Sea Days and Steel Drums

Today was our first sea day. The time changed last night and we lost an hour but luckily we were able to sleep in and relax today. We woke up to blue skies and sunshine which are always good things.

Chris, Renee and I started with a late breakfast at the buffet. Afterwards, I allowed them to talk me into taking the line dancing class in the Piazza. Apparently knowing your left and right, counting to 4 or 8 and remembering routines are necessary skills to being a successful line dancer. I thought at this point in my life I had at least the first 2 skills down. I may have been mistaken. At some point, my 1/4 turns turned into 1/2 turns and my lefts and rights got messed up, resulting in my bumping into some poor, unsuspecting soul. In a later dance, I very confidently messed up the steps completely and the instructor caught me, pointed at me and the two of us broke into uncontrollable giggles. We worked up a good sweat anyways.

Next up, we wandered to the Princess Live lounge to learn how to play the steel drums. To be good at this, you should know the alphabet, have some sense of rhythm and remember the right notes in the right order. We learned The Banana Song and Jingle Bells. It was a lot of fun but not sure I will be getting offers to cut a steel drum album any time soon.

The afternoon was spent in the sun in the pool. It wasn't nearly as warm in the pool as it was the other day, but it was still lovely and refreshing.  

Tonight was our first formal night. We got all spiffy and headed to Santorini's for our dinner, where Danica decided she prefers crepes Suzette to crepes Juliet. Duncan ordered 3 desserts once again and some of the rest of us may or may not have tried 2.

The Princess Theatre was home to the production show Rock Opera tonight which we enjoyed while sipping on free champagne or mimosas. We attempted to go check out the comedian next but found ourselves in the wrong place and ended up playing a fun music trivia game instead. In the excitement of the game, my competitiveness took over and I ended up sacrificing my lipstick for the good of our team. For that particular question, we had to have a man wearing lipstick run up to answer the question. His wife's gloss was clear so I handed him mine and he applied it, rather poorly, while running onto the stage, ending up with it hanging from his beard. It was all worth it though as our team won! We then didn't fare so well in the Christmas Jeopardy, particularly in the History and Geography categories. The kids were then totally embarrassed by me when I called out a Bongo during Music Trivia Bingo. I got too excited again and even though I was singing Johnny Be Good, I marked off Bo Diddley as in my head it said Johnny Be Good. I thought Duncan was actually going to abandon me...

And now we're in bed but one of the kids is awaiting their latest Room Service order, which is their latest obsession.

The next 5 days bring us into 5 different ports so many more adventures await.

First Stop - Bahamas

There was no time wasted in getting us to our first port - Princess Cays, Bahamas. It was raining a bit when we first arrived via tender but once we staked our claim on some lounge chairs, it stopped though remained a bit overcast for much of the day.

The water was a beautiful turquoise but not as warm as we had expected. Of course, it was still warmer than Lake Superior at it's warmest so we were fine. We floated around for a bit, excited to see stingrays floating by once in a while. 

Our first adventure was a stingray encounter. We all made sure to kiss Star, the Stingray for 7 years of good luck. We also had the opportunity to see conch; we have seen the beautiful shells but had no idea that they housed such weird looking creatures. There were lots of big angel fish swimming around too.

After some lunch, it was time for adventure two, the aqua bikes. Chris and Renee had rented one but we all took turns riding it. The kids made it look much easier than it actually was. Perhaps due to their youth but most likely due to their much lighter weight. Renee and I didn't think it was fair that we worked so hard and our watches didn't capture any "steps".  

Back on the ship, Chris and Renee used their first specialty dining reservation at the Crown Grill Steakhouse while the rest of us returned to the dining room. Danica let it slip that she had made yet another visit to the Pastry Shop while Duncan and I were getting ready. Not to be outdone, Duncan ordered 3 desserts after dinner.

