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Woke to a beautiful, if a bit subdued sunrise this morning. Our coffee and yogurt were delivered at 8 and we sat out on the veranda to enjoy the fresh morning air. It is already 68 degreesF and the clouds on the horizon are not anywhere close. The swells are only five feet this morning and the patch is doing its job. The irritating side effects of the patch are nothing compared to that horrid throwing up kind of sea sickness.

Mo is attending the the most demanding job of the day: read the Princess Patter and make a little list of what we want to do when. Last night we went to a great short show with a truly good vocalist, Lovena Fox. She had a great range and was a good entertainer. I actually got goosebumps when she sang “Don’t Cry For Me Argentina”. Jennifer Lopez always used the “goosies” to judge whether a singer was good enough to win on American Idol. I really love it when music gives me goosies. I think I even got a few watching Paul McCartny on the big screen the other night as we sailed under the bridge.

After the show we traveled through the Promenade deck 7 to the Amalfi dining room for our second seating dinner. Everything was actually delicious! We weren’t too excited about dining on our last cruise to New England on the Caribbean Princess, so dinner was a great surprise. I had spicy beef satays and a Tom Thai soup for appetizers, and then decided on the signature Princess fettuccini Alfredo, thinking it might be easy on my stomach. It was, and I even enjoyed a perfectly made creme brûlée for dessert. Mo had a Caesar salad and some excellent beef fajitas with all the trimmings, including some great guacamole. The meat was well seasoned, tender, and perfectly cooked. After dinner coffee was prompt, hot, and strong. Much, much different than our last cruise. Tonight we will be eating turkey in the dining room so we are happy to discover that the food there is good.

The weather today has been nice, and the clouds on the horizon never came near us and thank goodness the swells have stayed low. Even without pool time, it is amazing how we can while away a day. At ten I decided to join a group of “Knitters and Natters”, an informal gathering with no leader, for some light conversation and some ooohing and ahhhhing about what everyone was working on. It was nice. Mo watched a show on how to carve a turkey, which was a bit of a turkey anyway.

We wandered to the pool deck to see how warm the hot tubs were, and snce they weren’t that warm, we decided instead to sit on the sunny side of the deck and people watch. I knitted, Mo read, and we shared a really good hot dog and some french fries from the Trident burger bar near the pool. We hoped to play some ping pong, but the tables were completely monopolized so we gave up.

It was 2PM, and the agenda had nothing of importance until 4. We went back to the stateroom to put on workout clothes and then up to the 15th floor to the fitness center. All the elliptical and treadmill machines look out over the ocean at the front of the ship. The machines are pretty high tech, and it took awhile to get them going, but once we did it was a great workout, better than walking the windy decks on the track above us or on the coldish promenade deck below us.

Back to the room for another change of clothes to go to the Captain’s Circle party. In the past this party for repeat cruisers was held in one of the big bars, with wonderful hors doeurves and complimentary cocktails while cruisers were awarded various prizes for the most cruise days, the most cruises, and some random door prizes. We even won a bottle of champagne at one of the previous parties.

This one was different, not worth the effort of going down the elevator! It was a big generic group of people gathering in the big Princess theater. No drinks, no hors doeurves, and just some promotional videos of the new Royal Princess coming out next year. So their way of thanking repeat customers is to dump us into the theater and try to sell us something? That was dumb. The gift certificate from the captain for a drink of our choice that was passed out to us as we left the theater barely made the thing worth while.

Another silly while the time away moment was the 12 varieties of fudge special at the Godiva chocolate shop tasting party. I stood in line for 3 little and I mean tiny little, pieces of fudge and then a hard sell to buy more. I hate gummy fudge and this was quite gummy. Nothing like the sweet, creamy perfection of Alaska fudge company in Juneau. Ah well, I kept my card in my pocket for this one.

All these non-activities make it sound that cruising can be really stupid and boring, but in between the stupid stuff, there is still always the ocean. Outside our deck the sky is open, and the sea slides by in the most incredible shade of navy prussian blue. Remember that color from the old crayon box? It was always my favorite.

We are back in our stateroom, watching the ocean slide by while Mo watches the news. We have FOX, BBC, and MSNBC to choose from, no CNN. But unlike European hotel coverage, this news is the same that is running in the states. Soon we will “dress” for dinner, and take the long comfortable walk to the back of the ship for our Thanksgiving turkey dinner. It is a formal night, and already we have seen some really gorgeous dresses, and spiffy tuxedos. I know some folks don’t like this part, but for me it is fun. Dress up opportunities in Klamath Falls are rare, and my work life for several decades required heavy boots and dirty jeans. I love putting on long flowing things that sparkle and love even more watching all the other people who are sparkling.

An easy day at sea, and I am feeling great.

