The last day. No matter how many last days we’ve encountered in our cruising career, I simply haven’t found a way to make them easy. Or fun. Not when there’s almost five months of life to be packed up, and especially not when there’s an impending 24-hour travel day that stands between us and our snowy home.
Captain Tony was absolutely right when he said he were in for some rough weather after we left Hobart early yesterday. In fact, it was one of only two times on the Majestic Princess that we’ve really felt the motion of the ocean. This ship is stable. And though things had calmed down by this morning, our sleep last night was that fitful kind, punctuated by frequent awakenings as the ship shivered and shook.
When I woke up and G was already out and about, I sprang into action, opening a suitcase on one bed and folding all my hang up clothes on the other. Since nearly all of my clothes get hung up in the closet (even shorts and Ts), when I had finished that, my packing was 80% complete. Go me! I held off packing my swimwear, thinking we might possibly use a pool or hot tub today (we didn’t), but left just enough toiletries out to get me through the day and tomorrow morning. That had me 90% packed while G was still out of the cabin. It’s so much easier that way.
We eventually met up in the World Fresh Marketplace where I had brunch... it was too late for breakfast and not really lunch time yet. I tried to do the online check in for our flight tomorrow, but what was I thinking? There is no way I could scan and upload a jpeg of our passports. Still, I could see that we had an empty middle seat between us. Fingers crossed that it lasts.
We returned to the Princess Theater for today’s matinee performance of Fantastic Journey. I guess we just needed one more fix. But the Taylor Swift Shake it Off portion of the show always reminds me of a YouTube video of the USAFA parachute team throwing themselves out of planes to that song. Just search on USAFA Shake it Off to see our country’s best and brightest getting jiggy to T. Swift. Harious.
By dinner time, G had most of his packing complete, though we don’t set out our suitcases until the stewards’ carts are out of the corridors in the evening, regardless of what they say in the disembarkation talk. That gave us a chance to tuck a bag of those last minute dirties in a suitcase before setting it out. We skipped all the entertainment tonight and were in bed by 9am. I know I say this every year, but once I start packing, I’m quickly out of cruise mode. I’m never ready to go home until it’s time to. And then I cannot wait.
Day 8 dinner menu, page 1
Day 8 dinner menu, page 2
Day 8 dessert menu
The alarm is set for 5am tomorrow, and we are meeting in the Princess Theater at 6:40am for our shuttle to the Sydney Airport. There’s a story there, but I’ll just sum it up like this: despite filling out the disembarkation form and noting our early Princess EZ Air flight from SYD, and then hand delivering the form to Guest Services, we were assigned a disembarkation time in the middle of the pack, at 8:20am with passengers with independent arrangements. Grrrr. I’m glad we stayed on the ship yesterday in Hobart; at least I didn’t have to wait in a long line to get that fixed. That would have added insult to injury.
One final sleep, our 140th in a row on a ship, one long day and then we’re home. Right now, it’s hard to imagine what that will be like, hard to remember how it feels to be at home. But 48 hours from now, our cruising season will seem a lifetime ago. It’s funny how that works, that whiplash of emotions we experience every year. But after ten seasons of extended cruising, it won’t be a surprise.
Ten seasons.
Life is good. :-)
Day 8 Princess Patter, page 1
Day 8 Princess Patter, page 2
Day 8 Princess Patter, page 3
Day 8 Princess Patter, page 4
