Mediterranean Cruise Journal

Introduction
This is a journal of our Mediterranean Cruise on the NCL Jade that departed from Barcelona Spain on Nov 30, 2008. If you’re planning on taking a Med Cruise, this will give you a good idea of what you will experience.

I’d taken three cruises prior to this trip; one three day and two seven day. Two of them were in cabins with portholes, one in an inside stateroom with no window. I’ve travelled quite a bit on business, and had been to Western Europe several times on business and on vacation.

How we did it
We wanted a really nice stateroom for a 12 day trip. For the year we took the trip, we didn’t buy anything for our Anniversary, Valentines Day, Birthdays, Sweetest Day, or Christmas. We used miles for the airline tickets, and Marriott points for the hotel in Barcelona. We picked the last Mediterranean cruise of the season to get the lowest price and avoid the crowds.

We originally booked a “penthouse” on deck 10 at the very front of the boat. About four weeks before sailing, the Cruise line cut prices; the morning they were cut my wife called and managed a free upgrade to the First Class suite in the exclusive courtyard area on deck 14.

Flying and cruising First Class all the way was a new experience for both of us. If you’ve ever wondered “how the other half lives” we lived that way for 14 days.

The Trip Over
Having spent so many days and weeks in preparation, we found ourselves packed and ready to go at 2:00 PM with a 9:30 PM flight. After an hour of doing nothing we figured we might as well wait at the airport, so off we went! At the airport we had a quick bite at the Fox Sports Lounge, and hung out in the Northwest World Club.

We were excited to be in World Business Class, featuring chairs that converted into beds. We were sitting in row #1 on the A330 airbus. Takeoff was uneventful. They gave us a very nice menu of dinner selections. As it turned out, most of the selections were unavailable even though we were in row 1. My wife ordered the beef; I asked for the same and was told they were all out.

The appetizer, consisting of mixed nuts, crackers with lobster spread, and a cucumber with alleged prosciutto ham and a date on top was okay.

Then the main course was served. It was, without a doubt, the worst meal I have ever been served on any airplane in coach or first class. As it turned out, I was lucky to not have the only beef meal, allegedly beef tenderloin. She managed to choke down one bite. She’s a picky eater; I eat just about anything, so I tasted it. It was, in fact, absolutely awful, I wouldn’t feed it to a dog.

I got “the fish”. It had obviously been hard frozen, and cooked at extreme temperature for way too long; it was rubbery and tasteless. The sauce spread on top was inedible. The vegetables had been so overcooked they had no flavor; a soggy mass of colored something. And it was room temperature.

I’ve been flying for many years (since the 70’s). I remember when they put out a tablecloth and you ate off china. I also remember the horrid meals they served in coach just prior to phasing out hot meals altogether, replacing them with dry sandwiches followed by the “Snack box for $5”. This meal was worse than any of those. Remember, I eat just about anything.

The salad was good, and apparently what we were to survive on. Dessert, if you could call it that, was so hard I had to use the entertainment system remote as a hammer cut off a piece.

Then we attempted to convert our chairs into beds. The chairs had a control system that only a NASA engineer could understand; there must have been 20 control buttons. Some functions would only work when the chair was in a certain position; I was convinced mine was broken; maybe it was maybe it wasn’t. My wife, being shorter, graciously traded seats with me. Once I finally got the chair into full recline, it was not all comfortable.

First Class on Northwest is like camping on a steep hill. There is simply no position where you can be comfortable, and the chair is designed so you can only stretch out in one position, which is like standing up but leaned back thirty degrees. I’ve gotten more sleep in coach than I got on that flight. My wife got no sleep at all.

Pictures of the meals, the chair controls, and the inside of world business class can be found here:

http://picasaweb.google.com/MooseMiester/Vacation2008TripOver

Had I paid full fare for first class I would have been upset about how it went. But as the trip was done on miles, I had nothing to complain about. The in flight entertainment is also nothing to write home about. Breakfast was a croissant, that was good, but the fruit had been frozen, perhaps more than once, and defrosted – mushy, tasteless, and sour.

Finally we landed in Paris. We had no gate, and had to sit and wait twenty minutes. Finally we got to the gate. We all stood up, and waited, and waited. The jet way approached the plane, stopped, and went away again. The captain came out to look out the window to see what the problem was. About that time someone released the biggest, most foul smelling fart ever. My wife ducked forward for air. The rest of us suffered.

At last, DeGaulle airport! We made our way through the maze to our connecting flight. Only in France would you have an airport without a single clock anywhere in sight. The Air France flight was delayed, and delayed again, and finally we got on board. Imagine our surprise when we discovered that first class on Air France is exactly the same as the rest of the plane, except that the center seat isn’t sold.

We were offered Orange Juice or champagne before takeoff. I took the Orange Juice. It was Tang! I nearly busted out laughing in my jet lagged stupor. My wife had the champagne; it was excellent. Lunch was some kind of mushroom red pepper thing on a piece of bread, and a chocolate dessert; cold, edible, not bad but certainly not what one would expect in first class. The flight was rough and bouncy.

We arrived in Barcelona at long last. Our baggage made it, amazingly, we only waited a few minutes for the hotel shuttle, and we arrived at the Marriott Airport Renaissance hotel around 3pm local time.

The hotel was wonderful, modern, and clean. Our room was beautiful. We were so relieved that the trip was over! Then my wife went into the bathroom and discovered it was flooding. Down to the desk I went “Banos Explodo Come quick”. We had another room in a few minutes.

Having been to Europe several times before, I knew that despite being exhausted we had to stay awake in order to get used to local time. After the ordeal of the trip over we were rather dazed and confused to say the least.

A hot shower really helped. We sat in the hotel lobby and sampled the local beer “Costella Damm”; it was excellent. Later we had a light dinner in the hotel restaurant.

The staff was amazing. I had set a wakeup call at 9AM, coffee to be delivered at 9:15. They called at 9AM to make sure we were awake as they were making our coffee. Then we got the wakeup call. Then they called back to make sure we had gotten our wakeup call, and to remind us that coffee was coming. Then they called again to see how we liked the coffee, apologized because it was one minute late, and to remind us that we had a bus to the boat at 11!

The ride to the boat was uneventful. First impression: Spain is like a very clean, modern version of Mexico.

Pictures of our hotel room and the ride to the ship can be found here:

http://picasaweb.google.com/MooseMiester/Vacation2008Barcelona

The Ship at Last
As we were in a Courtyard Villa we got priority boarding; as soon as we reached the counter it was “follow me, please”; the butler took our carry on luggage and cut through the line waiting to get on the ship “excuse me, out of the way please”. Boy did we feel important. Our fellow bus passengers, waiting in the massive line to board the ship, gave us quite the look as they were pushed out of the way so we could pass. Unlike the rest of the passengers who were stuck in the public areas until 2pm we were escorted right to our stateroom via the exclusive Courtyard Villa.

The private villa is fantastic. There are flowers, teak walkways, a large hot tub, and comfortable chairs. Upstairs on the top of the ship is a private sun deck. When we arrived there were fresh cookies, M&M’s, gummi bears, coffee, ice cold water, and French champagne. Our escort, concerned that we hadn’t eaten anything, tried to get us to have a snack before we got to the room.

Pictures of the private courtyard are posted here:

http://picasaweb.google.com/MooseMiester/Vacation2008PrivateCourtyard

The stateroom was absolutely beautiful. It reminds me of the staterooms on a modern Grand Banks or Nordhaven yacht. Beautiful wood work, arched doorways, artwork, and soft padded carpet are everywhere. It is a luxury condo on the water. We especially loved the picture window over the bathtub, and the sleeping accommodations in the master suite. The master shower was a “shower tower” with six side jets and two shower heads, one on a wand and the other on the ceiling. There is considerable water pressure and no shortage of hot water. There is green marble tile in the master bathroom and nice tile in the second stateroom bathroom as well. We had a top notch cappuccino maker in the room, and cold champagne on ice when we arrived.

Temperature control was in each room and was spot on. There were no less than four flat screen TV’s; a large one in the living area, one over the bathtub, and one next to each of the two beds. The channel selection was typical ship’s fare; mostly commercials for ship activities plus news (CNN, FOX, BBC) and three or four movie channels. We had two DVD players; there was a list of movies you could order at no cost.

Pictures of our stateroom can be found here:

http://picasaweb.google.com/MooseMiester/Vacation2008OurStateroom

There was an ice bucket in the room that our butler kept constantly filled. There was also a mini-bar, and yes, the drinks were extra just like they are on all cruise ships. Prices were what you’d expect; a coke was $1.75, beer $4.50, bottled liquor $6.50 to $9.00. If you are a heavy drinker you will spend a lot of money on drinks on a cruise ship.

We walked around the ship and took pictures. The ship is beautiful and immaculately clean. Yes, it’s a bit gaudy, but every cruise ship I have ever been on is that way. Everyone we met was very friendly. They were giving away French champagne and we drank four or five little glasses.

Pictures of the ship can be found here:

http://picasaweb.google.com/MooseMiester/Vacation2008TheShip

As soon as we got back to our stateroom our luggage arrived. Considering the number of bags they had to process, we either got priority luggage handling or the process is very well executed.

We had our first shipboard meal at Cagney’s. My wife had a 10oz Sirloin steak with fries, and chocolate ice cream for dessert. The steak looked great. I had a very nice tomato, avocado, and onion salsa dip, followed by an Asian salad with strips of lean beef on top; dessert was the most wonderful peach and blueberry cobbler.

