Halloween at Sea

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Forecast: 68°F & partly cloudy, rain



I know it’s Halloween but the candy is wiped out again. Now Karen wants to dip into my private candy stash to feed the masses. That’s not happening. Call me “The Grinch that Stole Halloween” but that candy bucket is done. From now on all it’s getting is my empty candy wrappers. Deep breaths, Al, deep breaths! I’m OK.

The alarm wakes us at 7:20am. We ordered room service for this morning between 7:30-8am so we need to be ready. Just coffee and 4 milks. Nothing like Queenie and Jonathan would order. We just wanted the small milk cartons to put in our refrigerator for later on, accompanied by a few oatmeal cookies we’ll get later. I’m all dressed when our meal arrives. What's this? These guys are killing me. It’s four glasses of milk. Where’s the little cartons? Could this day get any worse? We stash the glasses in our refrigerator.

The forecast is for some rain and 68°F today. It’s getting warmer and fellow cruisers say the weather gets much nicer after the first two days. We leave for breakfast at about 9 since we have to be at our Meet & Greet by 10. With the dining room full, we eat out by the covered pools. After a light breakfast, we head to the “The One5” bar on Deck 15 at the stern. We’ve never been here before and it looks like a great, out of the way place for us to hang out in the future. For now, Stan, a fellow Cruise Critic member, has put this together. He’s invited all those on our roll call as well as some of the ships officers and staff to meet each other. While Mom soon finds a seat, I prefer to walk around and meet the faces of people who previously were only screen names like “Gimer” and “Bluebelle3”. I take some photos and I find that I won an award as the only one in this group never to have made this voyage before. Wow. Some of these people have been on this same 15 day itinerary 6 or 7 times and one lady in our group has been on 85 Princess cruises, her nearest competitor was 28. For the record, we are 3. Just missed it!

A little after 11 we are off to the atrium to see what guest services wanted. Turns out we are booked for the next “Ultimate Ship Tour”, the date TBD but sometime after we depart Hawaii. Great. While Mom watches some restaurant demo put on by a bunch of guys in chef hats, I make my way to the adjacent Internet Café to ask “Why can’t I log on to the internet with my laptop?”.

“Do you have your laptop with you?”, asks the gentleman in charge to which I must reply, “Uh, no.” The IT guy then says the obvious, “Why don’t you go and get it?” I’m sure I heard him mutter something like, “Is this guy an idiot or what?” or at least that’s something I would have thought. Actually, I was just checking his posted hourly schedule but he was there so let’s do it. I return minutes later with the computer and he has it up and running in no time. My problem, he says, is that the $99 plan that I signed up for a week ago before we boarded is no longer available and that’s why I can’t sign on.

“But”, he says, “for only $25/day I can get you unlimited internet.” I just want about 20 minutes a day for posting my blog. I don’t need email, Facebook, sports or anything else. So now I have to spend around $200 for WiFi for the balance of the cruise. I can't just buy one day of internet service and send out several blogs at once. I bet that’s how it’s going to be on all ships moving forward. Anyway, my computer is ready and I will send these entries out in batches starting Thursday or Friday when I will only have to purchase a few days at the end of the cruise..

With that done, I sit in the atrium listening to a guy playing piano, working on my computer until its battery dies. I see George & Martha Washington, the Devil and Superman all walking around. Of course, it is Halloween. While we dressed up two years ago on our South Pacific cruise, we declined this year. Mom peruses through the “Holiday Junk Sale”, returning with a couple of trinkets and we retire to the Crown grill for a “Pub Lunch”, you know, fish and chips. Finishing around 2, it’s time to return to the cabin to freshen up. I call it sleep. After an hour, I’m up pittering and puttering about until Karen finally gets up.

Not feeling like dealing with a full dinner, we opt for the buffet tonight. Just salads and a small sampling of a few items is all for us. We sit awhile, watching the people parading around in Halloween costumes. Then we walk past an empty pool area and out to the large open pool where we grab an ice cream cone, some blankets and chaise lounge chairs and watch the last of game 6 of the World Series on the giant TV. Imagine watching a baseball game while cruising in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Dodgers win, forcing a game 7. Grabbing a couple of free hot coffees, we travel down to the Crooner's Bar to listen to guitar player Simon Defer-Wyatt. He's very good and the venue near the elevators offers further opportunity to check out more costumes worn both by passengers and crew.

9:00pm signals that, at least for us, it's time to return to our room. I guess we're too old to party any more. Mom is out right away but I watch TV and edit pictures until 11pm. Since we set our clocks back another hour tonight, it's really only 10pm. Tonight I see that we are about half way to Hawaii, putting us 1015 miles from SF and 1008 miles to Hilo. It's been a quiet day but that's what this trip's been all about - peace, quiet and relaxation.

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Photos

Our Cruise Director Matt & Stan from CC
Also Stanley, the Princess Bear