Greenpea2

I tried the infinity pool one deck below but it was way cold. So back up to the top and I baked for awhile in the hot tub.

As long as the internet is cooperating (yay for a change) I will try and get caught up. After breakfast we put on our swimsuit attire and went to the Haven pool area. First stop was a pair of Bloody Marys for sustenance, courtesy of our sun deck bartender Made (pronounced Mah Day). Then up to the top deck on onto on of the very comfy double loungers. With an umbrella at the ready.

We had breakfast in the Haven dining room, but sat in the outside area. That was great on a beautiful morning. We both ordered Eggs Benedict. Mine without Canadian bacon, but with crispy regular bacon on the side. Plus hash browns. Because, I’m sorry but if hash browns are offered (and they are crispy), this gal is going to have some. Joe had his with the Canadian bacon. Plus regular bacon. Plus hash browns.🐷 and then he insisted on rearranging his plate into a face for its formal portrait. the bottom one is mine. I never touched how it looked. It came to me looking like that! Not sure how appetizing it is to contemplate eating a food face. But boy was it good!

Today is beautiful and our plan include making use of a hot tub and sunning. Lunch in MDR. Captain’s cocktail party tonight then Cagney, the Donna Summer show and checking out the disco after. dH not interested in the disco part but hell, I am. I told him he could stand there and I would disco dance around him. Now you KNOW Sistah would be dancing with me!

One of my favorite images so far. DH and I took a walk around the sun decks last night, exploring. The night was beautiful and this sight needed to be photographed. Leaning over the rail. then we went to bed, watched TV, then could not sleep. So had a late night white pizza delivered. Yum! That did it. Carbs equaled snooze time.

This is what I get a lot of when trying to post. A lot. I’m having Starbucks waking up in the corner of the top sun deck.

A sculpture I keep wanting.

Spacey shot of DH, the view from our table and sunset.

A couple of interior shots. Those white partitions do a good job of separating space and making it more intimate and quiet.

We had dinner at the Haven restaurant last night. Wonderful as ever. The Haven restaurant is so much bigger on the Prima. Wonderful survice as usual. This is the roasted beet salad with goat cheese. Yummy.

It was pretty much as I remember it from my last cruise before Covid. Except this time (as reported by others) we had to watch a video in our room. Then we hall met in various laces for the usual drill and talk. The first third of that no one could hear because most of the crowd laughing and talking. It was crazy. Finally a supervisory staff member yelled really loudly “ Everybody quit please!!!” That did the trick. Silence for the rest of it!

The Haven would be a great idea for you. I’m not sure I can recommend this particular one yet but I’m giving it some time. This Haven complex is spread out differently and it seems like we walk SO much today going to various parts of it… but I’m not ready to give a thumbs up or a thumbs down. It’s only been 12 hours that we have been here, after all. The Haven is beautiful and all staff have been terrific. Having the two sun decks is wonderful. So far the only real thing we are not grooving on is our suite. Which I will explain later on. It just is not set up in a way that makes sense to us.

Yeah, they had large golf-cart things to take us there. I wouldn’t mind spending the night there! 🙂

It is 5:40 and sail away is happening. Not as exciting as from New York, but still.

After checking in to the hotel we decided to drive over to Cocoa Beach. I wanted a new tee from Ron Jon’s. Wow that place seems bigger than when I was there probably 8 years ago. Unfortunately it was packed, with stagnant check-out lines. And most of the tees there are the thinner type of fabric. The kind of draft fabric. I wanted nice thick hearty cotton material like I bought before. So that was a bit of a washout. we walked around hoping to eat at one of the waterside restaurants. But they were all full (Saturday night and all). So we went back to the hotel and ate at a very good Italian place across the road from it. Verracella’s, I believe it was. here I am flirting with the chef. He smiled a lot but didn’t seem too full of life.

Wow. I am back. Finally. The main reason for my lack of posting is the lack of internet until about 5 minutes ago. Wotta mess. I finally have everything working on mi iPhone so I will go with that for awhile. it is 4:40 pm and we are still at the pier in Port Canaveral. There was just an announcement from the Captain saying that the hold up is that they are still loading supplies. Why they are late with that was not mentioned. So sail away is a bit late. Yesterday was a good day. Flight was on time and smooth. Our luggage arrived with us (always a good thing). SIL and BIL picked us up and we went from the airport to Port Canaveral. We decided to check into the hotel first. hampton Inn and Suites PC is really nice! Room was roomy, beds were big and sooo comfy. Two different kitchen areas for breakfast. And a large pool and courtyard area with a pool bar! Here is the pool. more in a bit…

That sounds like a good excursion! The group is an open forum, so of course. It's a very friendly group. There is no meanness, criticism or judgment. Very supportive. And fun.

That's true! So there should be a place for another Haven experience again. Good to know.

