Guacamole time!

Totopos - Nachos

Aguachile de Camarones - Shrimp Ceviche

Betabel - Beet Salad

Al Pastor Tacos

Carne Asada with Rice & Beans

Side of plantains

Dessert Menu

Chocoflan

Bunuelos de la Abuela

On our way back to the room, we checked out our boarding photo.

Atrium Christmas tree

We stopped by Customer Service, because some of our stuff that should have been in our room hadn't arrived in our room. They said we needed to talk to Latitudes in the morning.

We stopped by the Atrium Bar. We asked for a bottle of water, since we had the package, for the evening. They asked which one?? We said the boxed one, we didn't know there were others. One of the guys looks at our card and goes, no no no. Let me get you something better. So we came back to the room with two Acqua Panna's. The first of many on this cruise!

We got ready for dinner and then headed for the Welcome Aboard Art Event the Park West Team was doing,

Looking down from Deck 7

A few pieces outside the gallery.

I won a Buying credit certificate! Yippee! More Art!

Time for dinner at Los Lobos!

Margarita!

19 hours ago, lepidoptera said:

I love the ginger bread display! Watching more and more decor get put out was one of my favorite parts of my December cruise on the Breakaway. 
 

Great pics of the Francis Scott Ket! Last year my sister and I took a girls trip to Baltimore for a knitting festival. We talked about doing a cruise and the knitting festival if we could get the dates line up when we driving near the cruise port. It is weird to think that so much has changed in less than a year. I was definitely shocked when I saw the video…Im already not a fan of heights and bridges. 

 

I am hoping Susan won something and spent some time in the Spa. I know the Sun doesn’t have a traditional thermal suite, but am interested in hearing about it. I usually get a spa pass-can’t buy one online so I plan on touring it on embarkation but any info or pics would be awesome. 

I love seeing the ships all decorated around Christmas! Taking a Christmas Cruise has become a tradition!

Yeah it was a shock to me as well, especially after such a beautiful picture.

Unfortunately, Susan got skunked. She did a massage during the cruise, one of the spa combo specials they offered. I thinks I have one or two pictures later on of the Spa.

While I was out Chilling on deck 😉 Susan went to the Spa Raffle!

Spa Menu

Here is the video of our Baltimore Sailaway!

This post is going to be the toughest one for me. I was deeply saddened when I awoke on March 26th, 2024 to the News reports of the Francis Scott Key Bridge Collapse. This post will share the photos I took of the FSK Bridge as we sailed out of Baltimore on December 21st, 2023. I am saddened by the loss of such a beautiful structure.

The FSK Bridge coming into view

This was my favorite photo!

Pulling out of the Port of Maryland.

A few more people, but they are only interested in the bar!

Goodbye Baltimore!

Fort McHenry

Point Breeze and the Port of Baltimore

It is roughly about this location that Francis Scott Key wrote the Star Spangled Banner aboard the British Ship.

As it was quite chilly, the sailaway party did not have very many early attendees. I made my way to the Great Outdoors to enjoy sailaway!

oops! A little blurry

Topsiders

Gingerbread House display inside the Garden Cafe

The Great Outdoors was not very full either. 

Cargo Ship being unloaded off our stern.

Still pretty sparse on the crowd

It was a beautiful night! Just because it was 38 degrees, everyone stays inside like their cold or something. Compared to home, this is warm!

pano

Time to throw lines!

6 hours ago, lepidoptera said:

I just read the thread. Very excited to see your trip, I’m on the Sun in 36 days, not that I’m counting the days or anything 😉

 

This will be my first trip on her.

We have done 4 sailings on her! She is our favorite!

22 minutes ago, vacation44 said:

 

I had the dessert wrong with my guess.

nice!

12 minutes ago, NikiPinkston said:

We've sailed the POA twice and you're going to have an amazing time. Hawaii is my absolute favorite place on earth and you & Susan are going to love it!

I am looking forward to it! We have a variety of activities planned for the trip!

3 hours ago, purpleally said:

What state are you missing?

We are missing Hawaii! 49 days to go!

4 hours ago, SeekingKillerWhales! said:

I'll take Wedge Salad, Cheeseburger, and Creme Caramel? For $500 Alex. 

 

Well, darn. Someone forget to refresh for new posts, and now can't delete. 😄 Sorry! But at least I was right!

That is the correct answer! 
 

Had to inject a bit of humor into the review!

So in 2007, when Susan and I got married, we sailed the Sun on our honeymoon. Our stateroom on that cruise was room 5001. When we got our upgrade notice, the stateroom that we got placed in was room 5002! Right next door. The great thing about these rooms are they are down a dead end hallway! Thus they are very quiet, even as you are literally 100 feet away from the Atrium!

Room 5002!

Meet & Greet Invite

Our bags started to arrive

So we started unpacking.

I always get the wedge!

Susan got a Cobb Salad.

Susan got the Fish & Chips

I ordered my normal bacon cheeseburger

I got the Creme Caramel

Susan got the Five Spice Mango Tapioca Pudding

After lunch, we checked in at CruiseNext and signed up for all our Sapphire Perks! 

This was the awesome gingerbread display in the atrium!

We cleared up a restaurant reservation issue.

