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Go With Me on My 2014 Grand World Voyage

Esri

By Esri,
in Holland America Line

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innlady1

innlady1

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Thank you so much for your wonderful blog, esri. I am so enjoying it. And, I am so very sorry to hear about your father's passing. My heart goes out to you...but the cruise might be the best way to celebrate his life.

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Esri

Esri

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Just a note before I post today's blog entry... Thanks to you all for your kind words about my father. He was a very good man. We will all miss him.

 

Read it on Go With Me!

 

I slept really well last night. I woke up before my alarm went off, but was well rested. I had time for a shower before my room service breakfast was due to arrive. After the shower I read a chapter in The Hobbit.

 

Breakfast arrived promptly at 8:55 AM and was quite good. The bagel was nicely toasted and there were two large and thick slices of lox along with some red onion and a few capers. I actually prefer dry-smoked salmon, but this lox was very tasty. The mango was sweet and juicy. (I do love mangos.) I had a glass of cranberry juice and a glass of fresh-squeezed orange juice to wash it all down.

 

After breakfast I spent about thirty minutes on the Internet. I had to answer some questions from the sister that is handling my Dad’s funeral arrangements and freezing his accounts for me. I am his executor. Probate doesn’t have to be done immediately, but I have to account for all his assets so they have to be frozen. Thank you, Brenda, for taking on those tasks for me.

 

I made sure I logged out of AND disconnected from the Amsterdam’s guest network before starting to work on my Day 2 blog post. If you forget to log out the minutes keep adding up even if you disconnect. You don’t want that to happen at 25 cents a minute.

 

After the first draft of the blog post was done I went into Lightroom to work on the pictures I’d taken in Fort Lauderdale and on the ship. I love Lightroom. I can simply “clean up” simple problems like composition or exposure, but I can also get as creative as I want. I can make a photograph look like a painting or spotlight a portion of the photo for dramatic effect. It is great fun.

 

At 11:45 I headed for the main dining room for a Cruise Critic lunch get together. Lunch was very good. I had a vegetarian taquito and a latin-seasoned steak salad. I was going to skip dessert, but they had a no sugar added chocolate éclair that was calling my name.

 

That’s okay though, because after lunch I took my camera and strolled down Deck 5. I took a lot of pictures, but most of them didn’t turn out well. The pitch and roll of the sea is great (my Fitbit thinks I’m taking eight or nine flights of stairs a day), but I’m going to have to practice because most of my pictures were out of focus. I posted the few that came out with the Day 2 blog post.

 

I spent about an hour at the Ocean Bar paying for tours I’ve booked with Cruise Critic members. Well, maybe ten minutes paying and the rest just chatting. Then I came back to the cabin and finished up all my photos, including the new ones, in Lightroom. Then it was already time for dinner! Time certainly flies when you are having fun.

 

For dinner tonight I had the shrimp cocktail, Caesar salad, and Veal Cordon Bleu. It was all good. They served the Cordon Bleu with a bit of mushroom sauce on one side of the plate and a bit of marinara sauce on the other, which I thought was a bit odd. It worked though. It was very good.

 

I think we have our table filled out now. This evening we had two nice gentlemen join us. However, Kay’s friend Joanne switched from the 8:00 seating to 5:30 and wanted to sit with us. Yesterday Aloha & Estelle’s other cousin, Vangie, joined us. So we only had one opening at our 8-top. Jack, one of the gents, had been assigned to our table. The other, Dick, actually sat at the wrong table. When the Dining Room Manager told Joanne she had been assigned to ANOTHER table instead of ours, Jack graciously volunteered to take her place at the other table.

 

So our group is me, Kay, Joanne, the cousins – Estelle, Aloha, and Vangie, Mary and her father, John. John said he has a harem. We were once again a lively bunch and nearly the last to leave the 5:30 seating. We might have made it out earlier were it not for the confusion over seating arrangements, but I wouldn’t have bet on it.

