OrcaGirl

Okay, back to yesterday morning before all of the nastiness. The aroma hot therapy massage was blissful. Just perfect. I even sat through the product recommendations hard sell at the end with a smile on my face. (Still didn’t buy anything.) Post-massage, I headed up to the buffet for breakfast, and – in lieu of hash browns or Eggs Benedict, which were nowhere in sight – I had some fruit and a ham-cheese-mushroom omelet. The Garden Café was pretty packed so I headed down the stairs to the extra seating at La Cucina. After breakfast, I headed down for the Cruise Critic Meet and Greet. I’m glad I had checked the roll call this morning, because the venue had changed from the Manhattan Room to the Bliss Lounge. There was a great turnout, but… I always thought that the meet and greets are best when they’re about chatting with and getting to know your fellow cruisers, and sometimes a few officers show up. This was really structured more as a “meet and greet with the officers” event. Maybe there was more of the socializing at the end? You know, the part I missed because I was busy tossing my cookies (except without the cookies part) outside in the hallway. But my big issue with the event was how the Q&A with the officers quickly devolved into a ***** session. Perhaps I’m alone in this, but a meet and greet doesn’t seem like the appropriate opportunity to discuss: — Why weren’t my double Latitude points applied that one time on a different ship? — Why wasn’t I offered two side dishes at Cagney’s last night? — Why isn’t the Studio Lounge bigger? — Why wasn’t there a special line for dinner for Sapphire members last night? — Why can’t my free Platinum dinners be noted on the NCL App? — Why am I a new Latitudes member when I cruised with NCL that one time in the early 80s? These are all perfectly reasonable questions to discuss with the appropriate staff member, but bringing them up during a Q&A and putting them on the spot without any of the context just felt… off. (Yes, I understand the irony of bitching about a ***** session.) Or maybe I was just feeling cranky because I was starting to feel the seasickness take hold? Random observations “Country potatoes” are just not as good as hash browns. The general manager (??? The really tall guy) noted that the ship is sailing full with 3,680 passengers this trip, but it’s actually less than last week. (Due to fewer kids and 3rd/4th guests, I presume.) The best moment of the Q&A with the officers is when a first-time cruiser with NCL asked why the Hotel Director referred to the Epic as “unique”; literally 2/3rds of the other attendees just burst out laughing. 🤣 I really miss the Waterfront. I was going to try to be more social on this cruise – I’m an introvert by nature – but I just don’t think it’s gonna happen.

A quick update before I return tomorrow to recap the rest of Monday. I got super seasick today, and (mortifyingly) threw up just outside the entrance to the Bliss while the Cruise Critic Meet and Greet was still taking place. 🤮 Gross and embarrassing. Apologies to everyone who had to walk past on their way out.

Slept like a log. Motion of the ocean was the perfect thing to rock me to sleep. Also the having been awake for like 36+ hours. Woke up about four minutes before my alarm went off. Quickly showered and headed straight to Starbucks for my morning fix. Caffeine acquired, I took a little stroll through the casino, finding the perfect slot machine to play later today. And then to the spa for my massage appointment. Random observations Apparently pre-booking spa treatments isn’t actually pre-booking? A woman was very upset that the days/times she’d booked in advance had changed. Woke up to 9 unread messages from my husband. Was initially concerned until I realized he was recapping last night’s episode of reality show Love in Translation that he watched with my mom back home. 😂 Missed opportunity in the spa to not have the treatment rooms cantilevered over the edge slightly with a SeaWalk-style glass window in the floor under the massage table so you could watch the waves as you get a massage.

Ha, that’s almost exactly what I texted a friend last night.