Having read horror stories online about the Garden Buffett we checked it out, and I can report that the horror stories are obviously from very picky, unhappy people who live only to complain about everything. They had a prime rib carving station, and a huge variety of food of all kinds. Everything looked really good; it looked like you could eat in there for two weeks and never eat the same thing twice. It was packed, and people were piling their plates high with food.

While we were puttering about, we snagged a free tour of the garden villa owners suite. It was pretty spectacular, but it should be at the price! We were never allowed into the Black Diamond Suite, #15000.

We watched the ship depart after dark. It was a little cold out on the top deck, so we retreated to our balcony.

We dined in Alizar that night. Again, having read horror stories on the internet, our expectations were low. I had Caesar salad, chilled peach soup, and mahi-mahi with hollandaise sauce on a bed of couscous. It was all excellent, the salad was cold and fresh, the soup tasty; the fish arrived steaming hot. The Hollandaise sauce was rich and creamy. For dessert, we had sugar free coconut cheese cake and coffee. Our waiter was attentive as can be; he kept apologizing for this or that being late when in fact it all came quite quickly.

We had read complaints about how one could not get a decent cup of coffee on board. I’m not sure what those people are used to, the coffee was better that what we get at home, be it from the in room coffeemaker, the coffee in the Courtyard, or in any of the restaurants.

The only thing I found to complain about on the first day was the ship’s internet service. My advice is not to bother; I’m sure it is a challenge to provide satellite internet while at sea for that many people. I paid $100 for 250 minutes, hoping to upload pictures to the folks back home. After ten minutes I hadn’t managed to get a single picture uploaded.

Finally it was off to bed. The motion of the ship made it a little difficult to get to sleep at first, but once I was asleep I slept like a rock.

We were served breakfast in our room. I had scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage, Danish, orange juice, and coffee. The food arrived steaming hot, the orange juice was fresh squeezed, and the coffee was wonderful.

The seas were a little rough with waves 7-12 feet. Having sailed small boats on the ocean and the Great Lakes, it wasn’t too bad, but there was definitely some motion to be felt.

After breakfast we tried the hot tub, it was great. A snack of freshly baked cookies in the courtyard and we were out walking around. At the very front or very back of the ship on the lower decks you could feel the up and down motion; mid ships the ride was good. Despite there being some 2,000 passengers the ship never seemed crowded except for the area right around the buffet.

There were the usual cruise ship vendors hawking all kinds of stuff and people were buying it. The gift shop is huge; the prices are a little high but not exorbitant. Be advised you can buy liquor on board at duty free prices in the gift shop but not consume it – they give you the liquor when you get off. They do, after all, make a good deal of their profit from drinks just like any restaurant does and make their income from the drinks.

Of course it was time to eat again! Lunch was wonderful; I had oyster fritters, followed by chilled vanilla bean soup, a 10oz steak with garlic butter mashed potatoes and mushroom, followed by chocolate ice cream and coffee. My wife had a salad, chilled pineapple soup, the steak, and chocolate ice cream as well. We were stuffed again.

Monday afternoon it got cold (fifties) and actually hailed little hailstones on us for a few moments. Late in the day, before dinner, the ship slowed down and the ride became much smoother.

All during the day the cabin staff kept checking up on us. The concierge called; had we gotten the invitation to the VIP captain’s party? The butler dropped by three or four times; was everything OK? Did we need anything, anything at all? He dropped off the snacks we ordered on our snack card around five o’clock; dried fruit (dates, pineapple, bananas), chocolate covered strawberries (European milk and white chocolate (delicious)), and mixed nuts. About an hour later we got a nice bowl of fruit. We ordered two glasses of iced tea and they showed up in about fifteen minutes.

The Captains VIP cocktail party was OK, we availed ourselves of the free champagne. Then it was off to dinner at Alizar. Amazingly our waiter from the night before recognized us and said hello. I had an excellent pumpkin and ginger bisque, followed by lobster, and topped off with apple strudel and ice cream. Feeling extraordinarily full, we wandered about the ship. The casino was pretty dead; we don’t gamble anyway, what was remarkable was how quiet it was compared to casinos in Las Vegas.

Having cleared the straight the ship sped up again and the rocking came back. We wandered around to see what it was like in different places.

Rome
We got up early for our Rome adventure. I had a wonderful breakfast of pancakes with caramel sauce. My wife had the Belgian waffle which she reported as so-so.

They had plenty of busses to take us to the port entrance in Civitavecchia and we only waited ten minutes or so. As we always do, our first turn was in the wrong direction but we figured it out and made our way to the train station. The B.I.R.G. rail day pass, that gets you the train and the metro all day, was 9 Euros. The train was typical for European rail, smooth riding, fast (140km/hr), with plenty of stops. It took about an hour and ten minutes to get to Roma Terminus, the center of the city. If you’re interested in seeing the Vatican the train stops right next to it before continuing into Rome.

The Civitavecchia train is on the last track (27); it is a long walk to the train station proper. If you have to use the bathroom, do it on the train! The bathroom in the station was 90 cents (Euro) each, exact change required, and was protected by a fast moving glass door insuring that each person paid.

We made our way to the Colosso station on the metro. The Rome metro is clean, but crowded. It was raining fairly steady, but we didn’t care. The coliseum is impressive, but it looks taller on the History channel!

Before we left I had painstakingly prepared a detailed, 3 page walking tour using Google maps. Google had predicted our walk would take 38 minutes. It took about two and a half hours. Navigation in the old city is very difficult; there are conventions in street and plaza naming that are not on the map; many of the streets were not on the map at all. It is a maze of passages, and it is extremely easy to loose your sense of direction. We were not alone, on many street corners were tourists looking at their maps with a great deal of angst.

We made it to the Vittorino, which is quite impressive even in the rain. Umbrella salesmen were everywhere, and quite insistent, lowering their prices as we walked away.

The Pantheon is not that easy to find until you are close and then there are signs pointing the way. It is a very impressive building, having been built 2000 years ago.

The Trevi fountain is beautiful. It must be a madhouse in tourist season. We threw our coins in and made our wishes.

A few blocks from the fountain we stopped to rest, and had two beers at 6 Euro each. Prices in the souvenir shops were pretty steep; a baseball cap was 24 Euros. We bought a refrigerator magnet.

At long last we were back on the metro, which took us back to Termini, and we made the long trek to Track 27 for the train back to Civitavecchia. We wandered around a bit. At the local McDonald’s a quarter pounder hamburger was 6.20 Euros – didn’t try it, just wanted to see the price. They also had lasagna.

Pictures of the Rome adventure can be found here:

http://picasaweb.google.com/MooseMiester/Vacation2008Rome


Sea Days
Back on the ship, we had a tall beer ($5.50) to relax. Our bartender, from Bali, was really nice and friendly. As we were sitting there, a British gentleman and his wife sat down, ordered a beer, and said rudely “Why don’t you see if YOU can FILL IT ALL THE WAY FULL THIS TIME”.

When we got to the room it had been immaculately cleaned, and our butler had left us brownies, dried fruit, nuts, and a basket of fresh fruit. We went to dinner at Alizar again; I had a really tasty lamb sausage appetizer (best appetizer yet), a Caesar salad, and spaghetti carbonara. My wife had a fruit salad, ordered her Caesar salad special (just lettuce and croutons), and the chicken; it was all good.

We wandered around a bit and came back to the room, sure enough our butler had been back, and had left us little mints and fresh cookies by the bedside.

Around 10pm we had tired of watching the ships navigation channel so we looked at the movie selection. The movie selection book indicated you had to pick a movie by 9pm, but of course it was no problem; our butler brought us cheesecake, chocolate cake, two pots of decaf, and the movie in about fifteen minutes. Our butler must work 20 hours a day.

In the morning we went down to Cagney’s for breakfast; I had the best breakfast yet: smoked salmon, smoked trout, strawberries with fresh whipped cream, cantaloupe, honeydew melon, croissant; poached eggs with dill hollandaise sauce over crab cakes on English Muffin with hash browns, orange juice and coffee. How anyone could complain about the food on the Jade is amazing. My wife had eggs and bacon with hash browns; it looked to me like she got 10 strips of lean bacon, it was piled on the plate.

We walked around to work off breakfast as we passed through the straight between Italy and Sicily. It was a bit hazy but still beautiful. Back to the room and they were cleaning everything, again. Our butler came by to double and triple check if we needed anything. The night before my wife and I had heard noises on the sundeck above us after midnight (doors closing, chairs being moved around, water running). We thought they were cleaning it as we had seen water running off from the balcony. She asked the butler if they could keep it down.

Half an hour later Ruth, our concierge came by. She was concerned that our beauty sleep had been interrupted, gave a long explanation of all of the officers she had talked to, assured us that on one was cleaning at that hour, and if heard any noises again at night we should call 00 immediately and security would be dispatched to check it out.

On previous ships they had galley tours and bridge tours; I asked about that and was told that because of viruses galley tours had been eliminated and that post 9/11 bridge tours were also stopped. There is a spot on deck 11 where you can observe bridge observations and see the same radar and tactical displays the officers do. The bridge of the Jade is an impressive sight and you should not miss it; I have pictures posted with the ship photos.

Things get Interesting
During the afternoon we went out for a cold beer. It was quite windy up on deck but we found a place at Bali Hai overlooking the pool that wasn’t bad. As we sat enjoying our beers they began closing down the outside decks as it started to rain. The sea was a little choppy but not bad.