 

Once again I had every intention of going back out this evening. I was going to go to the movies at eight. Never made it. That’s okay. I’m enjoying what I’m doing and that’s what cruises are for, right? You do what you want to do.

 

Tomorrow is our first port, Puerto Limon, Costa Rica. I’m taking a tour arranged by a Cruise Critic member – a scenic drive and tour of the Tortuguero Canal. Maybe I’ll see a sloth or a monkey or two.

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Esri

Esri

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Read it on Go With Me! (With Pictures - 1 Now, More Soon)

 

Last night was a restless night. I felt exhausted by 10:00 PM, but stayed up to finish up the blog post, check e-mail, Facebook, and Cruise Critic. I went to bed around 11:00 and darned if I could sleep. I tossed and turned. I looked at the clock every thirty minutes or so. Finally, I think I fell asleep around 3:00 AM and woke up at 5:38. I had the alarm set for 6:00, so I just got up.

 

Breakfast was once again room service, but just juice and a Danish this morning. After breakfast I read another chapter in The Hobbit and waited for the announcement that we could disembark. It came around 7:30 and I was off the ship at 7:45 for an 8:00 tour.

 

I know it is cheesy, but I took the opportunity to have my picture taken with the pirate at the end of the gangway. I bought two photo packages at the pre-order discount and I intend to use them mostly for gangway photos. Our tour organizer, MaryAnn was waiting at the end of the gangway with another new friend of mine. A very nice retired doctor from Hilton Head, just north of where I live in Georgia.

 

The full group as gathered by 8:00. It was about 82-degrees and a little humid. Keep in mind I live in coastal Georgia so my idea of “a little humid” and yours may vary. We had a pretty good trek to meet the tour guide, Eduardo, and our driver, Yupy. Eduardo told us that Yupy is the second best driver in Costa Rica. The best is in the hospital. ;)

 

We loaded up the van and headed out for our scenic drive. It was as advertised – very scenic. I haven’t seen much of Costa Rica, but what I’ve seen is beautiful and much cleaner than Mexico. At least the part of Mexico that borders Texas. I’ve never been to the resorts on the coasts.

 

Eduardo was sitting right of front of me on the drive and he heard MaryAnn tell someone I had just retired from the Army. I said I’d just retired as a civilian working for the Army. Eduardo asked me what I did for the Army, make bombs? I laughed and said that I worked with computers. He said “You are a very smart lady. You can program computers?” I said I could and he said “You can make web pages?” I said I could indeed make web pages. Long story short, we exchanged cards and he wants me to do some web work for him after the world cruise. If I get a web site job on every tour my little side business will be off to a nice start.

 

Eduardo was a very entertaining host and his English was excellent. Our first stop was a little fruit stand where he showed us a coffee tree, a cacao tree and a cashew tree. I took a few pictures of the owner’s children and they gave me a flower. I was reaching into my little security wallet to give them $1.00 and Eduardo shook his head at me. I saw him tip the owner before we drove away though.

 

After the fruit stand we went to a Del Monte banana plantation. He showed us the little houses the workers lived in and said they didn’t have to pay rent or power. It sounds great, but I could hear Ernie Ford singing “I owe my soul to the company store.”

 

We saw how they bring the bananas down to the shipping facility from the fields. They have a zip line set up and they tie bunches of bananas to the line and when there are twenty-five bunches, a worker runs to the shipping area, pulling them all behind him. Eduardo said that each bunch of bananas weighs about twelve pounds, so that is 300 pounds the worker has to pull behind him, while running in the heat and humidity. I said “That’s a very hard job” and Eduardo agreed.

 

Next we drove to the village of Moin to take a boat ride down the Tortuguera Canal. This canal runs from Moin to San Juan, Nicaragua. A boat ride the entire length of the canal takes about five hours. We didn’t go down the whole thing.

 

Our boat captain was Frederick, or Fred. He had a most interesting accent – a cross between Austrian and Costa Rican. His parents came to Costa Rica when he was small and he still speaks German. He said it was not as good as his Spanish, but better than his English. His English was excellent, by the way.