Day 1 Epic Transatlantic Daily: Epic-Day1.pdf

I grabbed my iPad in lieu of my phone to film sailaway, but apparently because I’d watched so much Dexter and then Seven on the flights, its battery was low too. After filming like 15 min of the sailaway (inc backing up and spinning and then heading out) as a super cool time lapse, the iPad died and I lost all of it. 😭 Sailaway itself happened at 6pm; if there was an official announcement of the time, I missed it. After sailaway, I tried to go to the solo meet and greet in Bliss but 1) it was really, really loud in there to the point that I couldn’t really hear what the staff were saying about planned activities, and 2) there was no bartender. So I bailed and headed to Maltings for an Eastern Legacy to take to dinner. The MDR was serving the standard day 1 menu, so instead I headed up to the buffet for ‘American Dinner’. Turkey and fixings, sliders, etc. Pretty good. Someone on the transfer bus this morning had mentioned that there was a launch scheduled for the Space Center tonight, and I happened to catch the tail end of it. Not enough of a space nerd to know exactly what was going on, but seeing things burning up in the sky and then hearing a sonic boom was pretty darn cool. After that I went back to the cabin and my luggage was there! Yay! Spent a few minutes unpacking and getting organized before heading to the theatre for the Welcome Aboard show. Really enjoyed the dancers and vocalists, so I’m looking forward to seeing those full performances later in the cruise. But I’ll give the Beatles a skip. Can’t wait for when the cruising demographic ages enough that it’s more fiscally responsible to have a Depeche Mode or The Cure tribute show. After the tight 40 min set, I grabbed a nightcap at the Atrium bar and headed back to the cabin to finish unpacking. Or at least as much as I can without access to the main closet. Random observations This sailing has ~3700 guests from 35 countries according to Cruise Director Dan. Elevators are going to be a challenge. I’m trying to take the stairs as much as possible, but my foot is really bugging me so I’m taking the elevators if I need to go up more than three flights. Hmm, if only there was a foot pain seminar offered. 🤣 Speaking a little Indonesian and Tagalog continues to surprise and delight the staff. This cruise I’m going to try to learn a little Indian as well.

After my mini lunch, I did a quick lap of the Epic Garden Cafe. I forgot how small it is! But the food looked good. I then headed down to check out my cabin and drop off my backpack. The solo cabin is so cute! It’s showing a bit of wear and tear, and the sliding door to my closet is completely busted and won’t open so I hope they can get it fixed ASAP. I called housekeeping but the steward was very distracted with getting the final touches done on other cabins, so I’ll try reporting it again tomorrow. It was 3:45pm at this point, and I thought sailaway was at 4pm (though I had my doubts given the length of the lines earlier) so I hustled up to the top deck to scope out a spot to film sailaway. But the sailaway dance party came and went and no movement. So I gave up at 4:45pm and headed down to the Mandara Spa for the spa draw and to make a massage appointment. The staff spa acknowledged that the Platinum spa discount that’s only valid on port days was a little useful on a transatlantic, so they offered me an early morning spot tomorrow when I can use my 25% off. However, I can’t stack my $50USD spa credit onto the same appointment. Oh well. While in the spa waiting for the draw to start, I could see down into the pier that the crew was still loading provisions and luggage. There was even a crew on a lift doing repairs or cleaning, so yeah, I don’t think we’re leaving imminently. Alas, no luck at the spa draw. So I’m heading back to my cabin to try to charge my phone before actual sailaway. Random observations In 25 years of cruising this was a first. The captain (I think?) interrupted the sailaway party to request the driver of a Nissan minivan to move their car from the casino parking lot. 🤣 I’m regretting not bringing my binoculars or my DSLR. I’m trying not to freak out that the AirTag in my checked luggage is still showing as being on the pier. 😬 Apparently 70% of guests on this cruise are Latitudes members. The Wonder of the Seas seems to have departed close to on time.

