Day 115: Finally...a day off!

We had moved our clocks ahead an hour last night, and maybe that's the reason we just couldn't get going this morning...but then what would be our excuse for the rest of the day?  For whatever reason, we were just wiped out today, and despite the fact that this was probably our prettiest Princess Cays day of the winter to date, we just could not muster up the energy to pack up snorkel gear and beach towels and make our way to the island.

We made it to breakfast, though, just before the DaVinci Dining Room closed at 9am and both ordered just fresh fruit and oatmeal, so as not to hold up the galley crew. While the tender service to the island of Eleuthera had already begun, we kept stalling, saying we'd do a load of laundry before heading over ourselves. 

Doing that load of laundry was slightly more difficult than it needed to be, because the token machine in the passenger laundry room was broken. I quickly ran back to the cabin to get G to either 1.) stay in the laundry room with the clothes in the washing machine, or 2.) run down to the Passenger Services Desk to get tokens, and I would do the other. He chose the sitting and watching job, so I went down to Deck 6 and waited while one clerk helped two passengers and the other four clerks stood at the counter staring into their computer screens and generally not noticing me at all. It took 14 minutes before I was able to leave the PSD with two tokens and return to the Riviera Deck laundry room. 

I started the washing machine and returned with G to our cabin where we immediately became engrossed in a movie on TV called The Walk, released late last year about Philippe Petit's 1974 high wire walk between the two World Trade Center towers. We rock-paper-scissored to decide who had to return to the laundry room to move the clothes into a dryer (there's no DVR on the Emerald Princess TVs), and, by the time I returned with dried and folded clothes, Phillipe Petit was stepping out onto the wire. Shoot!

This, of course, required that I finish watching the movie and then watch as it started again from the beginning.  And that is how the day got seriously away from us. At 1:15pm, we finally went up to get some pizza (I love the pizza calabraze, the specialty pizza of the day) and ended up spending the rest of the afternoon in a hot tub and pool. 

We were showered and dressed for dinner by 4pm, choosing to watch from Skywalkers as the Emerald Princess sailed south from Eleuthera along the length of Cat Island in the Bahamas. It was herbed goat cheese night in the PES Lounge, so, naturally, I had to have a Breeza Marina, but was once again irritated when the drink order I placed at 5pm wasn't delivered until 5:20pm. This is ridiculous, and has me swearing off any more drink orders up there. We heard in the hot tub today from others who have purchased the unlimited drink package and can't get a drink, and I've written it up in my post cruise surveys, too. 

Dinner went a long, long way to unruffling my ruffled feathers. It was Italian night, and, after I finished the Breeza Marina I didn't have time to drink in Skywalkers, Darko (not that one) brought me my bottle of Bordeaux and headwaiter Francesco was making penne arrabiata in the dining room and life was very good. I teased Francesco (from Italy) when we walked past him to our table, asking if he knew anything about making arrabiata. Francesco's arrabiata is what made me fall in love with arrabiata years ago on the Emerald Princess, and he said that just one taste would jog my memory. ;-)

We had a decision to make after dinner...attend the 8:15pm performance of production show I Got the Music (which you know we love), or be lazy and just go up to the Calypso Pool to watch the Pro Bowl on MUTS. Now, as far as football goes, the Pro Bowl is pretty much the bottom of the barrel, but, somehow, we decided to spend our evening as the lazy slugs we'd been all day. Of course, there were plenty of loungers to choose from (plenty), but we were up there early enough to catch the tail end of the sunset anyway.

Tomorrow's sea day brings with it a couple of commitments for us; instead, we turned today into our 'relaxing day at sea'. 

A picture is worth 1000 words (especially 'cause I'm not mentioning nothing). We could be watching this non-game Pro Bowl in the comfort of our cabin, but need to keep our fannies in shape for hours of lounge chair sitting next Sunday. 

:-)

Day 114: Fort Lauderdale (turnaround day)

I am going to keep this rather short tonight. We were up very early, had a busy day and now are faced with moving clocks ahead an hour overnight. Our current smooth seas are hopefully a good indication that we'll be able to tender into Princess Cays tomorrow, so I don't want to be up too late tonight. Besides, with only a couple of exceptions, it was a fairly standard Fort Lauderdale turnaround day, with the usual shopping to restock items, several phone calls and extensive use of our AT&T Internet to check on things at home, pay bills, text and generally Google ourselves silly. 

We were in the Botticelli Dining Room for breakfast as soon as it opened at 6:30am. By 8:30am, we had received and organized the usual embarkation day paperwork (invitations, schedules and shore excursion packet) and minibar setup for this cruise and were walking off the ship. Even though we were at Pier 21 today, we were thrilled to see that there was a Global Entry line with no one in it, allowing us to bypass a long queue of disembarking passengers going through immigration. Honestly, now that Port Everglades has Global Entry lines for disembarking passengers, there is no better value than the $110 for 5 years that we paid for it. 

We immediately caught a shuttle bus from Pier 21 to Pier 2, returning passengers back to their cars they left at Pier 2's parking garage a week ago. We had left the ship so early this morning that there were only two other couples on the bus, one of them doing the same thing we were:  saving the time of walking and the cost of taking a taxi the 2+ miles to Pier 2.

Once at Pier 2, we walked over to the condo building called The Port, right across the street from Port Everglades, to tour the property. We are definitely not ready to buy, but might be in the market to rent there in the next few years. Following that, we toured the marina behind the condos (see previous post). I was really impressed by the whole development.  

