Cruising
Here is my cruise recap, most of it being written while on ship!
Friday/Saturday
Friday morning we let our normal 6AM alarm fire off despite us not having to leave the house until 8:45 or so. We had most of our things packed and ready to go. Cindy handled doing the chicken chores one last time before we left, meaning on the first night Katie only had to make sure the birds got back inside safely. Elsa and I hopped in the truck to get coffee and drop off a couple more 3D store sales for shipping at the post office.
When we got back we did our final loading, including loading Elsa into the Ioniq to drop her off at Katie’s place. It was sad for me leaving Elsa there but we were only going to be gone a handful of days and Elsa generally has fun with Katie’s dogs.
The drive over in the Ioniq was ok, only getting hairy traffic-wise until the last 30 minutes or so. Even though the Ioniq is a great car I found myself missing Tesla autopilot and how effortless it makes this type of driving. When we parked in the garage we saw yet another ancillary expense we would be posting, the $22 a day parking fee. Ancillary fees has been a very common theme in my cruise experience so far, which is not unexpected.
The terminal for Royal Caribbean was beautiful and filled with happy, helpful employees. I swear every 25 feet there was an employee smiling and directing us exactly where we needed to go. It was a level of service I am not accustomed to. When we finally got a good view of the side of the ship it was visually impactful. The length and height of The Navigator of the Seas was just massive and disorienting if you cruise as infrequently as I have.
Once we got on the ship we could not get access to our room right away so we lugged our carry ons into one of the free dining areas. The food spread was diverse and plentiful. I tried my best to not be overly gluttonous right off the bat. By the time we finished up eating we still had some time to kill so Cindy, who is a nine cruise veteran took me through the ship to check out some of the amenities.
At 1PM we were allowed in the room which seemed pretty nice, especially compared to the room I had years ago on Carnival. This time we were on the 9th floor deck with a balcony which was awesome. We unpacked and enjoyed the view out on our deck.
Before we could depart we had to do the muster drill where they go over emergency procedures with all passengers out on the deck. It was sort of a pain in the ass but we wound up passing a good portion of the time talking to some interesting and funny people. The one cruise line employee even entertained us briefly by singing some Ave Maria. It was hot as we stood out there for the drill. When it finally finished there was an older woman that was sitting against the wall. I guess the heat really got to her.
We pushed off the dock around 4:30, I was out on the balcony for a good portion of the departure, it was just cool to be out there in the middle of the ocean, something I don’t get to experience often. I was probably out there a good 30 minutes plus just taking it all in, feeling appreciative of the quiet and beauty around me.
We had our dinner reservation at 5:45 and we could get a table just for two, an impossibility when I last cruised. Back then they had assigned seating where you were stuck with the same 6-8 people at the table every night, if you like it or not. Instead Cindy and I enjoyed a quiet table for two while we enjoyed a three course dinner which we both enjoyed.
Most of the night we could feel the ship rocking back and forth, a rarity with a ship of this size. When we went up on the top deck later it was VERY windy and the sea looked very choppy. It made more sense why we felt the movement.
During the afternoon I took my first ever shot at a rock climbing wall, a big one, that they have on the upper deck. I figured with my calisthenic and specifically pull up training that I should do ok with it. I completed the easy and medium difficulty course back to back. By the time I was done I was pretty beat and the difficult course looked like more than I wanted to attempt at the moment. We spent a lot of time just walking around and checking out attractions and a few small shows. I happened to run into a guy that I work with who is on the cruise with a bunch of his friends/family. It was very funny to see him here.
Cindy was very excited to attend the 70’s party that was not scheduled to start until 11PM. Let’s just say I did not share her enthusiasm but I told her whatever she wanted I would do since the cruise is for her. She had packed 70’s costumes for both of us. Mine include a big black wig, sunglasses, a tie die shirt, and bandana. It looked silly as you can imagine. Cindy looked better in her outfit.
She was visibly upset when we went down and basically no one else, outside of a group of four or five women actually dressed up. Instead we felt like monkeys in the cage as everyone looked at the big dorky guy in a hippie costume. Once the 70’s music started however it didn’t matter, everyone got into the genre and it was a lot of fun for all.
