We’ve been home a few days now and I guess I’d best share while the details are fresh on my mind.
We had a lovely week, starting Feb 11, which, coincidentally, was Dinah’s 12th birthday. (Let me emphasize at this point that this was a coincidence, not a birthday present. I just can’t provide a cruise for every one of my kids’ birthdays!) I had chosen to teach a couple lessons on Friday afternoon to avoid the hassle of rescheduling and such. In hindsight, we wished we had left a bit earlier on Friday. But it turned out fine. We had great roads all the way to Primm, about an hour south of Las Vegas. We were really glad that we had a reservation. Standing in line to check in to Buffalo Bills was like standing in line for Peter Pan at Disneyland—weaving through the ropes for about 45 minutes. I asked as we checked in if this was a normal Friday night. He told me that there were three events going on that weekend. I have no idea what they were, but it was big. Frank had to park clear across the way and haul everything to our room. And it was chilly for Las Vegas!
We got on the road by about 8:30 a.m. with the long drive to San Diego ahead of us. Passing through San Bernadino, there was an incredible traffic back-up, happily, going the other direction. But we kept our eye on the road ahead of us, hoping that we didn’t encounter the same situation going the other direction. We never hit big traffic, bit we did have a tire blow out as we passed throught the Encinada area. My first concern was that I had no idea what shape the spare tire was in. But it was fine and we only lost about 20 minutes. We know that because when the tire blew, the ETA on the GPS was 1:02. As we got back on the road after changing the tire, the ETA was 1:22. Not bad!
Traffic increased as we got closer to San Diego, but it was manageable. I was delighted to find that we drove right down in to San Diego to the port. I’d never been to San Diego. It really is as charming as everyone says. However, we hit a bit of a glitch in that there was an air show going on that afternoon. Hence, No Parking! I could feel Frank’s nerves getting a bit tense as we circled a couple blocks. We were directed to a couple spots, but everything was full. Finally, we tried the parking area suggested by the cruise documents—down a block and a half, turn right, and there it was. But..there were orange cones in front of the entrance. We were about three cars away, and as we got closer, the attendant pulled the cones to allow 4-5 cars in. We breathed a sigh of relief and found a spot. I turned out to be $15/day, but it was secure and literally across the street from the port. We gathered everything, locked up and headed for the ship.
The check in at port was so easy compared to last year on Carnival. I had a great time on Carnival, but the atmosphere is so much more dignified. We didn’t have to wait in line for an hour. We’re not sure if we were ahead of the rush or behind it. We didn’t care. The process was so smooth, and we were through and on board in about 20 minutes. And our room was ready. Last year we had to wait a couple hours for our room to be ready. It doesn’t matter, really. The buffet is open on the Lido deck from the minute you step on board. But it was nice to go unload our carry-on bags and then explore the ship.
One of the first things we did was to find the maitre ‘d and arrange for a table in the dining room for dinner. Because we booked so close to the cruise date, our travel agent was not able to get us a table. But we were able to do in on board—no glorious window seat like we had last year, but a set table with what turned out to be two delightful servers—Verry and Ari. They took wonderful care of us each evening.
We took some pictures from the deck.
And at 5:00 pm we set sail!
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