My alarm is set for 7:15. If I disembark with my “group” – which I don’t have to, since I’m carrying off my bags – I don’t have to be anywhere until 9:40. And I’m packed already now, other than the PJs on my body and the last remaining bathroom items I’ll need in the morning.
Continue reading “December 18: Disembark in Texas and Fly Home”Tag: vacation
December 17: At Sea (Last Day Onboard the Ruby Princess)
The morning starts well.
Lester has made sure my coffee is strong enough to be coffee, and not the colorful water they brought earlier in the trip. The bacon is cooked perfectly. And he offers to come by tomorrow to say goodbye (even though I tipped him this morning, just to make sure I didn’t miss him). I don’t plan to order coffee in tomorrow, so this is my moment.
Continue reading “December 17: At Sea (Last Day Onboard the Ruby Princess)”December 16: At Sea
Even though the pathlight is covered, I wake up just after 5am, afraid it might be later and that Lester will be knocking shortly. Nope. Maybe I can get back to sleep for a bi—
Continue reading “December 16: At Sea”December 15: At Sea
I missed last night’s sunset. We’re operating on East Coast time, so my dinner reservation fell intersecting the sunset. Alas, so be it. I wanted the early dinner time and the aft dining room; it meant the dining room was as “clean” an area to unmask as there could be, indoors on the ship, having been least used when I get there.
There are only a handful of us masking regularly at all times indoors or in crowded public spaces. But no one makes any remarks either way about it, so it’s fine. I only had one person ask me about it, at an indoor venue where we were crushed together shoulder to shoulder, but her question seemed like genuine curiosity (or maybe concern about whether I was masked because I was sick and maybe she should be giving me wider berth) but not at all a questioning of my choices.
Which honestly is a bit of a victory; on her last trip, S encountered people who felt the need to comment, but she’s a professor and a pediatric nurse who works with extremely at-risk kids. She does not say anything to grown people making their own decisions even if she disagrees with them (unless a child is actively being harmed / needs medical intervention, of course) but she is so over letting people make snide comments to her, or even passive-aggressively “joking” about her in her hearing. She doesn’t fight or shout – I don’t think either is in her nature – but she will be kind yet extremely direct with people who then have the audacity to seem surprised she isn’t going to just let them say whatevertheeff without any response.
I’m glad people here seem to have a live/let live approach to it here. Or at least anyone who is really bothered by it, is just staying away from me, which probably suits us both.
Anyway…
Continue reading “December 15: At Sea”December 14: Cartagena, Colombia
It will be a short port day today – we don’t dock until 9:45am (guests get clearance at 10:30am to depart the ship) and we are due back on board by 4:00pm.
Continue reading “December 14: Cartagena, Colombia”December 13: Panama Canal, Panama
What could be more apropos for the last day of the year than to be posting from my transit across the Panama Canal?
Continue reading “December 13: Panama Canal, Panama”December 12: At Sea
The morning session on Cartagena is interesting. The session on the Canal passage is informative. The Effy auction is tempting – if I still had a long term paycheck, I would make different choices. The craft for the day is not of interest.
Continue reading “December 12: At Sea”December 11: Puntarenas, Costa Rica
It’s an early day, and a long one.
Our first stop is the Animal Rescue Center.
Continue reading “December 11: Puntarenas, Costa Rica”December 10: At Sea
It’s the little things that add up to a trip. Little moments interacting with friendly people. Little moments breathing sea air. Little things that make you laugh. Little conveniences that make things easier.
Continue reading “December 10: At Sea”December 9: At Sea
The seas were slightly choppier last night, because of the winds. There was just the slightest movement but for some reason instead of just being aware of it, I felt … like it might start to bother me. How weird, I usually don’t — (looks at wrists, realizes I took off my seabands to shower while we were in port and rushed out to dinner without replacing them).
Ah, that would do it. Sea-Bands back on and a few minutes for them to fight back what I already felt…
Good as new! I round out my evening activities, settle in, and sleep so well and soundly that…
Continue reading “December 9: At Sea”
aka gringita 