That night we had dinner at the specialty Tex-Mex restaurant. The portions were enormous; I originally ordered four courses and cancelled one for fear of seriously overeating. The beef Quesadilla appetizer was a meal in itself; my wife had the Taquitos and they looked good too. Our waiter was from India and very friendly. After the appetizer I had a very nice bowl of Tortilla soup; it was very thick and rich. For the main course my wife had the beef Fajitas, I had the lobster tacos and they were excellent. Complimentary margaritas arrived and they were not weak!

We were too full for dessert. The wait staff really wanted us to have that dessert; they offered to hold it for after the show if we wanted.

During dinner it got rougher, and although we were mid ships we could feel the motion of the ship. Rock and Roll! Off to the magic show. Being in a Villa we had VIP seating, front row balcony. All the way in the front of the boat at the Stardust Theater the up and down motion was intense, to the point of making walking difficult.

Between the stomachs full of spicy Mexican food, the margaritas, and sitting up high in the balcony it was touch and go for a bit. I was determined not to be the one that lost it first, so I stared intently at a fixed point while planning my exit strategy if I did loose it. Lean over the railing and barf on the lower class passengers? Make a mad dash to the bathroom? Ask the concierge for a gold rimmed first class barf bag? Maybe I’d get a silver bucket. Fortunately I did not have to exercise any of these options, as the show began and I was distracted enough to forget about the fact that I was riding a roller coaster with a stomach full of spicy food.

A few minutes into the show and we heard a massive thunderous bang followed by a significant heaving; we never found out what was causing this noise. The magic show was entertaining, although being positioned in the balcony front row we had a distinct advantage and could see how some of the tricks were being done. The magician and his wife deserve real credit for juggling on a pitching stage while something banged loudly against the hull.

We carefully made our way back to the room. The ships navigation channel indicated that the waves were 12-18 feet and we believed it. The wind howling on the balcony was intense. Being boaters, my wife knew to stow all loose items and glass. We had to close all the doors as they kept banging off their stoppers.

I gave in and took a Dramamine. We decided that ice cream might be a good stomach settler. Despite the seas being 18 feet, our butler, Juramar, arrived in less than five minutes with large ice creams and fresh ice. We watched the storm on the bow cam. Every so often waves crashed up and splashed the bow, a few seconds later we would feel them. It was fun, now that dinner had settled. We joked about having picked the wrong night to eat Mexican food.

It got more violent. Then it calmed a bit. Checking the navigation channel the Captain had cut our speed from 22 knots to 14 knots. At that speed Athens by 11 AM was not going to happen.

I went out for a walk about. All the way forward on deck four, the lowest deck on the ship, the movement and g-forces were pretty strong, it was noisy, and the creaking was intense. I felt sorry for those folks! Up on deck 11 next to the bridge the tactical displays showed the apparent wind at 58.5 knots, or around 67.3 miles per hour. I took pictures of the displays, sadly on the pitching deck the picture of the apparent wind speed is more than little fuzzy. Those pictures are here:

http://picasaweb.google.com/MooseMiester/Vacation2008RoughSeas

If you look closely at the tactical display you can see that the ship is using the bow thrusters in addition to the stabilizers to keep things steady.

I went out on the pool deck, the only deck that was open, and it was definitely blowing. Back inside where it was safer the crew was strategically placing barf bags about the ship. Around 1AM we got to sleep, with the ship making around 11 knots. With the motion of the ship we slept very soundly!

At 6:58 AM we were both awakened when we took two sets of huge waves that reached all the way to the web cam, dousing it with water. Holy crap! We later figured out that this was during the course change to round the tip of Greece. We managed to get back to sleep and rolled out of bed groggy and tired around 9:30 AM.

Recalculating speed and distance put us into Athens at around 2PM by my estimation. The ships navigation channel does not update arrival in real time, but it does give course, speed, and distance. I called our concierge, Ruth, and my math skills are apparently intact as we were expected to be able to get off the ship at 3PM.

We went down to lunch in Cagney’s. A regular passenger was at the counter exclaiming angrily “I know they are serving lunch in there, I WANT TO SEE” while pointing his finger at the poor girl at the desk. “I HAVE A RESERVATION!” he says; she flips the pages “You have a reservation for dinner, Sir”. She took him to the door, which can only be opened with a platinum key. His key didn’t open it. Again “I WANT TO SEE”. They let him in to look. We didn’t see what else happened as we were escorted to our table by the window.

Lunch at Cagneys was always serene, peaceful, and elegant; today was no exception and the wait staff was their usual friendly fantastic. I had a nice salad, a roast turkey/bacon/egg/lettuce/tomato sandwich with cole slaw and chips, topped off by an absolutely superb pecan pie with home made (not soft serve or out of a box) butter caramel pecan ice cream, with little pools of European Chocolate sauce to dip the pie in. It was really, really good, the best dessert yet. My wife had her “usual” salad; 10oz Sirloin steak with fries and vegetables; and chocolate ice cream.

We asked why the place was so empty and our happy Romanian waitress explained that everyone had come down early and had a big breakfast in order to get off the ship at 11. As she walked away from the table I remarked to my wife that “clearly, rich people cannot do math” and we both laughed long and hard about that.

Back to the room to prepare for our abbreviated Athenian adventure. We decided not to attempt to make it to the Acropolis and back, for fear of missing the ship. We started seeing islands, and then coastline, and snapped a few pictures. We stopped, to take on the pilot, and we waited. And waited. Then the captain came on the announcement system to explain that after three tries, the pilot was unable to board the ship, as the winds were still gusting to 50 knots. He was sorry, but it was the weather, and there was nothing that could be done about it.

We weren’t the least bit annoyed. My wife filled out a “You made my day card” for Juramar and headed down to reception to observe the whining and complaining contingent. It is so easy to be entertained on a cruise ship. Apparently they hadn’t all shown up yet.

Our butler arrived again to check on our snack, coffee, and ice and we had a nice chat. Another day at sea we hadn’t expected, whoo-hoo! To compensate for the lack of landing, the ship gave away free beer, champagne, and wine allegedly for an hour but they were still pushing free drinks on us quite a bit after that.

Back at the stateroom and new snacks! It was then that we realized that the mixed nut selection was changing. We had chosen the dried fruit and nuts and one of our daily snacks; I liked the dried fruit but not the nuts, had they sensed this and changed the nut selection? As it turned out they had.

We decided to eat light, so we checked out the Blue Lagoon. We ordered spinach and artichoke dip and fish and chips. It was more like one piece of fish and chips, but you could order as many of them as you liked so that was OK. It wasn’t bad at all. The little Filipino lady that manages the Tex Mex restaurant apparently runs this operation too, and she immediately recognized us and came over to see how we were doing, were we being taken care of, was everything alright.

We checked out the entertainment in the Spinnaker; it was a cabaret of the ship’s orchestra plus Second City improvisation. The second city troupe was pretty funny. The band was tolerable as long as they didn’t sing. The ship was taking on waves in the 7-10 foot range, and Spinnaker’s is on deck 13 at the bow of the ship, so we retreated to our cabin for Dramamine and another snack; we ordered pizzas and they were quite tasty.

Izmir, Turkey
We were excited to be at a port again. Down to Cagney’s for breakfast, I had Eggs Benedict, which turned out to be different from the crab cakes Eggs Benedict but it was good anyway. My wife had the French Toast, she reported it a little rubbery but OK.

She had done the Turkey research so it was a stress free navigational experience for me. First we went to the bank to change our dollars into Lira. The bank was quite modern and efficient, and to my surprise the guards were armed only with pistols; I was expecting AK47’s and Shotguns. We were given a number, and waited possibly ten minutes; during which time my wife practiced how to ask the right question in Turkish. When we got to the counter the teller understood her perfectly. He wrote the conversion rate on a piece of paper and the transaction was completed. Fifty American dollars gave us 74 or so Lira. Thank you in Turkish is a mouthful, so she pointed at the translation sheet to thank him and got a big smile in return.

Down the coastline we walked to the city center. Turkey is an interesting blend of mostly new with little pieces of old; there are occasional very old buildings in disrepair, but for the most part it is quite modern. It is conservative. If you’re a woman, walking around in short shorts and a halter top is going to be offensive to the locals.

It is a good walk to the market, about 40 minutes on cobblestone streets. Halfway there, we sat down, and my wife said she was pleased that she had communicated with the guy at the bank. I replied that I knew three words in Turkish! “What words are those?”, she asked, and I replied “Towel, Bath, and Border” and we both had a good laugh. I had been saving this for years, having heard it on Firesign Theater records thirty years ago as a teenager.

The market gives you a taste of the real Izmir. The food shops have local food, not the Western Menu’s one finds along the beach, and there are shops selling plumbing parts, hardware, electronics, foodstuffs, etc. In the center of the market area, or shopping district, is the Kemeralti, a building constructed in the 1500’s. In there you’ll find mostly jewelry, clothing, and antique shops.

Just about everyone who is male in Turkey smokes. Popular in the morning is a sweet apple flavored tea served in little glasses; in the open areas were men smoking and having their tea. Next to the Kemeralti a very old Mosque built in the Ottoman Empire. A very nice, kindly gentleman came up to us and started talking: “You are Americans, yes? Please do not be afraid, you are very safe here, we know you hear bad things about us but in our hearts we are very friendly and loving people.” Up until that point I hadn’t been the least bit nervous and felt perfectly safe! As it turned out he was learning English and just wanted to practice on us.

