Honolulu Blue

Their statement says that they plan to maintain the same speeds for those who don't purchase packages. They might be able to do it. Then again, if they get more package buyers - especially those who are large bandwidth consumers - then service could suffer for those who don't have packages. We'll see.

I'm sailing solo. And I'm glad you enjoyed your last solo trip. You'll probably enjoy your upcoming trip on the Emerald at the end of the month. There's trivia during the morning and afternoon, but it has always been in categories that don't appeal to me. YMMV.

Thank you for your commentary here. I can confirm our port lecturer is Jase, and that he is good. 👍He will be giving a lecture on Portland this afternoon. I'm sure it will be interesting. I plan to attend.

After receiving my correspondence from Princess & US ICE, I headed off to the trough. Expectations were muted for Italian night. But I was able to cobble together some good selections. The pork loin was good. The meatballs were better than good. The potatoes hot the spot. But the star was the dessert - a peach pie that wasn't quite like any peach pie I've ever had. The filling was sticky and there was a hint of some spices in there. Pretty good, I thought. Also good was this random map I found near the entrance. Have I missed this on all my previous Princess cruises? I tried some things this tine around. I tried the water from that black cooler with the shot glasses. It was pretty good. I then tried watching a video near the forward pool or hot tub. That worked out all right. Not much foot traffic and the big screen wasn't too distracting. I then returned to the room to find my room properly turned down. Thanks Daniel. Here's tomorrow's newsletter: I doubt I'll go back out this evening, so I wish you all well as day turns to night.

It's funny that I saw this post as this was placed under my cabin door: Apparently this is what's about to go down. I've heard of similar inspections by others, but this is the first time it's happened to me. We'll see what happens. If it goes according to this written plan, it shouldn't be TOO bad, but as always, the devil is in the details.

I've never felt this way. I don't get depressed about owing anyone anything at any time, as long as I bought the goods or services at fair value. I figure I'll pay them off eventually, and if the worst happens 👻, then my debt is going to be the least of my worries.

We're still in Charlottetown, but according to Captain Johnathan, we should be leaving soon. I went on my excursion around PEI. The starting procedure was similar to my other Princess excursions- meet in the theater, sit on the lower floor until called, head out the gangway, then head to the terminal to the bus. Our guide's name was Heather and our driver was Gerry. Gerry was fine. I found Heather a little hard to follow as she seemed to give details about every other building or farm she passed. I normally prefer more details to fewer, but for some reason it didn't quite click as well with me ad it should have. My fault. Sorry Heather. Our first stop was a scenic viewpoint that was perfect fir taking photos. So I took a few. It was only a few minutes to our next, and longest stop at the Green Gables Heritage Place. This place is a big deal because author L.M. Montgomery and her Anne of the Green Gables books from the early 20th century are a Very Big Deal here. There were some buildings here that I mostly didn't explure. But I did go on Lover's Lane, a path that went into the forest and made a loop back to where we started. Very scenic and calming. After doing this I went in the well stocked gift shop to buy souvenirs. And then it was time to board the bus to head back to Charlottetown. We got to the port just before it was time to sail away and there were multiple huge lines to get back onboard. There was nothing to do but slowly work my way to the front of one of the lines. I finally got to my cabin at 1:55, a full 40 minutes after we were dropped off. We left town half an hour later and we're now heading for Portland.

You're welcome. Note carefully that I stopped short of saying Holly would take over as CD. Neither Lloyd nor Holly mentioned it in their talks together or apart. But neither will I say that she won't. 😬 Thanks for the note about Planks, Steamers, and Crab Shack. You'll have plenty of time to find out the rest of the story about these venues.

We made it to Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, Canada and we've been cleared to depart since 7:30. My tour doesn't meet until 9:30. It's nice and sunny out. The meal at the trough was much the same as my other days onboard, except I subbed some chicken drumsticks for the fruit. Seating was a little tighter than past days, but still not bad. The food was as good as always.

I'm waiting on my tour in Wheelhouse again. It's a nice, comfy place that's relatively quiet. Before I wrestled my way for space at the trough, I looked for a restaurant called Planks BBQ. This is another casual dining option on certain Princess ships. I like BBQ ribs, so I was instantly attracted to it. Like the Salty Dog Gastropub, this one isn't attached to the app or TV and you'll have to go there live or call the special number to book. It wasn't tough to find. It's at the back of the buffet. Here are their open hours. It seems as though it will only be open a couple of days on this cruise. It shares space with Steamers for you seafood lovers. Back to Planks. Their menu was conveniently left out, so I took a snap of the main page: Not bad, though again I'm not thrilled with the appetizer choices. I haven't decided if I'll pull the trigger on this, the pub, or take my chances at the trough. I guess we'll find out together! Speaking of pulling the trigger, Princess offered another flyer for discounted excursions, this time for Portland. Some of these options look tempting. I'll have to take a second look, check the weather forecast, and see what I want to do. There's not too much of a hurry; I have until 6 tomorrow to decide. This post is getting a little long. So I'll split our arrival and my breakfast into a separate post to follow shortly.

