Details of the ship
2003-03-03

The main dining rooms are on the third, fourth and fifth levels aft. All are named after composers. Ours is on 3, Vivaldi and it is rosewood and gold chandaliers and red velvet with a massive staircase down the middle. Think Titanic, but bigger. It is just breath taking.

The food was so good and it just kept coming. We did shooters every night after dinner too, but not the pre-mixed garbage in the cheesy souvenir glasses. We wanted to see the layers. At first our drink waitress was cranky, but when she realized she was selling 30+ shooters just at our two tables, she came around. Lots of other people saw what we were doing and bought drinks that way too... She was smiling by the end of the cruise big time. Money talks.

Our primary gathering spot was the Solarium on deck 11. It was a partially covered spot away from the beach bunnies and kids, but complete with two hot tubs a pool and its own bar. It also had the best lounge chairs on the boat. When ever you were looking for somebody it was a good place to start.

Between one and two o'clock, Johnny Rockets or the buffet were the likely spots where you could always run into folks you knew. It's funny, on a 1,050 long ship with 14 decks, you'd figure that you would never see people from the group. Wrong! We all seemed to gravitate to the same spots at the same time. Unreal.... Pretty cool too...

The first night at sea we all went to the ice show. They served frozen drinks and we sat in fancy theater style seats with drink holders. Most of the performers were young and pretty and Russian. The ship was rolling pretty good on Sunday and yet they axeled and toe looped thier way around that little rink. One of the guys almost ended up in the front row in a very nice crash and burn. That was my favorite part. Does that meke me mean?

They had other shows and several comedians who were very funny. If you missed something during the day you could watch it on the ships TV station. I saw several folks from the group doing various things. I managed to stay undiscovered.

We kept updated on the West Warwick fire on CNN. That was the only big cloud over the week. When people asked where you were from and you said Rhode Island, a kind of sad look would come to their faces and they'd say, Oh, where that fire was... By the end of the week, I just said New England...

They usually had three or four live bands with different types of music playing. The rock band and jazz bands were both very good. I only danced a little, which worked fine for me.

I also did not shop in the ships mall. Fortunately for us, there was a sports bar at one end of the shops with lots of TVs and ESPN. We watched the New Zelanders lose thier mast live...

I came out about even in the casino playing video poker. M.E lost her shirt on the slots.

Our room had a queen size bed and a huge bathroom. Each room had a closet, dresser and a little safe. We got fresh ice delivered twice a day and chocolates on the pillows and animals made of towels and sunglasses every night on the turned down bed.

Every room had a 19 inch TV which got 15 or so channels including one which was the view from the front of the ship.

Oh yeah, that was another spot for late at night, the bow. It was so peaceful and quiet up there. Just the waves and the zillions of stars. By the end of the cruise we ended up there every night. Nice... Why am I here? UGH....

Later...

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