He gave me a tour of the Mosque that was built during the days of the Ottoman Empire. It was stunningly beautiful. I’d been in a Mosque before, so I knew to take my shoes off; there were little lockboxes for your shoes just inside. He showed me where the Iman stood during regular prayer and higher up on special days. I took plenty of pictures.

Back outside again we did some more shopping, my wife found some beautiful clothes to go camel riding in. In Turkey, one haggles price, the price of the item means nothing. The price marked on the clothes came to 125 lira. The shopkeeper did not speak much English. After some haggling I paid 100 and used a credit card. I’m sure I could have done better had I spent more time on the transaction.

We walked around some more and bought a refrigerator magnet, and some blue “tiger eyes” to give people as souvenirs. I looked in quite a few antique stores but didn’t find anything that jumped out at me. There were quite a few old tube radios in the Antique stores, which surprised me as I did not think people collected those much in Turkey. I collect wooden Zenith Tube radios.

I decided a small Turkish rug would be the perfect thing to bring home so it was into the rug merchant’s shop. Large Turkish rugs can be very expensive items, so the rug shopping experience is like buying a car in the states. We sat down, were given hot apple tea, and shown rug after rug after rug. Price was not discussed. Finally we found one we liked.

After insuring that we were paying with “cash money”, and my waiting for him to quote a price as opposed to asking “how much” he gave me a price of 175 lira (about $110), handing me a calculator with the price on it. I pressed in 50 lira and handed it back. He laughed long and hard and responded with another number. This went on for a little while and we ended up at 75. I knew I had 60 lira in my pocket, so I carefully counted it out and said I’m sorry I don’t have 75 lira and I need money for the cab fare back to the ship. I offered him a fifty dollar U.S. bill. He did some button pushing and came back with “That’s only 73.50 Lira”. I dropped it on the floor, and said you want to sell me a rug today, pick it up. He did not. So I picked it up and we walked out. Five feet out the door and surprise I had bought a Turkish rug for $50 U.S.

We started our walk back. About halfway we stopped at one of the touristy restaurants on the beach, and shared a lamb kebob that came with mashed potatoes and a vegetable that looks like a green bell pepper but it was not – very spicy, the kind of hot where it tastes a little sweet and then burns and burns. The Turkish Coffee did not disappoint. I accidentally drank a little of the local water but it did not make me sick.

We made our way to the ship, sore feet and all, spending our last lira right next to the boat on some tea. Port security in Turkey involved walking through a metal detector, which went off, and no one cared. We headed straight for the hot tub in the courtyard. Walking on rough, uneven surfaces is much more tiring than smooth sidewalks.

Pictures of Turkey can be found here:

http://picasaweb.google.com/MooseMiester/Vacation2008Izmir

I wanted lots of small change for bakeesh in Egypt so I went down to reception, presented a $20 and a $10 and asked for thirty ones. I was told they did not make that kind of change. So I laid my platinum Deck 14 stateroom key down and suddenly it was no problem.

We had dinner in the Grand Pacific. The menu here is the same as in Alizar, but it is a much prettier dining room. When we showed up, as soon as we gave our room number they told us we had a table for two right next to the window, but it would be two minutes, they were so sorry; there was another window table in corner if we did not want to wait. We waited about fifteen seconds, during which they apologized profusely again and again and took us to the table next to the window. “Please sir, I am so terribly sorry for the inconvenience this has caused you, please accept my apology it will only be a few moments I assure you please wait over here, again I am so terribly sorry.” Restaurants in America could learn a lot from these people.

Dinner was escargot in garlic butter, a tomato and mozzarella salad, lamb chops in a wonderful wine sauce, and chocolate mousse cheesecake with bananas and caramel sauce. My wife had the escargot; the seasoning was not to her liking; followed by a regular salad, the lamb and the chocolate mousse cheesecake. During the meal a senior staff gentleman in a suit came by and asked us if everything was alright, could they do anything for us, how were we enjoying the cruise so far, etc. He only stopped at our table, leading us to believe that our table was connected with our stateroom class somehow. Was everyone else being treated this way?

On the shuttle to the ship, we had ridden with a couple from New York, and from their luggage tags we knew they were in the penthouse, forward on Deck 9. We had run into them in Cagney’s once or twice. Knowing that they were in the very front of the boat on the rough sea days, I went over and asked them how they were doing. “It was awful” she exclaimed, “We only got ten minutes of sleep that entire night. Our cappuccino machine almost fell off the counter; in the room next to theirs glasses were falling out of the shelves and breaking.” Apparently they were taking waves on the balcony that were hitting the sliding glass door; they were also kept up by the mysterious banging noise, which they thought was the anchor about to come crashing through the wall at any moment.

They asked about how we had made out, as they apparently thought we were in the Romance Suite at the back of the ship; I explained we were on Deck 14. They explained that they had been offered an upgrade to Deck 14 for an additional $700 just before sailing. She was very interested in “what it was like up there”. I explained that it was very nice and that we had slept like rocks that night.

Then we were off to the Spinnaker Lounge for more Second City. At first we sat up at the very front, with the entertainers ten feet away from us, but once the band started playing we had to move back because it was extremely loud. As with the night before, the comedy act was really funny, but the music in between the acts was not so good. During a few songs the ladies sitting next to us were laughing because the music was so bad.

Accustomed to getting everything free, we were a bit surprised to pay $3.45 for two cups of coffee during show. They were allegedly decaf but they were not.

Back at the villa suite and our butler had brought us chocolate covered strawberries, dried fruit, and the new nut selection (macadamia, pistachio, almond, and peanut). On our bed in the master was the cutest towel animal we had ever seen.

We had gotten a letter from Ruth, our concierge, explaining that while everyone else had to go to Alizar from 9:30-Noon to stand in line and pick up their passports, us VIP folks did not, as they would be available in the courtyard. How nice. As it turned out, she delivered them to us in the room the next day.

I had a bit of a swollen ankle, probably from walking on the cobblestone streets in Izmir, so I took some Motrin and went to bed early. My wife watched a DVD. I slept in late; my wife discovered you could get the full Cagney’s breakfast on the courtyard so she ate there. I had fruit and cookies for breakfast.

Lunch at Cagney’s was a hearts of palm / artichoke salad, 10oz sirloin steak with fries and carrots, and the most wonderful chocolate crème brulee. We were stuffed yet again.

During the afternoon we passed through the Messina Straight; pictures are posted here:

http://picasaweb.google.com/MooseMiester/Vacation2008MessinaStraight


My wife went to the regular reservation desk to make a dinner reservation and was told we could not be seated at 7:30. She called our concierge and no surprise our reservation at 6:45 was immediately confirmed.

That afternoon, I went to the “behind the scenes” presentation. We were given a nice slide show, followed by the Captain, Hotel Manager, and head Chef taking questions. The Captain demonstrated a great sense of humor. Most of the questions were on material already covered in the presentation. One gentleman with a beard and a turban shook his fist and angrily demanded to know “What is FreeStyle, I see FreeStyle this and that, and every day you give us newspaper FreeStyle Daily, what is this!!”

When I got back to the cabin I discovered I was on ship’s television as the whole thing was taped for the other passengers. If you were on the Nov 30, 2008 sailing of the Jade I was the guy who asked what they were looking at with the searchlight the night it was rough. They were looking at the waves.

Our butler arrived at precisely 5:00 PM with the daily snacks and fruit. As we were getting up very early and going camel riding the next day, we had no plans for the evening except for Dinner.

An Incident!
We arrived in the Grand Pacific exactly on time. We about half way to our table when the hostess came running after us and told us we couldn’t sit there. We were shuffled to another table in the middle of the restaurant. As we had always had window seats, we indicated that we wanted to sit next to a window. We were walked to a window table in the back. Arriving at the table, the waiter came over and said we couldn’t sit there, the table was reserved. Back we walked to the front of the restaurant. The hostess did the usual apologize five times that we had come to expect, and then explained that it was all a mistake, the table was reserved for us. So back we went again and were finally seated.

We got our water, and our bread, and started looking at the menu; mine was in French so I asked for an English one. Nothing on the menu was particularly appealing at that moment so we sat there for a few minutes. At that point a man in a suit came over and told us we had to move, that the table had been reserved for a passenger with a hearing problem. I gave him a look “Are you kidding me?” My wife snapped her menu shut and glared at him.

He started offering comps. A bottle of wine, perhaps? He chased us out of the restaurant.

At NCL University they must spend weeks in first class apology studies. “Please sir, from the bottom of my heart I deeply regret what has happened and I speak for myself and all of the restaurant staff, we are so sorry to have inconvenienced you, etc. etc. etc. holding his hand over his heart and looking at me like he was about to bust out in tears” I quietly explained that my wife was not pleased, and that I was not one to argue with her, and perhaps a bottle of champagne sent up the room would smooth things over. “It will be there before you arrive, Sir, I personally guarantee it!!” Either they are very well trained or they get flogged somewhere deep in the bowels of the ship when they make the slightest mistake.

Back to the room we went. When we got back to the suite there was a letter from the ship’s medical staff warning us that a number of passengers on the last Egypt trip had “acute gastro Enteritis upon returning to the ship, but their symptoms were mild” and went on to warn us about eating raw food and drinking the water. This seemed a little contradictory to us. We packed plenty of hand sanitizer and used it after every stop.

We ordered room service, it was easy. The assistant manager showed up with an expensive bottle of Mumms and chocolate covered strawberries, again with the “With my deepest respect from the bottom of my heart I so very deeply regret the terrible inconvenience and all of us from the dishwasher to the head of the department will do everything we possibly can from now and into the future to insure that this never happens again, really Sir I an so very, very, very terribly sorry and you are welcome into our restaurant at any time as deeply cared for members of our family etc. etc. etc.”

