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.

Monday, 8/8 – Day at Sea

At last we had an opportunity to sleep in, and we did. Hubby slept at least an hour later than he normally does, aided by the fact that fog had the ship packed in and the day was quite dim. When I finally got up and got moving, we had to report to a particular restaurant for a face-to-face meeting the UK Immigration Service. All the ship’s guests needed to do this. After the UK official’s met with us, and determined that our passports were indeed ours, those passports were ‘confiscated’ so they could be stamped and given back to us. In 4 days. This did not make us happy, but what were we going to do?

With the thick fog, the day was chilly, and we decided it was too chilly to use the hot tub. We went to the main dining room for lunch. I had hush puppies, a tuna melt with French fries, and a crème brulee. I don’t remember what Hubby had; probably sea food, as he does as often as he can.

I went back to our cabin and tried to finish the book I had checked out of the library. I think it was The White Spirit by Mercedes Lackey. I don’t think I’ve read much by Ms Lackey, but this one pulled me in and kept me entertained, despite several names being too much the same for my liking. I’ve had another author compare my writing style to hers, so maybe I should read more of hers and see if I can discover what she does that has so many fans enthralled with her work. Anyway, when we went to see the evening music review, I had about 29 pages left to read.

This was the second music review that was offered on this cruise. There comes a point where you aren’t sure if a dancer is slow leaving the stage because their character is uncertain if he should leave, or because that dancer momentarily forgot their next movement. The singers and dancers are good enough – certainly far better than I could ever hope to be – but Hubby suffers from TB (tired butt) after sitting for 5 minutes, so I’m not sure we’ll be going to see the 3^rd music review. We’re more interested in seeing something that has a plot involved.

After the show, we had reservations at Cagney’s Steak House. This was a special being offered by our cruise line, where we could eat at a specialty dining location without paying for it. Hubby ordered shrimp for his appetizer, and they were huge. My appetizer was a beefsteak tomato, cut into 3 slices, then stacked back together with sliced onions in between, and some kind of balsamic sauce on top. I can never get enough tomatoes.

Hubby ordered a filet mignon, and I ordered a petite filet mignon, with steamed broccoli and a baked potato. I liked the meat, didn’t have any problems chewing it up. The broccoli was very lightly steamed, meaning it was still crunchy, but I ate it. The baked potato was over-done, meaning the insides were mushy, while the skin was crunchy and difficult to cut. But I ate it all and didn’t have any room left for dessert. When they brought the check for us to sign, Hubby was very glad we didn’t have to pay the $140 bill!

So we went back to our cabin and Hubby turned in, while I finished my book. Although the ending was not really a happy ending, I was satisfied with it. It was, after all, better than it could have been!