Charlie Bear

Don't have a lot of time for this update, but I was so excited to hear that my sound was fixed that I had to post something!! John, our sound tech, is a miracle worker and hooked me up so that I can actually hear my voice coming through the monitors!!!! My voice is saved! Tonight's show is You've Got A Friend, which is all my Carole King and James Taylor songs rolled into an hour show. However, since we don't disembark till 9pm tonight, I'm afraid that only a few people will show up. In my experience, the longer we are in port, the more tired the passengers get, thus sending them to bed earlier. No worries though. I have met about 6-8 people who have been to both my shows so far, and I'd ... read more

Hey friends! So I leave tomorrow for my Alaskan cruise experience and I'm more excited than ever!! My last contract was a 7-week dream cruise from San Diego, California to Rome, Italy and it was amazing! However, 50 days away from my friends and family was a bit trying at times, so I think this shorter contract will suite me better. Anywho, I thought I'd give you all the run down on what I'll be doing while I'm abroad (can I call it "abroad" even though I'm still visiting US ports? There are some Canadian ports too, so yes, I can say that) and what I've been doing thus far in preparing for this once in a lifetime adventure! First of all, my title on board is "Show Pianist". This means that at my bar (yes, ... read more

Put your finger on a map in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. Go ahead, do it, I'll wait. K, did you find it? The farthest point from any piece of land that is around? Good. That's where I am right now. The middle of Nowhere. After three days at sea, I can safely say that I prefer land over water anyday. I look out the window and what do I see? Water. No coast. No other ships. No buildings. Nope. Just water. Because of this fact, I try to sleep as much as I can to help the hours click by faster. I found myself in my room thinking about home and missing everyone terribly. So today, I decided to change that. I woke up early, got breakfast, and began getting busy. I signed up ... read more

So..... About four days ago, I spent an hour (which is $6 US on my internet card) writing this LONG update, and then the server went out and I lost everything. I called Mom and complained, but I only just got over the incident today, so I thought I'd try again. If it gives out again, however, I'm quitting Travel Blogging forever. With that being said, a whole lot has happened since we last chatted. So let's recap, shall we? Day one, we left San Diego, in Code Red after having 140 or so people infected with the virus. Days two and three we were at sea, and Day Four was our first port, Puerto Vallarta. (This is the same port that I went Bungy Jumping). Right at about this time, I developed a cough that ... read more

Hey all!! Greetings from Mazatlan, Mexico. This week has had it's fair share of good news and bad news. Good news: Stiletto, the company that is responsible for maintaining all the equipment for the musicians on the ship, has sent a representative to cruise with us for 7 days. Ray is my new best friend because after we had a lunch meeting, he swapped out my sucky keyboard that has 8 broken keys with a new fully functioning keyboard that same day!!! Last night I actually got to play without having to lift up on the keys after I played them.....very exciting!!! Bad news: Our ship has just been set to code RED, which means that a highly contagious virus is sweeping across the entire ship. This particular virus causes extremely violent vomitting and diarrea for ... read more