I can’t imagine what would have happened would we have actually raised our voices, or made anything resembling “a scene”. I doubt if the people sitting next to us even noticed.

Egypt
Awakened at 6 AM, we found ourselves in port in Alexandria. Our butler served us breakfast at precisely 6:30 AM as requested and we were off to the Stardust Theater for disembarkation. My wife and I are not tour bus types, we had, in fact never taken an organized tour anywhere in the world we have travelled to.

We hung out in the back of the Theater in order to get a seat near the front. At 7:15 AM we were hustled off the ship and into our bus. We managed to get a seat in the second row, behind security. A gentleman and his wife asked to sit in row 1, because “he was handicapped”. As we were on the Jeep Safari and Camel Ride adventure tour we wondered what his “handicap” was.

Off we went in armed convoy on the two and a half hour trek to Giza. We were initially escorted by motorcycles with flashing lights. Then we noticed blue security vans with heavy set men in them darting in and out of the busses. We were told that traffic was light because tomorrow was “the feast” which we later realized was the end of Ramadan.

Egypt is a third world country and it looks every bit of it. No matter where you are in Egypt there is a mosque every eighth of a mile. Some of them are quite elaborate. The living conditions for most folks is pretty horrible compared to Western standards. You really need to look at the pictures. They are posted here:

http://picasaweb.google.com/MooseMiester/Vacation2008Egypt


Our bus driver drove the bus at an alarming pace; I was sitting in the aisle looking out the front window as he cut off and/or narrowly missed car, donkey, truck, or camel. Playing “chicken” with your fellow driver is the rule. Being in one lane or another means nothing in Egypt. There is no traffic control, and honking is the primary means of driver communication.

At one point we merged onto a fairly decent highway that finally turned into the road to Cairo and Giza which was not so smooth. Along the way there were several security checkpoints where we endured several large speed bumps, slowed down to a crawl, and passed under the watchful eyes of uniformed men carrying AK47’s and other machine guns.

The entire time our tour guide, Rania, rambled on and on over the microphone at rock concert volume levels. Halfway to Giza I was holding my fingers over my ears in a vain attempt to not get a blinding headache from the intensity of the volume. She kept promising to be quiet for a minute but it never came. Having watched quite a few shows on Egyptology on the PBS, the History Channel, and the Discovery channel we quickly determined that we were getting a slightly modified version of the truth.

We’d get information, followed by a sales pitch for T-Shirts, Cartouche Jewelry, etc. and we had to keep handing samples back. While she was taking orders I asked her if she could turn the public address volume down a bit and it went down a fraction. To our surprise, she was doing a brisk business in souvenirs; we’ve never been ones to collect that kind of stuff so we passed on all of it.

In the row directly behind us a blonde woman chatted incessantly about everything imaginable without pause, we dubbed her “ChatterBox”.

Finally we could see the pyramids. From watching the History and Discovery Channel, you’d think they were out in the middle of nowhere in the desert. On three sides, they are. On the other side is a vast, sprawling city that goes as far as the smog lets you peer into. The closest establishment to the pyramids is, heaven forbid, a Kentucky Fried Chicken although it is the only western establishment and only the sign is familiar. I wouldn’t recommend eating there.

The Pyramids themselves are awe inspiring. They are considerably larger than they look on TV; they are absolutely massive structures. We were approached by quite a few shady vendors that we ignored, I had learned beforehand to say “No Thank You” in Arabic but unknown to me yet I was not pronouncing it right so they didn’t know what language we were speaking.

We were given around 25 minutes at the Pyramids. We were back to the bus on time, but of course there were a few stragglers so we left a little late. We were chastised by our tour guide. The chatterbox woman behind us got on and declared that the Pyramids were the worst experience she had ever had in her ENTIRE LIFE. We looked at each other and tried not to bust out laughing.

Our tour guides phone kept ringing and ringing. We figured that they were coordinating the buses and groups. She told us she kept getting all these calls because it was her birthday.

On to the scenic overlook, where you can see all three of the great Pyramids at once, with Giza and Cairo stretching off in the distance; this is the picture you see most frequently. I took some snapshots and struck up a conversation with the security guard, who taught me the proper way to say no thank you in Arabic. It is pronounced Lah Shouk-a-raan. On the Internet, it is written No Shukarn which probably means I have ants in my pants or something.

Down to the Sphinx we went. Armed with the correct pronunciation, the vendors were gracious, and a few even said “You’re Welcome”. The Sphinx is not near as large as it appears in pictures but is very impressive nevertheless. You can’t get too close, but you can get close enough and I took some pictures.

Back on the bus, and Rania was hawking bookmarks and coin collections. We had to wait in the parking lot while these transactions took place. The driver had bottled water and coke for sale for $1, while we were sitting there a man came forward and tried to buy one with a $100 bill, claiming it was the smallest bill he had.

We drove at dangerous speeds through the main road in Giza, dodging camels, donkeys, tractors, and all sorts of third world conveyances. The road is divided by a canal that features plenty of garbage and the occasional dead animal.

After about fifteen minutes we went through a security checkpoint, with uniformed men and AK-47’s and we were clearly in a nicer neighborhood. In Egypt one doesn’t pay taxes on one’s house until it is finished, so most people are living in houses that are half under construction and always stay that way. Only the richest people have finished houses. We caught glimpses of some really nice estates as we flew down the narrow road. We turned into the “Country Club” where we were to have our jeep ride and camel adventure.

Rania gave us advice on tipping the camel handlers, and let us know that they would demand more money than they were due. We were also told it was safe to give the camel drivers your camera and have your picture taken. Apparently plenty of folks at the Pyramids or the Sphinx give their camera to a vendor only to have to pay to get it back. This was the best advice we got from her.

Upon exiting the bus, we were given a water bottle. The water tasted funny and we only drank a swallow of it.

We were herded into jeeps, which were actually air conditioned six passenger Land Rovers. My wife is prone to carsickness so I gave her the front seat and took the middle row in the back. Mr. and Mrs. “I need the front row because I am handicapped” slid in next to me. They were rather large people and I had difficulty putting my seat belt on.

The Jeep ride over the dunes was great fun and lasted about fifteen minutes. Several times while rounding corners at good speed I prayed that the mass of my seatmates crushing me against the door did not result in the door popping open. Every time we hit a bump my seatmates yelped. Although our driver spoke limited English my seatmates kept asking all kinds of complicated questions that he could not answer.

Although the whole process had been explained at least four times, it seemed we were the only ones in the jeep that had listened, or had short term memory. We were to take the jeeps to the camels, and then have lunch. “Are we taking the jeeps to lunch?” “Where are the camels?” “Are we riding the Jeeps to the camels?” “Do the Jeeps come back to the bus and then we ride the camels?” and then once we got to the camels “Where are they taking us?”

We arrived at our geriatric looking camels. As soon as we got out of the Jeeps a small boy grabbed my hand and literally dragged me to a camel, separating me from my wife. I pointed that I wanted to be with her and he relented, dragging me to another one. I looked over and my wife had gotten on and the camel was standing, so I put my foot in the stirrup and about one tenth of a second after getting my leg over the camel was on the way up. I was very happy not to have fallen off.

Camels don’t smell very good. They are lot taller than a horse, and have an odd gait, but you get used to it. Up and down hill they tilt quite a bit. The saddles are much looser than a horse, and you need to hold on by squeezing your legs around the beast. I managed to get off a few pictures. The Camels were being led, and more than once got too close together, resulting in my bumping into a fellow passenger. We stopped at the top of a hill and had our pictures taken astride our camel.

The Camel ride lasted perhaps twenty minutes. Getting off was much easier than getting on. I tipped the camel boy $3 as instructed, as did my wife. We were hounded and hounded as we made our way towards the larger group but did not give in.

We were herded inside for the buffet. There was chatterbox from the bus, trying to have a conversation with the gentleman from Nicaragua who spoke almost no English “We’re just doing so much walking today! I’m starting to get a blister on my toe! Are you?” The man from Nicaragua stared at her blankly and hurried to catch up with his partner.

Hoping for a traditional Egyptian meal, I was mildly disappointed to see some of the selections, but given the age of the participants this was probably a good idea. I filled my plate about 2/3 full and sat down. Most people were heaping the food on like they had not eaten for weeks. The food was OK. I went back for a little hummus and Pita bread to finish off with. As I spooned some hummus on my plate, a woman asked me what it was; I explained to her that it was camel entrails and goat milk. She didn’t seem the least bit surprised at this. Hummus is, of course, mashed chickpeas with almond paste.

The Egyptian version of baklava and coconut macaroon was really good.

Back on the bus again. We had two stops that afternoon; at the step Pyramid and one at the “mass tomb”. At the mass tomb they did not allow cameras inside. This was explained at least six times before we got to the step Pyramid. On the way to the step pyramid we listened to the chatterbox lady behind us going over every single item she had eaten for lunch in minute detail. Sure enough when we got there half the bus asked if they could take cameras. People openly and heatedly debated the camera issue, asking each other if they knew the answer.

At the step pyramid we quickly separated ourselves from Rania’s repetition of what we had already heard on the way there, and walked to the base of the pyramid. It is very impressive and much larger than it looks on TV. There were very few vendors hawking things there. Despite having covered much more distance than the tour group we made it back the bus before many other folks did.

