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Travelogue: Florida, Bahamas and a Cruise,
September & October 2010
By
Roger W. Reini
By
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Prologue
This is a travelogue about my trip to Florida in September and
October 2010. This trip will involve travel by car, by rail, and
by ship. The rail portion is the Auto Train from south of
Washington, DC to north of Orlando, Florida; the car portion is my
driving around Florida and back to Detroit; and the ship portion is a
4-night cruise to the Bahamas on the Disney Cruise Line.
Why a cruise? Simple: I’ve never been on one. Why a cruise to the
Bahamas? It was a close-by destination, meaning a short duration cruise
for my first time out. In case I didn’t care for the experience, I
wouldn’t have to endure it for too long. Why the Disney Cruise Line?
I’d heard good things about them from friends of mine who’d taken
Disney cruises. Now would the Disney Cruise Line be the ideal
experience for a single man without children traveling by
himself? I’d find out for myself in October.
Top
Thursday September 23
I have started to pack for the trip. Actually, I’d started
packing a few days ago. One suitcase is fully packed now and is
ready to be put in the car. The rear seats are folded down;
nobody will be sitting in them, and I may need the space for
stuff. Of course, when I folded them down, I had to reposition
some things that are normally in the back of the SUV, such as the shelf
for my radio transceiver. Today should have been my last day of
mail before the trip; because I plan to leave for my first overnight
stop in Ohio directly from work, not heading home in the process, I’d
miss any mail delivered tomorrow. Newspaper delivery should stop
after tomorrow morning.
When I head out tomorrow, I will head down to Ohio and take the Ohio
Turnpike to the Youngstown area -- specifically, North Lima, Ohio,
which is nowhere near Lima, Ohio. You might think it is, but it
isn’t. North Lima is clear all the way across the state from
Lima. And tomorrow night, my destination is North Lima.
Unfortunately, during the day, I’ve been experiencing a funny sensation
in my throat, one that may be warning of a cold about to start.
That is the last thing I need! I have been sitting across from an
individual at work who’s been suffering from a cold the last two weeks,
and I sure hope he didn’t give it to me.
Top
Friday September 24
I didn’t sleep that much overnight. One of my sinuses clogged up;
whether because of an oncoming cold or the use of a Vicks Inhaler (or
Vapoinhaler, they’re calling them nowadays), I couldn’t say. I ended up
waking around 4 and taking a shower. I also watched last night’s 30
Rock, finished packing, and got ready for work. Everything was
locked; things were turned off that needed to be turned off. Around
6:30, I set off for the office. As I made my way through the
construction zone on Ford Road in Garden City, I participated in the
normally-daily QSO (conversation) on the Tin Lizzy Club repeater
(145.27 MHz, for you hams out there). I was feeling a bit
chilled, but turning off the air conditioning made me feel stuffy and
warm, so back on it went.
At the office, there were times when I felt chilled and other times I
felt comfortable. Having a ventilation duct near my desk didn’t help
matters much. As the morning progressed, I decided I was
suffering from a minor cold and really didn’t want it to turn into a
major one. The co-worker who may have given me his cold was sorry
to hear about it. He wasn’t sorry to learn, though, that he and
his wife were able to join up with a pilgrimage tour to Israel next
year -- a tour that, being oriented to Christians, will be quite
different from my Bahá’í pilgrimage in 2007. I hope it will be as
spiritually uplifiting to them as mine was to me. But I
digress....
I had lunch at the cafeteria and then went back to my desk to wrap up
things. Not everything could be wrapped up, of course, but by the
end of the day, I had done what I’d set out to do today. Now
there was a time, very early in the day, when I felt like going back
home to rest up for the trip. That feeling passed. However,
I did leave a little early to pay a visit to the nearby drugstore, to
stock up on some medicine and get a drink before hitting the road in
earnest. And so, sometime between 2:30 and 3, I was on the
road, heading south towards Toledo. It was windy today; I heard
on the news about a light pole being blown down on the Southfield
Freeway and causing a traffic jam, and I also heard about a dead tree
being blown over on top of a man, crushing him. He did not
survive.
When I reached Toledo, I stopped at a Pilot truck stop to visit the
restroom, to get a few munchies, and to make sure I hadn’t forgotten my
second camera or important paperwork. No, I hadn’t forgotten any
of them. There was one trip where I did have to head back home to
get a camera I’d forgotten. Back on the road I went, down I-75 to
I-280 and the Ohio Turnpike. As I drove, I listened mainly to the
RadioClassics channel on Sirius, which was enjoyable as ever.
Later on, though, I found myself becoming very sleepy, not a good
situation to be in when behind the wheel. I pulled over at the
next rest area and walked around for a bit, buying a bottle of Diet Dr
Pepper for the road. This would have been the rest area west of
Elyria. Onward I drove, enjoying the Westerns Hopalong Cassidy,
Frontier Gentleman and Gunsmoke. I can certainly remember
Gunsmoke on TV during its original run, but I never really watched it
then. I didn’t really like it then; I was too young to appreciate
it. But I do find myself enjoying the radio version of Gunsmoke
(same with the radio version of Dragnet).
