Posts
I was up and about at 7a.m. but still feeling tired. There's lots of fluffy clouds out there that look like towel animals and you can hardly tell where the sky and sea meet because it's all the same colour. I still havent seen a whale or a dolphin on this trip, i wonder where they are.
Spent some time playing my game and didn't have much luck so after getting ready i started out for the buffet breakfast but then changed course and and decided to do the brunch in the Gold Pearl. It's been years since i've been to a brunch but a change of pace is nice once in awhile.
At the desk i asked if there was a solos table i could join and was lead to a table of seven and they all knew each other; either married couples or as room mates. It was a little disturbing feeling like the odd one out but they were all very friendly and welcomed me so that was cool. Nobody had ordered yet so my timing was good. The menu seemed a little limited but maybe not unless you've been a regular at the buffet; the land of plenty.
I ordered OJ, the fruit and cottage cheese plate and french toast. The fruit plate i received consisted of 8 pieces of fruit. They were cut in tiny pieces about dice sized. I got one each of canteloupe, honey dew,pineapple, apple, orange and grapefruit along with a grape cut in half all laying atop the thinnest slice of watermelon and there was a half a tsp. of cottage cheese artfully placed in a tiny strip the size of a matchstick. I had to hold back my laughter. This sort of delicacy is so not my style, hell, gimmee a half of a watermelon and a big 'ol spoon, lol! The humungous bowls of cut up watermelon pieces the size of at 4 dices they have in the Lido makes a person feel free to get a soup bowl full and then go back for seconds or thirds and they keep adding more all the time and they never run out.
One man at the table broke the ice by telling me that he used to visit Vancouver alot with a group of guys that went fishing together and he'd love to go again. Another said that she had driven across the border from Oregon into British Columbia. I had to correct her on that as B.C. only borders with the States of Washington, Idaho and Montana. The two ladies in the group were cruising from one to another cruise and doing a lot of back to back cruises and this time they'll spend some time in Singapore before hopping on another ship. What a life! A very charmed life! They also gave me alot of info on being a casino cruiser. One of them had received a call from Carnival inviting her to find a friend and they could both get on this cruise for free. They were even given cash to spend and it was a sizable amount too!
Now, i've never received such a call but i'm sure hoping it'll happen. But the key thing is to stick with one cruiseline to build up your status and one has to do several cruises per year to make the cut. I already know i likely wont get called; i cruise on misc. lines so it'll be me calling them and i'll pay whatever they say. Oh well, i was enjoying my pipe dream there for a minute.
Between the eight of us at that brunch table we all had different info....well, gossip if you please.....their story re the 52 yr. old man who died of shock after winning the $24,000. in the casino went like this - 48 yr. old man won $20,000. died of a heart attack in his cabin not in the casino. The first death that went from it being a woman to a man went back to it was a woman according to these people but according to the couple that sat at my lunch table today they said they saw the dead guys wife and she is very old and in a wheelchair. The latest one was apparently a Phillipino worker onboard and i just realized that i hadn't seen my room steward in a couple days. OMG i hope my Anthony is ok.
Well, somebody is tending to my cabin but i just thought of 2 clues that it might be somebody else....my towel animals are not made in Anthonys style and whoever it is isn't leaving me a fresh shower mat everyday and Anthony always does.....well, did.
As it stands now there's been 4 people who died on this cruise so far and several have been taken away in ambulances at every port we've docked at. My new friend Judys roomie had to leave by ambulance in Honolulu as she needed gall bladder surgery. Not clear on if she flew to her home city and hospital from there or if it was done in Honolulu. Somebody said the record number of deaths on a cruise was 30 and today i heard it was 35. Either is hard to imagine but maybe it was on one of those world cruises that last 100 days or more. Or maybe it didn't happen at all.
Well, on a ship this size, which certainly isn't the largest by far there's up to 5000 people onboard counting the crew and all. The majority of cruisers are over 60 so thinking about it in terms of if it were a city with this population i sort of do believe it. I remember as a child living in a town with a pop. of 4000 there was at least one a day and my dad was a pallbearer for just about all of them.
There's alot of older people in the casino at any given time and they're in the elite status and getting free drinks.....well, there ya go!
Later i went to customer service to get a printout of my cruise expenses. I've spent $47.40 so far but one entry is questionable. It shows i bought 2 specialty coffees at the coffee shop but i only remember buying one. Maybe i'll find out if or when i read back in my blog if i bought one or two,lol. My call to my hubby back home cost $22. and that was much less that i would have thought it would be from Hawaii.
One of the reasons i write all this stuff is to be able to dbl. check things but mostly i enjoy reading it like 5 years later when i've forgotten everything. It jogs my memory which would be totally lost if i didn't. Heaven forbid that Blogger should ever shut down! And hell, i forget cruise things after a year, never mind five.
The ocean and the sky have now become two distinct things unlike earlier when it all looked the same and you couldn't tell where the ocean and the sky met. Theres clouds in the distance that look like they're sitting on the ocean making it look like a snow covered mountain range. I'd take a pic but my camera is charging and anyhow my window is very salty so pics would be blurry. As well, my porthole is old and i think all on the ship will be replaced when she goes into dry dock. I think the carpets are ok for the most part but new furniture is needed. A cruiseship takes a lot of wear and tear being it does one cruise after another after another non stop for years. I don't really mind these conditions as it makes for a cheaper cruise when a ship is on it's way to drydock.And actually this ship is in pretty good shape, just as my last years ship was.
This Splendor ship is not coming back to the U.S. because after her retrofit she'll be cruising in Australian waters so i might not see her again. But then you just never know as we were passengers on Carnivals Spirit "last" cruise in U.S. waters when we sailed from Vancouver to Hawaii several years ago and she carried on to Australia "never to return". I remember how we waved and cheered her on as we watched her leave from our condo the day after we had arrived there. Well, for whatever purpose or reason the Spirit is now back cruising in N.America again. So i'm sure Splendor will return again too.
After dinner in the Lido i went to the casino until it was time to get a seat in the showroom. It was a songstress and she was allright but not my style so i slipped out midway and returned to my slots. I picked up a little over $100. so that'll keep me going for a few days trying to build on it. There's 2 machines that i want to play and they're the only ones of this type with rhinos being the main character. i'm a real sucker for rhinos; i love those things! But every time i've been there there's already someone playing them so i just sit back watching and waiting for them to leave and i'll jump up and grab it but they never leave. Today i figured it out; it must be a family or friends or some sort of a group deal thing who have taken over those two machines, taking turns playing and maybe they've made a pact that when it pays off big they'll all share in the pool. Now, i think that's a brilliant idea if that's what's happening because a machine that's played 24 hrs a day non stop has got to land on the jackpot soon. Or maybe not. Whatever, i think it's a good plan they've organized if that's whats going on and i hope it pays off for them.
No comments:
Post a Comment