Spring Break Cruise: Part II

Part II: Come Sail Away!

Our excitement built as we rounded the hallways that brought us closer and closer to boarding the ship. Finally...we were on! They snapped a quick picture of each of us that they would use each time we entered and exited the ship and then we were free to go find our rooms.

Pilar and I had an ocean view room, which meant our room had a window, while the boys were in an interior room. We walked down, down, down the hallway on the ninth floor, made a left, and boom! There was our room on the right, next to a lovely, floor to ceiling sized painting of a beautiful beach. We opened the door expecting to walk into a pretty nice room with a small square window and two beds. What we saw rocked our worlds! Not only did we have a sitting area with a couch, coffee table, minifridge, wet bar, etc, we had a window that took up the entire far wall and overlooked the BOW OF THE SHIP! We could sit in front of that window and have a panoramic view of the open ocean. The window also had an automatic blackout shade complete with a switch for moving it up and down. So legit!

So, after drooling over our room for a little while, we joined the boys for a little meal, went to our emergency drill, and then donned our bathing suits and headed to the "sail away party". We were very lucky that our rooms were on the same floor as the Lido Deck which had the dining rooms with all the buffet lines and 24 hour food places as well as the swimming pools, hot tubs, bars...basically it was where all of the action happened during the day. Pilar and I were on such a mission to get our long islands at this point that not even the mob dancing to the Cupid Shuffle could get in our way! Finally, long islands in hand, we headed up to watch the ship debark from Miami. After a little while the boys met up with us and we had our first official toast on the cruise as a group!

We soaked in the last of the rays and enjoyed some hot tub times before heading back to the room and getting cleaned up for dinner. We were lucky to have the later dinner time at 8:15pm, especially since we could never seem to make it on time even then. Our table was on the bottom level of the beautiful Lincoln Dining Room. We had a booth on the edge of the room which was great because we were still a part of the action, but had our privacy at the same time. We had the same waiter every night, Jose, who was from El Salvador. He was always very cheerful and provided us with great service. The food offered and served at dinner was incredible as well. There was always a great selection and it was always fresh and well prepared. We did have the fortune of sitting at the table next to Sarah Palin's voice twin who spoke very loud and about things like poopy diapers. It definitely added a little something!

After dinner, we headed back up to our room where we made a toast to the night and then we headed down to the Eagles Lounge for karaoke. Pilar and I are seasoned karaoke singers, so we jumped at the opportunity and signed up to sing "Faithfully" by Journey. Unfortunately, I had to use the ladies room which was pretty far down the hall, and they called us before I got back. Travis stood in for me and did a fantastic job, especially for not knowing how the song went, but insisted I replace him when I arrived back. Pilar and I finished strong, I believe, and captivated the audience with our glowing stage presence. When we tired of karaoke, we headed over to the club to dance a jig. Now, I had some preconceived ideas about how a club on a cruise ship was going to be, but those ideas were DEAD WRONG! The DJ in this club was one of the best I've ever heard. He played an awesome mix of new and old music that made us never want to leave the dance floor! Pilar and I were very lucky to have two very good dancers accompanying us, so it was always hard to leave the club at night. After a few hours of shaking a leg, we retired to our quarters.

Fun day at sea tomorrow!

...to be continued....