ever wear. Halfway to the aft of the ship, I remembered why I hardly ever wear heels; my knees were complaining, my hips weren’t happy, my ankles felt weak and uncertain, and my feet were screaming in pain. I decided right then that on the walk back to our cabin, I would take off the heels and walk in my stocking feet. Unfortunately, when we headed back to our room, we walked through the Promenade deck, which was very crowded. I didn’t dare take off my shoes until we reached deck 10 and the relative emptiness of cabin area hallways.

The Dr Who Cruise Part 2

Monday, Oct 23 – A Day at Cocoa Key.

 

We got up at 7 and went to the buffet for breakfast. The ship had docked at Cocoa Key, but hadn’t given out any newsletters to tell us what to expect. We didn’t know when we could go ashore, or even what deck we needed to go to in order to do that.

Sunday, I had walked 12,250 steps, far more than the 2K I sometimes manage at home. My legs had ached all night and were still ackey, so I took a pain pill. But my legs still bothered me at 10:40 when we left the ship to look around the island. It wasn’t long before I admitted I needed to sit for a while. I found a lounge chair and sat down in the shade. Hubby went off to look around.

 About 1 ½ hours later, when he came back, my legs felt much better, and I was more alert. He was tired from walking almost 10K steps already, so he sat down to rest. I checked my steps, and I had already walked 7K steps. Hubby rested for about 15 minutes, then we walked back to the ship.

We went to Guest Services to ask about internet service. We had brought a laptop for Hubby to work on, but we couldn’t get Word to work because it ‘couldn’t confirm we had an account with Microsoft, so please connect to the internet.’ What a bummer. We don’t usually buy an internet package on a cruise ship because the service is so lousy. But he couldn’t work without Word, so we bought internet service for 1 day to see if that would solve the problem. After all, I had used the laptop for a couple of weeks when my desktop died, and it had worked fine, but it was always connected to the internet during that time.

 We took to our cabin the instructions for signing in, and I sat down to work with the laptop, getting it onto the internet. Hubby laid down on the bed and fell asleep. He almost never takes a daytime nap. He woke up about an hour later and asked how I was doing. I was done, and Word was working perfectly. He rolled over and went back to sleep for another hour. So I changed some color settings to see if he could see the cursor any easier. He had complained how hard it was to see a white cursor on a white background. I played some games, but the color was odd; red cards were black, and black cards were blue.

Hubby awoke about 3, and we went to the pizza place for a bite to eat. After returning to our cabin, he worked on his stories, and I worked on my blog.

About 6 o’clock, we left to explore a section of the ship we hadn’t been to yet, the Boardwalk. It had a carousel, a candy shop, a hot dog stand, a hamburger joint, a sports bar or two and a rock-climbing wall, so it didn’t take us long to explore it.

We still had a ½ hour before meeting the others for social hour. We thought about going to the floating bar and riding it from the 5^th deck to the 8^th deck, but it had already left deck 5 and hadn’t yet reached deck 8. So we returned to our cabin and got the special tumblers that proved we had a beverage package, and then came back for social hour. With a group as large as ours, it’s hard to find enough chairs in any 1 bar, but we did the best we could.

We had a nice dinner with 2 actors who played various monsters on Dr Who. Hubby did his interpretation of a social butterfly, flitting from table to table to talk to members of the talent and some fan writers about some ideas he had for a story. After dinner, we returned to our cabin, worked for about an hour, and then turned in.

The Dr Who Cruise Part 1

About every 15 or 16 months, a friend of ours organizes a Dr Who Cruise. It generally is fairly small, maybe 40 people. This year’s was the largest so far, with 72 guests signing up for it, including about a dozen ‘talents’ and 26 members of one family! The next few blogs will follow Hubby and me as we enjoyed the cruise.

 

Sunday, Oct 22 – We’d been looking forward to this cruise, and now it was time to get to it. First, I got out of bed at 5:20 AM to load the dishwasher, because who wants to come home to a sink full of dirty dishes? Then I cleaned out 3 email boxes and packed my cpap for the trip. About 9:30, we tossed the suitcases into the Toyota, put my car in the garage, and we were off.

 

Getting to the parking lot at Port Canaveral was mostly uneventful, although there had been some confusion when I wanted to mapquest the directions to get there. Turns out there are 2 lots with very similar names, and I had made a reservation at Lot B when I thought I was making a reservation at Lot A. But that got straightened out before we left home, and the directions to get there were simple. However, we didn’t see the sign for the parking lot until we were driving past it, so we made a couple u-turns to get back to it. We arrived about 2 minutes late for our reservation, but we were the first ones on the 11:15 shuttle to the ship. By 11:25. The shuttle was full to the gills and took off.

 

This was a Western Caribbean cruise on the Wonder of the Seas, Royal Caribbean’s largest ship. We’d been to the Caribbean several times but traveling with our DW friends was always fun.

 

Once we got to the terminal, it was practically a walk-through to get to the ship. Of course, my artificial knees set off the security alarm, so that slowed us down a bit, but not for long.

 

The first thing to do is to go to our muster station, so we know what to do ‘in case of an emergency’, so we asked how to get there. Our muster station was through the spa area and deep in the fitness area, which seemed a strange place to put it, but we didn’t ask questions. Perhaps there was a nearby exit to the outside deck that I didn’t notice.

 

The buffet is always a madhouse on debarkation day, so we thought we’d try the main dining room, but that had a private event for those passengers who had bought the ‘key’ package, and we hadn’t, so we ended up in the buffet anyway. At least we got to claim our soft-drink package and didn’t have to rely on the buffet’s watered-down juices.

 

By the time we finished lunch, our cabin was ready for us. But we had packed everything in the suitcases except our travel documents and whatever I could stuff in my fanny pack, so there was little we could do there until our suitcases showed up. In the meantime, we explored various decks, looking for ‘quiet spots’ where we’d be able to work. John had brought some short stories to on and edit on the laptop, and I would be writing on my blog and current WiP using pen and paper.

 

We went to the fitness center about 4:30 to see if they drew our names for a spa raffle. We didn’t win anything in the raffle, but we decided to sign up for the Managers Special, which was a 75 minute massage. We made our appointments for Thursday at noon, without knowing what our DW schedule for that day might look like.

