(It’s close enough to Monday, and since I’m still awake, here goes…)
With today being the unofficial end of summer, at least as far as the US is concerned, I thought I’d share a bit about my just-complete vacation cruise. Don’t fret – it won’t be too long and I hardly took any pictures, so you’ll be spared that.
As we were checking in, the doo-doo hit the fan early. They were trying to charge my inlaws an extra $500 because allegedly, I’d booked them as Maryland residents even tho they’re from Florida. Well, I know full well I didn’t do that, but there was no way to prove it. With the help from a very nice customer service rep, the problem was solved by putting FCD and his dad in one cabin, and my MIL in the other cabin with me – at least on paper. With a Marylander in each cabin, we were good.
Time to board the ship. With two elderly passengers, we could have easily gotten to board at deck 1 and ridden the elevator up. But nooooooooooo, MIL wouldn’t hear of it. She could walk the regular ramp. Yeah, she did, with 2 stops enroute. And I see what I’ll have to deal with when FCD is 30 years older. :rolleyes: Anyway, we got up to the buffet deck, had a little lunch, then went to our rooms when we were allowed to at 1:30. We had all of our luggage by 5:30, which was great.
Dinner was at 6, and it was the only meal we ate in the dining room. Our assigned table was in a horribly noisy corner – honestly, you couldn’t hear yourself think! And the other 4 we were seated with weren’t all that pleasant. Plus the service was incredibly slow – who knew getting a refill of water would be such a trial!! We had the rest of our meals from the buffet, which was a huge disappointment for me. On our last cruise, the dining room meals were superb!! Oh well…
I wish I’d known that Bermuda pretty much closes at 5 - we’d hoped to go to the zoo/aquarium, but by the time we’d docked, bought tickets for the ferry and bus, then asked about the zoo, turned out we’d have had maybe an hour and a half to look around. We weren’t too keen on spending another $12 each for a ferry/bus pass for the next day, so we just went into Hamilton. We were in search of another place I’d read about that was supposed to be pretty close to the ferry landing, but we walked as far as the 80-y/o legs could manage and still didn’t get there, so we just caught a bus back to the ship. Pretty much all we saw of Bermuda was out the bus windows.
Moral of the story - don’t plan a vacation that involves a lot of walking with people who can’t handle walking…
The next day, we just wandered around some shops near the ship, then went to the little beach a few blocks away. I got a t-shirt and we got some earrings for our daughter, and we were back aboard the ship with tons of time to spare.
It was pouring when we got to Boston, and it was an early departure day (back on board by 3:30) so we didn’t even leave the ship, despite the sun coming out around 11. Newport was nice, but it was just a shopping day. We did eat lunch in town. Newport - famous for seafood, especially lobsters, and we ate BBQ. What a disappointment… 
On board, we saw a couple of shows, watched The Hunger Games (What a stupid movie) and lost about $25 in the casino. I do not get the appeal of gambling. We got some time in the hot tubs and bought one photo that was taken in Bermuda. I also bought 2 bottle of Kahlua and FCD got a globe paperweight that he’d been wanting since the last time we were on that ship. I also got my daughter a pashmina from the $10 sale. All told, we spent less than $150 on board, including our casino losses.
The return to Baltimore was fun for me. We sat on deck as we passed the Chesapeake Bay Bridge/Tunnel. It was wild watching the approaching headlights just disappear as they went down from the bridge to the tunnel. Then we were in the bay and it was DARK!!! We got up early the next morning and stood on deck as we came into the berth – it just amazes me that a huge ship can maneuver itself gently into position with tugs. Between the bow thrusters and the azipods, it was a piece of cake! They were starting to tie up when we grabbed some breakfast. Oh, and my Kahlua was supposed to have been delivered to my room on the last night, but it wasn’t. I was at the guest relations desk at 5:30 the last morning, and by 8, I had my Kahlua, so happy ending there.
Getting off the ship was tons easier than when we sailed in January – much better organized. We got all our stuff and were in the car by about 9:30, and home before noon.
And I learned to use the software I’ll need when I start back to work. FCD had it loaded on his laptop, so we spent a few hours on a couple of days going over the basics, and I played with it myself a few times. I’m familiar enough that I’ll be able to start working right away on Weds.
So that’s how I spent the last of my summer. On Tuesday, I’ll take the inlaws to the airport for their morning flight. On Weds, I return to the ranks of the employed. And here are the pictures I took. No need to feign interest… 
Happy Monday!
We’ll see what Paul says tomorrow.