Ft. Lauderdale to Hamburg Transatlantic Cruise – 2017

HAPPY EASTER!

Today is the last day of the cruise before we arrive in Hamburg early tomorrow morning and disembark the Regal Princess.  Of course, we took the opportunity of sleeping in this morning since we did not really have to anything to do today but pack. 

The morning weather was one of the best yet for the cruise, at least as far as the sunshine was concerned.  We awoke to really clear skies, and the ship was heading in a direction where the sunshine was coming directly through our sliding glass door.  If only the temperature matched the sunshine.  It was about 46 degrees outside, but at least it was not very windy. 

I got up earlier than Stephanie, showered and then went down for our breakfast sandwiches so she could sleep in a bit more.  She got up when I came back to the room, and we ate our breakfast.  Since there is no priest onboard, and it is a day at sea, we could not go to Easter Sunday Mass, so we read all of the Mass readings from our The Word Among Us missalette that we had brought on the cruise.

Our Door Decorated For Easter

Afterward, we got ready and headed out to let our cabin steward clean the room.  We were going to do a little packing this morning, mainly our dirty clothes and the warmer weather clothes we will no longer need once we leave the ship tomorrow.  We were able to look at the forecast for Hamburg and Berlin, and it is forecast to snow Monday night and Tuesday morning.  It has been unusually cold here for this time of year, even for the locals we have talked to.

We headed out to the Crooners Bar to find a quiet place to read and type on the blog, trying to catch up after our three consecutive port days.  Stephanie wanted to find Arturo in the Outrigger Bar so we could say goodbye to him and give him a little token of our appreciation for his service.  We had already thanked Zivka and Reiner in the Wheelhouse Bar last night.

Easter Decorations in the Piazza

Stephanie found Arturo at the Outrigger Bar but he was moving to the Seaview Bar to let Ref go on break. Stephanie came and got me and we both went up to the Seaview Bar to thank Arturo.  We had one of our morning drinks while we were there, the Bellini for Stephanie and a Bloody Caesar for me.  It was too cold outside at the bar since it was in the shade, so we could not stay long,  It was nice in the sunshine out by the pool, it was more protected from the wind, and there were actually a few people in bathing suits laying out in the sun, They must be from cold parts of the world, it was not quite that nice outside.

Packing – An Awful Sign That The Cruise Is Over

We headed back to the cabin with our beverages and proceeded with our initial packing effort.  We were not going to keep our carry on bag we brought just from the drive down to Ft. Lauderdale.  We also knew we would have much bulkier and heavy clothes on tomorrow because of the cold weather than we wore in Florida, making for more room in the suitcases, so packing was fairly easy.  We got everything packed except our clothes for tonight and for tomorrow.

After packing, we headed up to the buffet for some lunch, which was quite good.  There were boiled shrimp and sautéed shrimp on the buffet, as well as spicy French fries, which we had not ever seen served before. 

After lunch, on the way out of the buffet area, we ran into Dagmar and Gerd.  Today is Dagmar’s birthday, so we wished her Happy Birthday, and talked for a bit before they headed to a table to eat lunch.

We went out to the Seaview Bar to tell Ref goodbye.  We did not get to spend much time with him because it was just too cold after the first few days to be at an outside bar.  They were going to have a flair show at the bar today, and were preparing for that in their coats and stocking caps.  He was going to try and find us later at the Wheelhouse Bar for a final goodbye.

We went back to the cabin to get the computer so we could do some more work on the blog and relax in the Crooner’s Bar area.  After a bit, Stephanie headed to the room to take a short nap while I continued to work on the blog.  At 3:00 PM, there is a daily buy one, get one for a dollar happy hour in the Crooner’s Bar, and it was starting to fill up.  There was also an end of cruise raffle drawing from all of the purchased happy hour drinks, a ticket is given for each drink bought at happy hour for the duration of the cruise.  I left because of the crowd, and knew someone would want my seat for the happy hour that we did not need to participate in since we are on the beverage package.

I headed back to the cabin to wake up Stephanie.  She was feeling a little under the weather, having developed a scratchy throat, so she continued to rest while I did a few other things for our packing effort.

We got ready early for dinner tonight so we could go to Vines and enjoy some wine and tapas, and give one of the servers there, Nelsie, a little tip for taking care of us.  We enjoyed the wine and tapas and then headed up one deck to Alfredo’s for an early dinner.  We were seated next to a window, and it was a nice view outside.  We were cruising fairly close to the coast all day, but going only about 10 knots, so we saw several ships pass us and they were quite close.  The water was fairly shallow, the Captain had said only about 40 feet deeper than the ship’s draft, so the water was quite dirty with sediment.

Stephanie and I both had the Minestrone Soup for the appetizer and Stephanie had a pizza for dinner, and I had a Calzone.  As usual, everything was quite good.  We got to see a really nice rainbow form over the sea not too far from the ship while we were eating, it appeared to go straight down into the water.  Of course, we had no camera for a picture.

Dagmar’s Birthday

After dinner, we headed to the Wheelhouse Bar and found Dagmar and Gerd there having a drink.  They were getting ready to go to dinner in the Dining Room for Dagmar’s Birthday.  We had planned to head in early tonight, but wanted to wait until they returned so we could celebrate her birthday.  Stephanie had purchased a small stuffed bear in Bruges, and we gave her that for her birthday, knowing from some of our conversations that she really liked stuffed bears.

Dagmar’s Birthday Bear

The bar was running out of some of the various alcohols, and my Knob Creek was one of them.  They were trying to reduce their inventory at the bar so that when drydock started in Hamburg, there was less to box up to be put in storage.  They also ran out of canned Diet Coke and small bottled waters at the Wheelhouse Bar, as well as ginger ale in the cans.  However, they did go and get some ginger ale from another bar.  We were trying to hydrate some today after not having drank enough water the previous couple of days while we were in ports, so we alternated between water and adult beverages.

We did see Glenda and Sam pass by on their way to dinner, so we only chatted a bit, hoping to see them later, but it was already almost 8:30 PM, and they were probably going to miss us since it takes about two hours to eat in the dining room.

Dagmar and Gerd returned from dinner a little before 9:00 PM, just in time for Simon to play her favorite song, Hallelujah, for her birthday.  We sat with them for a while, and showed them where we were staying in Berlin on my phone.  They gave us some tips on places to eat, and will send us an email when they get to their hotel in Hamburg, where they are staying a few days with friends before returning to Berlin later in the week, so they will not be there while we are there.  I also added WhatsApp, an app similar to Viber, and we exchanged numbers, and sent a text as a trial to make sure it all worked.

The Gang From The Wheelhouse Bar

We said our goodbye’s to all of the staff at the Wheelhouse Bar, and even Ref came by to tell us farewell.  We were also able to tell Simon goodbye when he completed playing for the night.  With a final goodbye to Dagmar and Gerd, we headed back to the cabin for the night.  We watched a little TV, part of a movie called Passenger.  We also occasionally went outside to see some of our sailing up the river to Hamburg.  The water was really muddy, and there were several factories that put out some really smelly smoke. 

We are scheduled to arrive about 4:30 AM tomorrow morning, and the Captain had said we would use three pilots, starting at 9:00 PM tonight to navigate the shallow water and river up into Hamburg, quite a distance inland.

We set a wake up call for 7:00 AM tomorrow morning and went to sleep.