 

Our cabin was a surprise. It was pretty much a normal cabin, except it had an extra 7 or 8 feet to it. The ceiling sloped down in that area, and in the middle of the slope was a big picture window looking out over the bow of the ship. Next to the window was a button and a sign asking that we close the curtain in the evenings so as not to disturb those working on the bridge. It took us a minute to figure out that button, which was 3 buttons in one, but we did understood it before night fell.

 

Our group’s dining time was 7:45PM, and those who wanted to could meet at the Schooner Bar at 7:00 for a social hour. At about 7:45, we would all go down to the Main Dining Room and find the table we were assigned to. On the first day, I didn’t realize the Main Dining Room was located on 3 decks, so I went down to deck 4, because that was where I remembered seeing the sign for it. There was a long line to get in, but it moved pretty quickly. When I got to the maître d’ and gave my cabin number, he informed me I was on the wrong floor and sent me up to deck 5. When I got to the deck 5 maitre d’, he started to show me to my table, got distracted by his radio, and told me to ‘look around, your party is around here somewhere.’ I knew a moment of sensory overload; there was a sea of faces around me, and I couldn’t pick out 1 that looked familiar. Then I heard Hubby calling my name, and I was united with the friends who were sharing a table with us.

 

After dinner, those fans who were interested went to the conference center to discuss ‘creative endeavors’ for the cruise. Sometimes the fans write a short DW episode and film it during the cruise, but with only 7 days, that didn’t seem feasible. So it was decided to split the creative fans into groups and let them write stories 5-7 pages long. On the last night of the cruise, the professional talent would read the stories out loud to the group.

 

The gathering was turned over to the creative fans. I couldn’t participate this time because I had deadlines to meet. Hubby was placed in charge of one writing group, and he spent some time talking to the other members about story ideas. Eventually, we crawled off to our cabin and went to bed.

Pearl Harbor & Getting on Our Plane

 

Pearl Harbor

Saturday, 4/29 - John got up about 5:45, having had a miserable night. Went for breakfast at the buffet, then gathered our carry-ons and made our way to the disembarkment station. Around 8, we were sent off the ship to claim our luggage and find our tour bus. John nearly had a panic attack because he couldn't find our car keys. We were given a short tour of some sights in Honolulu, then given about 4 hrs to explore the Pearl Harbor Memorial. We saw 2 short movies and took a boat over to the USS Arizona Memorial, where we spent about 15 or 20 minutes. We didn't know if there would be a place to eat at the airport, so we got a sandwich apiece at the snack shop and finished with a look through the gift shop, where I bought a tote bag. By then, John was getting tired, so we slowly walked back to the bus and waited for the rest of the people to show up. The tour bus dropped us off at the airport at about 1:30. Our plane was scheduled to take off at 10:59 pm, so we had a long wait before we could check our luggage and go through TSA. There was no place to eat outside the TSA, so we were extra happy we'd had sandwiches to get us through.

Getting on Our Plane

John searched every one of our suitcases and the carry-on bag for the car keys, which we finally found. We discovered we could get our suitcases checked in 6 hours before the plane took off, so about 5 pm, we hopped up and got started on that. TSA was its usual nightmare for John, or more so, because the x-ray machine claimed he had metal somewhere, and they had to pat him down. Happens to me all the time, but I think it's the first time for him. Then we started walking to our gate. It was a long walk, made even longer by the number of stores that were already closed. We finally came across a restaurant that was open, so we stopped and had burgers and sodas. $50! Just before we got to our gate, we came across a news stand that was still open, though we had passed a couple that had already closed. We sat down and waited. Eventually, I went to that news stand and bought a bottle of water. When I got back, John asked, "Couldn't you just use the water fountain right over there?" My reply was, "The airplane doesn't have water fountains."

There were more people trying to get on the plane than they had seats, including a pair of parents and their 3 young girls. The clerk was looking for volunteers to be bumped so these extra people could get on. As we were checking in to board the plane, this family apparently figured out they wouldn't be sitting together, so they had to go back to the clerk to get something done about that. John and I didn't get to sit together, either. We had a 5-hour flight to LA, and I thought the plane was cold, so I didn't manage to get any sleep. John tried to get some sleep, I could see him from where I was, but I don't know if he managed it.

Nearing the End in Hawaii

Thursday, 4/27 - I got up at 6:30 for our morning excursion to the 'Grand Canyon of the Pacific'. First, we made a stop at a rocky beach to see a spatterhorn in action. That's where the incoming waves go into a tunnel in the rocks and shoots out a hole on the beach, looking much like a geyser. Very interesting.

Then we went to the canyon, which was beautiful, much greener than the mainland grand canyon. We weren't getting back to the ship until about 2, so we made a short stop in a small town, where most people got off and got a bite to eat to tide them over. John wasn't doing very well on the way back, and he promptly lay down for a nap. I took my book back to the library and read for an hour there, then went to the bar in the lobby and got a Bahama Mama. As I sat there, a long line of people walked by on their way to the luau. I heard some 700 people had signed up for that. About 1 1/2 hr after john lay down, I went back to the room and waited for him to wake. After another hour, he stirred and rolled over. I asked him if he wanted supper, and he said no, so I went to the skyline by myself. I was waiting for my 2 desserts (couldn't decide on one) when he walked in and found me, so I guess he did want supper, but he kept complaining the room was warm. After supper, he turned in for the night, and I wasn't too far behind him.

Friday, 4/28 - I got up at 6:30, even though I had set the wake-up call for 7. We had breakfast in the buffet, although we didn't have a shore excursion scheduled this day, then I got off the ship just far enough to use my phone to call John's ENT, but the office was closed. Was it that late? Didn't seem like it to me, even counting the 6 hrs of time difference. Meanwhile, John checked our account balance, then we started looking for face masks for our shore excursion the next day. The Pearl Harbor Memorial, we were told, requires face masks be worn while inside. The ship's souvenir shop didn't have any, but the medical center handed them over cheerfully. We went to deck 11 to do some reading. About 11, we went to the room to pack everything we weren't going to need. At noon, we went for lunch, then John wanted a nap, but was coughing too hard to sleep, so he went to deck 11 to take pictures. I sat in the room writing.

