Wooden Dutch shoes and all things.....wrinkled

After seven days at sea on this ship with a Dutch-looking flag, the shore can't appear off my balcony on the ninth level fast enough. This is my fifth cruise in a span of three and a half years; it may be my last for a while.

Without opening myself to a libel suit, I did know that this particular cruise line catered to "older" cruisers. Meaning those WAY over my own age. (For those of you new to this page, I will qualify for Medicare in six days. I congratulated the on-board blues band for proving there were actual pulses aboard ship with mine, something I seriously doubted for the first few days aboard.)

Some other clues that I had picked the wrong cruise line this time.....

• Even if this Dutch-sounding cruise line had provided a pair of their wooden shoes to all those who came aboard, it wouldn't have slowed these people down any more than they already were. 
• The spa spent most of its time presenting seminars on taking care of your feet.
• The bar called "Chocolate Seduction" was never open, probably because no one who crawled on board could remember what that second word meant. And their doctors had told them to avoid the first one anyway. (Bad for those hearts.....)
• I didn't get splashed even once in the pool by a person younger than 80. Actually, the pool never had more than five people in it at any one time.
  

  

  A lonely pool.....

• All the "Name That Tune" games featured music from the Big Band era.
• .....and all the games were over by sunset.
• Most people were reading real books.
• The bars were populated only by a crew member wiping the already-clean bar...a lot. 

  

  A lonely buffet area....

  

  The lonely barkeep.....

  
  
• What's up with this mouth-breathing thing with older people?? Mysterious. But maybe that's why I was feeling anxious to get back to shore; all the oxygen around me was being sucked out of the air.
• The nurse automatically asked what blood thinner patients were on before passing out band aids.
• The only noise in the passageways at night came from the lonely "DING!" of an elevator.....once an hour or so. 

  

   A lonely theater....

I thought I would welcome a vacation at sea sans children and drunks. In exchange, though, I got  more gnarled feet that I ever care to see again and no activities that even smacked of a trip to the tropics. (I sadly remembered the great deck parties that started even before the ship sailed...on all those OTHER cruise lines.)

All of this is another reminder of the axiom that continues to prove itself as I age to perfection: Be careful what you wish for.

“If you didn't remember something happening, was it because it never had happened? Or because you wished it hadn't?”
― Jodi Picoult, Plain Truth

Cruise Control: Day 6

Roller skates, anyone?

This time we asked for a cabin in the middle. 

Meaning mid-ship, instead of all the way forward in the misty recesses of the longest corridor I have ever seen in my life. Ever.

On our cruise before this one, I almost started stashing my clothes in a restroom near the Atrium so that I wouldn't have to walk that corridor again.  Of course, my stuff would have disappeared almost instantly, due to the uber-efficiency of the housekeeping staff on board, just like every other department we had contact with on these ships. But I did think about it.

We'd open that passageway door leading to our cabin, look helplessly at each other, and begin the long trek. The other end wasn't even visible, as outrageous as that sounds.We walked and puffed and stopped to rest, and then we walked some more.

These ships are immense. I'm thinking that they build them that way in order to board literally thousands of people who pay a tiny fraction of the value they are going to experience while cruising. This way, the cruise lines maximize the concept of quantity, without sacrificing quality at all. It's a thing of beauty. Just about any other industry could learn a great deal from these companies.

The ship we were on for this cruise shakes out like this:

Year Built	2008
Refurbished	2011
Tonnage	113,000 tons
Length	950 feet
Beam	118 feet
Passenger Capacity	3,080

 3000 plus folks contained in a floating city. And that 950 feet is a long way from stem to stern, especially when you're sunburned and hungry, believe me. (I still think they need a buffet on each end of the ship, because no matter where I was starting from, that sucker was on the opposite end. I never did figure that one out.)

One day I walked the entire length of the ship--twice--trying to find the adult swimming pool. I didn't realize that there were TWO of them on board, and I was calling the one I wanted by the wrong name. I never found either one on that particular trek: the one I didn't know existed in the first place or the one I had been looking for when I set out from my cabin. (I think part of it was that "no window in my cabin" thing that I found so disorienting this time; I never knew which way the front--or back--of the ship was when I left my cabin, because I couldn't see which way the the ocean was flowing by. Very confusing.) I finally fell into a deck chair at one of the family pools out of sheer exhaustion. 

Of course, this won't stop me from cruising again, and we did do better with our cabin location this time. We also decided maybe it's in our best interests in the future to focus on smaller ships with fewer people. 