The Freestyle Daily promotes the ‘all-new NCL app’, which I don’t think has been significantly updated in years, so I’m guessing it’ll be a looooong time. 😂

As soon as I was onboard, I went straight to the ladies room and then to my muster station. Priorities. I was craving a croque madame in Taste but lunch hours were already over, so I decided to get some embarkation chores down and then find food. Signed up for all the Latitudes Platinum things at the Cruise Next desk, and then headed to the Spiegel Tent to sign up for Canvas by U, which I have never done. The ship wifi finally reset about that time and I was able to get online. At 2:30pm, while I was in line at the pool bar, the ‘all cabins are ready’ announcement was made. Earlier than I expected actually. I grabbed my mojito and a hot dog at the Great Outdoors, and finally had a sit down and rest. Random observations The casino smells smoky. I miss the Waterfront already. I do love the outdoor dining area on the Epic. I know the Breakaway class ships sort of have it too, but it always feels so dark and contained. The Epic chandelier is nice enough, but I’ll always prefer the Encore’s bubble wrap chandelier. Yes, really. 😂 I’ve managed to scuff up three nails of the manicure I got yesterday. 💅 I better win the spa draw so I can get them redone.

It took us about an hour to reach the cruise terminal from the airport, but it felt interminable. (You know how some people’s voices are like nails on a chalkboard to you?; that was our bus driver.) But we saw gators from the bus so that was cool. Our first view of the embarkation lineups was a bit shocking to a lot of the people on the bus. Don’t worry, the ship won’t leave without us. The luggage situation was a bit more chaotic. Unattended luggage was just sitting out everywhere before we even pulled in, and only one porter seemed to be on site. I’m more used to the ports at Los Angeles, Miami, Fort Lauderdale, etc where there are dozens of porters everywhere you look. Upon arrival, we were directed to stay on the bus until the luggage was all offloaded. My luggage was already tagged so once we were cleared to get off the bus, I headed over to the very long check-in line. The timing: 12:30pm - got in line 1:30pm -made it to the top of the ramp and inside the building 1:37pm - hit the offshoot line for Platinum and above (probably saved me about 20 min) 1:40pm - checking in 1:45pm - into the boarding queue 1:49pm - on board the Epic Random observations At least a few people on our bus didn’t tag their luggage before putting it on the bus, so they were concerned that the porter would grab them before they could get to them. I feel like a bit of a party-pooper. The lady next to me on the bus was saying how great the Epic looked compared to the Wonder of the Seas and the MSC Seashore, and my unfiltered reaction was a nose-crinkle and a “Really?” 😂 (I booked this cruise for the price; I’m not a huge fan of the Epic on its own merits.) I think it took me five minutes to get a bit of a sunburn waiting in line in the Florida sun. Every cruise, it seems like more and more people are bringing their big luggage onboard themselves. A few people were really fixating on “we have to be on board by 2pm” and it didn’t matter how many times they were told that as long as they’re in the line at the port, the ship will not leave without us. A paramedic crew with stretcher entered the port building around 1:30pm. Someone’s vacation might be ending before it’s begun.

Group 7 got called to the transfer coach a bit before 11am. Unfortunately a bunch of people didn’t pay attention and hadn’t actually checked in and gotten a group number, but boarded the bus anyway. Three or four of us were left without seats, so the poor NCL rep had to double-check that everyone had their 7 sticker and kick a bunch of people off the bus and the poor bus driver then had to dig their luggage out of the hold. That whole process added an extra 20 minutes or so to loading, and we didn’t leave the airport until 11:20am.

Another uneventful flight from Toronto to Orlando. I tried and failed to get even a little sleep. But I did listen to a different serial killer on this flight. Disembarked the plane and followed the signs to baggage claim (gate-checked my carryon again), where I quickly spotted the dude holding a NCL sign and followed his (poor) directions to the NCL transfer desk. Around 10:30am I checked in and received a group 7 sticker. And then I booted it over to the nearest Starbucks for a caffeine and sugar fix. Random observations I think half the people on this flight were going on a cruise, and the other half were on their way to Disney World.