About 5 pm, we went to deck 11 to try to see the beautiful Nali Pai shoreline. The ship had left its dock about 2 and traveled to the east side of the island so people could see this spectacular view before it turned around and headed for Honolulu. It had been a misty day, and unfortunately, as we approached the Nali Pai shoreline, the clouds came down to sea level and obscured the view. So we went to supper at the buffet, since we were already on deck 11. John had a couple desserts, while I had corn on the cob, celery, apricots and walnuts. Back to our room to make sure everything was packed, then John went to bed. I put the big suitcases out to be disembarked for us, and went to bed about 7:45, but because it was so early, I spent some time thinking about the next scene in my Work in Progress.

More Adventures in Hawaii

Tuesday, 4/25 - Hilo, Hawaii (the big island). I got up about 6, the wake-up call came at 6:45. Went to Skyline for breakfast, where we were warned that omelets and waffles could take 1/2 hour to prepare, in case we had a shore excursion. We ordered anyway, and there was no delay. Went to the theater and shortly got sent down to find our bus. Before we boarded, they handed each of us a 'box lunch' and a can of water. Because of my knees, we were offered seats in the front of the bus. We stopped at a Japanese garden, a statue of Kamehameha, Rainbow Falls, Akaka Falls, the zoo (where we ate our lunch), a macadamia farm gift shop and a candy shop. Had to take a detour to get to Akaka Falls, and missed the turn to the falls, so had to turn around on a busy hiway. Got back to the boat about 3:30 or 4:00, went to the talk on our next port of call. Back to our room until 5:30, when we went to Skyline for supper. Long line to get in and had to skip dessert to get to the comedy show, which was good. Back to the room, read for a bit, then went to bed.

 

Wednesday, 4/26 – I have forgotten the names of the rest of the ports we visited and the islands they were on. My notes don’t include that information. We’re still touring Hawaii, and probably hitting the islands to the north and west of the Big Island.

I got up at 5:30 because I woke up. The wake-up call sounded at 6:30, and John got up. To the buffet for breakfast, then to our room to pick up stuff for our day ashore; water, our shore excursion tickets, and so on. Went to the theater to be ready for our excursion. To get to our excursion, we had to get on a tender boat and be ferried to the shore. Once there, we found our tour guide, jumped in his van, and we were off for a "Scenic Taste of Hawaii". First, we went to a coffee farm, where John bought an expensive lb of coffee ($46). Then to a farmer's market, where we bought a book, 2 jars of local jelly, a facial scrub and a bottle of essential oil (TiTree). At a macadamia nut farm, John found a lb of coffee was going for $64! (He didn't get any.) Then to a park on the beach where we got a box lunch and drink for lunch. Then back to the port for a tour of the Kona Brewing Co, where we sampled 4-5 different beers. Got dropped off at the pier about 4:05, and the line waiting for a tender ride back to the ship was a mile long. The last tender was leaving the pier at 5, and they were loading tenders as fast as they could. Once we got to the ship, we went to our room, to relax before our specialty dining reservation at 8:00.

I was not terribly impressed by the French food offered by Jefferson's Bistro. Mostly, I wondered how I was supposed to eat it. Even for the baked pear I got for dessert, I had to ask for a knife so I could cut it up and get pieces on my spoon. 

Maui, the First Island

 Getting a Taste

 Sunday, 4/23 - At the island of Maui. We had a tasting excursion at 8:15, so we got up at 6:30 and had breakfast. Had 14 passengers and a driver/guide packed into a van, driving from place to place to try various dishes. Usually, a 'tasting' is a single bite, or maybe 2, but several of these tastings involved a complete serving. John got over-heated at 1 point, and then got full at the next stop, which surprised me. The final stop was a craft brewing company that served food. John tried the 2 beers they offered for tasting, but neither of us ate our fish taco. Back at the ship, John was wiped and took a nap. Then we had supper at the skyline, which was okay. John read for a while and went to bed. I read until midnight and went to sleep.

Our room had not been made when we got back to the ship about 2. Which meant the bed had not been split. I complained - again - and someone arrived about 3 to clean it. We went to the library until about 4. It had been cleaned and the beds separated so we could use them.

 

Climbing the Volcano

Monday, 4/24 - still at Maui. Had an excursion at 8 to go to the top of the dormant volcano, supposed to be 2 to 1/2 hours, but we didn't get back until 12:30. John tried to walk the last 500 feet to the top of the peak, but only got half-way there before he had to turn around and come back or miss the bus. It was a spectacular sight, but John was running down by the time we got back to the ship. We were going to eat at the Skyline, but it wasn't open, so we went to the buffet. Listened to our voicemails on our room phone. NextCruise wanted to answer John's questions, and she would be at her desk from 2 until 4. We originally went to the wrong desk, but eventually found her. Then back to our room, where John was tired and upset. At 4, went to the talk about the next day's port, Hilo, on the Big Island. At 5:00 was a Loyalty Appreciation party. After about 15 minutes, we left to get supper. Decided to try the Cadillac Diner, but weren't impressed. John ate about half his sandwich and went back to our cabin. I finished most of my meal and went to our cabin. We talked about the luau, which was an evening excursion on Thursday, and decided to cancel our participation, so I went down and cancelled it. When I got back to the room around 7, J stopped reading and went to bed.

Saturday, Getting on the Ship

 After going to bed so early, I got up about 6, and John at about 7. When we went down to find some breakfast, the lobby restaurant wasn't open, and looked like it was undergoing renovations or something, with a ladder and some tools in the middle of the floor. Other guests told us there was a coffee shop down by the entrance, so we went down and got some breakfast sandwiches and drinks and took them to our room. Our phones worked, so John had a long call with a fellow Klingon while we waited to check out. He wanted to call another friend, but realized he didn't have that friend's number. We checked out just before 11, and I sat in the lobby with our luggage while John went outside to take pictures. He came back about 11:15, and we moved out to the driveway, trying not to miss the taxi, which was due at 11:30. We found the taxi, the driver got us to the dock just fine; it was a much shorter trip than from the airport.

We had never gotten luggage tags for the ship, so we had to go inside and find the table set up just to deal with that problem. We discovered our cabin had been changed from 4005 to 8197, so we thought we had gotten an upgrade. Turning over our large suitcases, we could now check in, and we let them take a couple pictures before we got on the ship. Of course our cabin wasn't ready for us yet, so we found our muster station and checked in, went to the buffet for lunch and then to the Pink Champayne Bar for drinks, where a trio was playing Hawaiian music.