We briefly split up then to divide and conquer the list of things we had to complete. I mailed a couple of things to Mom at the auxiliary post office on the north side of 17th Street and shopped at Publix; G went to Walgreens and Chase Bank. We walked back to Pier 2 and were able to catch the shuttle back to Pier 21. Though it was nearly 11:30am by then, there were still 100 passengers from the Emerald Princess needing to get back to their cars at Pier 2. 

Traffic around Pier 21, with the Westerdam and Independance OTS at nearby piers, was completely gridlocked. I'm sure there must have been some critical reason that the Coral Princess, just returning this morning from a dry dock in Freeport, Bahamas and with no disembarking passengers had to be at Pier 2. I just don't know what it was, but things were surely a mess as a result. After sitting in traffic right across from the Emerald Princess for 15 minutes, G and I asked our shuttle driver if she would be allowed to drop us off right there in the midst of the unmoving congestion. She said she couldn't, but if she opened the doors for some air and we just happened to hop out...  So we did. At noon we were walking back on the oasis that was the Emerald Princess. 

Following lunch in the DaVinci Dining Room,  we grabbed charging cords and an extension cord allowing us to plug into a single outlet in Skywalkers and made phone calls and Interneted until muster drill. The seven short and one long blast on the ship's whistle kicking that off signal shower time for us, but the Emerald Princess sailed right at 4pm today and I didn't make it out onto the Terrace Deck until we'd passed through the channel into the open ocean. Still, we popped the cork on another bottle of Barefoot Bubbly (it landed in the Terrace Pool but we were able to fish it out after it drifted to the side) and toasted our 11th sailaway of the season.

I had the same butterflied shrimp and basa filet I've had before for embarkation day dinner, but changed from my usual flourless chocolate cake in favor of a Norman Love chocolate soufflé. It was...okay. The description was quite appealing but it wasn't too dissimilar from a regular chocolate soufflé. Not that there's anything wrong with that. ;-)

We went to the Welcome Aboard show just to see another new comedian (for us). Jammin Jay Lammont, but were thrilled to see that Deputy Cruise Director Frenchie had come on board today. We sailed with Frenchie most of the winter three (I think) years ago and she is a treasure, truly one of the best. Jay Lammont does mostly musical impressions but with lots of percussive sounds and was very entertaining. 

That was our day, and I'm finishing this up just before 9pm (10pm tomorrow's time). Go me!  But I need to take just another few minutes to point out two occasions in less than a week where ship time and local time have not been the same (because this is a common question among cruisers):  last week in Roatan, where the Emerald Princess stayed on EST though Roatan is on CST, and tomorrow; when the ship will be on AST though the Bahamas are on EST. 

It happens. Occasionally. Just not often. Unless you've been on the Emerald Princess lately, in which case it has happened. Often. Not just occasionally. 

Fort Lauderdale field trip

We are continuing to do our research about possibly living in Fort Lauderdale again one day. Today we were checking out The Port condos, right across from the northern entrance to Port Everglades. 

While there, we were invited to tour The Port Marina located just behind the condo building, and this was the most interesting thing I'd seen in awhile. The two attendants/operators who work there invited us to watch as the totally automatic boat lift system retrieved a boat and lowered it into the water awaiting its owner's arrival.

This warehouse is Category 4 hurricane rated, and that apparently lowers the boat insurance premiums considerably. This is a previously unknown industry for me and gives me a whole new world of things to explore. 

The warehouse is huge and meticulously maintained. 

The attendant electronically requests the lift to retrieve a boat, and that's all that he has to do until the boat is in the water. The lift moves to the boat's location...

...and rises to the correct level automatically. 

The lift moves under the boat...

...and lifts it up, pulling it out of its bay. 

Once it is again in the center section of the warehouse...

...the lift turns 90 degrees to orient the boat correctly for the canal into which it will ultimately be placed. 

Once the boat is correctly positioned...

...the lift is positioned over the canal and the boat lowered into the water. 

This is when human intervention is finally required. The ignition is started and the boat is steered backwards out of the warehouse...

...and docked outside awaiting its owner. 

This time it was my turn to be fascinated by how something works. Just yesterday, we were asked again whether we get bored staying on cruise ships for months at a time. I truly cannot imagine such a thing. There is always something to explore or do or experience. I would still be watching this process at The Port Marina if we hadn't had a bigger boat to board. 

Cruise #5: 7-nights to the Eastern Caribbean

Day 113: (Not) Princess Cays

Though we could see the southwest Eleuthera shoreline from our breakfast table this morning, I think we were almost expecting Captain Forteeze's announcement around 8am informing us that, due to swells of more than 7 feet, we would not be able to safely tender into Princess Cays today. The storm last evening, the wind we've had most of this cruise, the slight though persistent bounciness of the sea...no, we weren't surprised in the least to miss our island stop today. 

While I'm certain there were thousands of disappointed passengers as a result, for me it meant a 48 hour reprieve before I might again face a forced march to the lighthouse on the southern end of Eleuthera. We'll be back again on Sunday. I could claim the tenets of my religion expressly forbid me from partaking in any strenuous or stressful activities on its official day of rest, but I doubt that would work. We all know what stress I'll be exposing myself to the next Sunday. 

I'll keep working on an excuse. A tummy ache might work. I could leave an open ibuprofen bottle on the vanity. But I think my best bet is for Mom's knee brace to make an appearance tomorrow. It's hard to miss that message. 

