Day 4

Thursday, Sept 29

Very humid and quite hot when we got up this morning.  Today is Christie’s birthday, so Dawn emailed her a birthday greeting.

We finally went up to the buffet for breakfast at about 10:30.  Ate enough that we didn’t feel much like having lunch so didn’t eat again until supper time.  We tried to find a spot to watch the movie on the big screen at noon.  Pretty crowded on the the deck and very hot in the sun, but we finally were able to join a man who was sitting at a table under the shade of the roof by the grill. We watched a Bon Jovi show that took place in Chicago (it wasn’t as good as the show we went to in Vancouver in the spring).

The fellow left after he had eaten his chips, and another couple came along and asked if they could join our table.  They were from Monterey in California.  They were an interesting couple.  She was having a difficult time with the heat, and he loved it.  They say that the average temperature where they are from is in the 70s, which sounds pretty nice.  They got on the ship in San Francisco.

We went to a lecture in the theatre.  It was about the construction of the Panama Canal from 1904 – 1914.  I’m sure the fellow giving it was an historian (fairly boring) but the talk and the slide show were interesting.  We may go tomorrow to the next in the series – Panama, the Future.

Had a great dinner with mom, dad, Lloyd and Karen, at the buffet.  We started earlier than we have, and stayed a lot later.  Afterwards, Dawn and I went outside to watch the movie under the stars.  Still fairly hot, but cooler than the afternoon.  The movie was Thor, and although not great, it wasn’t bad.

After that, it was back to the cabin and time for bed.

Day 3

Monday, Sept 26

Overnight, things calmed considerably.  When we got up, Dawn decided to use her seasickness patch and put one on.  We walked around, had breakfast, and as we neared San Francisco, the fog rolled in.  We saw the pilot boat leave, but within a couple minutes, it had disappeared in the fog.  Our ship has a loud, mournful sounding foghorn.  Because of the rough seas yesterday, we were going to be 3 hours late arriving in San Francisco so the tour we had booked was cancelled.

We were supposed to be at the Golden Gate bridge at 11:30, and at almost the exact time, we began to see the towers of the bridge showing up in the fog.  We got a couple pictures from our balcony as we went under the bridge.  Then, within minutes of passing the bridge, the fog was gone.  It was a beautiful entry to the bay.  Looking back at the bridge, it was a great sight with the fog in the background.

By 1:00, we were docked at pier 35 (right beside Fisherman’s Warf - pier 39).  We decided to get off the ship so left by 1:15.  While walking to Fisherman’s Warf, we saw an open top tour bus that had 2 hour tours of San Francisco, so we jumped aboard ($20 each).  It was a great tour, driving through the streets of downtown and through various ethnic communities in the city.  We ended up at the Golden Gate bridge where we stopped for about 20 minutes.  Got some great photos during the tour, and especially of the bridge.  The driver was great – very informative.  We very much enjoyed the tour.

Our ship from Fisherman's Wharf

He got us back to Fisherman’s Warf about 5 minutes late, but that was lots of time before we had to be back on board.  We walked around some of the shops, looking for a power bar to plug some of my electronics in.  Doug and Norma Butler were on this part of the cruise, and we met them while at one of the stores.  They were staying the next 4 days in San Francisco, so we didn’t have long.  Unfortunately, we didn’t find a power bar.  It was as if the shop employees didn’t know what I was asking for.  They must call them something else here.

Alcatraz as we were leaving San Francisco

We were back on the ship by 5:00, and hung around our balcony to watch the ship leave the pier.  Got some great photos of the area and the bridge off in the distance.  We wanted to stay on our balcony until we left so we could get some photos of Alcatraz as we went by.  However, the ship left about 6:30, and by the time it backed into the harbour and got going, the sun had gone down and it got dark very quickly.  We got a few photos, but they are pretty dark.

Went for dinner (did I say how good the food is?) which wasn’t too busy by that time.  We figured it was because a large group had gotten off the ship in San Francisco, and another group had gotten on.  We didn’t have to go the emergency drill, but they did, and that took place while we were eating.

Went to another show tonight.  This one was a guy who did impressions.  It took a bit of time to warm up to him, but once he got rolling, it was pretty good.  Again, he certainly made us laugh.

Day 2

Sunday, Sept 25

Pretty rough for most of the day.  The ship was bouncing around pretty well with 5 meter swells (about 15 ft).  Dawn took some gravol but still felt sick so we spent much of the day lying around our cabin and sleeping (reading, too).  The gravol made her quite sleepy.  We went to a comedian that who was pretty funny.  I don’t remember his name, but he had a bit of a stutter.  He certainly made us laugh.

The bow wave

Our Cruise to Florida

Sat. Sept 24, 2011

Arrived at the ship (Coral Princess) at about 11:45 am.  The porter took our bags for delivery onto the ship and we entered the terminal to see when we could check in (we weren't supposed to start boarding until 12:00).  Dawn reminded me that we needed our passports so I started digging around for them.  Checked all the bags we had with us but couldn't find them.  The dilemma then was were they with our bags that had been taken onto the ship, or were they in our car that was on its way back to Abbotsford? I ran out to where the porter had taken our bags, but they weren't there, so I found him and he directed me to his supervisor.  I asked him if he could find our bag and bring back the one where I thought the passports might be.  He left, and when I turned around, Dawn was wagging them at me (they were in one of the bags I had already checked).

Long story short, I couldn't find the supervisor, so I asked another porter who was heading to where the bags got loaded to let him know that we had found what we needed, and then headed off to board.

Boarding is very slick - line-ups that moved fairly quickly, boarding check first, then into US border patrol to check us out with our passports, then a quick medical questionnaire.  Finally to the window where we confirmed our credit card info, and then onto the boat.  Had to go through another security check where they took our pictures matched to our cards, and then to our room.  We were in the room by about 12:15 and our bags showed up about 1:00.

About 3:30 we had the emergency drill to make sure everyone had the life jacket procedures down, and then we left port.  Took some pictures on the way out of the harbour and going under the Lions Gate bridge.  Sent one to the kids through IM with our farewell message.

Karen and Lloyd are in the stateroom beside us, and mom and dad are on the other side of them.  We went up for dinner about 5:30, eating from the buffet.  Very nice although the roast beef was not very tender.

Dawn and I went to the theatre at 7:45, just as we were passing Victoria (I brought the GPS and it worked if we were out on our balcony).  A comedian-juggler was performing and he was great.  Had quite a few laughs.  Walking down the aisle, we found Norma and Doug Butler in the show, too.  They came and sat with us as there was room where we sat.  They are going to San Francisco (arrive there Monday).  They'll stay there for 4 or 5 days and then fly back to Kamloops, so it was nice to visit with them.

Just about the end of the show, the boat started moving around so we thought we were getting some weather.  We went back to our room and on the  balcony it wasn't bad.  It was cold out there and we didn't stay too long before coming in and watching TV.  Overnight it did become rough (I assume when we left the Straight of Juan de Fuca).  Didn't sleep too well because it was so rough and bouncing around.  In the morning, we could see the wave were quite large and there was a wind blowing at an angle to the bow