We enjoyed another lazy morning, with coffees and water bottles delivered to our cabin (via Ocean Now delivery). My Apple Watch has stopped barking at me that I’m not getting enough sleep and is now saying my respiration rate has dropped. When I look at possible causes, alcohol consumption is high on the list😉 (but I think lower altitude also plays a role). While it’s true that I’m only consuming three, four, maybe five drinks a day, at home I go for months without consuming any alcohol, so I guess it’s all relative.
I forgot to mention last night that we got laundry back the next evening, in less than 48 hours, and that was a surprise on a transatlantic cruise. I think all the Elites were on the Sun Princess waiting for Port Everglades to re-open after Hurricane Milton and the amount of free laundry being sent in on this cruise is considerably lower as a result.
It was warmer today but still largely overcast and the seas were a bit rough in the morning, getting worse as the day went on. Our sliding glass door was whistling a little even when tightly closed and locked, and our connecting cabin door was downright screaming. We used duct tape (supplied by the ship) to mask off the crack between door and the frame and that helped a great deal. When G was in Ruby Princess jail quarantine, he had the same issue and his next door neighbor was so sick with COVID that he either died or was taken to a hospital in Maui. Meanwhile, the air from his cabin was pouring into G’s room. Grrrr…
Things you don’t see in the brochures
And, speaking of COVID, we left home with TWENTY test kits and tested before we boarded the ship and again today. COVID is on board, but we remain not only well but URI-LRI symptom-free.
I digress, but it’s a good time to talk about the free, unsolicited, unwanted upgrade we received the night before this cruise. We were in a balcony cabin on Marina Deck marked No Upgrade, and when we returned to our London hotel after our afternoon at a tavern, I received an email about a free upgrade to a minisuite mid ship on Aloha Deck.
Options at that point were kind of limited. It would have been difficult from London to call…anyone who could fix this on a Saturday afternoon. It wasn’t an awful upgrade; minisuites just aren’t our favorite cabins. But we used a Sharpie to correct our luggage tags, aready attached to our suitcases, and just sucked it up.
It’s a nice cabin, and especially since G had been used to cruising solo (and taking up all the storage in his cabin), the extra space is appreciated, as is the midship location. I detest showering in a bathtub but am using a shower in the spa locker room more often than not. We have quite a large balcony (it’s the widest angled one) and I’ve been out there exactly one time so far. We haven’t exactly had balcony weather.
Most amusingly, we are getting Mr. and Mrs. Smith’s mail (the original occupants) and someone, probably in our original cabin, is getting ours. They must have been quite excited to get a letter congratulating them on being the third most traveled guests on board and we are having trouble chasing down anything Captains Circle related.
But this, too, shall pass, and I’ll miss the larger vanity and desk when we move to an inside cabin next cruise. Still, I’ll be watching for an upgrade letter the night before that cruise starts. 😉
It’s nice to be hungry when we go to lunch in the dining room. Food quality remains hit and miss, but I’ll never understand why we haven’t yet had a single hot and fresh French fry onboard. That’s a pretty straightforward thing to deliver. Today I asked for the collard greens from the chicken and waffle entree as my starter, and enjoyed them so much I had them for dessert too.
I peeled off just the roasted veggies and ate them as my entree
Collard greens and onions. Yes, please!!!
We sat next to the nicest couple from Luxembourg at lunch. I don’t believe we’ve ever met anyone from Luxembourg and considering there are only half a million people in that country, that’s not too much of a surprise.
Afterwards we tried sitting on the Terrace Deck (this is where we went last night to watch the northern lights), but a squall blew in that chased me inside to The Enclave, aka My Happy Place. Then it was time to shower and dress for drinks and dinner.
Dunes martini in Crooners. Oh so sweet but I loved the melon liquor (no surprise).
I had a frozen margarita with dinner, a Mexican salad, vegan pasta and grilled seafood bowl. The salad and seafood was wonderful; I recommend a pass on the vegan pasta bowl. Come to think of it, many of these have been pretty blah, very dry and flavorless.
A winner
A loser
Simply perfect
Tonight’s Princess Theater entertainment was pianist Kyle Esplin. He looked exactly like John Corbin but when he opened his mouth, a Scottish accent came out. It was such a disconnect. G made sure we had the most perfect front row seats where I could see his hands and I’ve never seen anything like it. His hands moved so quickly that they reminded me of that leg blur in the old road runner cartoons. I have no idea he he does it. Tomorrow night we’ll have a singer Tom Hall/ pianist Kyle Esplin varsity show which is going to be a treat.
It was difficult even to walk from the theater in the front of the ship to the Wheelhouse Lounge in the back. The ship was rolling strongly from side to side and many people (including me) were using a walking stick for that third point of contact. We enjoyed drinks and live music in the Wheelhouse for over an hour, but skipped walking back to the Piazza for G’s ice cream tonight. It was just too rough.
And, finally, today’s short story, The Tale of Two Sweatshirts, was inspired by the fact that I actually wore a Michigan sweatshirt during the day today. I brought it, figuring I’d wear it only in the cabin, but this is turning out to be a casual cruise. An ultra casual cruise. I felt comfortable dressed very casually until dinner tonight, and I like it. It’s very homey. Anyway…
The last time Michigan won a national football championship was in 1997, and even then it was a shared championship with (I think) Nebraska. Still, on a trip to Ohio back then, I went the Ohio State-Michigan store (it really was divided right down the middle) and purchased a sweatshirt that I have loved hard for years. Decades. After increasingly frequent mending, I finally had to stop wearing it away from home, but still sported it for every Michigan game I watched. It became a joke with friends: what was going to happen first…the sweatshirt disintegrating or Michigan winning another national championship? Yeah, that’s harious.
We got close two years ago, and I was advised to buy a B1G Championship sweatshirt, but I was holding out for the prize. I just had a feeling it was going to finally happen.
Stained, worn, faded, but so loved
The day after Michigan won the national championship this year, G started hounding me to get a sweatshirt. It took a couple of weeks of online searching to find the perfect one. Once I had it in hand, he convinced me to buy a second one. I can’t count on another national championship in my lifetime. I can just see me in an assisted living facility at 91, hunched over my walker but still wearing these 2023 national championship sweatshirts. It’s good to have goals. 😊
Hail yes!
