ceilidh1

We left at 11:30 last night. Currently circling around in WA waters, so 10.25% tax. Not that I’m ever drinking again

I slept (passed out?) until 10:30 this morning. I’m pretty sure I have never slept this late on a cruise. Needless to say, we missed breakfast. I slowly got myself together and headed to Starbucks. By now it was time for lunch so we headed to Garden Cafe where I was thrilled to discover my favourite butter chicken! So so good! I grabbed a vacation hero card for my room steward and left her a nice tip. These folks work so hard and I know this has been a tough sailing for many. So many grumpy guests complaining about lines and waiting time and who knows what..,

DS was ready for bed after Siglo. I needed water so told him to go ahead and went in search of an open bar (only one per deck). I stumbled in to the Observation Lounge and got greeted like a celebrity by a bunch of folks from our bar crawl. The rest is history. We closed down that bar, then relocated to the Atrium. Drinks literally just kept appearing and many new friends were made (all over legal drinking age). I honestly have zero recollection of leaving or getting back to the room. I’m amazed I even found it! At one point I woke up and had to check I was actually in the RIGHT room!!! Oh What A Night

After dinner we went to the theatre to watch a 3D showing of Guardians of the Galaxy. Love those movies so I was more than happy to go with DS. From there, down to the Atrium for Siglo and more drinks. Siglo were as great as always. I remember them from our very first cruise on Bliss - I loved them then and have been lucky enough to catch them every sailing!

Oh my. Last night became quite the night. I actually wrote all about dinner but obviously forgot to press submit as it appears to have disappeared. Let’s just say, I’m not feeling my usual energizer bunny self this morning! Dinner was at Los Lobos. I feel that this was where things began a downward spiral. I ordered a glass of 66 Prosecco (Veuve adjacent) and he brought me the whole bottle. Ummm. Ok! For dinner we ordered the tableside guacamole- amaze balls! Chicken quesadilla, beef burrito , and fish tacos. Oh, and the street corn! Soooo good! The tacos weren’t fantastic but everything else was. DS literally devoured everything on the table. I got the tres leches cake and DS got a scoop of each ice cream for dessert. The avocado ice cream was amazing! I also got handed a Mexican coffee and let me tell you, that stuff is STRONG!!! This was the first time for us at this restaurant and will not be the last! Thanks @YVRteacher for telling me I had to do it!

I’m going to try that tomorrow- Maltings is closed tonight cause…Canada! I had the Getaway there years it was really good!

Courtesy of DS - a Pineapple Surplus! Not bad at all! Judt spent an hour in the arcade and then trivia. The trivia was super hard - we got second place with 3/20. The winning team got 4! There’s a family music mania thing on now and I’m already done with the kids being annoying! lol. Just as well I need to go get ready for dinner soon!

Rude!

Folks are starting to get off the ship now. It’s a nice day so we may try to hit the slides and hot tubs if lots of people go into town. If not, we will chill and go to the arcade or play games. And drink. Dinner tonight is Los Lobos!

Happy to report that although Veuve is no longer available on the plus upgrade, the 66 Prosecco is almost as good. I’m on glass 5 today. We had WA tax all the way up the coast but in Canadian waters nothing apparently? Only one bar per deck as Canadian rules. I knew that. DS just ordered me to get a Banana Rum-Ble. It’s good. Not great. Doesn’t taste of banana but very pineapple-y

DS and I spent a chill morning in The Ateium doing various trivia’s and games. You know when you are so confident in your answers and then fail miserably? That was me today. lol. For lunch, I had to go to Garden Cafe as I can’t miss NCL Indian food. Hands down the best. They didn’t have my face butter chicken, but what they did have was excellent! We docked n Victoria around 1pm and there was another delay for disembarking. This time all around the Canadian clearance. Once again, huge lines started forming and folks getting angry at ship staff who have zero control over this. If you want to get angry with someone, get angry at your fellow passengers who didn’t f do o what they were asked - fill out and return the clearance/customs form prior to today! Announcements all morning for those folks to go to guest services. Come on people. Get it together. On a side note, I DID fill out and return the form and yesterday got a phone message to go to guest services as something was incorrect. Now I’ve filled out that form a billion and one times (and I wasn’t drunk when I did it this time) so was 99.9# sure nothing was wrong. I couldn’t deal with it last night as I was slightly less than coherent so I went first thing this morning. The lady at the desk insisted I needed to fill in the box that was marked “visitors to Canada”. I explained I wasn’t a visitor. I live there. She insisted that I had to as I had a US passport. No. No I don’t have to. I wasn’t going to get into an argument, but I also wasn’t going to complete something that might land me at secondary inspection in Vancouver (we aren’t getting off in Victoria) so I politely said, “No. I’m sorry. If there’s a problem you can have a CBSA officer speak with me.” Nothing since then…

You, my friend, know me far too well! The Getaway will never recover after we sail her…

Observation Lounge bar is great, especially toward the end of the night. The bartender lady at the Casino Bar was so fun yesterday at the bar crawl - she was in the Atrium Bar this morning and remembered me (no surprise there) and asked how I was feeling…🤣 I can honestly say every bar and bartender (except the one grouchy one that reprimanded DS for being at the pool bar while waiting for his drink?) have been great. Zero complaints. I miss the Chocolate Cowboy, though..,

Breakfast at Local. No wait or line so I grabbed a Starbucks first. 10.25% WA sales tax today. Couple of thoughts on breakfast - Baked beans should not contain chunks of red and green pepper - Cold toast and hard butter don’t work - How can a plate be hot enough for 3rd degree burns but the food on it cold? I ordered English Breakfast and Buttermilk Pancakes. Food was fine, but cold. Not even warm. Cold. At least my Starbucks was hot and perked me up.

Goodies in the room tonight

Dinner this evening was Teppanyaki

From 9am to 5pm we made our way through every bar on the ship. No repeats of drinks. We had a passport that was stamped for each venue. There was also a scavenger hunt ( I won this past year so didn’t play this time as it wouldn’t be fair). At the last bar we played an alternative form of bingo, which was hilarious!! Find a tramp stamp. Find a whale tail. Etc. etc. etc. We stopped for group lunch in Savour…but it forgot to take pictures

No idea what happened to the text for the above pictures! This morning was a bar crawl, organized by the same person that did it on this same sailing last year! It was so fun last year so I had to do it again!!! It was awesome and there were another two people that also did it last year!!!

I honestly don’t remember a whole lot after this, but my pictures tell me we grabbed food at The Local

I’m not sure where I left off. Shenanigans will be reported elsewhere. Last night we watched Jersey Boys, which was excellent. Then we caught the tail end of the 80s party in the atrium. DS called it a night and went back to the room, while I continued the party at the Social. Apparently the Social wasn’t open for another 10 minutes, so I got chatting to the dude manning the door (shenanigan alert). Turns out he neither works for nor is paid by NCL but was told by a staff not to allow anyone to enter. He took that job SERIOUSLY!!! Once the doors finally opened, I was dancing with a bunch of gals who were LGBTQ friendly. No probs on my part, but I don’t bat for that team so things got kinda weird. Luckily, my bouncer came to my rescue (shenanigan alert). The rest is history. I danced and danced and danced! I called it a night at 3am and texted DS to see if he was still up. He was. And he was hungry!

Found the cigar place