Day 4: At Sea

Today’s weather turned out to be much better than I’d imagined it would. We had a lot of sun, some wind and slightly bouncy seas. It was life as usual on the ship. A good day. 

It helped a great deal that we finally got a great night’s sleep. That the “neighborhood” was calm and quiet helped immensely. We were in Sabatini’s for breakfast shortly after it opened at 7:30am and I mixed things up a little with oatmeal and berries. Oatmeal, I’ve decided, has no staying power. I was starving a few hours later. 

Our view at breakfast

But before hunger set in, I attended a smart phone photography session in the Wheelhouse that turned out to be really quite good. I especially appreciated it because I’ve really spent no time exploring the camera settings on my new iPhone and the photographers actually explained a few functions that are unique to the iPhone 18 Pro. 

Lunch was in the Botticelli Dining Room with Nyoman and Peter, and by 2:30pm I was in the Terrace Pool for a water workout.  It was sheer endurance to get through it today. The pool water was considerably cooler and a little choppy and I froze…but I persisted. After an hour, I stood in a shower as hot as I could tolerate for 20 minutes to warm up. 

Tonight was the only “formal” formal night of the cruise (we will have a dress to impress night on a later sea day). We started the evening in the Elite Lounge (it’s all around wonderful) and then went to dinner. I had to send back my first meal when the halibut that I was so looking forward to was totally overcooked. The second plate was perfect.  But, in general, the food has been great; I think this fish just sat a little too long under a heat lamp. 

G swung by the Welcome Aboard champagne waterfall while I went to the Princess Theater to grab our his favorite seats (this year), at the top of the theater on Deck 7. This set us up to make a quick exit after the show and enabled us to get seats in the Vista Lounge for the comedian whose show began at 8:45pm. 

The reserved Premier seats in the Princess Theater on the Grand Princess.
Isn’t it a pretty Princess Theater?

Production show British Invasion is an oldie but a goodie. The difference in production value between this ship and the newer ones is astounding. The lighting, scenery and sound quality is all fairly basic compared to more recent builds but I don’t think it mattered one bit to the audience, who was in the perfect demographic to enjoy that show. Frankly, I enjoyed it more than any production show we saw on the Star Princess. 

Comedian Eric Lyden’s act really hasn’t improved in the ten years since we last saw him perform. ‘Nuff said. 

And, finally, on this light day (content-wise) I’d like to share some initial thoughts on the Grand Princess. If we had any reservations at all about cruising on the oldest ship in the Princess fleet just months after cruising on the newest one, they have been quickly put to rest. The ship looks to be in excellent condition. Our cabin is perfect. The bathroom, the drawers (usually a weak point), the shower, the sink stopper, the mattresses. This could be a brand new ship given their condition. 

The bathroom is unnecessarily large (but so is the shower, which is nice), the closet resultingly small, and the cubbies  shallow, but the room’s remaining storage is similar to other Grand Class ships. The crew has all been wonderful. It’s obvious that this is a well managed ship.  

Of course, if we didn’t have hot water, AC or a working toilet, it would dampen my praise substantially. But that hasn’t been the case. We needn’t have been concerned. 

I’ll continue to share thoughts going forward, but just wanted to get these out there. We’re loving this!

However, we are sailing into a perfect storm of Hurricane Polo and tropical storm Rachel. What the heck?!?  I anticipate further itinerary changes. In fact, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if this cruise ends up being San Diego and Ensenada (Rachel permitting). We don’t care. Life on board, even without ports, is pretty darn nice. 

Day 3: San Diego 2

Steward Robert’s little chat with our neighbors worked a charm. We had no door knocking in the middle of the night. Instead we had extensive chit chatting in the corridor, but, fortunately, not at 3am. More like 1am. We haven’t experienced this kind of thing since we did the short Spring Break cruise on the…was it the Caribbean Princess?  I think so. That’s when the college students loudly returned to their cabins around 5am or so. Fun times!