 

The boat ride was quite pleasant. We saw a couple of Great Blue Herons, several types of Egrets and Kingfishers, and a few Grackles. We also saw several iguanas in various sizes and colors.

 

My goal on this tour was to see a sloth and we did see them. I can now report that I got a couple of good pictures of sloths, birds, and a really good picture of an iguana. The boat never stopped moving so I shot in continuous mode with the AI Servo auto-focus motor and hoped for the best. Just at the end of the tour I met my secondary goal – howler monkeys. A sloth and a monkey or two – checked off the list.

 

After the boat tour we stopped at a little bar on a hill overlooking the port and I was able to take few pictures of the Amsterdam at the pier. I had a Diet Coke (Coke Light they call it here.) The owner asked if I wanted ice because the soda was lukewarm, but I passed. My travel doctor told me the never touch the ice or water. I fear Montezuma’s Revenge. ;)

 

On the way back to the ship one of the ladies asked Eduardo if he knew where she could buy a battery for a clock. She had the old battery. He showed it to Yupy and we headed around corners and through traffic. He stopped in front of an auto repair shop and we all laughed when Yupy took the battery inside – saying we didn’t want a car battery. Even Eduardo laughed saying Yupy must have misunderstood, but he came out with the right battery and said they were $1.00. So more than one person ended up buying them, since most of those batteries are around $5.00 at home.

 

Shopping done, Yupy took us home. We had to walk about two blocks to find the van when we disembarked from the ship, but they dropped us off right at the end of the pier. Eduardo said the cruise companies don’t allow the private operators to pick up at the end of the pier, but they can often drop off because they know the gate guards. Go figure.

 

After I got back to my cabin and cooled off, I headed up to the Lido for lunch. I just got a Panini with prosciutto and fresh mozzarella with some potato chips. It was excellent and may become my go to lunch in the Lido.

 

After lunch I went in search of a good phone signal to call my sister back home. We talked for about fifteen minutes, which will cost me about $30.00. I needed to make sure she was doing okay though because our Dad’s death came as a surprise to all of us.

 

She’d been having breathing trouble and trouble sleeping. She said her breathing was better and she slept last night. We talked a bit about our pets and she had a couple of questions from Brenda about my Dad’s affairs. She said she was expecting phone calls from Brenda and her friends about the funeral, which was this afternoon, to start coming in soon.

 

After I talked to my sister I headed back to the cabin to work on this blog entry and my pictures from today. I couldn’t get on the Internet to post last night’s blog entry, but hopefully I can do that tonight. I got most of this entry written and my pictures loaded from my camera to my computer. I was backing the pictures up to an external hard drive when…

 

The lights went out! It is dark in an interior cabin when the lights go out. Luckily my laptop (which wasn’t plugged in – it wasn’t me!) gave off enough light for me to get to the door. There was emergency lighting in the hall, so I felt a bit better. The lights were only out about three to five minutes, at least on the Main Deck.

 

AFTER they came back on the Captain made an announcement apologizing for the loss of “hotel services” and said he’d make another announcement when they were all restored. A few minutes later, the Cruise Director came on for his regular afternoon announcements with no mention of the power failure. Eventually the Captain did come back on and said that while the loss of power was unfortunate, the system i as it should. We’d blown a few breakers, which kept the generators safe.

 

Dinner tonight was something of a disappointment. Our table was as lively and fun as ever. We all agreed though that today was the first time we had trouble deciding what to eat not because of too many tempting choices, but too few. The offerings were advertised in the daily bulletin as Costa Rican favorites. As far as I could tell they put the words “Costa Rican” in front of a few random offerings…

 

I ended up with a shrimp cocktail, a garden salad, and flank steak on polenta. It was all tasty, but not up to the expectations set by previous evenings. Everyone but me seemed to be having trouble with the quality of their food as well. They all said their food was barely warm to cold – even Mary’s French Onion soup was cold.