A short fast drive later and we were at the mass tomb. We never did quite get the name of the place as Rania pronounced it mastom. Part of it was covered by sand, preserving the Egyptian carvings on the walls which were very impressive. We were led through, during which time we stayed slightly ahead of the group listening to the explanations.

We were accosted by a man wearing a green robe and turban who hadn’t taken a bath in weeks who kissed me on the shirt. He seemed nice and then asked for a handout. I had saved a 50 Turkish Lira piece just in case so I gave it to him. He turned it over in his palm and gave me a dirty look, and then kissed me on the shirt again.

The Costa Cruise Italian tour was ahead of us and a few of them were taking pictures. Rania saw the flash and demanded angrily that they stop, threatening to call “the guard” to have the camera confiscated.

We got to the main room where there was a statue. Rania began telling us stories of all the “treasure” that surely had been there at one time. To prove her point she showed us carvings of five ships on the wall as proof that there were five ships of treasure buried there. I didn’t point out that there were ship carvings in other places inside the building.

We were told that we had to leave right away because the attraction was closing. Funny thing there was another group going in right behind us.

Back to the bus and the Papyrus sales talk began in earnest. We were more interested in watching the bus driver fly down the narrow road, narrowly missing people, animals, and traffic, alternately flooring the throttle and slamming on the brakes all the while honking wildly. Were we running late, or avoiding being shot at, we wondered? There were three dogs playing the in the street in front of the bus, he honked but did not slow down. Suddenly he slammed on the brakes way too late and there were two thunderous thumps followed by a series of bumps as the dog flopped under the length of the bus. There was a brief silence on the bus; chatterbox behind us even shut up for at least fifteen seconds.

After an exchange in Arabic between the driver and security the bus stopped. The guard, the driver and Rania nervously got out, quickly glanced at the front of the bus, and quickly jumped back in. She deadpanned “The dog survived” and after a few seconds happily declared “The dog is alive, praise God”. I looked at my wife and whispered “bullshit”. My wife gave me a look that said it all. We heard other people saying “Oh good, the dog is alright”. The Papyrus sales talk resumed unabated. I whispered to my wife that I wondered if we would have stopped any longer had we hit a person; she replied that the only reason we stopped was to insure that the dog was not impaled on the bus for all of us to see when we got off.

We arrived at the Papyrus factory and Curio shop. We stopped in view of the Pyramids of Giza. The two beside us kept arguing about what city we were in.

We passed on the Papyrus factory and went into the Curio shop as we had no intention of getting off the boat in Alexandria on day two. There were a lot of nice things in the shop, but not being souvenir people we passed on most of it.

We bought a refrigerator magnet; the price of the magnet changed three times between the first quote and the final payment. Egypt is the reverse of Turkey; the first price quoted is extremely low, but when you get to the counter the price doubles and you haggle.

Standing out side the curio shop taking it all in we examined the front of the bus. The license plate was significantly bent, and there was a good sized dent in the bumper with a distinct brown dog color to it. Clearly at least one dog, possibly two had been obliterated by the bus.

Sitting outside an American lady came up and explained that whereas she had never done this before, could she have a cigarette. She explained that she had tried to buy some, but the man wanted five Euros, but she was “WAY out of my comfort zone here” and just ran away. My wife gave her one and I joked “Two Euros for one” and she laughed nervously.

We were first back on the bus. Our fellow tourists filtered on carrying bag after bag of stuff they had purchased, and the Papyrus they had bought in the factory. Finally it was almost over and the end was in sight. But there was more. It seemed that four of the passengers had ordered Cartouche T-Shirts in the morning, and forgotten that they had done so. So they had to get off the bus, be taken into the store, and pay for them.

On the two hour ride back to Alexandria my wife sat in the aisle seat, with a clear view forward, and I sat next to the window. Apparently she had missed the fun of watching our crazed driver race the bus on the open road. If you have a feint heart, or are easily scared, ride in the back of the bus and do not, I repeat do not, look forward. By watching the mileposts and the clock I estimated our speed at eighty to eighty five miles an hour with most motor traffic moving between thirty and fifty miles an hour with the occasional crazed Egyptian weaving in and out of traffic at ninety to one hundred ten.

Chatterbox finally quieted down after they dimmed the bus lights. Under the conditions a brief nap was not in order. One thing we noticed was that in Egypt many drivers do not use headlights at night at all. Almost all of the cars were packed with occupants, and some had huge amounts of baggage piled up on the roof. There were many small pickup trucks with a cow jammed in the back headed into Alexandria for the feast.

At last we were back at the ship. A tall blonde woman nearly ran me over in her haste to get back on. We were greeted by another towel animal, a monkey this time, and of course all new towels. For the entire cruise, if we used a towel once, it was replaced. We ordered room service; I had a huge pineapple boat filled with fruit, and a wrap made with turkey, avocado, cheese, tomato, and carrots. My wife had another burger and fries.

Sitting on our balcony after a hot shower I remarked that we needed to get a good night’s sleep, we had a lot of eating to do the next day! We decided right then and there that we were not getting off the boat again in Egypt.

We got a great night’s sleep. In the morning we had breakfast in the courtyard; I had the eggs Benedict with crab cakes; absolutely delicious. My wife had eggs and bacon. After breakfast we relaxed, walked around the boat, and looked at the pictures I had taken in Egypt. For lunch I had potato and leek soup, a very nice rainbow trout with a thick cream sauce and vegetables, and gingerbread pear upside down cake; my wife had salad, the potato soup, a 10oz steak with potatoes and spinach, and chocolate ice cream. We dubbed the day “The Olympics of Eating”, having already eaten as much by noon as we normally do on a holiday. In the afternoon we walked around; I worked on this journal.

We had our butler chill our free bottle of Mumm’s French Champagne and we enjoyed it immensely. We watched the impressive display of the ship pulling out of port and headed down to Alizar for dinner. They set us up at a table for four, but set for two. As soon as we sat down an assistant manager of some sort came over, and explained to us that she was going to bring us a bottle of champagne that Ruth, our concierge had ordered for us as an apology for what happened in the Grand Pacific the night before. She said she didn’t know what happened, but was terribly sorry anyway. Another bottle of Mumm’s came out and she poured us very full glasses.

Our waiter explained that the last table she waited on was a little upset, because they had very young children along, and apparently the feast involved slaughtering animals in the street. She had asked them how the day in Alexandria had gone and all the little ones started wailing and crying. I thought to myself that they had gotten a good education but kept my mouth shut. I have always felt that every American teenager should spend a week in a third world country to truly understand how lucky they are to have been born where they were.

For dinner, as if we had any more room, I had a crab and avocado appetizer, corn and duck soup, and superb eggplant cannelloni. My wife had the same appetizer and the lamb with different vegetables than were on the menu. Both of her dishes were ordered with changes from the menu but of course it was no problem. All through dinner we were asked many times if everything was alright. After we had finished our meal the supervisor of the restaurant came over with our “special dessert”; little cakes made of almonds, dates, and raisins with strawberries on the side. Then our waiter brought us the dessert menu but we passed. Back at the suite and there were our snacks; somehow we managed to eat a brownie. We declared the day’s “Olympics of Eating” complete. After all those calories and the two bottles of French Champagne we fell into a caloric and champagne induced stupor punctuated by giggles.

The next day I woke up still full. I passed on the crab cakes Benedict breakfast, settling for a small plate of fruit and rolls from the courtyard snack area. My wife had two eggs and bacon and declared that she was stuffed, again. You may be getting tired of hearing about all the food. On a typical sea day, one spends on average of five hours sitting in a restaurant, as the courses come slowly and there are a lot of them. If you don’t like to eat, don’t take a cruise.

We walked around the ship. Our pace had slowed from the first few days. There was a huge crowd in the Atrium buying stuff, so thick we had to detour around them. The ship was making good speed on the 800 mile run from Alexandria to Malta, doing 20 knots. It was windy outside.

We decided to make the walk to the bridge observation area. Upon arrival, the shades were drawn, probably because they were having a meeting in there or something. A little old lady from England was intently rapping on the glass, right next to the sign that says “From time to time we will close the shades, such as when approaching or leaving port, or at night. Please do not tap on the glass”. We looked at her inquisitively. She grabbed my wife’s arm, pulled her to the window, leaned down, peered in the crack between the shade and the glass, and said “I KNOW THEY ARE IN THERE!!!” and continued knocking on the glass.

We then heard all about how she lived on the approach to Heathrow Airport, and that a piece had surely fallen off a plane and caused her tile roof to crack. How did the stabilizers work? What did they look like? Were they filled with water? She was concerned about collisions at sea, and what if there wasn’t anybody “up there driving, then what?” Then she saw through the crack a woman in uniform and she was not happy about that at all. “There’s a WOMAN UP THERE!!” My wife explained that yes, there were female officers. More knocking on the glass ensued. An officer appeared. “Excuse me! Maa’m please DO NOT knock on the glass. The Bridge is closed right now”. She replied “Well WHEN will it be OPEN?” He replied 20 minutes. She checked her watch, tapped on it, and glared at the officer. We politely excused ourselves and headed down for lunch.

Lunch in Cagneys did not disappoint. I had a pear and celery salad, in heavy cream sauce, surrounded by some of the leanest prosciutto ham I had ever eaten, followed by a sandwich of lobster, avocado, tomato, and Swiss cheese on foccia bread. Desert was a warm apple strudel topped with heavy vanilla whipped cream. My wife enjoyed a salad, four huge jumbo shrimp, and fish and chips with mashed peas, and chocolate ice cream. The fish was very high quality compared to the fish and chips we had tried in the Blue Lagoon earlier, and was prepared with a unique batter that we thought had allspice in it. We were beyond stuffed at this point; we headed back to our cabin. Was it really Tuesday?