And only one adult pool.



 

Cruise Control: Day 4

Cloud-watching is fine by me, but if you want to be entertained on a cruise, you don't have to wait long. Or ever.

Half of the activities for one day

Every evening, your cabin steward places the next day's schedule of activities in your room, probably because it will take you overnight to read it all. Much less decide what your plan for the day will be, between comedy shows, bingo, dance lessons, art auctions, movies, ice carving demonstrations, tours of the galley or laundry, musical theater shows to rival Las Vegas, magicians, lectures, bands. There is literally some form of entertainment scheduled every minute of every day, in dozens of venues around the ship.

And, the best part, it all runs on time.

Of course, there are places where nothing happens at all, if your reason for cruising is relaxation. That's where you will generally find me: next to a hot tub on a deck chair in the shade somewhere. A glass of champagne will be close by, with more available whenever I look around for one of those helpful young people who hover everywhere. And a book, of course, which I checked out from the ship's library. These "quiet zones" offer vistas of the ocean meandering by, its shade of blue changing from a brilliant azure close to shore to deep navy the farther we sail from shore. Not everyone wants to experience non-stop entertainment on vacation, especially those of us who are aging perfectly.

But rest assured, if it's on the ship's schedule, it will run on time, whatever it is. These people could educate a few businesses I know of back here on dry land.

Entertainment in the Piazza

Our favorite: Jazz

Zumba class in the Piazza

Dance demo

Tour of the galley

The blue card is your pass to....everything!

My personal favorite!

Is it legal to have this much fun??

Comedy show coming up!

"Fun is good."

Dr. Suess

Cruise Control: Day 1

It wasn’t easy getting on the ship this time. But it is best that I experience cruising from more than one perspective, I imagine, especially if I plan on taking all of you along with me.

You know all that talk about budget cuts in Washington these days? Most of us yawn and turn down the volume since all the politicizing is posturing anyway, designed to get the other side of the aisle in Congress to buckle under the weight of all their obstructionism. But in this case, I came face to face with the results of the cut-backs. Or I should say, there weren't many faces to face at all at the US Customs desks as over 3000 travelers tried to get off the ship I was waiting to board. (We experienced the same lack of assistance at the other end of our trip, but more on that later.)

My previous embarkations were as smooth as the Caribbean’s aquamarine surface that would soon surround this huge floating party boat. No waiting, no glitches, nothing standing in the way of all the fun to come. The port personnel in this case did the best they could to process the incoming 3000 in a little over three hours, but the line I had to stand in stretched off into the distance—I literally could not see the end of it—and then it folded back over itself and wended its way back to where I started. But in the meantime, I chatted with the people standing around me and made some new friends. The time passed quickly. (I never saw any of those people again once we boarded, which is a testimony to how large these vessels actually are.)

Once inside the terminal, things happened fast, too, and soon there it was—the gangway leading up to the ship and a host of welcoming crew members. It is astounding to me that these folks can get that many people off the ship, clean and reset everything, and then take on another 3000+ to sail out of port so quickly. They dock at around 7 AM and the ship then heads back out to do it all over again at 4 PM. Amazing. Plus they all keep smiling.

I think this is what is so enticing about spending time on board a cruise ship: the level of service is extraordinary. You need extra towels in your cabin? No need to ask—your cabin steward (who I am convinced must hide in the wall directly outside my door to watch our comings and goings) will notice how many you use and will add extras until you finally reach the perfect number for you. Want all your meals served in your cabin? Just pick up the phone and ask—you’ll never have to leave the comfort of your (admittedly very small) cabin. You don’t feel like walking from your table in the dining room to get another glass of water? Just look up—you can be sure that a server is watching for your signal. He will hustle off to get what you need.

They smile, they agree, they are present without being pressing.

It’s important that the neophytes at cruising among you understand that, although these service professionals are superb at their jobs, there is a price attached to it. At the end of your journey, you will settle up your tab with the purser, part of which includes about $12 a day in tips for the staff. But I’ve always believed that we get what we pay for—and I am more than willing to pay these people to pamper me a few times a year. The ridiculously low price of the cruise includes food, cabin, ports of call, and a beautiful vacation, too. These tips still don’t push the cost of the entire trip off the fiscal cliff.

           

It’s a steal and heaven knows we don’t generally experience this level of service at home.

Tomorrow we’ll talk about food. Just make sure you’re hungry.

Year by year we are learning that in this restless, strenuous American life 

of ours vacations are essential.

Ellsworth Huntington