Given that today became another sea day, our excitement peaked early.  Yesterday, cabin steward Awesome Ambrish informed us that he was going to be involved in some water survival training this morning at the Neptunes Reef pool, starting just before 7am. This, of course, was cause enough for us to set our alarm for 6am. Anything outside of the normal course of activities and events...we're so there!

It was still dark out as we made our way to the International Cafe for hot chocolate (G) and brewed decaf coffee (me). Up on the pool deck, it was just starting to get light, and we saw 10-12 crew members dressed in shorts and T-shirts standing around the pool, which was closed off with caution tape. In the pool was one of the inflatable lifeboats. The safety officers began by demonstrating how to safely step off into the water, the same thing that is demonstrated during every muster drill. The crew had to actually practice doing this by stepping off the edge of the pool, and then successfully climb from the water into the lifeboat. Awesome Ambrish is not a fan of the water, but he did a great job. And being there to show our support certainly motivated us to get an early start to our day.

Unfortunately, after Captain Forteeze's announcement, a whole long day stretched ahead of us. Sure, the cruise staff immediately published a revised Patter filled with quickly scheduled daytime activities, but we weren't feeling especially participative. We returned to our cabin, intending to change for a hot tub session, but ended up reading and napping and watching part of a Hugh Grant movie (which, like most of his recent movies, was not great) on TV. 

By 11am we had already cruised north, half the length of Eleuthera en route to Port Everglades 

Not the best screen capture, but...

We spotted a large ship just behind us off our starboard side at lunch. Some quick detective work (looking at my ships in port with us spreadsheet for Port Everglades tomorrow) told us it could be the Westerdam (no...too big), the Coral Princess (no...too big) or the Independance or the Oasis OTS. G went online and found that it was the Oasis OTS. 

Lunch was offered in the DaVinci Dining Room (it always amazes me that they can pull together a full lunch menu that quickly), and we enjoyed that, but the fritto misto I ate accompanied by a glass of wine convinced me that I had to incorporate some serious activity into the afternoon. 

G and I started with a hot tub visit, and he continued to hold down the hot tub while I ran around in circles in the Splash Pool for an hour and then did some deeper water aerobics in the Terrace Pool. I was showered first for dinner and waited for G in Vines, where bar water Cherry always welcomes me so sweetly and poured me a glass from the bottle of Merlot they store for me there. Sitting there at a table on the edge of the Piazza, listening to Ryszard Sulek playing the piano, I suddenly acutely missed Suzan and Greg, and took a minute of valuable internet time to text them and tell them that. 

What a nice way to spend a few minutes just before dinner. :-)

If anyone coming onboard soon would be willing to do the chocolate-wine pairing with me, please let me know. I need a partner in the sublime!

Let me elaborate for just a minute about that...this new Princess@Sea app makes logging into and out of wifi so quick and painless that it's entirely possible to compose and send a text using one minute or less of wifi. I think that's my favorite thing about the new system. With the old system, it was impossible to log in without using three minutes of wifi, and it always seemed to round usage up by a minute or two. No longer!

Dinner with Victor and Darko (not that one) was superb. My tamarind salmon has never tasted better, every bit as good as embarkation day lunch salmon. And G said his New York strip steak was the best he's had. We had just sorbet for dessert...because you know what dessert is offered the last night of every cruise in the Horizon Court Buffet!

Tonight's sunset as seen from our table. 

We sat in the Piazza for 30 minutes or so, awaiting the quick song and dance bumper about Princess' 50th anniversary performed by the production show cast.

We still had plenty of time to get seats for the 8pm performance in the Princess Theater by comedy guitarist Dan Riley. Now, we've seen Dan's performances for years, and got to know him well last year on the Pacific Princess (that small ship lends itself to mingling with the entertainers), but I think his show tonight really connected with this audience. We've heard the average age this cruise is 62 years, solidly baby boomer-ish and Dan's show was perfectly geared to it. 

Then it was time for the second-most exciting part of the day, a visit to the Horizon Court Buffet to pick up a brownie for G and a piece of red velvet cheesecake for me. Honestly, it's enough to make me wish the cruise starting tomorrow was 4-nights long instead of 7-nights long. ;-)

And speaking of turnaround day tomorrow, Captain Forteeze gave us the very unexpected and completely unwelcome news during his noon announcement that the Emerald Princess will be at Pier 21 in Port Everglades tomorrow, not our usual Pier 2. Well...shoot. We did not get off the ship last turnaround day, and definitely need to tomorrow. The errands that are easy to complete when docked at Pier 2 become a bit more complicated from Pier 21. And while I might have said slogans last night for precipitation, my hope for tomorrow is for clear skies and non-humid air. 

Good grief I'm fickle. And picky. I'm fickly picky.  :-)

Day 112: At sea

We decided last night, before we fell into bed, that the only thing we would make ourselves do today before attending tonight's formal night Captains Circle party...was nothing. No plans, no expectations of each other, just a blessedly open day until it was time to dress for the evening.

Of course, we did do a few things today. We ate. We drank (really). We napped on and off. We caught the parts of the movie The Martian that we'd not yet seen (typical cruise movie viewership...we see the middle, then more of the middle, then the ending and finally the beginning of a movie over the course of several cruises). But removing the requirements to do anything and be anywhere at a particular time for even just a portion of a sea day makes all the difference. It's the part of cruising that we don't do often enough and that I like the best. 