One thing that was not fun was when I saw a text message pop up on my phone saying that I had over $100 in international roaming charges with a number to call. I had done absolutely nothing with my phone but I noticed that it had automatically connected to the cruise ship’s 3G service. Evidently it did this and continued gobbling data which costs a FORTUNE, in my case $6 per MEGABYTE. The rep told me my phone consumed about 16 megs of data over the cruise ship network which must have been just mindless background activity the phone was performing.
I was pissed, at the situation and at myself. I assumed if I took no action I would simply not have service so there be no issue. So my only option was to buy $100 ATT international plan that is good for 30 days. It included unlimited calls and texting as well as 200 MB of data usage. Doing this would negate the per mb charges I was racking up and at least give me a flat rate to pay for. The entire thing still burns me up. To pay $100 for phone use on a three day cruise is just stupid, in any scenario.
We got to bed late and neither of us fell asleep quickly. The queen bad accommodations are tighter than either of us is accustomed to. We still woke up pretty early, somewhere around 7:30AM. By the time we opened the curtain we were pulling into Coco Cay.
After eating breakfast we though it might be smart to hang on the ship for a bit to just chill out. We went to the upper deck and did just that, playing some ping pong, shooting some basketball and then doing something neither of us expected, riding the Flow Rider.
The Flow Rider is basically a never ending wave. At the front of it there is a high power stream of water that shoots up and over a hill. The objective is to ride a miniature version of a skim/surfboard like a surfer. We sat there watching several people go. Some were experts, some were trying for the first time.
I could tell Cindy was entertaining the idea of trying it and she was bugging me to do it as well. I have never surfed and I had no idea how much my One Wheel and Esk8 experience would help me. After a lot of prodding Cindy agreed to try it. After signing the waiver she had to first do a session on a boogie board. Once you do the boogie board they allow you to try going on the normal upright board. She did fine on the boogie board and got back in line to try the real deal.
She did great on her feet, staying upright for a good 10 seconds before wiping out. She got back in line and did it one more time before it was my turn. I felt like I had no choice since Cindy put it out there. The boogie board part of it was not hard for me, I could have stayed on that forever, the most challenging issue is not being able to see well from the water blinding you.
So now it was time to get on my feet. I felt wobbly of course but I definitely think my PEV riding helped some. I stayed up somewhere between 10-15 seconds before wiping out. Once was enough for me, I just wanted to be able to say I did it.
After a fun morning we headed to the room to get ready to go to Coco Cay, the massive adventure island that Royal Caribbean built. This was another ala carte pay to play item, costing Cindy and I roughly $45 each to get access.
The first thing we did once we hopped off the tram was find a place to sit down and eat. I was feeling pretty beat from the late night, alcohol, light sleep, and our active morning. The sun, despite temps only in the low 80’s, felt intense, I was looking to escape it. I thought I was going to have to toss my no beef, chicken, or poultry diet out the window. I almost grabbed a burger but instead found a portobello and parmesan sandwich that fit the bill.
The first water slide we did we waited forever for, at least a half hour , maybe closer to 45 minutes. It was a unique slide where 2-4 people got into an oversized inner tube. It’s highlight is at the end where after dropping down a very steep incline you go up a big ramp as far as your momentum will carry you before reversing directions and sliding into the splashdown area. It was fun for sure.
Cindy and I did the other two water slide types on that platform. They were more what you expect but still a good time. Earlier we also waded about waist deep into the wave pool, something I never experienced before. The water was pretty chilly and the waves were not that impressive so we didn’t stay in there very long.
There was one other massive water slide platform. Cindy climbed the steps with me to the tallest slide which supposedly was the tallest in North America. It took a solid four minutes of climbing to reach the top. The ride down was fast and disorienting. I had so much water hitting me in the face I couldn’t see a thing the last 10 seconds of the ride. The slides on the big platform are the type you go down on your bare back. I’m not a big fan as I still seem to feel all of the seams on the way down, it’s not a comfortable feeling.
I was going to do another slide on the platform where you get in a capsule and all of a sudden the floor drops out from under you, sending you crashing down a very steep tube. I was one person away from getting my turn when something broke on the one side that evidently wasn’t allowing it to work. We waited awhile but when the guy said it was going to take another 20 minutes to fix after we waited almost 15 minutes already I bagged it and walked down the platform to another slide, oh well. Cindy and I were pretty beat so we came back to the ship about 3PM. We have taken the time to just unwind or in my case, time to punch this entry out.
