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Friday, July 18, 2008
We arrive at port and are immediately told by security to put away our cameras and instructed where to park. It seems the port authority does not allow pictures of any of its facilities, inside or out. We are told we can take as many pictures as we want once we are on the ship.
Once on board, we find our stateroom and unpack our carry-on luggage. The rest of the luggage will be delivered a little later.
We head on to the top deck where there are people who are already in the pool! Not having any lunch yet we take advantage of the first buffet of the trip, careful not to overdue it since dinner is just 3 hours away.
Once everyone is on board, and before we set sail, we have to go through a mandatory evacuation drill. Everyone is required to participate, even if you have cruise experience. We all put on our life vests and head out to the designated area. Once there you can hear a mix of laughing, and fun as well as whining and complaining. Why are we doing this when we could be by the pool getting hammered? And they were not kidding, some people never left the pool. They took no excursions, and only ate at the Windjammer Cafe which served buffets and was located (You guessed it) next to the pool. I figured, it's your vacation, you paid for it, spend it any way you want!
We spend some time exploring the ship and take in a short first time cruiser's orientation. We learn the layout of the ship, a little history and future plans. As it turns out this is the last year that this ship sails with Royal Caribbean. It has been sold and will make way for a much bigger ship. Second largest in the world from what we understood.
Dinner at Vincent's. Our original dinner time at booking the cruise was "second dinner" at 0830pm. Turns out that they had changed it to the main dinner time of 0600pm., which worked out better for us. We get there and meet our waitress Armmie from the Philippines. She will be our waitress for all of our dinners at Vincent's. We will have rotating staff for breakfast and lunch if we choose to dine there. We also meet the second couple assigned to the table, Tyler and Savannah. They are there celebrating their 3 year anniversary. They end up being a great couple which whom we end up spending lots of time with.
During dessert our waiting staff surprises my wife with a birthday cake and a song, which I had arranged before the cruise. What can I say, need to keep the romance alive. Tyler also arranged to have cake for Savannah, to celebrate their anniversary. Both of our wives were surprised and happy. Lots of rocking on the ship that night, we blamed it on rough waves.
After desserts our staff treated us to a conga line. So entertaining! It really pumped up the energy level and set the tone for the rest of the trip. They all danced and balanced things on their heads or had a little trick up their sleeves. After that it was our turn, and we danced the Macarena. (At least we tried to. LOL)
After dinner we took a walk to get some sunset pictures where we met Anthony and Bonnie. They asked if we could take their picture and we ended up chatting a little. The Sound of Music Theatre was our next stop for the welcoming show put on by our cruise director. We were introduced to ship's singers and dancers, and were treated to the comedy of John Wing.
After the show we head back to our stateroom, finish our unpacking and turn in for the night. Overall a very good day.