I submitted your question to Lloyd through his Wake Show drop box in the library. This morning he replied on the Wake Show. He's leaving the ship on Sunday, so he won't be your CD. ☹️ Two other things he mentioned in connection with this: 1. He said we would be familiar with the new CD. You mentioned Holly. Is it this Holly? I don't know, but you might find out in a few days. 2. He said he would be on the Ruby later this year into next.

I have no affinity for magic, but I appreciate the description of your experience onboard the Discovery. Thank you for it. I've done a couple of 80s themed cruises from Princess. No VIP packages were offered and all experiences onboatd were open to everyone. They also announced the theme relatively late (2 to 6 months before sailing), so most passengers weren't aware of the theme at the time of booking. I knew, in both cases, and booked because of the theme.

Thanks for the note on throttling. I can confirm that on my current cruise, Internet speeds are mostly bouncing between 2 and 3 mbps. On other cruise lines, Celebrity seems to throttle their basic Internet at 1 mbps and premium (whatever they call it, too lazy to look) at 5 mbps. Royal's net is capped out around 5 mbps. Also, on this cruise, we have a diverse age range. There are quite a few kids onboard, along with their parents, some younger couples, and some solos of various ages. And, of course, plenty of Princess classic oldsters. This group is noticeable but does not dominate here.

Definitely drag your DH to the next trivia session. It'll be fun - even better if you know most of the answers.

Thanks. I'm sure you would have done better than me in other categories. One of the nice things is that they have lots of trivia sessions in many different categories. Perhaps Friends is your thing? That's happening tonight.

I'm on a cruise RIGHT NOW and they had an 80s music trivia session. I like to think I know a little about the subject, but the lounge was crowded with teams that thought the same. I didn't win, but they played clips from songs from artists that have been on my music cruises. First was Little Lies. Bella Donna the Fleetwood Mac tribute band didn't play this one on Rock & Romance this year. ☹️ Next was When Doves Cry. Prince tribute band Red Corvette played this on my 80s themed Princess cruise last year. Next was Tainted Love. Soft Cell was on this year's edition of The 80s Cruise and I had the choice to see these guys or Animotion. I thought ot was an easy choice. Last was Another One Bites the Dust. Queen Nation probably plays this at every concert, but this is from last year's UDC.

This post is sponsored by the letters I and F and the number 38. C.S. hosted the 80s music trivia competition. I recognized him from earlier. He had a lot of energy and I thought he did an excellent job overall. This competition just about filled the lounge, which meant that I was in for a rough time. The competition went like this - 15 song clips were played. We were awarded a point each for the song title, artist, and year of release. If we were one off the year of release, we were generously given half a point. The good news is I got 14 of the 15 titles AND artists. The bad news is I totally whiffed on Blue Monday by New Order. I had heard the song many times, but knew neither title nor artist. I did salvage half a point by getting within one of the release year. Blue Monday was one of C.S.'s confessed favorite songs, so I totally get why he wanted to work it in. But it absolutely killed my chance of winning. So gee thanks. 🤬 It turned out to be even worse as the years must have been troubling for the other teams (BTW, teams with 1 to 6 members were allowed. I always played by myself. I'll tell you if I eventually take pity on some team by allowing me to join). I scored out at 36.5 and the four winning teams all had 38. They had a tie breaker- one more musical question, but not a clip. In case you can't read it, it was how many seconds does Michael Jackson's Thriller album last. Two of the team's reps were way off. One said 2600 and I didn't get the other; I think he said something around 2400. My guess was 2540. I had a logical basis for this, but I'll save space and won't repeat it here. Some of you believe me, and that's great; some of you think I'm telling a 🐠 story, and that's all right too. Here's the answer. Missed it by that much. So, it was a close call in my best category. Oh well. It was still a fun time.