 

The sun has risen and I realize that we are on the right (oops, I mean correct) side of the ship for the trip toward the islands. Our cabin on the Star Princess is on the port side of the Baja deck. We are in the forward part of deck, the eleventh, so there is a bit of movement here as our ship leaps through the moderate swells. I woke several times during the night, rocking to the motion of the ship. I wondered if this is how it might feel to be a babe in your mother’s womb.

I am grateful for my sea wrist bands which are almost keeping me from feeling sick. I have scopolamine patches with me but I hate to use them since they make me feel so weird, but I think my plan is failing.

We are waiting for morning coffee and pastries to be delivered to our cabin. Our plans include just about nothing on this, our first day at sea. I guess that is a good thing since it is now several hours later and I am just emerging from a major bout with sea sickness. Lesson learned: if you wait too long before putting on the patch it will be too late.

We began this trip with a nice drive to San Francisco, west coast departure was nice since we didn’t have to fly anywhere. It took us just over seven hours to get to the City and Pier 35 where the beautiful Star Princess dominated the skyline. I am not yet jaded enough to keep from getting excited at these big ships. They truly are an amazing wonder of ship building and they are just getting bigger and more shiny all the time.

The pier had a drop off area but the traffic on the Embarcadero was backed up and slow. We sat in line for awhile before deciding to just go park at the prearranged garage and walk with our bags. It was only a couple of blocks and very easy.

Once inside, the lines were long but moved along quickly and efficiently and in no time at all we were in our stateroom. Our luggage was even delivered within a few minutes of our arrival. Our stateroom steward, Imman, from Indonesia, introduced himself, and very shortly we had the requested foam pad all set up. The Princess beds are very hard, so it is smart to ask for a pad before they are all gone.

We unpacked, once again appreciating the incredibly roomy closets on Princess and the extra drawers and shelves that do so well accommodating all our stuff. We walked upstairs to the Lido deck for a late lunch of fruit and Caesar salad. There are lots of fresh veggies available and the watermelon and pineapple were nice and sweet.

One of the things Mo wanted most from this San Francisco departure was the sail out under the bridge. Having lived nearby in Montera for many years, she has a special relationship with the City. Our departure was scheduled for 4pm and in spite of the cloudy skies we knew there would be a great view of the bridge as we sailed beneath.

We climbed to the top decks in the chilly air for the sailaway party, which ended long before the actual sailaway. With a two hour delay, we sailed in the dark, but it was still magical. Accompanied by Paul McCartny on the big screen and the lights of San Francisco, we sailed underneath the bridge in the dark drizzly skies, and raised our glasses and cheered with everyone else when we went under the bridge. Above us on the bridge, people were cheering as well.

Before we knew it, it was time for dinner. We had chosen early seating and specifically requested a table for two. Of course, we were led to a table for eight and the waiter was insistent that two tops did not exist for early seating. After a bit of a wait in line, I conferred with the maitre d and we signed up for late seating and a table for two. I would rather eat late anyway when we are exploring, but it is hard to eat so late on sea days. Better than having to play nice. Of course, we could get delightful people, but in the past it has been rather tiresome. We enjoy each other’s company without all that extra effort.

It had been a long day and by 7 or so we were both running down and decided that a buffet in Horizon Court would be just fine. Nothing fancy. Some kind of pork cutlet with rice, our standard watermelon, salad, and topped off with a really good cup of coffee. The bed felt great after that and in spite of the rocking I slept great.

Today has slipped by easily, especially after I quit being sick. A nice perk on this cruise is the $250 credit that Mo gets for being military. We can have a drink a day each and just barely use it up. The extra helped us to decide on a night at the special steak house some time during the trip.

The swells coming from the northwest are huge and the ship is still rocking crazily. Don’t let anyone tell you there isn’t much movement in a big ship! Tonight we are going to the dining room for dinner.

Just a little side note. This afternoon I took the iPad down to the Internet cafe and discovered another good reason for not upgrading to iOS 6. It isn’t compatible with the ship satellite Internet system. Lucky me and unlucky for a lot of folks standing there with ther shiny new iPads.

 

Seems as though a bunch of recent posts are not coming through on my blog feed so not showing up in the blog rolls. This is a test. I see that this post has shown up on the blog rolls of some of my favorite blogs, so in case you think I haven’t been posting, there are a couple recent posts you might want to read.  I have been missing your input a lot!

Going Home

Good morning.  If you see a bunch of posts roll by on your blog roll, and then can’t get to them because you get the “sorry” message, it is because I am following Erin’s suggestion that I publish from Blogsy and then revert immediately to draft. 

I can then bring everything back into LiveWriter and add photos.  I never did get good at the photo placement in Blogsy, but I did manage to keep notes for myself.  As you can see, I am working on it and eventually something I can live with as a memoir will emerge. Maybe by the next time I go on a tour with the iPad I will be better at the Blogsy thing, then again….maybe not!

