Bringing you up to speed on our cruise!

Note to readers: I have been keeping a journal since we left for our cruise, and it dawned on me today that I need to post it to my blog! SO... these entries are from last weekend up until yesterday. I will post a new blog daily until we get home. I hope you enjoy.

Alaska? Or The tropics??

Day 1

Saturday January 8, 2010

This is the day we have been waiting for since last June! The day we leave on our cruise!

Woke up at 4:15am when Danas alarm went off, thats the good thing. The bad thing is I had just gone to sleep at 2:30am!! Frankie was a mess last night, I think he sensed our excitement. We took him to bed at 9:30pm and he wouldnt settle down. I took him in the living room and he ate, drank, chewed on a twist and at 10:30pm I tried going back to bed. No go..

Bre was up so she took him until about midnight, then I tried again, he had me up at 1:00 and at 2:00 and finally at 2:30 he passed out!

I wasnt feeling bad when I got up, just a little tired. Breanna almost had a melt down because she couldnt find her keys. I found her keys and we finally left for the airport.

The temp in the grand valley this morning was -3! A tit nippley as our friends in PA like to say! Made it to the airport, hopped out grabbed our luggage, said our goodbyes and we were ready to go!!! Bre left and all was well. Or so we thought. Guess who forgot the folder with ALL of our paperwork in the Escape! Me.. well shit! I tried calling her several times but she didnt answer her cell phone, so Dana and I decided that we were going to have to wing it. And wing it we did! We made it through security, and to our gate, trying to remember everything we had in that folder. The most important items were our boarding passes for the ship and the luggage tags for the ship.

We got to our gate in plenty of time, and sat down to wait... and wait, and wait. Apparently the plane wouldnt start because it was so cold! 40Minutes later, we boarded and it was like a freaking freezer in there, but it finally warmed up about halfway through the flight. The flight was good, we arrived in Dallas only 10 minutes or so late, and guess what we found! A computer kiosk where we could print our paperwork. YAY!! So we printed all of the itineraries, and the boarding passes and headed up to the Skylink to find our departure gate. We finally found the gate, ate a sandwich from subway and then waited for the Ft Lauderdale flight.

The flight was great, a tiny bit of turbulence, but arrive in Ft Lauderdale with no problems, caught the hotel shuttle and checked in at the hotel. By the way, Ft Lauderdale had rain and 40 degrees!!!! A huge cold front moved in today and dropped the temps something like 35 degrees, go figure.

It was so cool to look out when the plane was landing and see the cruise ships all docked

at the pier here in Ft Lauderdale. I am getting excited for our departure tomorrow, I hope our luck is better.

Sunday January 10, 2010

Day #2

“Muster group A”

Today dawned cloudy in Ft Lauderdale, and COLD!! The temps dropped to 32 degrees overnight, hardly “sunny southern Florida”! Haha

The Floridians are not dealing with this frigid temps at all, I dont think they have warm clothes, if they do they arent wearing them. Dana and I had a light breakfast, then took a walk to kill some time. We walked to a local strip mall, and the only stores open were the Publix grocery store and an Ace Hardware! OK this is a tourist area, and the stores are CLOSED on Sunday? They need to take a lesson from Colorado.

Rode the shuttle to Port Everglades, lots of laughing, and loud people. I am looking for a little solitude and relaxation, hope these folks arent around the whole trip.

Checked in with absolutely NO glitches or delays. It seems like the Princess people know what they are doing. I am sure it isnt their first rodeo. Had our pictures take twice, I am sure the effect is going to be skewed since we were both wearing sub zero ski jackets and gloves and Dana had his hood up. LOL

The ship is breathtaking! It is the 2^nd largest in the princess line, only 2 yrs old and incredible. It will take us several days to check the whole thing out I am sure. Our stateroom is awesome and the balcony is too. We had a great lunch at the Horizon buffet and then went for our “Muster drill”. The Muster drill is where everyone takes their life jackets and we learn to put them on, it was held in a large auditorium (they divide the travelers into 5 different auditoriums) and took about 20 minutes. It was painless. Shortly thereafter we went to “sail away”

“Sail Away” was so fun, we stood at the railing on our deck and watched 2 other cruiseliners leave the port, then it was our turn. We were entertained by 2 coastguard

blow up boats as they spun and dove into the water next to our ship. They would wave at the crowd and turn those boats in short short circles then take them through the wake from the ship and fly into the water. A real site to see! The homes on the beach next to the port had several people waving at us as we went by. Off we go into the channel!