The gentle motion of the ship, and the food made us both sleepy; I fell asleep on the couch. After waking up we watched a few ships go by, and spent around forty five minutes in the hot tub in the Courtyard where we met a nice Swiss banker, his wife, and their three year old son.

That night was yet another exclusive cocktail party, where the penthouse and romance suites people got escorted up to the courtyard. They had a nice assortment of hors de-orderves, wine, champagne, and rum fruit drinks all free.

It was attended by the executive staff (Captain, Chief Engineer, and Hotel Manager). We chatted with our new Swiss banker friend, the Canadians we had met in the hot tub, and the New York couple who were in the penthouse up front. My wife gave the New Yorkers a look at our cabin and they were quite impressed with it. Later we would learn why.

We compared notes with other passengers who had taken the Egyptian adventures. Aside from the dogs our bus killed, our experience was not unique. One couple on the jeep ride got into the jeep, which immediately took off, and they had no time to fasten their seat belts. The result was that they banged their heads pretty good on the ride. Another couple was hit up for the camel handler tip before they even got on, and was hounded for tips the entire ride, finally telling the camel handler that they would give him a dollar if he would just shut up.

I had a nice chat with the Captain, and then the Chief Engineer. The Engineer and I really hit it off. After about 20 minutes of conversation about the mechanical aspects of the ship, he offered to show me the ship’s control room once we were in port in Malta.

We headed down to dinner. The choices were extensive as usual, with lobster and assorted fish on one entrée menu and a steak and potatoes on another. Having learned that it doesn’t hurt to ask, we asked for steak and lobster on one plate. Our waiter happily obliged. What he did was order both dishes, then place the lobster on the steak plate! I had a wonderful, spicy hot and sour crab soup for an appetizer. For desert, my wife had her usual chocolate ice cream, I experienced something called “molten chocolate cake” which was basically very rich European chocolate pudding, surrounded by chocolate cake, then dipped in milk chocolate. Needless to say we were stuffed yet again.

During the meal the assistant manager came by to insure that we were being properly taken care of. I told her the service in Alizar was excellent. She was so very, very happy that we were happy, and please sir if there is anything we can do to make your experience more enjoyable please do not hesitate to ask. I wanted to say that I was very happy that she was happy that we were happy but held my tongue. I told her that our waiter was really good, which was certainly true. She whipped out a little pad, and assured me that he would be our waiter for the remainder of the cruise, she would reassign him to whatever section we were going to eat in, and what time would we be dining tomorrow?

When we got to the room we found a towel animal cobra with chocolate mints for eyes on the bed. We ordered decaf coffee, and had a good laugh with our butler about the lady in the bridge room. We told him about our private tour of the control room, his eyes got really wide as apparently this is extremely rare and totally against the rules.

Breakfast was pancakes with caramel citrus sauce and bananas, delicious as always. We ate in our bathrobes in the courtyard. After breakfast we watched the ship dock in Malta. Malta is a 500 year old port that was not designed to accommodate huge ships and it was tight.

After we docked I saw a mid sized ship very close to us that looked like it was on a collision course. There was a crew member on the foredeck waving his arms wildly and shouting. The ship backed up, turned around, and reshot the approach, after taking pictures we determined it was a fuel ship (bunkering ship). As a small boat owner it made me feel pretty good to see a professional captain miss a docking.

The Chief Engineer had told me to meet him in front of the reception desk at 11:30 AM, I was there ten minutes early. He arrived at 11:30 sharp. Apparently I was the only person on the ship getting the private tour and I felt very lucky. We went in a door marked “Crew Only” and entered the real part of the ship. The difference between the passenger portion, and the real, working portion is quite dramatic.

From deck seven we proceeded down several flights of stairs. The Chief Engineer, despite being in his fifties, flew down the stairs. Down a couple of narrow hallways, and through a couple of large keycard protected large steel doors with huge “RESTRICTED ACCESS” signs and we were in master control.

It is a very impressive place. All the ships control systems are automated with computer PLC control of every function. Large computer keyboards and trackballs control menus that lead to real time status and control displays of each system. He showed me the main ships systems; fuel and fuel polishing, water, electrical, ballast, etc. In the center are large gauges that show the status of the azipod drive system, with a dedicated display for port and starboard azipods. The Azipod system places the electrical motors in rotatable “pods” that are steerable in a 360 degree radius; there is no rudder.

We were in the process of taking on 200 tons of fuel, and he showed me the fuel tanks and pumping systems that were currently in operation. The fuel is filtered, and heated to 130 degrees before being fed to the engines, which are massive 12 cylinder MAN diesel generators (there are five total). The engines are so large that each cylinder has its own, dedicated fuel pump. At speed (24 knots) the ship burns a gallon a second of fuel.

What I found most impressive is that the heat from the engines is used to drive the water processing plant as well as to make hot water. I commented that it must be quite the trick to balance the heat output of the engines with the demands of the water plant and he agreed.

He explained that the thrust bearings within the azipod motor system were the weak part of the system. The drive motors are very high voltage; the speed was controlled by modulating the frequency. Megawatt amperage numbers beyond comprehension were quoted; he might have said the motors were 1200 volt or 12,000 volts I do not remember.

A security station allowed access to cameras located all over the ship and within the engineering spaces. Under the direction of the Chief Engineer, I was shown the Azipod drive, the engine/generator rooms, and other systems I was interested in. I took a picture of the Chief Engineer to remember the experience.

I was most interested in the ship’s engines, having never seen diesels of that size. To my complete amazement he asked me if I wanted to see the one generator that was running.

We walked down the main ship’s corridor that they call I-95. It was a beehive of activity. The crew was mostly dressed in coveralls.

Down a few more levels, ending in a narrow steel stairway, we turned right and passed through another “RESTRICTED” door into the room where the diesel generator was. It was incredible to stand next to a 19,500 horsepower engine that was running. The twelve cylinder engine was absolutely massive; the valve covers for each cylinder head were probably fifteen feet square each. I asked if I could take a picture; the Chief Engineer said no. The noise level in the engine room was intense as you might expect; it consisted of a very low frequency powerful hum and a whine of moving parts. You could see access ladders and walkways that led to the bottom of the engine perhaps two stories down.

The engine was easily the size of a house. It was immaculately clean, no dust, no grease, no oil anywhere. I’ve been in automotive plants, and many small factories and I have never seen mechanical spaces as clean as the engine room on the Jade.

When we left the engine space and he closed the door the quality of the soundproofing was incredible. I commented on how cool it was in there; he explained that the engines drew air in from the top of the ship for combustion into the engine space.

A few more staircases, and he opened a door with a sign “Passenger Area Proper Attire Required” and to my surprise we were at the mid ships elevator on deck 4. I shook his hand vigorously and thanked him several times over. For the next hour or two I was in awe of the special treatment I had received, and what I had seen. I doubt if they do this very often.

Here are the pictures of the control room and the ship’s engineer:

http://picasaweb.google.com/MooseMiester/Vacation2008JadeControlRoom


Malta
Malta is very clean, with very well preserved old buildings everywhere. It is a very picturesque and beautiful harbor. We walked around a bit and did a little shopping. They make absolutely stunning glassware in Malta and we bought a few pieces. Prices were high, as they had been in Italy.

In a bookstore, I bought a Thank You card for the Chief Engineer. We sampled the local beer, which was cheap, tasty, and very strong. We bought a few items at the duty free shop and headed back on to the ship, wanting to enjoy every last minute of VIP service.

Here are the pictures of Malta:

http://picasaweb.google.com/MooseMiester/Vacation2008Malta


Back in our suite and we ordered a Pizza which was good. We found ourselves exhausted for no good reason, and skipped dinner, going to bed around 7PM and sleeping soundly until the next morning.

It was our last full day on board. We had breakfast in the courtyard; I had an omelet, my wife, eggs and bacon. We had gotten our wish for rough seas; they were 12-18 feet and we were thrilled. We headed out for a walk around the ship. On the way, we ran into Juramar, our butler, who was his usual happy self. My wife joked that for our last towel animal, I had requested a lion, attacking a gazelle, in the Amazon rain forest. We all got a good laugh.

Here are pictures of the fabulous staff at Cagney’s, and the rough seas on our last full day aboard:

http://picasaweb.google.com/MooseMiester/Vacation2008LastDay

I’ll let you figure out who the person in the last photo is.

The crew had placed strategic barf bags around the ship again. We had a great time walking around. When we got back to our room, to our delight Zaldi and Morena had just finished creating a towel menagerie on the bed.

On top was the monkey, with its arms in the air and his legs crossed. There was an octopus, dinosaur, lobster, turtle, sea lion, seal, butterfly, elephant, mouse, cobra, rabbit, two swans kissing, a dog, and of course the duck. We took plenty of pictures that you can see here:

http://picasaweb.google.com/MooseMiester/Vacation2008TowelAnimals


I wrote the Chief Engineer a thank you card, and my wife wrote some “You made My Day Cards” for Zaldi and Morena for the towel zoo. Upon arriving at reception it was packed with people arguing over their shipboard accounts and waiting for a drawing for a free cruise.

Headed down for lunch we learned from Juramar that they don’t make the mouse anymore, because a passenger was frightened by it. What they also used to do was make a towel person wearing your clothes on the bed, until a woman came into the room, saw a person on the bed, and ran out screaming for security.