We were in Sabatini’s at 7am (opening time today). I had asked Restaurant Manager Priscilla if she could get me some nutritional info on the Greek yogurt they use, and her staff came through for me this morning. I’ve never heard of this brand, and its protein is definitely lower than the Fage brand I use at home, but that’s fine. I have to closely monitor my protein to make sure I don’t go over a certain number of grams. This yogurt gives me more leeway at lunch and dinner. I’m glad I asked. 

We didn’t linger over breakfast today. Instead we left the ship and took an Uber over to Sea World San Diego.  Somewhere (I forget where), in the past two days I saw something online that said that veterans and their families could get a free admission to Sea World until September 30.  Tickets had to be pre-purchased online, and eligibility verified through ID.me, but we are set up for that already, so the process was not too onerous. I completed it and downloaded our tickets (usually $79pp but frequently available with a discount for $59). Ŵe Ubered over from in front of the ship on Harbor Drive for just under $20. 

I should mention here that I had purchased $200 of Uber gift cards for $160 through Costco less than two weeks ago. I should had started doing that earlier in the summer. We’re limited to $200 every 14 days, and our $200 was exhausted part way through the return ride today. Luckily I’ll have time to make another purchase before we arrive in Hawaii. 

If yesterday we got our exercise pedaling, today it was all about walking. I had been to Sea World Orlsndo in 2003 and loved it. No surprise, given my affinity for underwater sea life. I had gotten in for free then, too. G was away for military, I was meeting my sister in law and two very young nephews for a few days at Disney, and flew out a day early to take advantage of that free day. Totally alone with complete freedom to explore as I wanted, I spent a long day at the park, despite having arrived after a red eye flight, and remember the shows, the mime, the displays and how much I had enjoyed it. 

Frankly, Sea World San Diego seemed like a poor relation. It was busy- lots of families- but a bit run down. Everything seemed to have an extra charge, and our first impression was that our free tickets were just a starter pack. We were most struck by the number of food stalls and gift shops. In fact, we later learned that guests could pay $40 for unlimited all day food. Not a bad deal…but it’s all junk food. The number of shows seemed rather limited, but we quickly learned to just see the animals separate from the shows. 

This was on display at Sea World, but we were able to watch part of the airshow from a hot tub on the back of Deck 16 later in the day.

Hi there!

The dolphins were impromptly (is that a word?) doing flips on their own. I’d like to think it was for fun, but it’s hard to say. It could have just been muscle memory.

Orca whale

I especially wanted to ride the two roller coasters, but one never opened all day, and the second seemed to run sporadically. Still, we waited in line for quite a while and finally got a ride. The wait didn’t dissuade us; we’ve been known to wait 100 minutes to ride 97 seconds on the latest highest, fastest, steepest coaster in the world at Ohio’s Cedar Point. Of course, we were much younger then. 

Yep, we did that! Old but still kicking.

When it came time to ride Tentacle Twirl, G didn’t think he needed to, but I definitely did. That was fine; at least he was able to take a few pics of me on the ride. I stood in line for 15 minutes or so with all the excited kids and was excited myself. The 4 year olds were saying “Woohoo, I’m tall enough to ride this with dad (40 inch minimum height); the 7 year olds were saying “Woohoo I’m tall enough to ride this without dad (48” minimum)!”; and this 66 year old was saying “Yay, my ba$$ fits in this swing seat made for kids!”

We finally visited the jellyfish display, which was one of my favorites of the day. My favorite way to see jellyfish…in a tank. Not brushing against me as I dive or snorkel. 

Upside down jellyfish reflected it a mirror underneath

By then it was after 2pm and we were starting to fade a little. Or maybe we were just peopled-out. We left the park, Ubered back to the ship (under $25) and stopped in the International Cafe for a light lunch before returning to our cabin. I dressed for another water workout and G chatted with new friends on the Terrsce Deck as I used the pool for an hour. Then we both adjourned to a Deck 16 hot tub to warm up. 