 

Then at dessert we experienced our first real service snafu. Most of us ordered the “Costa Rican” flourless chocolate cake and got the sugar-free Chocolate Delight instead. Aras was quite apologetic and offered to bring us all the correct dessert, but we just asked him to bring one so we could all taste it. The Chocolate Delight was quite good actually, but the flourless cake was really delicious. I just had one bite of that.

 

By the time we got up from dinner I was practically falling asleep on my feet. So, once again, my evening was spent in my cabin. I actually went to bed right after dinner. We put clocks forward an hour, reversing the change we’d made two days before, so it was 9:00 and I was exhausted.

 

Unfortunately, I didn’t sleep. I tossed and turned for half an hour and decided to get up and try the Internet. I managed to get my blog entry for Day 3 posted and my email read. Then I went back to bed.

 

I fell asleep right away, but woke a little after midnight and my knee hurt so bad I wanted to cry. Just touching it to the mattress or even the sheets was awful. It is the worst pain I’ve had in it since about mid-November. I got up and put a lidocaine patch on my knee – they are prescribed for my arthritis, but pain is pain. I also took a couple of Advil.

 

I was able to go back to sleep and slept right through our entry into the Panama Canal, but that is for the next post.

 

Note: I am still working on post-processing the pictures from the excursion. I'll update this post with a photo gallery when they are done.

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Esri

Esri

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Read it on Go With Me!

 

I woke up at 8:30 this morning, late for me. I threw some clothes on and went to breakfast in the dining room. I got to start a new shared table at a nice window sit. I had a great view of the Zuiderdam as she was anchored for the day. We weren’t anchored though so that view didn’t last long. There were a few container ships and at least two more cruise ships nearby. I saw a Frigate Bird fishing for his breakfast.

 

I was joined shortly by another Cruise Critic couple I hadn’t met yet. Of course, when I said I was Pat, they knew me! I’m famous, I guess. I am glad I volunteered to do the photo booklet. Everyone thinks it was so difficult and time-consuming. I believe I spent about ten hours total on it. Of course, organizing the spreadsheets for several months did take a lot of time. I was pleased, though, when Bob asked me a few questions about how I’d set up the pages on my blog. I’m always happy to talk tech.

 

I hate to admit that I did not join in the awe of going through the Panama Canal for the first time. It just didn’t really matter to me. I know how the canal works. I know it is a great feat of human engineering and endurance. When I looked out the window at breakfast and lunch though what I saw was dirty water, tug boats, and container ships. I see those on the Mississippi River all the time.

 

So I mostly rested my knee today. It feels better so far tonight, but is still a little sore. I’m glad tomorrow is another sea day. I should be ready for Manta day after tomorrow.

 

I did go up to the Ocean Bar at 11:45 for trivia. I didn’t try to join a team. I was just testing the waters. I scored my paper since I was not going to turn it in. My score was seven, but if I had not changed or over-thought four other answers I would have had a thirteen. Since the winning team of six scored sixteen, that’s not too bad. Tomorrow I’m sticking with my first answer – yes, Regis, that IS my final answer.

 

I’ve finished all of The Hobbit except the last chapter where Bilbo kicks his thieving cousins out of Bag-End. Tomorrow I’ll start another book. Probably not The Fellowship of the Ring since I want to make the trilogy last the rest of trip.

 

I spent most of the day sorting my pictures from yesterday. They say if you can’t be good, be lucky and that certainly goes for me. I got a really good picture of one sloth out in the open. I had several of him that were in focus, but only one where his head wasn’t tucked into his chest. I got a face-on picture that I really like. I’m still working on post-processing in Lightroom, but I’ve already done a couple of versions of the sloth – one for my postcards (I use Postagram) and one to use as the featured image for yesterday’s blog post.

 

Dinner was fun as usual. Tom, the Dining Room Manager, dropped by our table to say hello. One of us said something about our table sometimes getting a little rowdy. He laughed and said “That’s the way we want it.”

 

Service was good tonight. No cold food or mis-matched dishes. I had the tomato & buffalo mozzarella appetizer, my Caesar Salad, and lasagna. The appetizer was tasty, but the tomato was pretty flavorless. The lasagna tasted great, but I swear there was no pasta in it – just cheese and meat. There were several tempting desserts on the menu, but I decided to give the Crème Brulee a second chance. It was better than the first, so I’m glad I did.