Had a disappointing sandwich at YVR. Flew to Toronto. Uneventful flight, but didn’t get any sleep. I had gate-checked my bag, so once we landed I went to find it. (They couldn’t check it all the way to Orlando because US Customs would be closed when we landed in Toronto.) So I grabbed my bag at the carrousel and went to find a quiet-ish place to chill until NEXUS opened at 4am. Found an empty bank of seats in front of a retro art installation. 🤣 Couldn’t get comfortable, couldn’t sleep. Next time remind me how much I hate red-eyes and long layovers. At 4am I headed into the Nexus line. Sure, I could have gone through the the regular line at 3:30am, but what’s the point of having Nexus if you don’t get to jump a queue? And damn do I love having Nexus for the purpose of going through customs and immigration. One look at the camera and I’m through in seconds. First stop after US Customs and Immigration was Starbucks. Oh look, it’s right next to my gate. How convenient. Now to wait 2.5 hours for my flight to Orlando so we can get this ship on the road. Random observations I had a bunch of extra US cash leftover from the hospital transfer shenanigans on my last cruise, so I exchanged $100USD to €80 in Euros at the airport for a little pocket money while in Alicante. I actually don’t know if Gibraltar accepts Euros, too, or if I should have also gotten a few pounds. The flight to Toronto was oversold, and they were offering $300CDN to anyone willing to take the 10:30pm flight. It was tempting, but I wasn’t willing to risk a one-hour layover at Pearson. I binge-watched several episodes of Dexter on the plane. 🩸 Apologies to anyone seated behind me. (I forgot how much nudity and sex the first season had.) The potato, cheddar and chive bites at Starbucks have quickly become my favourite travel day breakfast/snack.

Here we go again. I honestly didn’t think this cruise was going to happen for me, but I’m so happy it is. I’ll be heading out on the Norwegian Epic for the 12-day transatlantic cruise from Orlando to Rome, with port stops in Gibraltar and Alicante. This will be my second time on the Epic (first time was the extended-due-to-COVID-shutdown cruise of the Epic in March 2020), second solo cruise, but first time sailing in an actual Solo cabin. I will try to post 2-3 times each day with what I’m up to; my particular focus is usually cocktails, food, entertainment, and excursion adventures. (I’ll also be posting lots of photos over on Instagram Stories; look for erin_braincandy if you just want photos/videos without all of the commentary.) Today’s travel plan I’m currently sitting at Vancouver International Airport, waiting for my red-eye flight to Toronto, Ontario. Early Sunday morning, I’ll go through US Customs and Immigration, and take a quick flight down to Orlando. I’ve booked the NCL shuttle from MCO to Port Canaveral. 🤞 Past Semi-Live from CC threads… If you’re interested in some of my past “semi-live from…” threads: February 2024 | Mexican Riviera on the NCL Bliss (the fractured ankle in the Thermal Spa trip) October 2023 | Bermuda on the NCL Escape June 2023 | Alaska on the NCL Bliss April 2023 | Alaska on the Discovery Princess October 2022 | Mexican Riviera on the Celebrity Solstice December 2021 | Mexican Riviera on the NCL Bliss

Six has now (sadly) wrapped up on both the Norwegian Bliss and the Norwegian Breakaway. I was on the Bliss in mid-February and we had the second-to-last week of performances. See you at the Queen Elizabeth! Renewed my season subscription this morning.

Re: arrival in Los Angeles I don't know the why, but we did arrive into Port of Los Angeles a bit late. Disembarkation started about 45 minutes later than I would have expected, and the line of people doing self-disembark was craaaaaazy long. That said, a 3pm-ish or later 'cabins are ready' announcement has been typical on my last 3-4 NCL cruises. Re: cabins Sign of modern times. NCL went to once-per-day cabin service last year sometime, and I haven't seen a towel animal since before the restart. Cabin stewards are handling more cabins than ever. Because of mom's injury, we were often in the cabin during typical cleaning times so our schedule was all over the place, but the steward and his assistant did a great job of keeping the room clean and accommodating our special needs.