Just before we left Sydney, Guest Services announced they were looking for someone. There were no further announcements and we left just a few minutes late. I got the ticket for my excursion on PEI tomorrow as I was leaving for dinner. Everything seemed to be in order. It was Mexican night at the trough. I got some chicken mole, corn on the cob, Mexican potatoes, pineapple, watermelon, and orange Jell-o. I enjoyed it and noted that the skies were clearer than they had been, so more people were dining and doing other stuff out by the pool. I killed a little time sitting out by the Explorers Lounge before going in. The first 80s competition of the night was called... Jay hosted this one. He didn't quite have the moves of the others on the entertainment staff I've seen, but he did a good job of running this show. There were five broad categories- movies, music, games, TV shows, and cartoons- with five questions each. Most counted for one or two points (depending on how many parts there were), but one question had multiple answers and we were given one point for each. On music I was near perfect, except that multiple choice one where we had to ID the USA for Africa singers. They showed a short clip of their song, which was helpful. I got 12, and they gave credit for 20 of them. I did decently with the cartoon section. Don't ask about the others. 😧 I struggled my way to a score of 29. The winners had 51 and got a bottle of champagne.

Multiple post alert: I will be using three posts to chronicle my evening. This post will be tomorrow's newsletters. The next post will be about dinner and the first trivia competition. And the last post will be about the second trivia competition. First, those newsletters.

Thanks. I thought they might do something like this, deriving value from out of thin air. Speeds haven't been great on my current Canada/New England cruise, mostly between 2 and 3 mbps. I wonder how badly us non package buyers will get shafted once this change happens.

On Carnival, they say they gather all amounts under $10 and give it to their chosen charity. It's been that way for years. Princess, I don't know... Coin stealing had been known pre pandemic in Las Vegas, but soared to a new level during it as coins became temporarily scarce. I assume they haven't gone back to the old ways. ☹️🤑

Forget what I said a day or two ago. Debby's center isn't forecast to be within 200 miles of us in Portland or Boston. We might get some showers, but otherwise it looks like we'll be OK. 😃

I went into town on my chosen excursion and did a little sightseeing and souvenir hunting around the terminal. And now I'm ready to tell the tale. I went into the main theater to gather for our chosen excursion. There were significantly more people on this excursion than the last one, such that we needed two buses and two rows in the theater. My opinion remains that neither of the front two rows is where you want to be to view a show that you actually want to pay attention to. After following the crowd to our bus, we got going. Our guide was Catherine and driver was Marty. No pictures of either of them, sorry. But they did a good job. Catherine took a couple of pictures of me at one of our stops. I'm still camera shy, but it was in this general area. Our first drive by was Membertou, a Native controlled area that seemed to have a lot going on. Even without casinos. We then went through the neighborhood/company town called Whitney Pier. A guy named Whitney saw a lot of coal being mined in this area, along with a lot of iron ore being extracted from nearby New Brunswick and decided to put a coal mine here. It ran for 100 years from 1902 to 2002, then it was cleaned up for a decade and now it's been repurposed. Our first stop was at the Whitney Pier Historical Museum, where they had even more stuff about this place and era. Oh, and oat cookies and juice (both quite good, BTW). People from 26 different countries came to Whitney Pier to help produce steel and this is the monument that was made for them. See how many countries you can recognize. Moving along, we went to another museum, the Fort Petrie Military Museum, an abandoned military base/lookout point with lots of interesting places to see and photograph. So much so that I was the very last one on the bus. Sorry guys! From here we went back to Sydney and the ship with Catherine sharing stories on the way. Have I mentioned she was good. If you've been to Sydney before, you know about it's big violin. Here's a picture of it. I got a few souvenirs for the folks back at home and here I am. I've got to rest up for 80s trivia night, so I'll cut this off here.

You're welcome! I told him what you said. He seemed to purr approvingly. 🥰

Good morning! True to my word, I didn't do anything eventful last night. This morning I got up and watched the Wake Show. This show is always interesting to me. He mentioned our theme for today, and the fact that he's hiding another duck onboard. Oh ducky. 🦆 Not my thing, but it's interesting that he's explicitly catering to the group that lives for this sort of thing. I think the demographic mix on this cruise is very diverse - lots of the superannuated Princess fans with gray hair and various aids, parents and kids, younger couples, and even a few solos. I guess Princess truly has something for everyone. I got another flyer this morning about discounted excursions for Charlottetown, our next stop. This time there was something that caught my eye and I booked it by putting the completed form in their drop box. I went to breakfast at the trough and found it a similar experience to my other two days here. It was a little busier today, and there was one other difference on my plate. Can you spot it? BTW, I stopped in the Wheelhouse Bar to write these notes while I wait for my excursion to meet up. We're docked in Sydney and cleared to debark whenever we're ready.