This kind of day also lends itself to two things:  I start a blog post before 10pm (yay!) and I write a GPS-worthy post. All those things that I've been meaning to mention finally get mentioned, in no particular order. It's actually kind of a mentally cleansing experience, like checking items off a to-do list. (I guess I am simply unable to escape my naturally results-oriented mindset even at sea.)

We awakened naturally just before 8am; a wonderful thing in itself.  Breakfast in the DaVinci Dining Room was served until 9:30am (the sea day schedule), so we didn't have to fly out of the cabin. Instead, I let G attend to his morning ablutions first, and he left to get his hot chocolate and request a table for two in the dining room. I followed about ten minutes later and first stopped by the International Cafe for a large brewed decaf coffee in a takeaway cup, and immediately took it up one deck to the DaVinci Dining Room. Though G had arrived in the midst of a rush of people, when I arrived there was no one in line. 

Hostess Laura had already seated G at a table for two next to a window (how well they know us by now!) and I sat down to see today's Patter already at my place at the table. Thank you G!  Even if we aren't feeling participative, it's nice to see what we're missing. Waiter Anthran (I think...I forget the exact spelling) from Thailand brought me a plate of orange segments and mixed strawberries and blueberries. We can always judge what day of a cruise it is by how many blueberries are in the mix, kind of the fruit equivalent of reading a sundial. Blueberry availability decreases daily down to nothing by the 7th day or so. I ordered my usual egg white veggie omelet but today's cook included jalapeño peppers in the mix. That was an eye opening surprise first thing in the morning!

We left breakfast and went directly to Deck 5 for G to check out this cruise's Garage Sale, attendance at which is apparently another tenet of his religion. Speaking of religion, we were at Nachi Cocum yesterday with Father Andy, a young priest on this cruise who looks like any other passenger in his swimsuit and flip flops. G asked me if I thought it would be appropriate to ask Andy to start saying slogans about next weekend's sporting event (note I didn't mention Super Bowl 50...whoops). Not knowing Andy's football allegiance (he is from Michigan), if any, but understanding that he might not even know what a slogan was, I advised against it. 

There will be plenty of time for slogans next week. ;-)

While G was browsing the Garage Sale, I continued in my quest to report to you about every item in the new coffee menu. Today I ordered a blended raspberry caramel-y thing (sorry, I don't have the menu in front of me to see what it's called, but it's on the right side of the menu). I was uncertain about the pairing of raspberry and caramel, but since I like them both, thought it might possibly work. It does..if someone likes both raspberry and caramel. I ordered it decaf and skinny (I don't know why, what with all the sugar that is obviously in the flavoring) and it was very good. 

By the time I'd finished it, G had also finished his religious practice for today, and we returned to the cabin with every intention of doing our hand laundry. Instead, we watched the beginning of the movie The Martian and quickly fell asleep. Not because the movie isn't good (It's actually quite good, which is a little surprising after the Gravity flop of a year or so ago. We love the McGyver-esque parts of it...and the disco music that Matt Damon's character so disparages is fun, too.), but because we were still recovering from yesterday's partying. Somewhere, in the distance, I heard the ding-ding-ding-ding bells at the start of Captain Forteeze's noon announcement, but we snoozed on. 

Speaking of laundry (what a weak segue), I experienced my first real laundry fail today, and, naturally, it was of an item I brought the least of. First, I have already thrown away three pair of undies because the elastic was shot in them. They survived the Pacific Princess dryers but couldn't stand up to the Emerald Princess dryers. But I've learned from my past, and did not bring my best and brightest on this cruise. Instead, I brought the worst and dingiest, lots of them, so tossing them was not a huge loss and not one I would claim.

Still, this morning it was a surprise to reach for my shorts zipper pull when getting dressed...and not find it.  My first thought was that I had somehow put this pair of shorts (just back from the laundry) on inside-out, what with this being the morning after a tequila-filled day on Cozumel, but immediately dismissed that idea because the waistband had buttoned correctly. I checked again; no, the zipper pull was definitely not where it should be. I took the shorts off and looked more closely. The zipper appeared in perfect condition, until the bottom, where the zipper pull was gone and in its place was a bit of twisted metal sticking out. How in the world did that happen without the rest of the shorts getting trashed in the process? What damage had that piece of metal caused to others' clothing? I would love to have a tiny camera to record what happens to our clothes from the time we place them in a paper laundry bag until they are returned to us.

You may recall that, in my zeal to bring only three suitcases on these cruises, before my wishes were overridden and we brought four (grrr...), I had reduced my already skinny packing list even further. I brought four pair of shorts, one of which was workout shorts. Why, oh why couldn't those have been the ones that were ruined (maybe because they so seldomly need to be washed)? I am now down to two pair of 'regular' shorts, and I am a little afraid to send either of them to the ship's laundry. Meanwhile, the ship's tailor is examining the shorts to see if they can be repaired. Stay tuned...

On a more positive note, laundry turnaround times have been excellent. Laundry turned over to our steward in the evening is returned the next evening: morning submissions are returned the next evening. I've been sending laundry just once or twice a cruise, always in the evening. I don't want to be kept in suspense about the condition it will be in upon its return. :-| Okay, that was uncalled for. Really, the fail rate has been somewhere around 3%. Maybe 5%. Not too bad, considering the magnitude of laundry that is done every day. And not too dissimilar from my laundry fail rate at home, though that's usually a result of a forever lost sock or too hot iron. As a result, I try not to often wear socks at home, (cruising all winter definitely helps) and have sworn off irons entirely. 

