Scandinavia

I am less than 24 hours away from disembarking the Sea Princess!! The taste of freedom is on my lips, but first, here’s a briefing on my final ports.

Let me start out by saying that I could never be a permanent resident of Scandinavia. There is absolutely no way that I could handle the lack of warmth and summer weather. There was very little sunshine throughout the week and I don’t think temperatures broke 60 degrees. Grey skies and rain really don’t mix well with me.

Oslo was possibly my most favorite sail away of the cruise. Sailing through the fjords was breathtaking (despite the gale force winds trying to blow me overboard!). Just imagine if all the valleys of the Rocky Mountains were full of water, that’s pretty much what sailing through the fjords feels like. Oslo as a city didn’t impress me too much, but I did visit a very interesting sculpture park. The park was created by one man, Lindevine, and he sculpted over 900 statues. They all depict the life cycle and were quite stunning and profound. I also visited the world-famous ________ (insert name which I’ve forgotten here) ski jump that was used for the Olympics and World Championships and offered beautiful views over the city.

Copenhagen was a bit of a bust for me as I was on in-port-manning and didn’t receive relief until 5:00 in the evening. I would have skirted my duties, but there were internal auditors on board and there was a fiasco the night before, so being the goody-good that I am I followed the rules. I was looking forward to the nighttime adventures since we weren’t sailing until 4:30 a.m., but unfortunately traveling in large groups can be crippling. I went with a big group (mainly dancers) to the Tivoli Gardens, but we got there and nobody could make a decision about where to eat, so they defaulted to comfort and chose the Hard Rock Café which wasn’t even in the Gardens. Basically we paid 20 USD to walk into the park and turn right back around to go somewhere I could go within 20 minutes of my house in Colorado! I ended up ditching the group and returning to the ship without any Danish adventure. I think it made me realize that friendships at sea aren’t quite the same as friendships on land.

Helsingborg was a very short day and I have to say there is not much happening for this Swedish city. The highlight for me was visiting the Sofiero Palace which was one of the Swedish Royal Family’s summer houses. I could definitely get used to living like royalty. That was pretty much the extent of excitement in Helsingborg.

I have to say this was the easiest cruise of my contract in terms of workload. We only had 2 major shows and 3 nights off…I think I was making about $100/hr…it’ll be hard to find that on land!

Thank you all for following me along this adventure and I look forward to seeing everybody on the other side!

Amsterdam

I have officially set foot in Northern Europe. Today we arrived in Amsterdam and it was quite a beautiful sail in. It was the first time I’ve been through a lock. How this works is the ship goes through one gate and then they close the gate and lower the water. Once lowered the gate in front of the ship opens and we’re able to sail through the channel.

Holland is definitely a land of windmills. The amount of windmills lining the canal was staggering – they’ve obviously found answers to alternative energy. The other “green” practice that I was very proud of was the amount of bicycles in use. The city was full of bikes and all the roads had bike lanes – definitely a huge cycling culture.

We didn’t arrive in Amsterdam until 2:30 in the afternoon and I went on an organized ship tour. We went on a walk through the historical part of the city and then took a canal cruise through the ring of canals lining the city. I saw the house where Anne Frank’s family hid which was quite a surreal experience bringing that ugly part of history to life. I also visited a secret Catholic Church which were required after the Protestant Reformation. The Catholic’s weren’t allowed to build churches, but they were still allowed to practice their religion – quite weird to walk into a church that looks like a stock-house on the outside.

After the tour, I had a little over an hour to do some more exploring on my own. Of course, I went to the Red Light District – don’t worry, I didn’t purchase any services! I actually came to the conclusion that Sunday evening around 7:00 p.m. is either a very busy time for prostitutes or very dead – most all of the curtains I passed were drawn. I was actually quite surprised at the varying quality of the women. There were some absolutely gorgeous women, but then there were really old dumpy grandmothers as well. I missed all of the sex shows that a lot of the crew went to because I had to play shows – from the descriptions I think it’s a good thing I had to work!

The other interesting thing about Amsterdam is the aroma of marijuana. It’s absolutely everywhere you walk and they even sell cannabis lollipops! I didn’t partake in this either, because I want the company to pay for my flight home on Saturday. I would love to come back to Amsterdam and the Netherlands another time to do some more exploring of their culture – 4 hours just wasn’t enough!

Only 5 more days!!

Only One More Week!

I can't believe I only have 7 days left! I am so excited to be so close to the end of my contract and going home to all my family and friends. I really can't wait to cook my own food and sleep in a bed where I can stretch out my arms without hitting anything. It's also depressing watching all my friends leave the ship. Today, my 2 Scrabble buddies left the ship, but only one more week and it'll be me.

There's not really too much more to report. I've posted new pictures throughout the blog and the one on this is from the decades disco this week. I threw together a '50's nerd outfit and it went over with great success. This week should be exciting as I'm going into Scandinavia and will visit Amsterdam, Oslo, Copenhagen, and Helsingborg. Hope you enjoy the pics. Oh, I almost forgot to mention that I'm now 7 pounds heavier than when I left!