 

I laughed out loud when I came back to my cabin after dinner. My steward, Rifjki, had left a really cute towel animal and finished off by putting my computer glasses on it!

 

I’m going to spend the rest of the evening working on either my photos or the blog. I haven’t been able to get anything on the Internet to load all day other than the login page. Now that the evening shows are starting I’m going to give it one more try.

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startwin

startwin

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Thanks for the update, and glad your knee is less painful. I was awed at our Panama crossing - DH not so much.:rolleyes: We're doing it again in April, and again I will be all over the ship while we transit, getting photos on all sides.

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Esri

Esri

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Read it on Go With Me!

 

I slept better last night, but still needed a Lidocaine patch on my knee. It was still “burning” this morning, but felt better after I walked it off a bit after breakfast. I don’t intend to ask much of the poor thing today, because I’m going to be on it a lot on my shore excursion in Manta, Ecuador.

 

I slept “late” this morning – 7:30! Then I showered and had breakfast – orange juice, a fruit plate, bagel & lox in the dining room. Afteer breakfast I came back to my little hobbit hole and worked on my blog and photo post-processing until about 10:30 when Rifjki poked his head in. I told him I’d be leaving shortly and I did.

 

I took my Kindle up to the Ocean Bar where I read Blue Shoes & Happiness by Alexander McCall Smith until it was time for trivia. It is one of the “No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency” series – don’t ask me where it falls in the series. After I started it I realized I’d read it before, but the adventures of Mma Ramotswe are always worth a second read.

 

I did pretty well in trivia for a team of one (MeMyselfI is the team name I used on the card). There were only two questions that I hadn’t even a guess at an answer and I got only one completely wrong. I only got two points of the possible six from the bonus question though – name the six states of Australia. I didn’t come anywhere near winning, but I wasn’t embarrassed to hold my hand up while Gene counted up to the winning score.

 

After trivia I went to lunch in the dining room. I always agree to share a table and I had four lovely tablemates this afternoon. Two ladies from Columbus, Ohio – who just met at the table – and the Methodist minister who is serving as the Protestant clergy on the cruise and her husband. I went easy on lunch today. I had a vegetable spring roll and a flank steak salad with wasabi dressing. Both were very tasty.

 

Following lunch I went back to the cabin and finished up post-processing my Puerto Limon pictures. I thought they turned out quite well. The Internet was so cooperative that I managed to get blog entries for both days four and five posted as well as the image gallery for Puerto Limon. I even backed up my laptop to both my external hard drives before dinner.

 

We were three short for dinner. Two of our number were at the Pinnacle Grill and another wasn’t feeling well. We were a little quieter and we managed to not quite be the last ones out of the dining room tonight.

 

They had prime rib again tonight and that’s what I had. Shrimp cocktail, Caesar Salad, prime rib au jus with a baked potato, and Charlotte Royal for dessert. The Charlotte Royal was a nice little creation of four little raspberry jelly roll slices placed over a little scoop of Bavarian cream to form a little cake. It was light, not too sweet, and not too rich. The perfect dessert.

 

I came back to my cabin to find my towel elephant wearing my shades! Those little dudes are sneaky. Then I tried to log on to the Internet to check Facebook and Gmail to no avail. It’s as if I can only get one good run a day and I’ve already had it. I’ll try again in a little while. I’d like to say hello to my sister. After that I think I’m going to put my feet up on the couch for a while and read. Tomorrow is a port day (Manta, Ecuador) and I’ll be on my feet a lot.

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seagarsmoker

seagarsmoker

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I just read Jeff's blog and he said he had to get off the ship in Lima to post his blog and the new internet service on the ship is in a sorry state. This may be the reason that Esri has not posted. I hope it is this and nothing else.

Terri

 

Thanks for the update. Like others have posted above, I was getting worried about her.

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