About 3, they finally announced we could get to our cabins. Ours was hidden in a maze of hallways in the aft of deck 8, and I almost walked past it. When we walked in, our hearts sank. This was not an upgrade! There were 2 bunkbeds attached to the walls, each sticking into the room about 12 inches. The walkway on either side of the bed was about 14 wide, so we had to contort ourselves to get in and out of bed. We asked for the main bed to be split in two, leaving a larger walkway between them, but it wasn't done before we went to bed. Getting in and out was a miserable as we had imagined.

Friday, Getting There

We were at it again, flying out in the wee hours of night to catch a cruise ship. Headed for Hawaii! This was a little different, because we were flying in the day before the cruise started, in case we had a flight delay. I had booked us into a hotel in the Waikiki section of Honolulu. Their website said they had a shuttle from the airport, a complimentary breakfast and a pool. I should have kept looking.

We went to bed on Thursday, about 6 pm, and on Friday, 4/21, I got up at 1:15 AM to get ready. I woke John at 2:30. Everything was packed and in the car; all we needed to do was eat and take off. Easy Peasy. Except I forgot to water the houseplants and grab my refrigerated medicine, I was so eager to get going. Well, the best laid plans of mice, men and people going on cruises.

We got to the parking lot about 4:15, but there was nobody there to check us in. We waited with 3 other groups of people. Apparently, there was only 1 person working, doing both jobs, the clerical checking in and the shuttle driving.

We finally got to the airport about 4:45, and there were long lines at TSA, despite their signs claiming it would only take 18 minutes to get through them. It took us more than that to get to the first TSA agent, plus another 20 minutes or more to get through the machines. John and I got separated between that first agent and the machines, so I went ahead to the gate to wait for John. Well, I did pause at a little store and picked up a couple pops and candy bars, because who knew if we would be offered anything on the plane?

He got there on time, with his shoes. Things went fairly smoothly, then. We were on Southwest, and they don't have assigned seats, just your assigned boarding group. We were Group 8, the next to the last boarding group, but we managed to find 2 seats together. We discovered our seats wouldn't recline, which made it hard to doze. And there was no wifi on this plane, so there was no entertainment. Shortly after take-off, the crew passed out pretzels and drinks.

After 3 hours, we paused in Austin TX to let off some passengers. John and I changed seats to some that would recline. Then the plane filled up, and we were off to San Diego. The gate we needed in San Diego was pretty close to the gate we came in at. We ate burgers and fries and found some seats to wait in. John noticed our flight was delayed by about half an hour. I called our hotel to let them know we might get in late. They said don't worry about it; the desk was manned until midnight. (!) They also said not to worry about their shuttle from the airport, that a taxi would be cheaper, anyway. Then why advertise that they had a shuttle?

We finally got on the plane for Honolulu in mid-afternoon, and the flight was uneventful. John was antsy, but couldn't sleep. We landed in early evening, got our luggage and found a taxi to the hotel. It was not what I expected. It had a circular drive, but the drive was full of vehicles, and the taxi could barely pull in far enough to unload us. The lobby was hard to find, because of all the little businesses between it and the drive, most of them not open at 6 pm. There was no evening restaurant, just a small cafe that served breakfast and lunch, and it wasn't complimentary. We would have had to walk somewhere to find supper, but we were too tired. We went straight to our room and to bed about 7 pm.

There's a 6 hour difference between Hawaii and Orlando, so we had been up and going pretty much for 24 hours.

Neither Here Nor There

Well, I'm back, in more ways than one. In late April, we took a cruise around Hawaii on Norwegian's Pride of America. I took notes so I could tell you all about it. Before I could get those blogs written, we had a car accident that broke my right arm. No typing for me for several weeks. In the meantime, late in May, we flew to London to catch a cruise up through Scotland and the fjords of Norway. Even a broken arm couldn't keep me from that, but I didn't get any notes taken. And I already find my fond memories of these countries getting muddled in my mind, so I'm going to take these trips out of order and type/post the blog on Scotland/Norway before I go back and do the ones about Hawaii. Yes, I can type again!

The trip to get to the cruise ship was full of stress and worry, but that seems to be par for the course whenever we have to fly to the ship's port. We drove to the airport, parked our car, took the shuttle the rest of the way, checked our bag, got our boarding passes, got through TSA... That was a chore! If I went through the normal metal detector, my artificial knees would set it off, and I couldn't raise my right arm to go through the round metal detector. So they sent me through the normal detector, and then I got a thorough pat-down before we could go on to our gate.

By the way, TSA is now posting how long it will take you to get through the line, but that's just to get past the agent who studies your passport and boarding pass. You still have to get through the metal and explosives detectors.

Okay, the pat-down was done, and we went on to our gate, where we caught our flight to Montreal. Once there, we caught our over-night flight to London, where I had booked a night at one of the airport hotels. First, we wanted to recover from the flight, since we don't sleep well while flying. But also, we had to catch a shuttle from Heathrow to the Southhampton docks. Second, the shuttles picked people up between 9:45 and 10:45 am, but because we got in at 9:30 am, I wasn't sure we could collect our luggage and find our way to Terminal 4 by 10:45. We didn't, so it was a good thing I had booked our shuttle for the following day.

After walking what seemed like miles in Heathrow, we gathered our luggage, asked questions, had to go outside, take an elevator down to the underground level, walk long miles to get to the ticket station, take an elevator, get on the underground to Terminal 4, get off and take an elevator up. Luckily, just outside that elevator was a door with a sign that said, "To Terminal 4 hotels", so that wasn't hard to find. We walked a few more miles to get to the entrance to our hotel.

It was too early to check in, but we did go to the cafe and grab some lunch. By then, they had our room ready, so we went up and when we got to our room, we closed the curtains and took a nap. Later, Hubby wanted to go and search for the place where the shuttle would pick us up, so we walked another mile or so to find the Hilton. Having found it, we went back to our hotel, had supper and settled in for the night.