Neapolitan Feast

My culinary life is now complete; I’ve had pizza in its birthplace of Napoli. It’s almost 8 hours since I ate and I’m still completely stuffed! I gorged myself at lunch today. I went with the photo staff and a few of the dancers and we started with 4 different antipasti. One was sort of like a calzone stuffed with 3 different types of cheeses. Another plate had mozzarella, parmigiano, another soft white cheese, mascarpone, bruschetta, tomatoes, arugala, melon and prosciutto. Then there was a fried plate that included fried rice balls, fried polenta, fried dough, fried zucchini, and some other fried thing….I ate more grease today than the past 2 years combined! The fourth plate was a seafood plate with heron, squid, anchovies, octopus, and shrimp. After this I had a pizza caprese with fresh buffalo mozzarella, tomatoes, and basil. Oh, let me just say it was heaven on a plate. The crust is so thin and you have to fold the pizza over to truly experience all the goodness. My only complaint was that things seemed a bit over salted. The meal was accompanied by plenty of red wine of course.

After the feast we took a stroll to a gelateria where I had a lemon and melon gelato capped with a delicious espresso. I also stopped by at the Teatro San Carlo which was the world’s first opera house. I don’t know when I’ll return to Italy, but my stomach may quite possibly be stuffed for another month! All the grease and fried foods has left me with a bit of gas….just thought you might like to know!

I hope all you tennis fans were able to watch the men’s final at Wimbledon. It was probably the most exciting match I have ever watched and I’m happy that Nadal won. Tomorrow I’ll be in Corsica lying on what may be my last beach for a long, long time. Only 12 more days!

Happy Independence Day Frenchie!!

So who would have guessed that my first Independence Day spent outside the country would be in France? I mean of all the places, France!! To be honest, it was actually a really great day and I didn’t receive a single ounce of French attitude. I enjoyed a lazy day lounging on the beach of Cannes and swimming in the beautiful Mediterranean Sea. I also took a stroll through the town and saw the red carpet of the Cannes Film Festival. The French Riviera is slowly but surly winning my heart.

For the evening festivities, a fellow American, Ron, and I decorated the crew bar with red, white, and blue. I have to say for the limited supplies that we had to work with we did a bang up job of creating American Pride. We found out that there are only 14 total crew who are from the U.S. We were all in the bar later that night making ourselves heard with rousing renditions of The Star Spangled Banner, America the Beautiful, and every other patriotic song we could think of. The expression on all the foreigner’s faces was priceless. It was pretty ironic as none of us really support or are proud about the current situation of our country, but we still felt it necessary to honor our nation.

Today I had a lovely tour through the Etruscan countryside that is around Rome. It was a lovely tour and a part of Italy that I had never been to before. We went to the Villa Lante which was built in the 1500’s and has a magnificent garden. There was an intricate water system that worked solely by gravity, no re-pumping involved, and even had a cooling system for the guest’s feet and the food. That really makes no sense, but hopefully you get somewhat of an idea.

The highlight of the tour was the lunch that was served by the largest crater lake in Europe: Lago Bolsena. It was divine. The Italians certainly know how to eat – I guess it never ceases to amaze me! For antipasti, we had bruschetta with olive and red pepper spread, fried zucchini and artichoke hearts, and of course prosciutto (yes I ate meat). We then had 2 courses of pasta. The first was in creamy mushroom sauce, and I’m not the biggest fan of mushrooms, but this was magnificent – oh so creamy! The second pasta was a very basic tomato and meat sauce (I think it was veal – I know, I know) and fresh sage. For my main course I had a white fish that is actually native to the Great Lakes but has been introduced to Bolsena. It was the first fish I ever ate that was completely whole – head, eyeballs, and tail! It was rubbed with rosemary and served with fresh lemon. Simple, but divine. The contorni consisted of roasted potatoes with rosemary and a mixed salad. For desert, we had homemade hazelnut and cherry ice cream. A local white wine, Est Est Est, was accompanied with the meal and we began with a glass of prosecco. Coffee on the terrace overlooking the lake capped a perfect Italian meal. Mmmmm…

I am now exhausted as I only got 3 or 4 hours of sleep from the late 4th partying and early touring. Tomorrow I will finally bite into my first pizza in Naples…happy eating!

The Iron Fist

We have a new PSD (Passenger Services Director) who is basically just one below the Captain and she is wreaking havoc throughout the ship. She is power hungry and follows company policy religiously. If any of you have read Harry Potter, she has to be the incarnation of Dolores Umbridge. I’m so glad that I only have 2 more weeks of ship life! Just to give you an idea of how she is functioning we have these affirmation cards that are suppose to bolster our customer service and they change every day. Today’s card is “Be Polite”. The PSD is randomly checking crew members to make sure they’re carrying their card on their person at all times and if they aren’t she is taking their name down and reporting them to their supervisors. I fell victim to her antics for playing Scrabble. Two other band members and I were playing Scrabble in a passenger area and apparently she received a complaint from a passenger and reamed our supervisor for our misconduct. Luckily all the managers think she’s nuts and aren’t really enforcing all her policies. For all the things to get in trouble for, playing Scrabble has to be one of the lamest! She is also measuring name badges to make sure they are exactly an inch away from each other.

Anyway, the other reason I think it’s time for me to leave the ship is because all my dreams this past week have been about home. I finally saw a whale yesterday swimming next to the ship. It was very large and black and spraying water out its blow hole. Nothing else to report for now, except my count down to disembarkation is in full swing!