Stappcation – Spring Break 2023 – Fun Day at Sea

Spring Break 2023

Sunday, March 12th

Wakey Wakey Neighbors Kept Us Awakey

Ok – HORRIBLE title, but I try my best to be nice. Even when people are scooting chairs on their deck all night and smoking … right … next … door. Normally, we would have slept through it, but these people were unbearably loud and kept Amy up quite a bit through the night. The next morning, we made no effort to stay quiet hoping that the neighbors would get the idea that there were other people around. In retrospect, we would have done better piping the ship’s horn into their room.

We moved out as quick as we could get three women ready and went to spend the day hopefully close to the pool. From the deck-cam shown over the tv, there appeared to be plenty of room near the pool. When we got to the deck, this was far from the truth. There were no seats anywhere that we could comfortably set up at, except a single chair. Not a lounger! Oh no, it was a regular sit at a table type chair.

Military Training Comes in Handy

My training in the Army prepared me for several things. Not the shoot your guns and hide from the enemy training, the outside-the-lines training. I’ve learned politics in the workplace, don’t share more than necessary, and that there is always a solution that involves more work than others are willing to do. This was one of those situations.

Not willing to settle for a single chair in a poor location, I did a quick recon of the sun deck and found a good spot with plenty of room but no loungers. I then ventured even deeper into some dangerous territory – the smoking section – and found several unused loungers stacked up. I grabbed two loungers off the stack and lugged them all the way back to the other side of the sun deck to the space I found planted them, and signaled Amy to join me.

Deal or no Deal

We spent several hours lounging on the sun deck. We had drinks served to us. The girls slid on the waterslides and climbed the ropes course. We ate our breakfast and lunch. I got sunburned. It was a wonderful time just lazing the day away.

At one point, Amy took the girls to finish their scavenger hunt and do a little shopping while I lounged and continued to sunburn. I put sunscreen on, I swear! After the girls came back, I went to play Deal or No Deal. I wanted to see what it was all about and didn’t realize how popular it was.

It was a match game that I had to buy a card for ($25) and I had to match numbers to the board on the stage being played by one person, as if it were the actual game show. They played two rounds of it, giving me two chances to win! I watched one guy on stage come out with $250 and someone else $40. I won a free bingo package. So yay! More games!

Elegant Night

We showered and dressed up. Not too much, our suitcases only held so much. This is one of my complaints about a cruise. We try to pack as light as we can to fly across the country and get on a boat with barely any storage space (especially when you have four people a room the size of a large closet) and are expected to pack a nice dress or suit and a special pair of shoes for those clothes.

Yeah, not me. I wore a Hawaiian shirt, shorts, and the same shoes I wore on the plane (remember, I didn’t even pack my flip flops). Amy and the girls dressed up quite a bit more than me, wearing a summer dress, a pantsuit or I can’t even remember what Cooper wore but she was done up better than me. We were all underdressed compared to everyone else. We saw beautiful dresses, tuxedos, shoes that glittered … and the women were even more upscale dressed.

Dinner

We made our way to the main dining room and were shown to our table and ordered. While we waited, we looked around at the other tables all dressed up and getting their orders. Emma and Cooper noticed that the sun was setting and wanted to get a picture of it, so I took them outside while waiting for our food to be delivered.

We weren’t the only ones out there. There were around thirty other teenagers vying for a good shot on the walkway. I had Emma and Cooper walk down to where we could see mom at the table and took pictures there. The ones with Amy in them didn’t come out so well, but only because the table was so far away.

Food at Last!

We went back inside and sat down to continue waiting. Other tables were being served around us, but we were patient. We finally got our salads about the same time everyone else was being served their main course. I ordered grilled chicken. It was chicken. It was grilled. That’s all I gots to say about that.

We finished dinner and took in the end of the comedy show. The comedian was a good one – SMART! Since it was a PG show, he had the kids come up on stage and asked them what their parents do that annoys them, and he made a show out of it. Nothing funnier than watching kids tear down their parents and a funny guy laughing about it.

End of Day Two

After the show and a bit more wandering, we finished the day off and headed back to the cabin. I don’t know what it is about being on a cruise that makes me fall right asleep, but I know as soon as I closed my eyes, I was out like a light. In fact, I had a challenging time keeping my eyes open so I could finish a chapter of my book.