Back to our napping status today...

We slept on, at some point asking each other if we wanted to go to lunch. No, we decided that we needed to feel real hunger pains before we ate again. Eventually, I gathered up the three washcloths and two hand towels we'd used since our cabin was serviced last night and dumped them in Awesome Ambrish's dirty towel bag. He, in turn, handed me clean replacements and was done with us until the evening. It's hard to make a bed if we don't get out of it. :-)

At 2:55pm, we decided to attend this cruise's Grapevine Wine Tasting in the Michelangelo Dining Room. I hadn't yet attended it on the Emerald Princess this season but G had, last cruise I think. He had brought the list of wines back to the cabin and they have been changed up enough to motivate me to go this cruise. G quickly polished off the plate of crackers and cheese...I guess the skipped lunch was catching up with him. 

Wine tasting always puts me in a better frame of mind for dressing formally. Besides, I owed it to my husband. We had missed the first formal night this cruise, last Sunday night, due to...a prior engagement. ;-) 

Speaking of formal nights (that seque was much better), we have resumed filling out the Elite canapé request form. After the travesty that was the discontinuation of the chocolate covered strawberries on the menu, we had abandoned the practice of ordering anything on formal nights, but have since rethought that. If we order nothing, if all Elites order nothing, the perk will eventually be discontinued because of disuse. So we looked over our options and chose the prosciutto wrapped breadsticks. Our criterion was simple:  we picked the least stinkiest item. Really. We leave our cabin early on formal nights. We didn't want the canapés to be delivered when we were half-naked, getting ready for the evening, so we always elected to have them delivered around 7pm so they'd be in the cabin when we returned. We quickly learned that pâté and smoked salmon and shrimp don't smell so good after sitting out for a few hours. Prosciutto handles the room temperature much better. 

Note to Princess:  a few chocolate chip cookies would handle it even better. ;-)

At 4pm, we were passing by south Florida en route to Princess Cays 

We were nicely hungry tonight for the lobster and beef Wellington that is served on the second formal night on the 7-night cruises. In fact, I think the 4-night cruise is the only one that lacked lobster in the dining room; probably because it doesn't have a formal night. 

On a semi-related subject, breadsticks are no longer included in the bread baskets in the dining rooms unless specifically requested. I, of course, requested breadsticks and they are happily provided alongside G's soft brioche rolls in our bread basket every night. I mean, I would never consume a white-flour roll (lacking any nutritious value) with dinner, but breadsticks as a medium for lifting butter to my mouth...I'm completely cool with that. 

We were honored to join Phyllis at tonight's Captain Circle party at 7:15pm in Club Fusion. She was the #3 MTP again this cruise.

#1-1486 Princess days

#2-1390 Princess days

#3-923 Princess days

MTP Cutoff-384 Princess days

#1 (Sue and Gus) and 2 (Joyce) were also the same as last cruise, but they are leaving on turnaround day, and things will change next cruise. Apparently, the Emerald Princess has been chosen to trial the elimination of hors doerves at the party (oh goody!), but we still enjoyed the party- and seeing friends- very much. 

Do you get the impression we're starving here?  We're not, of course, but in the interest of full disclosure, I must mention the bad as well as the good. Luckily there is still plenty of the latter to make up for the former. 

We hurried down to the Princess Theater for the 8:15pm performance by comedian Carl Banks.  We got there at 8:10pm to find it SRO...so we stood. It's hard to believe that we had never before seen Carl perform, but I'm certain I would have remembered his joke about writing tuition checks for his daughter's Catholic school education making him a more religious man...it's harious. 

The weather had detiorated a great deal throughout the day, starting out bright and sunny this morning but looking ominously cloudy by 4pm and pouring rain shortly after that. I asked Captain Forteeze tonight about going to Princess Cays tomorrow. And he slyly answered that we would definitely be going...it was the tendering to the island part that was in question. We have not yet had great luck with Princess Cays this year, with three visits down and less than stellar weather on all three (though it improved just in time for our sailaway last cruise). Such a disappointment...G has been making noises about us doing the 6-mile round trip down hike down to the lighthouse on the southernmost end of Eleuthera. 

I'm saying slogans tonight for a rain of biblical proportions. 

Day 111: Cozumel

Today was the best day of our Caribbean season to date. One of the best days. One of the five best days. 

Today was a good day. 

The Emerald Princess arrived early in Cozumel, Mexico, and we were still in bed but awake at 6:57am when we heard the announcement that the ship was secured at her berth and had been cleared by the local authorities for passengers to proceed ashore (this is almost word for word what we hear nearly every morning, spoken by someone with an Indian accent). There were no lines today (there never are when the ship arrives early) when we walked off the ship just after 8am, packed for another beach day. 

I guess I can rightfully claim that life's a beach...at least while we're on the Emerald Princess in the Caribbean. 

I had been following the Cruise Critic roll call for this cruise, and read a recommendation from fellow passenger Laurie about a beach resort called Nachi Cocum on the southwestern coast of Cozumel. For $55pp, we'd get access to a pool, jacuzzi, loungers, palapas (natural sun umbrellas), all we could drink (including premium brands) and a four course lunch. It sounded good enough that we had made the $11pp deposit via PayPal while we were home in December...and prayed for a sunny day. 