By the time we had gotten cleaned up, it was 4:30pm, so we swung into the Elite Lounge in the Vista Lounge and I took a pic of the uncovered windows to show how it really does open up the room. I like it!  I also love the food display by Jimber and one other cook from India whose name eludes me. Today the acoustic guitarist was playing some light accompanying sounds and it was really a nice event. 

Dinner with Libres and Sulton was fantastic. They are so good to us (all the crew we’ve encountered, which is admittedly not many in two days, have been wonderful). I especially like how the dining rooms open at 5pm and the evening’s Princess Theater shows are at 7:30pm and 9:30pm.  We are not having to rush through dinner at all. On the Star Princess, the Sanctuary Dining Room opened at 5:30pm and the first show was at 7pm. We were always racing through dinner. I mean, G darn near had to stuff his cheeks full of filet mignon (every night) to chew on while we awaited the start of the shows! 😉

The ship was a little late leaving San Diego and I joked that they were, as a result of the unknown path of Hurricane Polo, still trying to work out where to go. Captain Ravera announced that we were heading south as planned, and he would keep us out of harms way (of course) but I’m not convinced that the remainder of this cruise will follow even the revised itinerary from three days ago. It doesn’t matter. I’m just kind of relieved to have some time to really relax and catch up on sleep (neighbors permitting). 

Tonight’s show Princess Theater show was two singers called Cruise Control and they were excellent. However, they were originally supposed to do a soul show and instead did hits of the 80s. I hope we’ll still get to see them in a soul show later (and with three days at sea and heading into Hurricane Polo, anything is possible). 

We had just enough energy to spend a little time at Silent Disco (I love that) before sleep was calling us. Well, G slept. I had to write yesterday’s blog post, and tried to make headway on this one, but didn’t get too far before I finally succumbed. I hate falling behind with blog posts but it’s hard not to with two port days immediately following embarkation day. Tomorrow’s goal is to be totally caught up. 

Day 2: San Diego

I wish I could say we slept well and made up for the lost sleep of the past several days, but we were awakened at 3am (is that the time the bars close?) by incessant tapping and then knocking and then pounding on the door across the hall. Seriously. At 3am?  Who does that?  If I had been dressed more appropriately (or even simply dressed, but perhaps that’s TMI), I would have opened the door and commented but I kept believing it was going to soon stop. It did stop, but only after quite a while. There was no falling back asleep after that, and then before 6 am there was a light tapping on that same door. My Apple Watch sleep score (which I have since turned off) was Very Low. 

I asked cabin steward Robert (who confirmed that they were a family group traveling together) to mention to them that they could get their medallions programmed to open each other's doors without the need to wake the dead.  Maybe that will solve this issue. 

So, having been up for hours, we were at Sabatini’s for breakfast (you might know why 😉) when it opened at 7am.  It opens at 7am on port days, 7:30am on sea days. Days like this, with a noon arrival, are hard to call. We went by the Botticelli Dining Room schedule. It opened at 7am. Bad call…Sabatini’s opened at 7:30am. So we walked around a little, seeing parts of the ship we had missed yesterday. When we returned, it was open. 

More sighs of contentment. They sure know how to spoil us in there. I ordered my standard Greek yogurt, orange segments and mixed berries, and a decaf shot milk cappuccino (included but not a personal necessity I’d pay extra for) and we enjoyed the scenery as we cruised the final miles to the port of San Diego. 

Now, I was a bit surprised that we weren’t arriving in San Diego until noon today. I would have guessed (not having frequented this area in the past) that we could have arrived in San Diego a few hours after leaving Los Angeles. Certainly the Grand Princess seemed to sail very slowly all night. But perhaps there wasn’t a berth available until noon today on such short notice after the new itinerary was decided 24 hours before the start of our cruise. Whatever…arrival time was noon, and I was all in favor of that after our meager night’s sleep. It was nice to not feel compelled to venture off the ship for a few more hours. 