Tonight we are doing another formal dinner. Followed by I am not sure what. There are supposedly big parties going on over at Coco Cay. Tomorrow we land in Nassau where I believe we spend most of the day just sight seeing. I think Cindy is most interested in getting some time in the Straw Market, a place I experienced once before. I don’t like the feeling of being cattle fed to the wolves which tourists with cash are. Cindy likes the interaction a lot more.
It’s been a good trip so far with a lot of unique and long lasting memories. Cindy appears to be having a lot of fun which is the ultimate goal at the end of the day.
Saturday/Sunday
Last night we totally ditched on activities on Coco Cay. After dinner I just couldn’t get this chill off my body, likely from a lot of sun exposure during the day. Cindy was wiped out as well. After dinner we retreated to the room, the hot shower I took felt good. We rented the latest Men in Black movie and zonked out in bed. Too be quite honest I dozed off for probably half of the movie, I was just tired, but what I saw didn’t impress me.
In a way I felt bad that we spent last night in such a mundane way. I told Cindy repeatedly I was ok with doing whatever she wanted. She just happened to want to relax as well. That is the cool thing about a cruise, you can make it as busy or not as you want.
I had another pretty spotty night of sleep. The boat was again bouncing and groaning most of the night as we traveled from Coco Cay to the Bahamas. Cindy described how she wanted to see various sites on the island and the ship had an excursion that covered most of those spots. Of course waiting until last minute meant the ship arranged excursion was already fully booked. Cindy and I planned to just wing it, getting to these spots via a taxi or some other form of transportation.
When we got off the ship we walked through a welcome center. We talked to a nice young guy that told us we could do the very same trip that the ship did not have available. It was almost half of the price of what the ship was going to charge, not a surprise.
Before the tour bus departed we actually found a Dunkin Donuts which was a minor miracle. It was nice to have some coffee that didn’t taste like armpit for the first time in three days. On the walk to and back we were accosted every 20 feet by someone else wanting us to buy something. My method to handle these requests normally is just to ignore them. Cindy tries to be more polite which is nice.
The tour was actually quite fun. It was enhanced greatly by our tour guide “Queen Bee”. She was funny and very entertaining. Cindy and I really enjoyed the roughly two and a half tour. Bee shared a lot of cool information along the way that we would have never have gotten or known about if we ventured out on our own.
After the tour we found a small, authentic Bahama style hole in the wall to eat at. We both ordered conch tacos. I don’t think I ever had conch before but it was good. I also had two Presidente beers that weren’t awful. While we ate we sat outside and talked to a 75 year old woman that owned the place, I think. It was the type of unexpected interaction that makes traveling fun. It was a good thing I had enough cash on hand to pay for the bill, which was scribbled on a lined notepad. They did not take credit cards, something I didn’t discover until we finished. The bathroom also didn’t have running water, instead they had a pack of baby wipes on a shelf.
Next up was shopping in and around the Straw Market, something Cindy really likes. Haggling with people over souvenirs isn’t something I have any interest in. Cindy is good at it however. She scored some deals that were impressive, getting 50% off the first price more than once. My primary role was to be the bag carrying mule, something I excel at.
We got back on the ship somewhere around 2:30. We wanted to ride the two big water slides on the ship. We wound up riding only one after waiting something like 45 minutes for a 45 second ride, it was fun while it lasted. Neither of us felt badly about not waiting to do the other single person slide (ours was a double rider slide)
It seemed like a lot of people bailed on Nassau early. We thought the boat would not be very busy yet, we were wrong. The pool deck was the most crowded we have seen it since departing. We grabbed some soft serve ice cream and watched a belly flop competition before returning to the room to prep for dinner.
Oh speaking of dinner, last night’s dinner was not great. I ordered tiger shrimp that came butterflied. Evidently they are designed to have the meat scraped out of the shell. Every shrimp dish I ever ate at the most required me to break off the tail, which is what I did for the three of the first four shrimp. These shrimp were small, no bigger than normal. When I told Cindy that it felt like I was eating tail we examined the shrimp more closely and discovered the shell was on all of them.
We confirmed with staff that the shell was supposed to be on there. The thing is, these shrimp were small so there was very little to be eaten. The meal also supposedly came with asparagus. Instead of stalks of asparagus they have about a half dozen little slices of it. It was a real pitiful amount of food. To make things worse the service was slow as molasses. We had huge delays between courses. Hopefully our last dinner tonight is better.
