Statistical Trip Summary

For those of you who absolutely have to be fed the statistics of our trip, here they are;

Departure date from Palm Springs:      December 21, 2013
Return date to Palm Springs:               January 21, 2014

Total sea miles traveled:         6588 nautical miles
Total air miles traveled:          5162 nm
Total nautical miles:              11850

Home again, home again

Monday, January 20, 2014

All good things must come to an end and today was no exception.  Since we had a late 6:00 pm flight home from Ft. Lauderdale, we chose an excursion to fill the many hours following our 8:00 am departure from the ship.

We really grew to love Pacific Princess, her crew and our fellow cruisers, but we were eager to return to our California home.  The morning weather was perfect as we disembarked the ship in Port Everglades.  Customs was a breeze and we were soon on the bus to our first stop, Everglades Holiday Park, a location where we would ride an airboat and view an alligator show.

Haven driven past scores of “reptile gardens” across the Sunshine State, we carried with us a high degree of skepticism about this tourist attraction.  Surprisingly, we were actually educated and entertained by the extra effort that EHP has taken to make this a quality attraction.  The airboat ride was more than a high speed thrill ride across the River of Grass, but was actually quite informative. 

Following the airboat trip, we were entertained and educated by an alligator show where a volunteer, who stood less than five feet tall, handled 300 pound gators.

Our excursion also visited Flamingo Gardens, a privately owned plant and animal reserve.  True to its name, the flamingos were beautiful.

We arrived at the airport by 1:30 and passed some of the time before our flight catching up on our email.

Oh, how the mighty have fallen.  Several decades ago, United Airlines, home of the Friendly Skies, was our premier carrier, proudly representing the United States in red, white and blue around the world.  The United 737 which we boarded in Ft. Lauderdale was a state-of-art aircraft, but the story ends there.  Not only was our 6 ½ hour flight uncomfortable, but it appears as if the airline had done everything possible to scrape every dime from the passenger, but providing only minimal service.  Not even a blanket or pillow could be spied.

Our seat had one broken armrest, an inconvenience that made it impossible to use the video screen in front of this.  On top of that, everything on the video screen incurred an extra charge.  Not one package of peanuts was provided.  Meals and snacks were sold, providing they hadn’t sold out by the time the cart had reached our rear rows of the coach class section. Compared to the Delta flights that we had taken on our eastbound trip, United’s service was quite substandard.

We finally reached San Francisco International Airport and sprinted our way to the other end of the airport to catch our connector to Palm Springs.  We could have taken our time, as the United Express pilots had not yet arrived.

Our commuter flight arrived in Palm Springs only a few minutes late and our friend and house-sitter, Gary picked us up and brought us back to our home at the Sands at 1:00 am.  We had been up for 22 hours, ready to crash in our own bed, the final chapter in a fantastic trip.

Travel Blog Jan 15-19, 2013

Travel Blog -Saturday and Sunday, January 18-19, 2014

Drawing to a close…at sea heading north---Go Seahawks!!

The last two full days of our trip were at sea. We left St Martin on Friday and continued our northbound voyage toward the home port of Fort Lauderdale, FL. Since these were not port days, we had two shows left to present for the guests. Our Friday show was scheduled for the afternoon so we spent the morning rehearsing and exercising on the ship’s track in lovely Caribbean weather. The winds were the same direction that the ship was traveling so no winds in our faces as we walked the track on deck 10. Very pleasant.

This next to the last show was our history piece on the Caribbean islands and we had a nice group attending in the main show lounge. Since we no longer have any ports to visit, we were not assigned any desk duty so we had the remainder of the day after our 1:30 show to read and relax on the lounges on the promenade deck. That has been our favorite hang-out since the start of the cruise as it is quieter than around the pool and usually has shade and a breeze blowing.