The shuttle was supposed to pick us up at about 10:45. We got there about 9:30 and tried to pass the time by watching other people get picked up by their rides. Probably a bad idea, as by 10:30, Hubby was positive we had missed our ride. Finally, we gathered all our stuff and moved outside (It was chilly and windy.) Our shuttle finally arrived about 10:55, having picked other people up in downtown London before it came to get us. At least that gave Hubby people to talk to during the 1.5 hr trip to the ship, so he got a chance to calm down.

The trip started out a lot chillier than we expected. Our first full day on the ship, during which we were headed for Edinburgh, Hubby made the comment, "I think I'm coming down with a cold." And of course he did.

We had a shore excursion scheduled for every day except the last, because the ship wasn't getting into Tromso (Norway) until 7 pm. And we had to get up at 4 am to get to the airport. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

The shore excursions were lots of fun. The first week or so, I was super protective of my broken arm, constantly worried it would get bumped too hard, or I would fall and do more damage. So I enjoyed the bus drives, looking out the windows, but I was too afraid to get off and explore Edinburgh Castle, because they said it was crowded and we'd be walking on cobblestones. Eventually, I did become more relaxed about my arm.

I did fall, a couple of times, but did no damage to my arm. Once when I was trying to climb onto an antique street car. The steps were really steep, especially the top one, and the tour guide was acting as my handhold, but the step was too deep, and I went down onto my right knee. It took both the tour guide and Hubby to get me back on my feet so I could find a seat. But no bleeding, so I was fine. The 2nd time was in Dublin, but I'll get to that later.

The Sheffield Islands (Scotland) have stone rings similar to Stonehenge. The Shetland Islands (also Scotland) have Shetland ponies, and I think that's where we saw an archeological site of a Neolithic village on the beach. The homes were built of stone slabs, and the furniture was made of stone, too. Plus assorted furs for the beds. I got off the bus for that and walked to the site, walked all around it. There was a Laird's house not far away that was open as a museum, but as slow as I walk, I didn't figure I had time to go there, so I went back to the bus. This was the place where the tour guide lost one of our group. The guide had said to get back to the bus by 11, and everybody had except one. After looking for her for 10 minutes, the guide made arrangements for the other buses to keep an eye open for her, and then we left. A little ways down the road, she announced that one of the other buses had collected the wayward woman and she was safe.

Norway's fjords are beautiful. The mountains are beautiful. At that time of year (early June), the snows are melting, and the waterfalls and rivers are raging, which is more interesting to see that 'stately and sedate'. The daily high was always predicted to be 52F, but at least one day, it got up around 60F, so you never quite knew if you would need a jacket or not. We had a great time, except for John's cold.

Now, remember how I said the trip there was stressful and worrisome? The trip back was much much worse. We got up at 4am and went to the buffet for a continental breakfast, which consisted of not much. We were supposed to meet at the Aqua lounge at 5am, and at 5:30, they would take us out to the shuttle. We got to the Aqua about 5:05, and they were already hurrying people out. There were 2 shuttles, and both of them were packed full. The one we got had no luggage capacity, so our carryon had to ride inside with us.

We got through Norway's TSA okay, which led us to Gate 32. There weren't enough chairs in the gate lobby for everybody to sit down, so they brought in folding chairs. The plane was supposed to take off at 8:35am. That's when the flight crew for the charter flight arrived, however, so it was more like 10am before the plane took off. Naturally, it got into Dublin late, and then, the luggage took over an hour to arrive at the carousel. Consequently, by the time we had our luggage collected, we had missed our flight to Philly. We trudged our way to the American Airlines ticket counter to see what could be done. Us and about 100 other people who had been on that charter flight.

Luckily, there was a cruise line representative there to help us with this problem! Over the course of several hours, he saw that we all got booked on the next day's flight, gave us bottles of water, sent us to the food court to grab some supper (and keep the receipts!), got us all booked into various hotels for the night, and arranged shuttles to get us to those hotels. It involved a lot more walking to get to the shuttle, which was parked 3 or 4 blocks away... felt like a lot more than that.

And now, the time I fell in Dublin; It was while I was getting off that shuttle at the hotel. I was on the stairs to exit, and somehow I lost my balance. I fell backwards, against my hubby, who staggered, but didn't let me hit my head on the driver's seat. So, no damage done, I got back up and got off the bus, and we chatted with the driver for a moment, then went inside. Very nice hotel, but we were exhausted and went to bed about 7pm.

In comparison, the following day was a breeze, but it had its snags. We were concerned when the shuttle didn't pick us up until 10:30am. We'd been thinking we would need 4 hours to get through the airport, and the plane took off at 1:55 pm. I needed help getting through the automatic kiosk, but it seemed a lot faster than going through the regular line. Then the kiosk printed out only one piece of paper, which said, "You have been selected for a Traveler's Survey". My helper told me to take it up to the bag check window, and they would help me. The survey was apparently only 1 or 2 questions, but the guy's machine didn't want to read our passports, so he had to enter the information manually. Finally, we got our boarding passes and could head for our gate, except we didn't know what gate!

We got through Ireland's TSA, complete with pat-down for me. Then we had to go through the US TSA, only when we found it, they sent us through a line that didn't have anybody manning it, which was worrisome as well as a relief. Then we walked and walked and walked until we finally found our gate, where we could sit down for 20-30 minutes. The flight was full, of course, with all those left-overs from the day before. Hubby and I weren't sitting anywhere close to each other. And the entertainment wasn't working. I slept for about 1.5 hrs, and hubby read his book.

We got to Philly and found our next gate. We had about 3 hours to wait. Eventually, we boarded that plane and started the last leg of our journey, to Orlando. The plane would touch down about 10:05pm.

In Orlando, we gathered our luggage and said good-bye to the shipmates who had made the entire trip with us. We found the pick-up location for the parking lot's shuttle, and called to let them know we were ready. This was about 10:55 pm. We saw lots of shuttles come and go, but not ours. At 11:20, we called them again. And several times after that, but they either didn't answer or hung up on us. Finally, about midnight, our shuttle arrived and was packed solid in no time. The driver was smiling and upbeat, as if nothing was out of the ordinary. And when I went to the office to pay for the extra day that we were stuck in Dublin, they didn't charge me $7, like for a full day; they charged me $10!

Anyway, we drove home, and got here about 2am on Wednesday. Here it is Sunday, and we're still recovering.

We really like cruising. It's the flying back and forth that drives us crazy.