If any staff tried to tell you that you couldn't wear water shoes, I'd look them dead in the eye and ask them exactly how many people slip and hurt themselves in the thermal spa each week. (I highly doubt anyone would say that she couldn't wear them. I mean, I saw an old dude on my last cruise wearing his tighty-whiteys in the pool and no one said boo. 🤷‍♀️) I honestly don't have any other suggestions besides the grippy water shoes, which the Fox and Red both said they'll never cruise without going forward. And we all did penguin walks for the rest of the week since we didn't have them.

I like the overall aesthetic, but as others have mentioned, without the pool, it'll likely be a 'try it once with a day pass and never again' for me. I do have concerns about the stairs to the hot tub. Maybe it's the angle, but they look super-steep and seem to only have a handrail on one side? And the step tile looks like just plain tile, nothing to make it non-slip. As documented on my recent 'live from the Bliss' last week, my mom fell and fractured her ankle (plus two broken toes and ligament damage in her knee) right in front of the thermal spa hot tub, so I'm paying more attention to these details.

So, we felt the medical centre staff were wonderful, our room steward was great, and all of the dining room and buffet staff were great at finding us a table to accommodate the wheelchair. I was not impressed by the Guest Services staff or the communication for disembarkation procedures. I'm also annoyed that we got two fruit baskets with a 'hope you're feeling better' card, but only the doctor from the medical centre actually followed up to see how she was doing. We never received any follow-up from either the thermal spa manager or the security team regarding the incident report while on the cruise. We received a call from Norwegian head office yesterday, and that's all I'll say about that until I have something to report. Re: my mother, we're still waiting to get in to see an orthopaedic surgeon here in Canada to get her looked at and get a better idea of recovery expectations.

As others mentioned, we rotated so we started the morning facing the beach but by the time I reboarded the ship around 10am we were facing the Arch. We were portside.

No, I was so entirely focused on my mom that I didn't even think to download them.

Ooh, I'd definitely take a reservation on the Beyond... great ship. 🤣

It was slippery tile right in front of the hot tub. Thank goodness she didn't bonk her head. Over the week, in addition to my mom falling, two other guests also slipped and fell in the spa just that we saw. I can't imagine how many others have.

