Hi there from the high seas! :) Today is our last day onboard the MS Amsterdam. We are at sea until 4 pm when we arrive in Victoria BC. We were at sea all day yesterday too. Yesterday we relaxed some, but Mom never would let me take a nap. We woke up and had breakfast in the upstairs dining room. After breakfast we went to a seminar (more like a Q & A) entitled "Life at Sea." It was all about living and working at sea. That was pretty interesting. I learned that many of those people work as long as 10 months at a time without a day off at all. They get a few hours off every now and then, but when they are at sea all day long, they work all day long. After that, it was time for the Mariner's Brunch. We got there early, because we are always early. We were able to get a table for 2 which was nice. The wine steward skipped right over me when he was passing out champagne. I really didn't even want any, but I made them give me some because I wanted to prove a point, haha! We had really good quiche at the brunchean. We had it back in November too and it was just as good this time as it was in November. After that, we came back to the room to rest a little before our afternoon event. The Blind Side was on TV so we watched that. We didn't get to finish it because it was time for the cupcake tea at 3pm. The movie was rerunning all day long, so I knew we would finish it later….and we did. Anyways, back to the cupcake tea……..it was just regular high tea in the afternoon but instead of the little fancy snacks they serve, they served cupcakes. They were really good. We went to a cupcake cooking demonstration earlier in the cruise, so we knew how they made those tasty cupcakes, but it's much easier to let them make them for us :) After that, we went to jackpot bingo, and let me just say that we did not win, yet again. Maybe today will be our day. We have one last chance! Then it was about time for the Master Chef's Dinner. Mom told me it was kinda hokey, but I like hokey :) We had to get there 30 minutes early because they put on a show during dinner in between when they served us. When we got there, the waiter put a chefs hat on both of us, and gave us the fun menu to order from. When I say fun I mean that it wasn't the normal fancy menu. It was just different. The dinner itself was really really slow. Some people had to wait a really long time to get their food. Then when they were getting their food, it was time for dessert! Anyways, I just wanted to get out so that we would have time for the spa. We made it to the spa in time and then came back to rest and such.
Then today…….this morning we got up for breakfast and ate in the upstairs dining room. There were only 2 people eating when we got there but a ton of people came in after us and they were bombarded with people that they had to serve. They had to go get another girl to help out. After that we needed to take care of a few pictures in the photo gallery and then it was time for the big Disembarkation speech. We needed to know how tomorrow would work. After our cruise director Jimmy gave the speech, the HAL crew did their normal "Love in Any Language" show/singing thing they do on every cruise ship. Next HAL cruise I go on, I'm going to get up there and sing with them :) Then after that we decided to stay for "Win a Cruise" Bingo. We didn't win :( Oh well…..at least we tried. Then back to the cabin for a little down time, well about 15 minutes of down time. Then it was time for our lunch reservation at Pinnacle. It was so good and two of our favorite waitresses were there to serve us lunch. Melyssa and Tina are two of our favorites on board. They are both from Indonesia and are both always so happy to serve us. I will miss them! After lunch we tried again one last time for jackpot bingo. This time it was worth 100,000 dollars. No one one it…..booooo! I should have been us. Then it was time for Amsterdam Superstar. It's just like American Idol but much more entertaining. The people really couldn't sing all that well, but it was fun watching them try. There was a middle aged woman named Reba, an old man named Chris and a young girl named Danielle. The girl will probably be on American Idol one day…..she wasn't perfect but with some training she will be really good one day. Just about that time, we docked in Victoria. If you notice this blog is a little all over the place. You see, I start typing it, and then come back later to finish before I post. So I started typing this earlier right before lunch and then now that we've been into victoria, I'm finishing it. There were SO MANY people trying to get off of the boat when we first got into Victoria. We had a tour so we needed to be off by 4:30 to make our tour. There were a couple of hundred people at least trying to get out one door of the ship. We finally made it in time to get to our tour. We got on the bus, took a city tour, and then made our way to Craigdarroch Castle. They told us a little history behind the castle but I don't remember it all. Basically, a man was really rich and built a big house to show that he was rich but he died before the house was finished so his widowed wife and unmarried children moved in or something like that. The were 4 stories to the castle and we had to walk up all those steps. There were too many people in the castle at one time and it got really hot in there. We had about 45 minutes to look in the castle but we finished in about 20 and went back to the bus almost 30 minutes early. After the castle visit, we drove around for a little more of our city tour. There wasn't much to see so after our bus driver took us back to the ship, we just got back on and here we are. We tried to go to the spa, but they closed down the jacuzzi (or what they call the hydrotherapy pool) early. So we went to dinner instead in the Lido and it wasn't all that appetizing. We just picked up the last of our pictures from the photogallery and now we are back in the room and mom is packing while I'm finishing the blog. Tomorrow is going to be an early morning. Breakfast is only served until 8 in the dining room so I'm going to have to get up and get moving which means and early bedtime for me, after I pack of course. Good thing I pack pretty light. Tomorrow we will arrive in Seattle and probably get off the ship around 9am. Then make our way to our hotel to hopefully check in. We don't leave seattle until June 30th. I'm hoping to meet up with an old friend that I haven't seen in probably 19 or 10 years. She lives in Seattle and we went to school together from 3rd grade (I think) through 12th grade….we go way back :) Anyways, I hope you've enjoyed our trip. We might have new pictures uploaded soon. Mom actually uploaded a few new ones yesterday I think, so look for the photo link and check them out! :)
No comments:
Post a Comment