After breakfast I donned my water workout clothes (they‘re  really not a swimsuit, because I would freeze wearing just that), grabbed the accessories I had packed (webbed neoprene gloves and inflatable water buoys) and tried the Terrace Pool first. The water was quite comfortable. Score!! I did a 60-minute water workout; even in warmer water (I’ve learned), my core temp drops too low to tolerate any longer than that. Security walked by and questioned me about my shoes (Ryki aqua shoes), saying they were a public health issue. When I pointed out my nearby slides and said I wore those to the pool, and didn’t wear the shoes until I got into the pool, they were fine with that. But, really…at home we have 25 people in every class wearing those same shoes from their cars in a parking lot and into the pool, only giving them a water rinse first. But when in Rome… I’m glad I brought the slides. 

I then went up to one of the two hot tubs on Deck 16 aft to warm up before returning to the cabin to get cleaned up for the day. I took advantage of the little time that was left before lunch to do some more organizing in the cabin and find the things I knew I’d packed but couldn’t say with certainty where they had ended up. We had kind of counted on the originally planned 1 1/2 sea days to Cabo to do that (and sleep. We had definitely planned to sleep). 

At 11:30am the Botticelli Dining Room opened for lunch. We’ve already fallen in love with Thai waiter Yoman and his partner Peter from the Philippines who were towers of strength and patience at embarkation day lunch when I was trying to drag a roll aboard over the the dining room carpet. Actually, it’s more complicated than that. G (you may recall his condition at that time) asked a stranger to keep an eye on one suitcase while he used the bathroom, which is up a deck on the Grand. I didn’t know this. I also didn’t realize he was pulling my suitcase, not his, at the time. Then G totally forgot about the roll aboard -MY roll aboard- and came to the lunch table empty handed. Oy vey. We were hot messes. Yoman ran out to the lobby looking for a green roll aboard with yellow and black caution tape and came back with it. My hero!  

Just another non-eventful embarkation. One would think we’d never done this before. Anyway, I was pleased and proud to present ourselves to Yoman’s table much more put together today. 

The ship arrived a little early in San Diego but it took a while to get cleared. At noon the gangways were open. We ate quickly and left the ship about 12:30pm, walking down the boardwalk to the Coronado ferry. It leaves every hour on the hour that time of day and it’s a 15 ride to the Coronado ferry dock. It was a sunny day, and hot, so I was glad I had applied lots of sunscreen and worn my Tilley hat. 

Coronado is very close to the cruise ship pier across the harbor

I had never been to Coronado Island but G had when he was in the military (actually, he landed in a military plane at North Island Naval Air Station), so I didn’t know exactly what to expect but knew I wanted to see a bit of the island. We rented a two person…I’m not sure what to call it but I’m damn sure it was not electric.  We had to pedal it. We took off to the north and pedaled for 90 minutes. 90 minutes!  And there was no slacking allowed. It took both of us to make this thing go. 

Hot, sunny and a bit muggy. A beautiful day.

The Midway and the Grand Princess

Our plan was to get back to the ferry dock area in enough time to turn in our “bike” and catch the 3:30pm (every hour on the half hour) ferry back to the Broadway pier. Sitting in the hot sun on the top level of the ferry, we started to re-think our 6pm anniversary dinner reservation at the Brigantine Seafood Restaurant on the waterfront just beyond the cruise ship. It had sounded so perfect when we made the reservation less than 24 hours earlier, but not so good then. We decided instead to walk directly down there, cancel the reservation and just have drinks on the deck over the water instead. By the time we had walked down there, even that sounded too taxing. We canceled the reservation and walked back to the ship. It was already apparent there wasn’t going to be much of a sunset anyway. The clouds were building. 

We took quick showers intending to just have dinner on the Terrace Deck, but at the last minute went to the Michelangelo Dining Room instead for a one-course meal. THEN we went to the Terrace Deck to watch the very poor sunset (really, the clouds obscured it) and were back in the cabin two minutes later. No entertainment; we were going to take advantage of a stable ship to get some rest. 

No dinner menu scans…I was so tired I forgot to take them.