Today is a welcome sea day, we are pretty tired after having had five consecutive port days. Of course, we slept in since we did not have to meet any schedule.
Once we were awake, we got ready and headed to breakfast in the buffet, which is always crowded on sea days. Everyone just lingers around, drinking coffee, playing cards, and other non-eating activities, so table space is at a premium.
After breakfast, we visited a few of the stores to kill some time so that our room steward could clean the room. We actually purchased come cologne and perfume from the store on board, the prices were less than we had priced at home, and we get a ten percent discount for being Elite in the Captain’s Circle.
We also filled out our future cruise deposit form so that we can get a reduced deposit of $100 on any future cruise that we book withing two years, and also get some amount of on board credit, depending on the room type. If we don’t use it within two years, it is fully refundable, so it is a great deal all around.
We returned to the room to apply sunscreen before heading out to the pool deck for some sun. It is quite breezy this morning, and the seas were a little higher than yesterday, so the ship has a little movement, but the breeze was welcome in the hot sun.
We went to lunch in the buffet and then headed back out to the pool deck. The weather forecast had been for the wind to diminish, and later in the afternoon, it completely died, making it very hot outside in the sun.
We headed back to the cabin to make some refreshments, and decided to get a head start on our packing effort so we do not have to spend as much time packing tomorrow. We packed all of our dirty clothes, and then most of the remaining clean clothes since we only need clothes for tomorrow and the next day, our travel home day.
We tried to sit out on the balcony, but since we are facing the west, directly into the sun, it was quite hot.
Tonight is the last formal night, and we have the Captain’s Circle Party at 6:15 PM, so we have to get ready a little earlier tonight than we normally would, especially since it take more time to get into the formal outfits, well at least for me with all of the studs, cuffs, bow tie, etc for my tuxedo.
We headed to the Captain’s Circle Party and it was already quite crowded when we got there at 6:15 PM. We had a couple of free glasses of wine, but the service was much worse than on the first cruise, we never were served any appetizers. We though it was also more crowded than on the first cruise. We had to sit on the side of the Vista Lounge, more to the front, and it seemed the servers were always out of refreshments by the time they got to where we were sitting.
After the Captain’s Circle party ended at 6:45 PM, we headed to the Princess Theater to watch a piano/comedy show by an entertainer named John Breeser. He had played piano with many famous people, and was quite good, and blended in some funny stories and jokes throughout the show.
After the show, we headed over to the Vines wine bar to get our last bottle of wine, a Jekel Riesling, to take to the dining room for dinner. Tonight is Lobster night, so the Riesling was a perfect wine for that meal. We were able to get a decent seat in the dining room, and the service was better than we had on lobster night on the last cruise. However, it was still pretty slow, and both our assistant waiter, and the one for the station next to us seemed lost. Again, it seemed like the waiter was a lot busier than the assistant, slowing down the service.
The meal was good, Stephanie had a Snapper dish, and I had the lobster and prawns. Unfortunately, there was some type of sauce on the lobster instead of drawn butter, so it was not a good as it had been in the past. Maybe the lobster had no taste, so they had to add a sauce to make up for the lack of flavor.
After dinner, we decided to attend another show, this time by an entertainer we had seen on previous cruises, Steve Morris. Steve is a great guitar player, and had played with many bands in the past, including the Beach Boys. He is also very funny. Unfortunately, we arrived just about ten minutes before the show started, and there were no seats in the Vista Lounge, so we had to stand in the back. The show was really funny.
We had intended to stay out longer tonight, but I was starting to sweat in my tux, it seemed it was hot everywhere we went, maybe due to the crowds. We intended to go back to the room to change, and head out to the big “balloon drop” at 11:30 PM, but we just ended up staying in. It was already about 11:00 PM, and we were tired. I think we are just a little tired of being away from home, and sleeping on a different bed, but we can tell our general enthusiasm in much less than it had been on the first cruise. It is just a completely different crowd, many of the people in the dining room were not dressed in any formal clothes, many of the men were only wearing long pants and a long sleeve shirt, with no jacket. It was a much more formal crowd on the first cruise, and a much more fun crowd.
Tomorrow is another sea day, but we have to pack and get ready to go home. We are scheduled for a “walk off” time of 6:15 AM on Sunday, so we can’t play too hard tomorrow, knowing we have to get up at about 5:00 AM to be ready to get off the ship at 6:15 AM and head tot he airport to get our rental car for the drive home.
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