Last Day at Sea & Getting Off the Ship

 

Thursday, 11/17 - Last Day at Sea

We got up about 7:30 and went to breakfast. John wasn't feeling quite right. I didn't feel like biking in the morning, thought I might do it later on, but never got around to it. John went to deck 8 to read. I went to the Atrium bar on deck 6 to write. Late in the morning, we got in line to settle our account with the ship and went to lunch.

I was hoping we could go to the hot tub, but John wanted to get packing done, and we didn't want to pack wet swimsuits and water shoes, so we went back to the cabin and packed. Despite our 'souvenirs' (4 bottles of rum, a towel and a dress), we still had room in the suitcases. Afterwards, we both went to deck 8 for the rest of the afternoon. John was feeling better by 4:00 and had a mojito, then did some walking.

I don't remember where we had supper, but since we were getting off with our luggage (supposedly at 7:30 AM), we went to bed a little earlier than we usually did.

 

Friday, 11/18 - Getting Off the Ship

Note: Friday, 11/18 - Getting Home has already been ranted about in the blog titled A Rude Return Home, posted on 11/24. I won't repeat the getting home part of the day, but the Getting off the Ship was also an adventure in frustration, so I'll go through that here.

We decided to get off the ship with our luggage with us. We thought we would save some time that way, as well as avoiding the frustration of waiting until our color of luggage tags was called. Little did we know...

We got up at 6 and went to breakfast. We had wanted to go to O'Sheehan's for our last breakfast, but for some reason, it wasn't open that morning. So we probably had breakfast at the buffet.

According to the instructions handed out the night before, those of us carrying our own luggage off got to start leaving the ship at 7:30. What none of the passengers knew was that the ship was late getting into the port, and didn't yet have approval to unload passengers at 7:30. So we—and a whole bunch of other people with their luggage—got caught in a traffic jam that had previously been known as the forward elevator lobby. None of the elevators would go to deck 7, which was where the gangplank was at. The stairs were roped off, so you couldn't walk to deck 7. All the forward elevators were stuffed with people and their luggage, plus (we heard) all the forward elevator lobbies were just as stuffed. Wall to wall people and luggage, and all the crew members were doing were telling us to leave a walkway so people could get through. How? Are we supposed to climb on top of each other until there's room for a walkway? And who's going to use the walkway, when nobody can get anywhere anyway?

Frustration simmered. It might have been easier to wait if SOMEbody had made an announcement that they had hit a snag (pulling into port late) and nobody could get off yet. But nobody had the guts to make that announcement, so frustration simmered, getting hotter and hotter.

Then random crew members started to arrange us in a long line leading away from the elevator lobby, heading aft. Before too long, we met a long line heading our way from the other direction. Now what?

Finally, and still with no announcement as to who was allowed to get off at that time, a crew member removed several chairs that were blocking the entrance to O'Sheehan's and started urging the line to go in there. I thought they were just corraling us up for some reason, but they led the line through the side door to the restaurant, into the theater lobby, and from there we could go out on deck, move a bit to the right, and get on the gangplank to leave. There were at least 3 levels of gangplank before we entered the building. It was kind of like being in the middle of a stampede. John and I got separated, and didn't see each other again until I pulled over to the side as I entered the building, and waited for him.

Not everybody who was getting off with us had their luggage with them, so others must have joined the fray when it was 'time' for them to get off. Again, it might have been more orderly, if somebody had made any timely announcements about that.

When we finally got to the bottom floor, they were yelling instructions about where to pick up your luggage. You were supposed to go to the opposite end of the building, claim your luggage, and come back and get into line. Thankfully, we had our luggage with us.

Before that day, I had thought our luggage was great. Almost too big, for they were pretty heavy once we got them packed (and we still had more room!) They're the kind that has any-direction rollers, and you 'push' them along by holding onto the handle and keeping the suitcase upright. But on that hurried walk down the gangplank, mine seemed to have a mind of its own, and it kept wanting to veer, either towards me or away from me. It almost tripped me several times. I wonder if we had its load lop-sided, with more weight on one side than the other.

Anyway, we got through the line, through customs, and out of the building. And that's when I start narrating what happened to us in A Rude Return Home on 11/24.

Dominican Republic

 

Wednesday, 11/16 - Dominican Republic

We got up at 6:00 and went to the buffet for breakfast. After that, it was a looooong walk down the pier to find our shore excursion, Puerto Plata Culture, History and Heritage. Puerto Plata is either a city, or an area that has a city in it, I'm not sure which.

I had read the tickets wrong, and we arrived at the duty-free shops about an hour early. I remembered being at this particular group of shops at least twice before, but we have been on several Caribbean cruises, so it wasn't that surprising. John looked around at the shops while I sat in what shade I could find to gather my energy after yesterday's 'forced march'.

Thank goodness it was a bus tour, but I think most all the shore excursions here were, since the port was some 25 miles from the city.

The first stop on the tour was a rum factory, where we got to taste several versions of rum. I still think 9:30 AM is too early in the day for rum tasting. The tour started with a room full of rum casks. It was totally dark, except for small lines of lights outlining the path to follow to get to the exit. Then a small theater that could only seat about half the people who were on the tour. (I think there were 2 buses there at the same time.) After a movie about the history of this rum company, we were taken to another room, where they had some historical artifacts having to do with the rum-making process. It was here that they passed out little sample glasses, and gave us samples of about 8 tastes of their rum. The factory store was across the street. But we had already bought 4 bottles of rum during this cruise, so we decided we didn't need any more.

Next we were taken to a jewelry shop that specialized in amber and larimer jewelry. Larimer is only found on this island. We were sent inside for a chance to buy jewelry, but learning the price of one piece was enough to dissuade me from buying anything. I had a lot of trouble persuading the sales person I really wasn't interested in anything. When we came back out and got on the bus, we almost left behind a couple who had been paying for their purchase!

Somebody asked why there had been police there to steer us into and out of the store, and the tour guide said it was to make sure the pan-handlers and peddlers didn't bother us. The police presence left us with a strange, 'you are watched' kind of feeling.

Next, we went to the amber museum, which also has a permanent display on the art of making cigars. Of course there was a gift shop, and John bought... a pound of coffee!