The Tribe was born thanks to Sid. After one of his earlier reviews, the chatting just kept going and going.. So he started a thread and we have somehow become his tribe! It is in "The Friends of Cruise Critic" section. No we decided not to get off at Jamaica. The thing I would have liked there is Dunn River Falls. I actually have done that (on my honeymoon with my first husband, in fact!)--many years ago. We are in good shape physically, but there are a lot of wet rocks you climb there and I am paranoid I would slip and twist an ankle, both of which I have torn a ligament in over the years. I do recommend that though! It's pretty and fun. A Bob Marley excursion sounds fun! What does that entail?

It's both satisfying AND exhausting, isn't it? 🙂 But at least we know the job gets done right!

Thank you. :~]

Glad to see you here, thanks TNVolnteerCruiser!

I know I won't be able to type as neatly or as clearly once I am on board and in the cruise vortex head set (not to mention the internet capability...). So bear with me while I add another "pre-cruise" blather segment. Then I probably am done with the big blathers. Thanks to all of you who have joined me. Your being here to listen to me and my thoughts really increases my cruise experience exponentially! Here we go: Excursions Planned For those that don’t already know, our itinerary is: Sunday: Embark at Port Canaveral Monday: At Sea Tuesday: Cozumel, Mexico Wednesday: Georgetown, Grand Cayman Thursday: Ochos Rios, Jamaica Friday: At Sea Saturday: Great Stirrup Cay (please, please, please) Sunday: I refuse to think about Sunday We don’t have a lot planned but we do have a couple of things set up (and/or anticipated). We tend to not do a lot of shore excursions because we love just being on the ship. All the normal excitement and activity during Sea Days are fun and very much enjoyed by us. But we also find it a bit of a treat to sometimes just stay onboard and enjoy the ship when it’s more quiet than usual. And frankly, we both want to get as much value out of the Haven sundecks as we can. Shore excursions Cozumel, Mexica: We signed up for the Salsa and Salsa excursion. Sistah and I had planned to do that, so when those plans changed, I wondered how “down widdit” DH would be since one of the “Salsas” is the dancing salsa. And getting him to even pretend to dance has been rare in the 18 years we have been together. When I presented it to him, I said (based on what I have read online) that we are brought to a restaurant and we are taught to make several different salsas, which we get to eat of course. With crispy Mexican chip things. As well as being plied with bottomless margaritas. Then, at the end they try and teach us (“try” being key here, I am pretty sure) to dance the Salsa. Then we are let loose to drunkenly explore the local shops and encouraged to buy stuff, before being brought back to the ship. He kind of raised his eyebrows at the dancing part, but said that sounded OK. Well! That wasn't too hard to sell! Great Stirrup Cay: Back Story: For the Sistahs cruise, she and I had booked a “regular” cabana on the regular beach and that’s all we wanted. It wasn’t fancy and it was not very expensive (relatively speaking), although I can’t remember the price. Maybe $300? But it was not an “ouch” price to me. For $150 each we’d get a day at the beach, our own space, drinks brought by, out of the sun. Cool. We wanted it. We were excited. About 2 weeks before that cruise I received an email from NCL saying that all the “regular” cabanas were being upgraded and would not be available … BUT they are SO HAPPY to be offer me and Sistah one of the NEW, very oo-la-lah LAGOON VILLAS for the SAME PRICE. I have to laugh now because I was super disappointed! I WANTED that plain old “regular” cabana, darn it! Anyway, I do digress…so we ended up with a Lagoon Villa. And it was incredible. What a peaceful, gorgeous day. On a peaceful gorgeous beach, with a Villa that was peaceful and gorgous to call “home.” One of my fondest cruise memories ever. So for this cruise I wanted to do it again. But the PRICE. Oh my. Like $800 or something? No way. Ridiculous! Especially for 2 people! I forcefully pushed the idea out of my disgruntled mind. But as time went by, I kept thinking about it, how wonderful and magical the day had been. One night after having a slightly larger martini than usual (yeah, it only takes one with me) I went and looked at them again. My Grey Goose mind found it amazingly easy to rationalize that this cruise is ALREADY so expensive, so what difference does it really make! (Yeah, that old tried and true one). So it is the Grey Goose company’s fault. I booked it. Now I am a little worried that we might not get to go, that the weather will not cooperate. Recent Prima reviews are iffy. Oh I want to go SO BADLY! Cross your fingers for us, please! On the bright side (there almost always IS one), if we can’t get there (sob), that money comes back to momma. But I don’t want the bright side. I want the Lagoon Villa.

That's a good one! The weird thing is that I am, not a spread-sheet type of person or someone that wants to control all the details. But I do enjoy doing it when I am given free rein. That's one way DH and I do mesh well. I have messy lists that I add things to and then finally type up clean lists. Does it take time? Sure! But I enjoy the anticipation and have been on enough cruise to know that in the end, those lists help make a trip come together. I'm betting you are the same. 🙂