Oh, the only hash brown I got all trip… 🤪

Disembarkation day wrap-up What a cluster*&$#… Never my favourite day of a cruise, this time is was 10x worse trying to manage the crowds with the wheelchair and trying to figure out where we needed to go. We got up, got dressed, left a very nice extra tip for our room steward, and headed down to deck 6. That was my first mistake. It was a 30 min wait for the MDR (actually only 15, we later learned from the Fox and K) and at this point we didn’t know how delayed disembarkation would be, so we didn’t want to wait. So we headed to the Atrium, and I ran up to the buffet to grab mom some toast and watermelon. That was my second mistake. The buffet was of course packed, and here is when the ‘touch all the toast’ dude really pissed me off. And the toaster wasn’t really working so I had to send my (untouched by random a-hole) piece of bread through three times and it was barely even golden. Then I tried to take an elevator down from 16 to 6, but after ~10 minutes or so of full elevators or people arriving after me taking any available space, I gave up and took the stairs down. After giving mom her breakfast, I decided to walk up to deck 7 and figure out where we were supposed to go for wheelchair assistance. Except the aft stairway and central stairway were blocked off, and the forward stairway was full of people awaiting the ‘easy walk’ announcement. I tried talking to one staff member to find out his suggestion for getting to the Local for wheelchair assistance, but he wasn’t any help. Sort of a shrug and just try to get through. Finally self-assist / easy walk was called; seemed like many, many more people chose that option than I’ve seen on past cruises. Our plan was to head up to the Local once the colour before us was called, but by the time it was and we said our goodbyes to the Fox and K, our colour (orange) was being called at 8:52. We headed up the nearest elevator bank and sort of merged into the line heading towards the Local. But when we got to the split point, the staff dude there basically said ‘you’re almost there’ and waved us on our way. And that was my third mistake, not listening to my gut and saying ‘no, we were specifically told to go to the Local for wheelchair assistance.’ So we basically cut the line (although everyone was very gracious about it), and got to the doors within minutes. Except this was the point that we actually really needed wheelchair assistance because I wasn’t going to be able to maneuver mom in the wheelchair across the disembarkation ramps. The lady ushering people off the ship was really trying to keep the line moving, but I dug my feet in and she called over her manager, who called for a wheelchair attendant to meet us there. It took about 10 minutes, and at this point, I was starting to sweat making our flight (which was for 12:40pm). So the wheelchair attendant arrives and was fantastic, and we disembark… only to discover a loooooong line for the one (?!?) elevator to get down to the luggage hall. It seemed to be split in two, with people using NCL wheelchairs and attendants got priority over people in their own wheelchairs or with just a f***ton of luggage. At the entrance to the luggage hall, our NCL wheelchair attendant had to leave us (union rules). So I took over pushing mom (still in NCL’s wheelchair, which seemed weird) towards the luggage. In my entire lifetime of 20+ cruises, I don’t think I’ve ever used a porter, but this seemed like the perfect time to start. We flagged one down, and Red found our luggage for him to load. And having access to the porter line for immigration was handy. A quick facial recognition later, we were heading out of the building. The porter brought us to the ‘ADA pickup area’, which, you know, seemed like a logical place to be at the time. Unfortunately it was also crowded and chaotic and staff kept yelling to move forward, move forward, and more than one passenger was having a very cranky morning. At this point, I called the first of the two phones I was given by Guest Services. It was very hard to hear her, and for a while she couldn’t find any record of us. Eventually, though, she told me to go find Mario or Dabby (?) by going up to the stop sign and using the crosswalk to the far aisle. Which, doesn’t seem to be super accessible with a wheelchair and luggage. So I left mom and Red with the luggage and went to find where we needed to be before dragging everything and everyone over. I don’t know if I was expecting someone holding a sign or what, but I couldn’t see any vehicle that looked accessible, so finally I approached a staff person loading the NCL airport busses and basically cried “I need help.” And she pointed behind her and said “that’s Mario in the long coat.” Not sure how I was supposed to figure all this out. Mario told me to bring my party and our luggage to this location. So back I go, and tried to navigate the disembarkation crowds with the wheelchair and our bags. I tried to flag down a porter who had just dropped someone else’s bags off but he waved me off. So we get over to Mario, and still no one was told us what type of vehicle to expect. After several more minutes of confusion, Mario gets in touch with our eventual driver, except his vehicle was in the middle aisle, so we had to drag everything across the crosswalk again. It took another 20 minutes to get mom transferred from the ship’s wheelchair to the transport van’s wheelchair and safely loaded into the van and strapped down. I’m glad we didn’t have more luggage as it just fit. And then we were off. I hope NCL got their wheelchair back, I guess? I was feeling better as we reached the outer edge of LAX about 30 minutes before the luggage drop deadline for our flight. But then our driver ‘took a shortcut’ and we ground to a halt. After many, many minutes of not moving, other people were actually getting out of their Ubers/Lyfts/taxis and pulling their luggage down the ramp and across the busy lanes in front of Terminal 5. Obviously not an option for us. After much honking by everyone, the driver at the front of the traffic jam was persuaded to ignore the ‘no turn on red’ sign (the light hadn’t changed colour in over ten minutes) and merge forward, which got us moving again and we arrived at our Terminal. My husband (with his good Air Canada status) had theoretically arranged for a wheelchair to be waiting, but they looked at me like I had two heads when I mentioned that. But anyway, a wheelchair arrived ten minutes later, we were able to get her transfer from one chair to the next, and released the transport van driver. I shan’t bore you (too late?) with the rest of the transport shenanigans, but suffice it to say: travelling with a disability is a b*%$&. But we got to Vancouver, spent the night, and then flew up today on a small plane that actually went smoother than yesterday’s business class adventure. We just pulling into the farm now, and my momma will likely never let me talk her into a cruise again. 🤣 If anyone has questions, fire away and I’ll answer over the next couple of days.