We went down to Cagney’s for lunch. I had chicken fingers for an appetizer, a 10oz sirloin steak with Teriyaki sauce, and a wonderful three layer opera cake for dessert. My wife had the salad, steak, and chocolate ice cream. We took pictures of the wonderful wait staff and thanked them all for taking such great care of us.

Exiting Cagney’s we ran into a man trying to sneak in behind us. I pulled the door shut before he could slip by. He seriously wanted in there, and insisted that he had told someone to meet him there. The girl at the reservation desk patiently explained that Cagney’s was opened at five for regular passengers, but was reserved for VIP passengers during the day. He huffed “Of Course! WE work for NCL so WE should have known that!” Rather than waiting outside the door, which would have given credence to his story, he stormed off instead.

We took a picture of Andrea, the poor girl who must fend off the people demanding to get into Cagney’s at lunch time and told her we felt sorry for her out there.

We walked around some more. Many of the passengers looked a little green and we saw a few coming out of the bathrooms with their hands over their mouths. We ran into chatterbox from the Egypt tour and I snuck a photo for us to keep as a souvenir. We ran into our New York friends again from the front of the ship and they told us that they were happy as long as they weren’t in their room. We stood in front of the elevator and chatted with them for several minutes; it was tiring to stand with the motion of the ship.

We invited them up to see our towel animal zoo. They loved it as much as we did.

As we had originally booked 10500 at the very front of the ship we were curious to see what we would have had, as they were in 9500, and they graciously invited us to their cabin. Right after we exited the elevator a large wave hit the ship and everyone struggled to keep their balance. It was clearly getting rougher.

The view from the front is spectacular. I shot some video. The ride in the heavy seas we were in was intolerable. It was difficult to stand up. It was about what we experience on our 34’ trawler in 7-10 foot seas. The huge balcony is sealed by a massive steel door that you are only allowed to open in port. About every fifteen to thirty seconds there was a massive metallic boom that you felt in the floor through your shoes. There was no way one would get any sleep in there at all. Ten minutes in their cabin and my wife, who had been fine for the entire trip, became seasick and we had to make our exit. She had taken a Dramamine only a half an hour before but it could not overcome the violent motion in stateroom 9500.

The furnishings in the penthouse, compared to the villa suite we had, was nothing to write home about; it was cheap looking. The furniture was plastic. The bathroom was reasonably sized, although in the sea conditions we were in there is no way I could have managed a shower without getting violently seasick, and there is no way to get fresh air, because the balcony door is sealed. I took a few pictures.

They told us that during the previous rough night they had gone down to the Medusa lounge and asked if they could sleep there. We felt very sorry for them. The wife’s comment to her husband said it all “From now on we are going down to Florida AND THAT’S IT”. If my wife had not gotten us the free upgrade our Mediterranean adventure would have been miserable indeed.

By early evening the swells were 18-24 feet, according to OceanWeather Inc on the Internet. We amused ourselves by videotaping the balcony door sliding open and closed on its own. We were determined to make our last dinner so we downed Dramamine, took showers (a bit of a challenge), and headed down to Alizar.

For my last dinner on the ship I had a nice clam chowder that tasted good but did not look like clam chowder at all, a Caesar salad, tandoori chicken, and a mango coconut cake. My wife had shrimp won-ton, a steak, and chocolate ice cream. The dining room was about 2/3 full, unusual for that time of night, probably because many of the passengers were, as I termed it at dinner, “anti-eating” due to the rough seas.

Packing up was an ordeal. My wife did most of the work. About five minutes to ten we put our bags out in the hallway and started the photo shoot for each towel animal so that we could go to bed.

According to the ship’s navigation channel, we had covered 3,455.5 nautical miles, with 90.0 remaining to Barcelona. The seas calmed to moderate after we passed the Balearic Islands.

We had our last breakfast on the courtyard, eggs and bacon, bid farewell to our lovely accommodations, and made our way to our assigned disembarkation station. After waiting around to see what VIP disembarkation would be like, we decided to simply walk off the ship ourselves. We waited in Baggage Claim for perhaps five minutes; the bags arrived and with the help of a porter we made our way to the parking lot to wait for the airport shuttle.

To our surprise we found ourselves standing next to the same individual who had tried to get into Cagney’s the day before. He was asking every person around him if they had a phone he could use. Being in Spain none of them spoke English, or was willing to let a stranger have their phone. It seemed he was waiting for the same hotel shuttle we were. I explained that we had called the hotel, and that the shuttle was on its way. “Where are you from?” he asked; we replied “Michigan” and he said he was from Colorado. His luggage tags indicated he had been on deck 10. “Where was your stateroom?” he asked. We told him 14010. There was a pause, he looked confused. My wife said “mid ships, port side on top”. “Ah yes”, he replied knowingly “I’ve been inside it. Many times”

When we got to the hotel, he was in front of us in line as he got off the bus first. The clerk handed him the key and said “You are in room 114, Sir”. He replied “I know”. We tried not to snicker.

We were “vacationed out”, as well as tired from the rough sea day, and decided to simply relax on our last day in Europe. We ate $17 hamburgers in the hotel bar, watched the Spanish version of “Wheel of Fortune” and went to bed early.



The Trip Home
The 23 ½ hour trip home featured KLM First Class to Amsterdam, Northwest World Business Class to Memphis, and Northwest first class to Detroit.

We hung out in the Air France first class lounge in Barcelona, which is also the Sky Team Alliance lounge, and availed ourselves of the free croissants and coffee. The lounge is typical European ultra modern, reminiscent of the visions of the future we got in the sixties. I drank something that looked like chocolate milk, but was more like cold hot cocoa.

First class on KLM in Europe is exactly like the rest of the plane, with the same seating arrangements, except that you get food. The Orange Juice was real, and the meal was reminiscent of the good old days of coach class fare; a pasta dish that was mostly hot, a salad, and a dessert with a vague sweet flavor.

If you’ve never made connections in Amsterdam you cannot appreciate the massiveness of Schiphol Airport. We walked the mile or so from the KLM gates to the Northwest gates, passing through security again.

Having had such a terrible experience in World Business Class out of Detroit our expectations for the Amsterdam – Memphis leg were extremely low. What a difference your flight crew and departure airport makes! We were greeted BY NAME once we sat down and offered drinks immediately.

The cardboard box of stale walnuts and peanuts we got out of Detroit was a large china bowl of fresh crispy Macadamia nuts, almonds, cashews, peanuts and walnuts out of Amsterdam. They actually had every item on the menu and it appeared that everyone got what they wanted. The appetizer itself was a full meal; a large healthy piece of smoked salmon surrounded by an artful presentation of greens. Compare this to the single slice of cucumber, topped by mystery meat, and a tiny date; stale crackers and alleged lobster spread we got on the trip over. For Dinner we both choose the vegetable lasagna; the portion was huge, it was steaming hot and perfectly cooked. All throughout the meal the flight crew came by constantly insuring that we had what we wanted, that our drinks were full, and whisking away the empty plates and soon as we were finished. For dessert, they ran a dessert cart up and down the aisle where they made you ice cream sundaes with your choice of chocolate sauce, fruit, nuts, and whipped cream or a cheese and cracker plate. The sundaes were huge; the whipped cream real and fresh not Redi-Whip out of a can.

On the Detroit to Paris outbound leg, we were given bottles of water and told we had to fend for ourselves for six hours after dinner. My wife had to go back to coach class to beg for a cup of coffee; they ignored her in the first class galley. On the Amsterdam to Memphis return, we got the same bottles of water, and every thirty minutes or so they came through the cabin with a huge tray of cakes, chocolate bars, pretzels, and fruit. We drank Bailey’s and coffee, which was kept constantly refilled with fresh coffee, and every time we got up to use the restroom or simply stretch there was the first class cabin crew offering us more things. We were always referred to by name, and at the end of the flight the cabin crew came down the aisles, thanked us by name for flying NorthWest, and told us what a pleasure it had been to serve us.

Upon arrival in Memphis we declared it NorthBest, as opposed to NorthWorst on the trip over. My advice is to avoid flying international out of Detroit at all costs unless you prefer a surly cabin crew and inedible food.

Customs in Memphis was extremely simple. I got a passport stamp, my wife did not, and they barely looked at us as we passed past the inspector. When we went outside the terminal for a breath of fresh air before the last leg, however, we were subjected to all kinds of security hassle getting back to the departure lounge, and had to surrender our tube of toothpaste in our carry on because even though it was almost empty, the label said it held 10 ounces. We were sternly lectured on the rules for carrying things on airplanes. As we clearly had boarding passes issued in Europe, and American identification it seemed pretty silly.

The flight from Memphis to Detroit, which was marred by a ½ hour late departure because the start cart / tug broke, seemed to take forever but in actuality was only an hour and seventeen minutes. The first class cabin steward was extremely attentive to everyone, offering snacks every ten minutes.

Our luggage made it. The hour long drive home on slick roads after having been awake for 23 hours was intense to say the least. Our house was still there. The next day we were pleased to discover that our small collection of treasures we had purchased had made the 15,000+ mile journey without getting broken.

Here are pictures of the trip home, including the first class meals. The city with all the canals from the air is Amsterdam.

http://picasaweb.google.com/MooseMiester/Vacation2008TripHome


The Last Word
I hope you have enjoyed this travelogue and learned a thing or two about travelling First Class as well as what it’s like to take a Mediterranean cruise on NCL. It was a grand adventure that I would happily repeat for the price we paid.