This was another formal night so we dressed in our formal clothes and had a nice evening with our great table mates and then attended the final production show. The singers and dancers on this trip are fabulous. With only eight in the whole company, we are amazed at the quality of the shows which they present twice a night. We know that they are young but even at that age, we wouldn’t have been able to do five minutes of their entertainment let alone two one-hour shows! We knew that we had to get up early for rehearsal for our final show so we opted to not attend the champagne gala at 11:00 pm.

It is the last full day of the 28 day cruise and we had one final show to present at 9:30 am in the main theater. We decided not to present our new pirate show but instead repeat the pirate show that we gave on the southbound journey as an encore presentation. We figured that only a few guests had probably seen our first pirate show as most of these guests did not take both cruises. We wanted to end with one of our tried and true shows so we could go ‘out with a bang’. It was very well received with lots of positive comments given to us after we were through. It was the last of 12 shows that we presented and we feel that we did not screw-up on a single show!

After the show, we changed into our shorts and tank tops and did our laps on the track and then went to lunch outside on deck. It was a pleasant and relaxing way to unwind. Next, it was time to start packing for the flight home so we went back to our stateroom and started to get all of our things back in our two suitcases, hoping that they will not be over-weight at the airport.

We spent our last dinner with our wonderful tablemates.  Baked Alaska was served or dessert.
At 7:30, Donna attended the show in the Cabaret Lounge and John stayed in our cabin to watch the NFC championship game between the the Seattle Seahawks and the San Francisco team.  Donna returned in time for the second half and the thrilling finale as Seattle won in the last play.  GO HAWKS!

Travel Blog -Friday, January 17, 2014

St. Martin, yet again!

It seems as if every cruise to the Eastern Caribbean stops at St. Martin.  We cannot count haw much time we have spent there.  The harbor was jam packed, with six large cruise ships in Philipsburg’s harbor. Philipsburg is the capital of the Dutch side of the island.

We had put in to serve as an excursion escort and found ourselves together on the same bus.  We had taken this tour last year, but the quality of our tour guide, a charming woman from Dominica made it quite pleasant.

Marigot, the capital of the French side

Our stop in Marigot, the French capital, was much busier than on previous cruises.  We did get a short rainstorm as we walked around.  Many of our fellow passengers donned raincoats or opened umbrellas, but, since we are from Washington we weren’t about ready to let a bit of warm rain bother us.

We completed our tour in Philipsburg and set out to our favorite bar to read our email on their wi-fi connection.  Donna disposed of 75 emails and we returned to the ship after walking the length of Front Street, the city’s main drag.

Following dinner, we were entertained by a great comedian, went dancing and turned in by 11:00.

Travel Blog -Thursday, January 16, 2014

St Lucia; a Day at the Beach

This was our fourth visit to St. Lucia. Our daughter, Kari, had recently been to St. Lucia and recommended Rodney Bay for a beach day.  The bay is located about 20 minutes north of our ship and we negotiated a taxi fare to get there. 

The beach umbrellas at scenic Rodney Bay, St. Lucia

Rodney Bay is a very upscale area, surrounded by many condos and hotels.  It is more reminiscent of Maui than any place we have visited so far on our cruise.  We arrived about 9:30 and rented an umbrella and deck chairs with a beautiful view of the magnificent bay.  Dozens of watercraft were anchored offshore, a few only a bit smaller than cruise ships!  We tried swimming in the portion of the beach in front of us, but Donna found the uncertain footing in the sand a bit too challenging.  We soon noticed a roped-off area about 50 yards down the beach and gave it a try.  I was much better and we enjoyed swimming and floating the gentle, warm waves.

The time passed quickly as we read, chatted, and swam and by 1:00 we were dressed and ready to catch our taxi back to the ship.

We again served our hour at the desk in the evening.

We really enjoy our dinner tablemates and have many laughs during that time.

On to St. Martin tomorrow!

Travel Blog -Wednesday, January 15, 2014

Tobago Revisited

Donna mans the artillery at Fort St George, Tobago

We served as tour escorts on our bus tour of this beautiful and friendly island today.  Our stops included forts, an old sugar processing plant and a few other scenic views.  This is a case of the tour guide making the tour.  Donna’s guide was excellent and John’s hardly spoke a word.