We walked off the Puerta Maya pier and through the "enter through the gift ship...and then through more gift shops" area required to get to the taxi stand. There was a group of passengers, including Laurie, going down about an hour later this morning, but G wanted to get an early start and Nachi Cocum opens at 8am in the winter. A taxi cost $17 and it was about a 15-20 minute ride south along Cozumel's only major north-south road. 

We commented, as we rode along, about how much Cozumel has changed since we first went there to dive in 1998. Then, there was one cruise ship pier in the town of San Miguel; now there are multiple piers and those piers keep expanding to accommodate more ships. We were lucky today, as there were only two ships in port. In Cozumel, that's a very slow day. 

Once we arrived at Nachi Cocum (which, coincidentally, was located right next door to the Allegro Diamond Resort we used to stay at), our photo was taken, as it usually is at these things, and would be available for purchase later, after we were nice and tipsy. We did buy it, of course. We'll add it to the other photos we have of ourselves on Cozumel, also purchased at the end of days when we were nice and tipsy. Honestly, the photos of us on Cozumel are the ones that are stuck on our refrigerator at home. Not only so they bring back great memories of very fun days, but they provide a somewhat painful but completely accurate chronicle of our aging visages. Today we paid the remaining $44pp due via credit card and were shown around the property. Nachi Cocum limits guests to 110 per day; today, there were only 22 of us. This really was like a private beach resort. 

Beaches on Cozumel are not the powdered sugar variety we've seen on Barbados and Antigua, and even on a good day have much stronger waves than we saw yesterday on Roatan with its protective reef. Today, was not a good day, wave-wise and the surf was very strong, though still safe to swim in. The beach was slightly littered with normal sea vegetation, but, by Cozumel standards, it was pretty darn good. But it was the setting that was perfect, and we were soon settled in loungers that were sanitized for us with small plastic tables that were cleaned for us too. And the best part...though there was some music up by the pool, all we heard in our loungers was the sound of the crashing waves. A catered day on a beach with only the sound of crashing waves. Heaven!

I dove right into the water (the temperature was 80F) and snorkeled a bit to see what there was to see. Not much. Though just a few hundred yards offshore are some of the best reefs in this part of the world, I saw only one lonely coral head with a couple of Moorish idols and several sergeant major fish. 

I returned to my chair on the beach (climbing up out of the water was a bit of a trick) and we ordered our first drinks of the day from our waiter Joseph. He gave us wonderful service throughout the day...maybe too wonderful when it came to our drinks. I tried to break them up with several long swims, at one point swimming the boundaries of the swim beach. The current was so strong that it was difficult to do anything other than get in the water on one side of the beach and try to get back out before ending up half way down the coast. G teased me that I was going to end up back at the Emerald Princess via the water and he was almost right. 

By 11ish I was getting hungry, and, when I came out of the water, discovered that Joseph had dropped off the menu for us to order our lunch. And here's when things really got good...we had a choice of appetizer, soup or salad, entree and dessert, and we could order each course one at a time and eat them right where we were sitting on the beach. 

We started with chips and gaucamole for me and breaded cheese sticks for G

About an hour later, for our salads, we ordered fruit salad with lemon sorbet. This is when we remembered how wonderful the fruit had always been during our Cozumel stays. The papaya rivaled anything we had had in French Polynesia but nothing will ever be better than those small Moorea pineapples we had enjoyed.

G slept at some point, and I walked up to the pool area to use the free wifi. Free wifi!  I am down to 19 minutes left on the ship's Internet for this cruise, and took advantage of the Nachi Cocum internet to upload some photos to the blog posts for the past couple of days and for today. 

Beach loungers and palapas

Nachi Cocum pool and jacuzzi with a swim up bar

I was texting friend Suzan from right here.

Eventually we ordered our entrees; G ordered the mixed meat fajitas and I asked for the freshest fish they had. I think my grouper was caught this morning. Honestly, we thought both meals were even better than what we've been eating on the ship (and that's been good). But the freshness of the ingredients in today's meals really made a difference. For dessert, we both ordered coconut ice cream and Joseph suggested we have it topped with kahlua. Well...if he insisted. So wonderfully yummy!

Naturally, we had continued to drink, mostly margaritas, all throughout the day, and for my last swim of the day, I momentarily considered whether I was sober enough to be able to climb my way out of the water back onto the beach. I did, of course, but I was just at the edge of having too much tequila. The far edge. ;-)

It really hit me as we left our loungers and walked back through the resort about 3:30pm. They called a taxi for us and our driver was there by the time we reached the parking lot. Everyone who worked at the resort was very welcoming and friendly (I remember that, too, from our Cozumel stays, about the wonderful hospitality of the locals) and we enjoyed our day so much that we are actually considering returning again on a later cruise.  We loved that Nachi Cocum specifically states that Spring Breakers and wild crowds are not tolerated. It's kind of the 55+ beach resort on Cozumel, and was just perfect for us, and might be especially attractive as we head into the Spring Break timeframe. 

Thank you, Laurie, for the recommendation!

We managed to get through the Puerto Maya shopping area and back down the pier without bodily injury, though the sound of our Check Liver Soon alarms was getting really annoying. We did rock, paper, scissors to see who was going to shower first (I lost), and generally tried to clean up a little more than usual because tonight was this cruise's MTP cocktail party. 

Just shoot me. 