I am writing from the hotel in Vienna, where we arrived yesterday afternoon. It is about 55 degrees F and overcast. This is only the very beginning of the story, but I thought it might be nice to at least check in a bit. I originally had half a dozen photos in this post and Blogsy keeps saying “1 photo cannot be found on the iPad, delete these photos and post again”. So far I have deleted all of them, so we will see if the dang thing posts this time. If so, I might go back and try again! Of course you can always check out the current stuff over on the Picasa or Google plus link to the left. Maybe something will be there, who knows. HA!

Our hotel in Budapest was the Marmara Hotel, on the Pest side of the Danube, in what is considered the more modern part of the city. Although the hotel is very close to a large metro station, it is also close enough to the Danube River and the hub of the city that it was easy for us to walk almost anywhere we wanted.

Arriving in a big tourist bus is always a bit daunting, and this was no exception. The bus eased its way down the narrow street between parked cars slowly enough that shopkeepers came out to watch and be sure that their parked cars were unscathed.

The hotel itself is decent enough, but we were surprised to find a lumpy rollaway bed pulled out into the room. The main bed was enough for us and we used the rollaway simply for spreading stuff out and storing luggage. The room was adequate, with a door that opened to a small balcony, but the balcony opened only to an atrium and we were surrounded by cement above and below us. Still it was good to have fresh air at least after being cooped up in an airplane for so long.

After settling in, Melody and I immediately took advantage of the central location and the sunny afternoon to go walking and begin exploring our surroundings. Both of us had walked these streets on Google Earth so things looked a bit familiar, and we had a small map to understand the lay of the land. The buildings are very tall, though, and it is hard to actually figure out where you are on the map and which direction you are walking!

We found our way to the Danube, and to the Parliament buildings, and then found a great little coffee shop in the basement of the National Museum where we had our first of several good cappuccinos that we would enjoy in the next few days. Once fortified with some caffeine to keep us going we stood on the banks of the Danube. After 24 hours without any sleep to speak of, both of us were a bit loosey goosey, and we knew it was important to stay awake until a regular bedtime to keep from extending the jet lag thing into the next da. We returned to the hotel without getting lost and again, as I look back from this vantage point I see really now little ground we covered that first afternoon, but it seemed like a lot at the time.

At 5:30 we met downstairs in the atrium for an orientation meeting with our guide and the group. That is always an interesting part of the trip, seeing just where everyone is from and who might be fun to know and who might be good to avoid. There are always both kinds. Lorena, our trip leader, is from Argentina, but relocated to Berlin 13 years ago and has been leading Go Ahead Tours for almost as long. She is personable and pleasant, quite lovely, and seems to do her job well. There are a few prickly folks who showed their colors right away and it was interesting watching Lorena handle them so gently.

The restaurant was nice enough, but they didn’t seem very well prepared for a group of 30 people. There are vegans, lactose intolerant, wheat intolerant, and vegetarian folks along who have special dietary needs and this seemed to throw them a bit. Our one vegan companion wasn’t difficult at all, and decided that the fried cheese they gave her was just fine.

We, on the other hand, thoroughly enjoyed the Hungarian Beef Goulash with Spaetzle. I used to make a midwest version of this dish back in the days of kids and casseroles, and believe me, it wasn’t the least bit related. I especially loved the spiciness of the paprika. Dessert was some kind of a sponge cake which I believe is also traditional, covered with a bitter chocolate sauce. I know European desserts are not sweet, but to me this was mostly just plain boring.

Back at the hotel, Melody was relieved to find that she could hook up her iPhone to wireless in the lobby at least. She really needed that connection to her kids and her husband and was happy that they could all communicate via facebook and skype without it costing a fortune as it would have without wireless availability. whew

I have no idea how late she stayed up, but when I fell into the moderately hard bed it didn’t bother me in the least. I slept like a rock. My cold was getting worse, but my knee seemed to be holding up well so I was grateful. Sometimes when I am that tired I can’t sleep at all, so I took an Ambien from my hoarded stash and didn’t wake up till morning. Best cure for jet lag is a good night’s sleep!

Here in Vienna, I am still trying to figure out how to get photos from my phone onto the iPad, and ready for the blog. I did manage to upload a bunch of photos to my Picasa albums, but I have no clue if they are the edited photos or the originals. Sometimes there just isn’t a substitute for a good old laptop! It seems as though even after I do some fine tuning of the photos using my iPad app, when I attempt to access them for the blog they are in their original format. I have written about each day, but it may be a bit of time before it all comes together and the photos are in the blog and all the towns are spelled correctly.

Some news is better then no news, right? Melody, on the other hand, has written volumes and posted a ton of stuff in FaceBook. I can’t even begin to keep up with her on that one! Tonight we are off to the Prater Ferris Wheel and tomorrow we will wander around the central city of Vienna on our own. So much to tell! Stay tuned.