We made it to the Princess Theatre in time to catch the early show. It was a 

guy from Thunder Bay singing mainly songs from the crooners with a few other songs thrown in. He 

was good. After that we checked out the Yes/No Gameshow where contestants had to answer questions without saying yes or no for 3 minutes. We ended the evening with 50s and 60s Music Lyric Trivia (for the record, my parents weren't quite as helpful as we thought they'd be and after hearing the song 'Rubber Ball', they have officially lost all rights to bashing today's music) and some dancing to the live band and DJ before heading to bed.

Tomorrow is our first official sea day. Looking forward to all of the adventures!

Officially Vacation

This morning we boarded the Enchanted Princess and our vacation has officially begun. The ship is beautiful and festive. We have heard great things about the staff, food and entertainment from our neighbour across the hall as they did another itinerary on this ship last week.

The day was fairly uneventful. We wandered a bit, hit up the buffet for lunch, hung out in the pool. Our matching t-shirts (or as Duncan so fondly refers to "the embarrassing white people vacation get-up) drew some attention and when combined with Chris' beard ornaments and effervescent charisma, ensured that he has already met half the ship.  

As we set sail, the captain blew the ship's horn to the tune of The Love Boat. Anything that gives me the opportunity to sing along, especially to an unexpected song I haven't heard in ages, always bumps things up a notch in my book!

Seeing as I had woken up at 430 am (due to excitement and anticipation or Danica beating me and yelling at me in her sleep, I'm not sure), the evening found me rather tired. While Chris and Renee watched the Packers game in the Vista Lounge with my dad and the kids built a fort in our cabin with the extra ladder and blankets while Duncan managed his sea sickness, my mom and I decorated the little tree she brought for their cabin and had an early night so we would be bright and cheery for the Bahamas tomorrow!

Plan B

If any of you know my family, you know that luck is often not on our side, particularly when airports are involved. The beginning of this, our COVID-delayed 50th anniversary family trip for my parents was no exception. Luckily, my mom has learned to plan her own luck over the years so when we got notification on Wednesday afternoon that our Thursday morning flight was canceled and rescheduled to Saturday, we jumped in the car Wednesday night to make it to Southern Ontario ahead of the storm and ensure we didn't miss our Saturday morning flight to Florida. Note to self - traveling at night saves time and money as you don't stop to shop or eat! Chris and Renee allowed us to bunk with them for the night so gave us cuddle time with Lucy in the morning. 

Thursday, we drove through rain, snow, slush into Toronto where we had a room booked for a few nights. Given the less than stellar road and overall weather conditions, we decided to hunker down for the rest of the day and night. Unfortunately the pool was out of order but we made do, entertaining ourselves playing cards on the ironing board.  

Friday, we awoke to blue skies and sunshine so headed to the mall to kill time and pick up a few things we realized we had forgotten in the chaos of unexpectedly leaving 16 hours ahead of schedule. 

Chris and Renee met up with us at the hotel Friday night in preparation for our 340 am shuttle to the airport. Thankfully, that flight went as scheduled and without any major hitches. We had downloaded the MPC app to speed up the pre-clearance process for US customs and it was fantastic. Of course, having Renee randomly selected to be swabbed as we entered security also meant that the rest of us got to skip the security line so that was an added bonus. Danica was a bit frustrated though as the man in front of her kept reclining his seat and then turning around and scolding her when her knees bumped the seat as she repositioned herself. 

Finally, we arrived in Fort Lauderdale. True to Florida form for us, it was raining when we arrived. We figured it beat the cold and frost that we have encountered on previous trips though. By the time we ubered to our motel in Lauderdale-by-the-Sea, it had stopped raining so we were able to explore the area on foot. We found a yummy little taco place nearby where we grabbed some lunch before wandering the little shops and the beach.

We headed back to the downtown area in the evening for dinner, but this time by golf cart.

Yesterday morning, we wandered the other direction to grab breakfast at Dunkin'. My 

parents had a little friend join them on their bench...

After breakfast, we wandered back to the downtown area to visit a few more shops and a Farmer's Market and then found this fun restaurant for lunch that we ended up visiting again for dinner because the food was good and reasonably priced, the atmosphere was fun and the service was great. 

Some of us traveled by golf cart again tonight.

This morning, we will be heading to the port to board the Enchanted Princess for the next leg of the vacation.