We were not in the least hungry, but we did need to eat a little something to soak up the alcohol (past and future). We went to our usual table in the Michelangelo Dining Room where Victor served me alphabet soup from the kids' menu and sorbet. And for the first time ever, we declined his offer to open the drapes so we could see the ocean rushing by just outside the window. No thank you. That would not help at all. 

We had time after dinner for a quick nap (really quick, and I set the alarm just in case we didn't wake up), and went to the MTP party in the Adagio Lounge at 7pm. I was happy to be able to tell Chief Roddy that the pool temperatures were just perfect now, thank you very much. It was funny...Captain Forteeze came over while we were talking to tell Roddy that another passenger had just complimented him for the warm pools. :-) However, my favorite Splash Pool on Deck 17 aft is unheatable, which actually works out perfectly for me. First, no one wants to use it because it's chilly; second, it's quite comfortable when I run around in circles in it. 

I wasn't intending to stay for the entire party, thinking I'd leave after just one Perrier (the only beverage I was up to drinking), but, as always, I start chatting and before I knew it, we were the last group to finally leave. Production show Magic To Do is being shown twice tonight, and I could make it to the 10:15pm performance...

...but a comfy bed and a book sound a lot better. 

Day 110: Roatan, Honduras

We were very much looking forward to our stop in Roatan today; I had checked our cruise history and the first and only time we were here was in January 2010 on the Crown Princess. We didn't remember a great deal about it other than the beach was great...and G broke out in bug bites that night. We were anxious to try it again, though, armed with the DEET 50 we had purchased in Papeete last year. We felt well protected against the no-see-ums and the disease-carrying mosquitoes.

Our arrival in Roatan was not scheduled until 10am, and I have to say that's a very pleasant time to start a day. We slept in, had breakfast in the DaVinci Dining Room, packed up our beach bags and still had time to be up in the open decks to watch our arrival. The long shoreline of the island of Roatan and the hills rising behind it were beautiful.  The cruise ship pier at Mahagony Bay, where all Carnival Corp. vessels dock, requires ships to back into a relatively narrow bay. High winds can prevent ships from docking at all, and we were happy to see that today's weather was absolutely perfect...blue skies, lots of sun and not much wind. 

The southeast coast of Roatan 

Mahogany Bay beach

As always happens when the ship arrives in a port mid-morning or later, passengers were lined up back to the Piazza to get off at either the mid-ship or forward gangways. The pier was quickly packed with disembarking passengers making their way through the Dufry duty free store (Mahogany Bay has perfected the "exit through the gift shop" practice, only here it is "enter through the gift shop...and the next gift shop...and the next). Getting to the significant point of this port- the beach- requires passing through multiple shopping opportunities and up and down a mild hill. It's about a 15-minute walk from the ship to the beach, but it can take up to 30 minutes if you're in the first wave of passengers disembarking when the ship is docked and cleared. 

We had immediately disembarked the Emerald Princess in the hopes of getting lounge chairs (free) in the shade, and in the front row, if possible, and we were plenty early enough to get both. We were lucky that the Emerald Princess was the only ship at Mahogany Bay today; and there were plenty of loungers and space for everyone. I wasted no time at all in getting in that gorgeous blue water, again as clear and blue as anything we'd seen in French Polynesia, and with no waves to boot. Like in French Polynesia, a barrier reef surrounds the Mahogany Bay Area, which is actually on a small island off the coast of Roatan, which is a larger island off the coast of Honduras, known for its diving and snorkeling opportunities. 

The sand was beautiful and the beach entrance very gradual because of the lack of waves. Though the ocean floor does get a little grassy further out, it is mostly sandy and pebble-free near the beach. I swam out to the beach boundary and along the buoy lines and only at the very edges of the swimming area was it over my head. I saw people snorkeling within the swimming area of the beach, but can't imagine they were seeing too much; however, I did swim right over a large lobster in the sea grass in about 5 feet of water. The water was so clear that I saw it without a mask. 

With most couples, it's the man who encourages the woman to get in the water, and get her shoulders wet, telling her it won't seem so cold if she just takes the plunge. Not so with us. I dive into the water, equipped with our pool thermometer while G sits in a lounge chair and awaits my report. Today's water temp was the warmest we've seen so far in the Caribbean, still just barely 80F, and a far cry from the 84-86F we always saw in French Polynesia. However, the sun was so warm that it felt quite nice, and even G was happy with it.

Roatan combines the best of what we each like in a port day:  G is happiest when he can walk, preferably up a hill, and I am happiest when I can be in the water. We spent nearly five hours swimming and soaking. I listened to an audiobook (Suzan, it's the book about Rosemary Kennedy) and G found people to talk to (picture it, Suzan and Greg) and happiness reigned. We packed up and returned to the ship (G discovered that the nature trail that wraps around the hill is a lot faster, and would be a great option when the walkway is crowded) about 3:30pm. 

We were showered and dressed for dinner and in Skywalkers to watch sailaway.  We were starving, and thrilled to see that not only was it Stilton night in the PES Lounge, it was Italian night with penne arribiata in the dining rooms. I ordered a new bottle of wine (a Chateau Rothschild Bordeaux) that was a perfect pairing and we watched a beautiful sunset right from our table. We hope that bodes well for our weather tomorrow in Cozumel...'cause we have plans!