There are a few shows tonight that Cindy is interested in, I told her whatever she wants to do is fine which has been the general theme of the trip. Tomorrow morning we hopefully will grab one more cruise meal for breakfast before heading back across the state.
The trip has been fun as I hoped it would be. Overall I would say the Royal Caribbean experience has been a step up from what I recall compared to Carnival. Although road trips will likely remain my vacation experience of choice I would definitely do more cruises with Cindy, especially the short variety like this. They don’t require much planning and deliver as many experiences as you can handle. My intent was for this to be a memorable and fun way for Cindy to celebrate her half century on the planet. Hopefully I was successful.
Sunday/Monday/Tuesday
Welcome back to live blogging.
Late afternoon we watched a belly flop competition which got delayed for awhile because they hardly had any contestants. I was half considering entering despite not having a typical belly flop build just to get the contest started. Eventually they got six people to enter. It was fun to watch.
Our last night on the ship we had our best dinner. They originally wanted to seat us at the same tables as we had the night before with food that was not great and wait staff that was slow. Instead we requested to go to adjacent table which was manned by Eka and Akilesh, who we had Friday night, we both liked them a lot. We were glad we made the change, we had a much better experience, The meal wound up with staff singing an early Happy Birthday rendition to Cindy which she enjoyed.
After dinner we went to Showgirls which was in the main theater. I was quite impressed with the production quality of the show, it was top notch. The guy that ran our muster station on day one was one of the main singers, and a damn good one at that. Even though musical/dance productions aren’t my thing I didn’t have a problem sitting through the roughly 45 minutes, it was entertaining for sure.
There was an 80’s party late Sunday night that originally Cindy was interested in but she later changed her mind. She had been getting pretty horrific sleep on the ship and was very tired. So after Showgirls we just walked the perimeter of the ship and enjoyed the beautiful vista of the open sea being lit up by the full moon. When we got back to the room we got our bags almost totally packed so we would be able to roll out EARLY Monday morning after eating breakfast onboard.
We set a 6:10 alarm for Monday. I slept a little better than the prior nights but not great, especially when there were four announcements over the PA between 4 and 5AM looking for a passenger. We hopped out of bed and were at the cafe where breakfast was served just before they opened the doors. The buffet style breakfast on the ship is well organized chaos. You are constantly swerving through human beings, most carrying plates of food. Within 30 seconds of getting up cruise staff swoops in to clear the way for another guest to slide in. The ship staff really was fantastic. Everyone goes out of there way to show you a smile, even if inside they are hating life.
We got off the ship promptly at 7:30 and got to the car incredibly fast. The most impressive/scary thing was how you didn’t even have to present your passport. All you did was look at a camera and you were matched up through image recognition compared to what the government has on you. Yes it was very Big Brother but it also made the line go very fast.
We had one final cruise related bill to pay on the way out, the $66 dollar parking bill. The money we spent beyond paying for the accommodations was not horrific because we didn’t buy drink packages or pay for excursions outside of Coco Cay. I stayed within the boundaries of the mental budget I created when I first thought of this idea.
The drive home was fast, we pulled into the driveway before 10AM which is pretty amazing. During the rest of Monday we tended to a few simple to do’s but I spent most of my time trying to edit the massive amount of footage I had from the trip. I also found myself more than once just thinking about how just 24 hours prior Cindy and I were 200 miles out in the ocean walking around Nassau. I get similar feelings whenever we go away on a trip.
I am off today as well. I spent my second phone session with work in as many days. There was a rather disruptive issue with a server that I think we finally got addressed with the call today. I also called and made arrangements to get our carpet restretched. We had Home Depot install the carpet in 2015. Within a couple years ridges started to form in the rooms. For a long time I just shoulder shrugged but recently after Cindy was complaining about the ridges I looked deeper into the Home Depot installation warranty, which is supposedly lifetime.
Based on what I saw, they should come out and make the problem right, despite the carpet now being four years old. That turned out to be true, they are scheduled to come out to restretch the carpet on the 28th which is cool. What isn’t cool is we are going to have to move a TON of shit to make the rooms prepared for the work. Sure the installers will move up to six pieces of furniture per room but those pieces have to be empty/clear and everything has to be off the floor. The bedroom will be relatively easy to clear but the other three rooms have hours of work to do the same. Hopefully the effort results in the carpet looking decent for several more years.
I may get out to ride later, maybe not. Below is the video outlining the trip. I think it does a decent job of capturing the fun we had.