Back on the street, I was wearing down, so I climbed back on the bus with a couple other people to wait. The rest of the group walked a few blocks to see 'Umbrella Street. After about 20 minutes, the bus went to pick up the others, and we started back for the pier. I caught a brief glimpse of Umbrella Street, and they had dozens of open umbrellas suspended over the street.

The Dominican Republic is the only port I remember where as we approached the gate to the port, a guard came aboard the bus and had to see everybody's ship-board card. To prove we had a reason for coming to the port, I suppose.

We reached the duty-free shops with about 37 minutes before we had to be on the ship. John wanted to buy me a Caribbean shirt that would fit me. He knew exactly what store had them. I didn't want another shirt, but to his surprise, I chose a Caribbean-style dress. (He was surprised. I was shocked! I swore off dresses decades ago!) Then we had that loooong walk back to the ship, which took us 7-8 minutes (I timed it). It was a very long pier.

We went to O'Sheehan's for a late lunch, then spent some time in the hot tub. About 7, we went to the theater for a dance show. This was our 'big night' on the ship, so I wore my new dress. The show was okay, the dancing was good, but I had trouble with the plot. I'm not sure it had one.

We left a few minutes before the end of the show to go to the other end of the ship, to the restaurant Cagney's, where we had dinner reservations. John was dragging on the way there, and had a little trouble understanding the menu. (It was past his usual bed time.) Since we were dining on a package plan, certain items on the menu were not available to us. We had a very nice dinner, and as we were walking out, we came across a couple who had been on the kayaking shore excursion with us, so we exchanged a few pleasantries with them. Then off to the cabin for the night.

Puerto Rico

Tuesday, 11/15 - Puerto Rico

It was raining when we went to deck 15 for breakfast. We had to try to run between the raindrops to get to the buffet. Of course that didn't work very well, so we got somewhat wet. And again when we went back to our cabin. But the rain didn't last long.

Our excursion today was the Mofongo and Mojito Experience. The group was large, so it got broken into 2 groups, and our group had to wait around for 15 minutes to let the first group get ahead of us. I was disappointed to learn it was a walking tour of the city, but I bravely set out with them, and was able to keep up for a while. Just as I (and John) were thinking we couldn't possibly keep up the pace much longer, we were led up to the 2nd floor of a 'cultural lounge', where we were seated around tables. Among talking about the history of their rum-making, they gave us appetizers and a mojito (which we hadn't liked on the ship, but these were good). Then they passed out big wooden mortars to everybody. Each had some cassava and a plantain chip in it. They gave us each a pestle and taught us how to grind the cassava and plantain chip into mush. Then they added a small ladle of chicken stew to the mush, and a fork to eat with. This was the mofongo, and it was quite tasty and very filling.

After lunch, they expected us to continue walking! I wanted a siesta. But I tried to keep up with the others. At one point we had to walk 2 blocks up a steep hill. I had to stop 3 times to catch my breath before I caught up to the others, who had stopped to wait for me.

Eventually, we came out on a hilltop near the bay, and we could see our ship sitting at the dock. It looked very far away. I was really dragging, but had no choice but to keep walking. The tour guide was worried about the time, so every time I caught up to the group, she immediately started off again. I didn't have a chance to catch my breath again. The closer we got to the ship, the further ahead the group got, and I didn't care. I didn't stop walking, even though my stomach got to feeling a little sick.

We finally made it to the dock, and John even had time to stop at the duty-free shop and buy a souvenir towel he had noticed earlier. I was wiped, and went to our cabin to lay down. After an hour, we went to deck 6 for cokes, then John went to deck 8 to read, while I returned to the cabin to lay down again.

About 5, we went to the main dining room for supper. Afterwards, we went to the mojito bar on deck 8 to try a couple flavored mojitos. We liked the spicy passion fruit mojito, but not so much the raspberry guava one, which seemed a little heavy on the alcohol.

Then we went to the theater for a comedy show. I thought there would be 2 comedians again, but there was only one. Back to our cabin for the night. I found I had walked 10,522 steps on this day. We went to bed at 8:30, but at 9:30, I got up to plug in my phone to recharge. At 10:00, I got up to take a tylenol, my legs were aching so much. Then up at 10:45 for another tylenol, and I could finally fall asleep.

Rum Factory Tour & St Maarteen's

Sunday, 11/13 - Rum Factory Tour and Tasting

We went to the Savor for breakfast, which was good, but not great. I went back to our cabin and laid down for about 1/2 an hour, and got up feeling much more awake. Meanwhile, John went off to do some walking. Our excursion started at 9:30. I don't remember what island this was, but the roads were the pits.

First, we went to a famous woodcarver's workshop and store. It was beautiful work, but I'm not into abstract or primitive artwork, so we didn't buy anything.

On to see Marigot Bay, which is only accessible by water taxi. We got to 'see' it from a wide spot in the road at the top of a hill. Surprisingly, it looked amazingly like a beach.

Then we were on to a rum factory for a tour and some taste testing. The factory tour consisted of a 2-minute audio tape, an 8-minute video tape, and then a walk to an open room in the factory, where we got a 10-to-15-minute lecture on their process of making rum. Unfortunately, the tour guide did not have a microphone, and they had combined 2 busloads into one tour, so it was very hard to hear her. Then our busload was sent through a labyrinth of colorful carnival characters and into the tasting room. They had about a dozen different varieties out, and we could taste as many of them as we wanted. Those of us who wanted to buy some were shunted off to the factory store, where, unfortunately, the card reader wasn't working. Since we don't carry much cash, we couldn't buy anything. Back to the bus to return to the ship.

The driver and tour guide wanted to show off their new way into town, called the Millennium Hiway. It seemed in even worse shape than the regular roads, until we got into the tunnel, where it smoothed out a bit.

The bus dropped us off at the duty-free shops at the pier. John wanted a pair of water shoes, but he got distracted by a liquor store, where he bought the 2 bottles of flavored rum he'd wanted to get at the factory. I went on to other stores to look for water shoes in his size, and when he finally caught up to me, he approved of the pair I'd found, and we bought those. The only pair I'd found in his size.

We dropped things off at the cabin, then went to a bar on deck 8 to get cokes. John finished his walking for the day. Then we hung out for a while, him reading and me writing. We had dinner in the main dining room. It had very few customers when we got there. It filled up some as we ate, but was still not full when we left about 6:30.