We had purchased the Free at Sea Plus Package - Unlimited Wifi, 2 extra specialty dinners; $50 shoreex credit for 2nd person; Premium Beverage package; plus waters and Starbucks package! Here I am enjoying the first Iced Mocha of the trip!

Atrium Cafe & Bar - Deck 5

Susan opted for a hot chai latte.

We found a spot to sit as we waited for staterooms to be available.

We headed up to take care of the Muster Station checkin

Boarding was on deck 5, so we headed up to 6 to check in. All Muster Stations on the Sun are on Deck 6 outside.

Once we checked in, it was time for lunch! 

We headed to Seven Seas for lunch.

Baggage Cart outside 

Lunch Menu 

Have you figured out my embarkation day order, yet? I order the same thing every cruise!

Brian Walters, General Manager, was up greeting guests as they got ready to board the ship. I love how he does that!

 Day 1 Daily!

Shore Excursion insert

We had an awesome time at Fort McHenry! We also learned a bunch about the War of 1812 and how Baltimore stuck together. It was time to return to the hotel, so we could grab our bags, and head to the ship!

Row houses - I thought these were so cool.

There is the Sun!

See you soon!

We grabbed the bags and checked out! It's Cruise time!

Our Uber arrived!

Unloading the bags at the pier! I love how they use baggage carts; Great idea!

Let's Go Cruising!

Security

Check-in lines

Once checked in, it was time to head to take the boarding photo!

There we are!

As that sign says, to the ship!

How can you tell its a Christmas cruise without me saying its a Christmas cruise? With a Santa greeting guests as the climb up to the ship!

We got to experience the changing of the flag from the overnight modern flag to the historical accurate flag of 1812. 

The ranger gave an excellent presentation.

Modern flag

She then asked for volunteers to help raise the historical flag. They have to raise and lower the flags at the same time to fulfill the Presidential Proclamation that requires a flag fly at all times over Fort McHenry.

unfolding the flag

There it goes!

Here is the video of the changing of the flag! This was really informative! 

Pano of the Fort inside

The brig

Here is what it would have looked like if you were a soldier at Fort McHenry during the battle.

I am so glad the citizens of Baltimore stopped this from happening.

Fort McHenry

This is a hard picture to look at. The Francis Scott Key Bridge was such a beautiful bridge, it is so sad that was hit and it came down.

During the summer months, the US Coast Guard places a special buoy out in the harbor to mark where Francis Scott Key was during the bombardment of Fort McHenry.

Heading into the Fort!

Ravelin Magazine

Someone short had to go down and explore the small room.

We had to visit Fort McHenry! So, for those of you who don't know. Fort McHenry is the Fort that the British were firing upon when Francis Scott Key wrote the Star Spangled Banner, our national anthem. Once we booked this cruise, I knew we had to visit the fort sometime while in Baltimore.

Inside display area

There was tons of info to read and digest. But the fort awaits!

December 21st, 2023

Embarkation Day!

Location: Baltimore, Maryland

My nerves woke me up early! I was noticing that the Sun was running a bit late into Baltimore this morning. The cruise that was finishing up had a bit of weather come through, which slowed down the ship a bit.

At 7:30 am, the Sun was just coming into Baltimore. This is taken from our Hotel room!

Knowing that disembarkation would be slower, we headed to breakfast!

After breakfast, we got the hotel to print the new bag tags. Put those in our tag holders and got everything ready. Then we headed down to the lobby and grabbed an Uber, leaving our bags at the hotel for now!

Where could we be off to?

Interstate 95 tunnel

Finally, we arrived at our destination!

Baltimore's Penn Station

Interestingly; Our bags got put on a earlier train (Amtrak 20 - The Crescent) and were already in Baltimore when we arrived!

Waiting for the Uber to arrive!

It was chilly, like 41 when we arrived into Baltimore. So we were glad to get in the car!

We had a half an hour or so drive to the hotel. We were staying at the Best Western that was only like 10 minutes from the Port.

Our room!

The view from our room! 

So by the time we got settled in the room, the Panera had worn off, and it was Pizza time!

Dominos for the win!

We enjoyed our dinner, watched some TV, then fell asleep knowing that tomorrow we would be boarding the Norwegian Sun!

After eating, we headed back to the Metro and made our way back to Union Station.

We collected the stored bags, and made our way to the gate where our train would board from. We were taking the Palmetto, one of the long distance trains that has a baggage car, up to Baltimore!

Susan ruined another penny. She loves those penny crusher machines.

I wanted to note, that on our way over to Seattle, the day before, we got notified that our bid was accepted to go from an inside to an oceanview. Unfortunately, now we had to figure out how to print new bag tags!

Time to board the train!

Amtrak Train 90 - The Palmetto!

We were going to be on the train for literally 45 minutes.

Just like that we arrived into Baltimore!

Eisenhower Executive Office Building

The White House - I am saddened that people can no longer be on the opposite side of the street. I understand the whole safety aspect for the President, but its still a government building that is paid for by my tax dollars. Why am I keep across the street from the White House fence?

General Marquis de Lafayette Statue

Treasury Department Building - Albert Gallatin Statue (Fraser)

We were getting hungry and knew we needed to eat something before heading to the train. We stopped by Panera and got some Soup and Sandwich.