And then we hit the waves! Lots of waves, very turbulent water. There was no way you could walk (I know, we tried) for about an hour. Poor Dana got seasick. I took an antivert, gave him one and we laid down to rest. He fell asleep and while he was sleeping we broke through the gulf stream (which was causing all of the turbulence). We have been headed out to open ocean now for another hour and the turbulence seems to have settled down. Thank goodness. I was hoping the whole trip wouldnt be like that.

I am currently sitting here waiting for room service and Dana isnt keen on eating anything else so we are in for the night. It is cold out anyway.

More to come tomorrow! First stop... Princess Cay Bahamas!

Day 3,

Monday January 11, 2010

“ 5 foot Swells”

We had a wake up call from the captain at 0900 this morning (we had to set our clocks ahead another hour for the time zone we were in). We were currently under a frigid air mass that had temperatures in Princess Cay down to 60 degrees, with 40 mph winds and 5 foot swells!! Because we were unable to dock directly up to the island, we were originally going to go ashore via “tenders”. Kind of like big lifeboats.

With the swells that huge and the wind blowing that hard, there was no way we could go ashore. SO the captain decided to sail southward to see if we could get into some warmer weather. St Maarten here we come!

We spent the day lounging on the deck, the sun was out once in a while. In late afternoon

we came back to the room and took a nap. Then went to dinner poolside, and down to the casino for a while. After the casino we came back up and watched the movie G Force under the stars, it was fun.

The temperatures outside are actually getting warmer the farther south we go. The weather prediction for St Maarten on Wednesday is for clear sunny skies and temps in the 80's. Yay! We have an excursion set for St Maarten, we are supposed to do an island and beach tour, I hope the weather holds.

The accommodations are very nice, and the food is good. Too good, I can tell I am really going to need Jenny when I get home! LOL

Plans for tomorrow- another day at sea.

Day 4, Tuesday January 12, 2010

“Crack Kills”

Today was our 2^nd day at sea, not sure if we are just moving very slow or maybe not in a straight line, but what it was originally supposed to take one day to accomplish is now

taking 2 days because we bypassed the bahamas yesterday.

Last night we traveled through a couple of storms, I could hear it raining, and feel the the ship rolling a little. Dana slept through it all, which was good.

Today it was overcast for the most part of the day. We ate breakfast at poolside, and then went up to the upper decks to read in the sun when it was out. Dana played a TV theme song trivia game, and won. His prize was 2 decks of Princess cruises playing cards.

The sun had been out for about an hour and we were getting warm so we went down by the Neptune pool in the shaded areas and read for a while. This is when I started to do some people watching. Now, normally, I think people are the most ignorant/stupid beings on the earth. Since I have had some rest and am on vacation, they are becoming more amusing than aggravating to me, which is a good thing. I sat there watching them all lounging by the poolside, and sitting in the hot tub and have come to some conclusions...

#1. crack kills. If you weigh over 300 lbs pull up your swimming trunks! Plain and simple. I do not want to see your butt crack and neither does anyone else!

#2 if your back and chest hair resembles a fur coat from the roaring 20's, shave it! Or wax it or something! For the love of God PLEASE do not waltz around the pool like you think people want to sit in the hot tub with the Yeti! Massive amounts of hair is NOT charming. It is nauseating.

#3 If your stomach hangs 3 inches over your waistline, do not... I repeat.. do NOT think a tankini will cover it up. Its a lost cause. Wear a one piece and keep it covered as much as possible. Thats what I do. LOLOL

Yes, America. We are out of shape. Nay, we are FAT. I have seen so many fat bodies in alarmingly revealing swimsuits today that I am feeling thin. And I am not even in the neighborhood of thin.

Dana and I even established a scale for grading those women who THOUGHT they had bikini bodies. The end result... unless you are in your 20's, have never given birth and run every day or do cardio training. Do not think you have a bikini body. You dont..

Plans for this evening, since it is a formal evening and we do not do formal... we are going to the buffet for dinner and then if it isnt raining, watch another movie under the stars. That was fun. We have to be up at 0800 tomorrow morning, we have received permission from the Island of St Maarten to dock earlier than our original 1000 docking time. So we will be able to go ashore before our tour starts at 1000. We are scheduled for a tour of the Island, called “The Best of St Maarten Island tour”. I am excited. There is supposed to be some good shopping there, and I can hardly wait to take pictures.

Did I mention that the temps tomorrow are supposed to be in the 80's. YAY St Maarten!