We took a stroll through Scarborough, but really couldn’t find anything of interest to buy, with the exception of some laundry detergent. 

As on every other day, we served our shift at the Port Lecturers’ table and answered questions about the next islands.  

Travel Blog -Tuesday, January 14, 2014

Coasting the Guianas

Today was a sea day, which meant that it was a work day for us.  This was to be our last destination lecture, a presentation on our ports of call in the Caribbean; Tobago, St. Lucia and St. Martin.  We were familiar with each of these, since we had visited them on our southbound voyage.

Our program was very well attended and we received many positive comments from the passengers.  This program would be rebroadcast for the next four days on the ship’s northbound voyage.

This voyage has had wonderful weather, with very little rain.  Since we are now out of the Amazon, we can again eat on deck and go outside after dark without the fear of flying and crawling critters that made nighttime activities so challenging in the Amazon Basin.

Devil’s Island, French Guiana

Monday, January 10

Devil’s Island, French Guiana

We had been asked by the Captain to deliver a narration from the Bridge as Pacific Princess circled the Salvation Islands, of which Devil’s Island is a member.  We had not been asked to take on this task when we first signed on for the cruise, but agreed to take the responsibility for the benefit of the passengers.

We were well prepared to begin our program at 9:30 am.  While getting ready to leave our stateroom at 9:10, we received a call from the Cruise Director telling us that there was only space for one person on the bridge.  You can imagine how much this shocked us, since both of us did the narration on the southbound cruise!

With just a minute to decide, Donna volunteered to do it. Her narration was fed into the outside decks, the Pacific Lounge and stateroom televisions during the 90 minutes the ship circled the islands.  Donna received accolades from the Hotel Director and our fellow guests. 

Tonight’s show by comedian-musician Dan Riley was fantastic.  We really enjoyed it.

Our ship is now pitching and rolling considerable and, consequently, dancing in the Pacific Lounge is quite challenging.

We turned in with smiles on our faces and ready for our next sea day.

Out of the Amazon, into the Atlantic

Travel Blog - Sunday, January 12, 2014

Out of the Amazon, into the Atlantic

We are still in the Amazon, although the width of the river makes the shore invisible most of the time.  The warm, muddy, freshwater of the Amazon is detectable over 100 miles out to sea! Later in the day, we turned north into the blue Atlantic.

We had an excellent turnout for our Devil’s Island program. It has been shown on the ship’s television network all afternoon.  

Donna & John at Port Lecturers' desk

Today was our first formal night on this cruise. Donna dressed up in her purple and black cocktail dress and John wore his wool three-piece suit.  Everyone on board the ship looked so good.  We were proud to be part the cruise at dinner, and at the Captain’s Reception. Afterward, we attended the evening’s show and went dancing until late at night in the Pacific Lounge.

Traversing the Amazon Delta

Travel Blog -Saturday, January 11, 2014

Traversing the Amazon Delta

Today was a “sea day.”  We will be traversing the massive delta of the Muddy Amazon for the next two days.  We delivered our lecture on Darwin and South America and it was warmly received. We have really appreciated the wonderful comments from our guests.

The Cabaret Club, our lecturing venue

Return to Santarem, Brazil

Travel Blog - Friday, January 10, 2014

Return to Santarem, Brazil

Our ship is back to its first (and last) Brazilian port of call.  Instead of going on an excursion, we decided to kick back, relax and catch up on a few things.  We did some of our paperwork, took a break, and tried out the ship’s pool for the first time. The wonderful weather and comfortable water temperature made it a delight.

We took a few minutes off to check out the dockside souvenir stands, where we made a few minor purchases.

Our Amazon lectures that we gave on the way on the way upstream have been broadcast continuously on our downstream leg of the cruise.

After serving our hour at the Port Lecturers’ desk, as we do every day,  attended religious services. Afterwards, we dined with our delightful tablemates, attended the show and retired for the night.

Typical Amazon Riverboat