Shockingly, at 7pm we found ourselves at the Princess Theater performance by country guitarist Ric Steel, a new entertainer for us.  I love most music, but try to avoid opera and country. We sat in the 'just in case-iest" of the "just in case" seats, in the highest row, stage right in the theater. Actually, he was very good, and even sang several non-country songs to appeal to a wider audience. The Love Boat Disco Deck Party will be held starting at 10:15pm, and the weather on the open decks will be perfect for it...but we're not going to be able to stay up. We arrive in Cozumel, Mexico early tomorrow, at 7am, and are already packed for (shock!) another beach day. 

Day 109: Grand Cayman

We were moving a little slowly this morning. I guess sitting in a lounger by the Calypso Pool for over four hours followed by eight hours of football spectatorship does take a toll. But let me say right now that this is not my first rodeo, even on the Emerald Princess, and we all remember how that one ended.  I am not going to get excited over the next two weeks about Super Bowl 50. In fact, I will not speak of this again over the next 13 days. Heck, I won't even think about it. And, hopefully, my left eyelid, the one that's been twitching since Q3 of last week's Broncos v. Steelers game, will get the idea that Super Bowl 50 is no big deal and calm down. 

Hopefully. 

It was nice this morning to return to a more normal schedule and go to breakfast together in the DaVinci Dining Room. Our plans for the day were simple:  to buy two Grand Cayman T-shirts (size Adult Small) and to take a long walk along the George Town, Grand Cayman waterfront in the opposite direction of Seven Mile Beach. It had been years since we'd been down that way, and even then it was by mini-speedboat on a Princess excursion. 

I don't know how many times we've been on Grand Cayman over the years (certainly fewer than we've been on St. Thomas), but I bet it's somewhere between 15 and 20 times. Our first visits were spent doing the typical Grand Cayman excursions:  swimming with stingrays at Stingray City, snorkeling Coral Gardens and a shipwreck, diving the Cayman wall and a shipwreck, shore diving on our own off of Eden Rock Dive Center, visiting the town of Hell, and riding mini speedboats around the southwestern side of this oddly shaped island. Like most islands we visit on these itineraries, spending a day on a beach didn't come until all other tourist options had been exhausted. 

But today was not the beautiful beach day we'd had here just over a week ago (it feels like months ago). There was no sun to speak of until we were sailing away from the island (typical), it was windy and it was chilly. In fact, we heard later that all excursions to Stingray City had been cancelled due to the wind. However, those things made it a great day for a long walk. 

We tendered into shore (only the 300 passengers Silversea Silver Wind was in port with us today...lucky us!) and first spent a little time looking for T-shirts. We were told by the taxi drivers trying to talk us into a ride to the beach that all the shops would be closed today due to a national holiday but were savvy enough to ignore them. It was a national holiday, National Heroes Day, but the shops were still open. And we were lucky enough to see a five minute parade complete with a marching band and participants marching in smart British-influenced uniforms. 

Our shopping completed, we started walking south along either side of the road bordering the waterfront, whichever had a sidewalk, until we ran out of sidewalk altogether. We had picked up a map of the island and decided that a beach called Smith Barcadere on the very southwestern edge of Grand Cayman was our intended goal. It was probably close to a two mile walk from the tender pier in George Town and Smith Barcadere turned out to be a less crowded, though less picturesque alternative to Seven Mile Beach. I think it's where the locals go when they want a beach day.  Another plus:  it appeared to have some decent snorkeling, too. 

We turned around and retraced our steps back to town. We stopped at a cigar bar and watched as a Cuban man hand rolled cigars. (It reminded us instantly of that Seinfeld episode). He was 77 years old and had been doing this for 60 years, using wooden forms and presses that are irreplaceable. 

It was shortly after 2:30pm when we returned to the ship. We had lunch in the Horizon Court Buffet (what is that, now?  Meal #4 since we've been on the Emerald Princess this season?). I made a huge salad from the salad bar and also brought back two pieces of a fluffy cake called strawberry shortcake. I figured I'd have one, and G could have the other. Well, by the time I finished my Big Salad (more Seinfeld memories). G had finished off both pieces of cake. I went back to the buffet for another, and they were gone; I took that as a certain sign that I was not supposed to have dessert at lunch. ;-)

We spent some time in the hot tub on the back of Deck 17, and I ran around in circles in the Splash Pool for awhile, and we watched as we sailed away from Grand Cayman around 4pm. Shortly afterward, Captain Forteeze made an announcement warning us about the Zika virus in Honduras, our port tomorrow, and its dangers especially for pregnant women or women planning to become pregnant (I guess that leaves me out). Hey, we faced down chikengunya in French Polynesia; we aren't scared (but will douse ourselves with DEET anyway). 

We napped for a few minutes (me too!) before going to dinner about 5:30pm. I wasn't too hungry after that big salad just a few hours earlier, but had gazpacho and Szechuan shrimp followed by a Norman Love white chocolate cheesecake for dessert. That certainly was a nice payback for my stolen strawberry shortcake at lunch!  We skipped all entertainment tonight, choosing instead to watch a Tom Cruise movie (probably Mission Impossible 22) and read in the cabin. The ship is nice and stable tonight, and I think I'll be asleep early, with visions of football dancing in my head. 

Whoops, sorry! That was the last time. Promise!

An aside:  I used a lot of Internet minutes yesterday texting friends during those...sporting events that I spent all day watching, and will have to seriously limit photo uploads for the rest of this cruise. I'll upload just one today, my Norman Love white chocolate cheesecake dessert. I mean, Grand Cayman was nice, but white chocolate cheesecake is even better. :-)