Cruising is nothing if not about “glamour”, and so these pix from our Royal Caribbean cruise on Freedom of Seas are all about livin’ the high life!
As I wrote previously, cruising is truly the farthest you can get from reality and still be on Planet Earth, and, frankly, that’s what made is SO great, and why, G-d willing, we will do it again! It is great, mindless fun- “no wockin’ furries” on an epic scale! And with all the great cruise bargains now on offer (we got ours from http://www.cheapcaribbean.com/), I truly think it’s the best idea for a last-minute holiday that will get, if only temporarily, you as far as possible from the cold & stress of the “Real World”. It’s also a super idea for folks who might not be able to handle the physical challenges of a trip otherwise; our fellow cruisers included families with small children & infants, as well as those in wheelchairs & with walkers, & the ship’s staff provided them with excellent service, both on the ship & in port.
While we hated signing for every, piddly little thing, at least I can now look at the 100s of pitzeleh receipts and remember, with pleasure, all our Beefeaters & Tanguerays in “Oive or Twist” and our charming Ukrainian waitress who we looked forward to seeing each evening; the dancing and live music (both the great jazz band and the Hungarian 70’s Cover band…); our Frangelicos at the Murder Mystery Dinner in Porttofino’s; our “Love Connections” and Elderflower Lemonades at the pool, and our “Blue Mondays” & “Wacky Wednesdays” in the hot tub; our Rusty Nails & Macanudo cigars in the Connoisser Club, and the excellent XYZin & French Rothschild wines we sipped at dinner… I revelled in our luxurious spa treatments (and that Dan actually ASKED me to book him the “Men’s Package” the day we boarded, along with my various facials, wraps, mani-pedi, & salon ‘dos! (And I Loved the way they did my hair! The stylist teased it a bit (something I’d Never do!), and gave me “height” & a very elegant, almost 1960’s Streisand look!) I found all the silly receipts for Dan’s shoe shines before our Formal Nights, and so remember how great we looked for each other when we went out- to the comedy show, to see the Three Las Vegas Tenors, to go dancing, and have silly fun in the arcade riding motorcycles & shooting guns… I found the receipts, too, for all our shore adventures, and the little gifts we bought each other: Dan surprised me with a silver Star of David ring in Mexico that is literally the biggest Shield of David ring I’ve ever seen! We bought matching tee shirts & caps (something we’d always sworn we’d NEVER do!), and we got our drinks at the Casino in those corny souvenir glasses so we could take them home and drink Appleton’s Jamaican rum out of them by the Elkhorn Inn’s fireplace…
I call this excersize “learning to enjoy your receipts”!
As you have probably realized by now, this blog also serves as our scrapbook- a way for me to relive and repeatedly enjoy the things we do that give us pleasure. As I’m 50 & Dan is 63, I firmly believe that we- all of us- need to do as many “wild & crazy”, fun things as we can- while we still can!
I hope reading about our trip gives you pleasure, too, and that it encourages you to do some “wild & crazy” stuff of your own!
And then it was over- all too soon- and we disembarked into a Freeeeeeezing cold Florida!
The next- and last- installment of this Trip Blog will be about out “road-trip” drive home to West Virginia through Florida, Georgia, and Virginia…