Our excursion for the next day had been cancelled, due to technical difficulties with the boat we would have been using. We went to see if some other excursion appealed to us. Nothing did, so we decided to stay on the ship.

 

Monday, 11/14 - St Maarteen

We got up and had breakfast as usual, but we didn't have any excursion today, as we'd been informed the day before. Since we aren't big on buying souvenirs, we decided to stay aboard and see what we could find to do. After breakfast, we started with some exercise, John doing his walking, and I going to the gym for a bike ride. John was still walking, so I took my notebook and pen to the deck 6 atrium bar for a coke and to write.

Fairly late in the morning, Arts & Crafts set up a table on the dance floor and handed out journal kits for those who wanted to make them. The instructions came in the form of a 16-page booklet of pictures and text explaining how to 'sew' the journal together. They did warn us that it would take us longer than a half hour, which was all the time allotted for Arts and Crafts. I sat at the bar, sipping my coke, and got it done in about an hour. It was fun and not difficult. It reminded me of lacing leather pieces together, particularly in one of the more challenging designs, like Mexican Basketweave. But I didn't have to worry about the lacing getting twisted, because I was using embroidery thread.

John found me, and we went for a light lunch at O'Sheehans. It wasn't as noisy as usual, because we were in port, and the casino wasn't open. Then we went to deck 8 so John could finish his walking - it takes time to walk 10,000 steps! But the bar I sat at to write didn't open until 3:45 or 4:00, so I couldn't have a coke until then.

We went to the noodle station for supper. This is a complimentary restaurant, only open for lunch and dinner. They have a limited number of seats, and once those are all filled, they turn away everybody else, so you have to get in line for it well before it actually opens. The food was good, but it seemed like a madhouse. People closest to the kitchen were getting their desserts before the ones further from the kitchen were getting their appetizers.

After supper, we went to the comedy club, where we could not get a waiter's attention to get anything to drink. The show was good, although we'd heard pieces of it before, when we attended the comedy show in the theater. And then John was tired, so we called it a night. 

St Thomas & St John's

Friday, 11/11/22 - St Thomas

Our shore excursion for the day was Kayaking, Hiking and Snorkeling. We were a little nervous about it, because neither of us had ever been Kayaking. I was worried the hike might become a forced march for me, since I walk so slowly and don't have much stamina. But the snorkeling would definitely be fun!

The 'bus' was a truck with lots of back seats in it, and no doors on the sides. Also, no seatbelts, so one had to be careful not to fall out. The bus took us to the other side of the island, where we received 10 minutes of instruction on how to kayak. Then we were loaded into the kayaks, usually 2 to a boat. (One family of 3 put their young daughter in the middle, and there may have been one woman in a boat by herself, I'm not sure.) I was nervous getting in, but I managed it with lots of help from a couple of the guides. I was in the front seat. John sounded just as nervous, getting into the back seat. The dock was in a small inlet, and I dutifully paddled around, trying to get a feel for this new mode of traveling. But it seemed like every time I paddled, I bumped into somebody else's boat or some bushes. I didn't feel like I had any control over getting it to turn or stop at all.

Soon everybody was ready, and we took off. I paddled left, right, left, right... but the boat kept turning left. I wondered if it was because John and I were both right handed, and those arms would push harder. Then one of the guides realized John was having problems, and came over to give him a second belt to help hold him upright. That was nerve-wracking for me, since I had no idea what was going on behind me, and couldn't turn enough to look. We took off again, already far behind the others, but the guide stayed with us. John said it was uncomfortable for him to sit in the boat, and if he tried to paddle, he sank down into the seat. So... I was paddling alone.

We caught up with the others, for they had stopped to talk about the local flora and fauna, and I bumped into other boats again, still unable to stop. As soon as a guide started out again, I was right there after him, trying not to fall behind again. But we did, and when we finally reached the end point of the kayaking, everybody else had moved on to the hiking stage. John and the guide did that, trying to catch up, but I was pretty winded, so after 100 feet or so, I decided to turn back and go to the tent, where there was a picknik table and benches for sitting.

Before long, everybody got back, and it was on to the snorkeling. Unfortunately, John didn't have any water shoes, and when he took off his clunky shoes, he couldn't walk on the rocky beach to get in the water. Everybody else was already a quarter mile away, so we decided to pass on the snorkeling and waited for them to get back.

Because we had taken so long to kayak to the finish, they sent us back to the starting point in a motor boat, our kayak tied up along side of us. I kind of wanted to kayak back, but in hind sight, there wasn't enough time for us to move back as slowly as we had moved outward. We would have missed the bus back, and would have missed the ship.

We got back to the ship about 1:30, where we changed out of our wet(!) clothes and went to O'Sheehan's for a late lunch. I guess we didn't get wet enough that morning, because after lunch, we changed again and went to the hot tub. Later, we went to the buffet for supper. There was no show in the theater this night, so we returned to our cabin to watch some tv. I slathered on moisterizer, because I was sun-burnt from my head right down to the tops of my feet.

 

Saturday, 11/12 - St John's

For some reason, I woke up tired this day, getting up at 7. Our shore excursion wasn't until 12:45, so after we had breakfast, I laid down for an hour and felt much better. Then I went to the Atrium bar on deck 6 for a coke and to write, while John went in search of a quiet place to read.

We met at the cabin at noon, and went to find our excursion, titled A Taste of Antigua (the city we were in). They loaded us into 3 extended vans to drive us around a little bit and see some of the sites, then we were dropped off at a night club venue for the tasting bit. We were given a half glass of fruit punch to help refresh us as we found seats around several tables. We listened to some history of the island and were given tastes of 3 different ages of rum. We were also given some sugar cane, some local dishes and a native fruit called a sweet apple (which was not an apple at all. It had a slight similarity to a pomegranate, but with bigger seeds.)

After that, we were loaded back up on the vans and returned to the dock. Did not notice any shopping locations at or near the dock, so we didn't get any souvenirs. We rested a bit and then went to O'Sheehan's for supper.

After that, we went to the theater for a musical play about Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins, and Jerry Lee Lewis and the small recording company they all started with. I enjoyed it a great deal, since it was mostly early rock and roll. For that same reason, I don't know how John felt about it. Then back to our cabin to call it a day.