By the time 6 o’clock rolled around, I was around 35 miles away from my
stopping point for the night. I stopped for supper (Sbarro pizza)
and gas (Valero gasoline) at a turnpike rest area, taking advantage of
the opportunity to check e-mail. Some 45 minutes after getting
back on the road, I was in North Lima and in my ground-floor room at
the Holiday Inn Express, intending to rest up after the rigors of the
day and hoping that the cold wouldn’t be too bothersome. I put on
some football games on ESPN (one high school game, one college game -
SMU vs. TCU), but I fell asleep during the games.
Top
Saturday September 25
I did not get a good sleep overnight, thanks to nasal
congestion. I did get some sleep, but there were times when I was
awake and unable to fall back asleep. I turned on ESPN2 and
happened to catch a game of Australian Rules football -- I think it was
a league championship (it was the 2010 AFL Grand Final between
Collingwood and St. Kilda, in fact). An unusual game, Australian
Rules football, and it probably seemed even more unusual at 3 in the
morning. And the game ended in a tie, so there will be a total
replay in a few days (it was a week later, and Collingwood won).
I needed to hit the road early this morning so that I wouldn’t be late
for the Auto Train. My bogey was 3 PM. If I didn’t check in
by then, I’d miss the train. I had over 300 miles to travel, so I left
at 6:12 AM, missing out on the hotel’s breakfast bar (it didn’t open
until 7 this morning). It was still dark outside when I
left. I saw something on the ground -- it looked to be a car
cover for a convertible, perhaps removed from the convertible by
someone who shouldn’t have. It wasn’t long before I found myself
in Pennsylvania, driving a route I’d been on three weeks before.
I listened to Sirius on the way down to Virginia, mainly the Radio
Classics channel, at least until something went wrong and I started
hearing two streams of programming at once. In the background of
a program featuring Orson Welles as Sherlock Holmes, I heard a George
Burns and Gracie Allen show and an episode of The Lone Ranger, which is
no longer heard on satellite radio. It was too fatiguing to
listen to for any length of time, so I changed to the music channels --
60’s, 70’s, some 80’s. As for the drive, I drove down Highway 522
through West Virginia and Virginia to Winchester, and then I took I-81
to I-66. This was the back door into Northern Virginia, a way to
get to Lorton without having to contend with the Beltway and
I-95. As I drove eastward, I noticed that I-66 had been widened
since my last time in the area. It was now 3 or 4 lanes wide with
an HOV lane as far out as the turnoff to Culpeper. Growth and
progress! I took the Fairfax County Parkway to Highway 123, and I
took that down to Lorton Road. By this time, Michigan State’s
football game had begun, and so I turned that on.
Between 1 and 1:15, I arrived at the Lorton Auto Train station. I
drove to a check-in window, where I turned over my tickets, received a
number for my car, and then drove up to the turn-in point at the front
door. I took my two bags, left the key, and went inside to
complete check-in. There, I received my boarding pass and my meal
pass for seating number 1, at 5 PM. Then after a trip to the
restroom, I visit the gift shop and cafe, where I had a turkey
croissant sandwich, a cup of yogurt, and a bottle of Diet Dr
Pepper. It wasn’t bad, although it seemed a bit overpriced to
me. I went outside to take some pictures of the station and the
train at its siding. Back inside, I went back to the gift shop
for two papers, a Washington Post and a Wall Street Journal, found a
seat in the terminal, and started to read the Post. The TV’s in
the station had a Virginia Tech game on, but they were too far away for
me to watch. No problem; Virginia Tech wasn’t one of my favorite
teams, and I had the Post to read.
Around 2:30, boarding started. I went out to the platform and
went rearward to find my sleeping car. The train used Superliner
equipment, the equipment used out west, so I knew the layout of the
train and of my sleeper. Now it turned out that this train had a
separate lounge car and dining car for coach and sleepers; there was a
coach lounge car, and there was a sleeper lounge car; there was a
dining car for coach, and there was one for sleepers. That was
unusual. A newspaper was waiting for me in my room: a Washington
Post. If I’d have know that was going to be there, I wouldn’t
have bought the Post in the gift shop. From my window, I could
see cars being driven onto the Auto Train cars for the trip to
Florida. At 3:25, the train started to roll. We weren’t
under way, not yet; we had to pull out to allow the car cars to be
hooked up (“car cars” -- an interesting expression).
There was a wine & cheese party in the sleeper lounge car. I
went to it, but only for the cheese, for I don’t drink.
Unfortunately, there was no cheese, so I only had one cracker before
heading back to my room. I was feeling more or less OK, thanks to
an inhaler of decongestant. Still, I did ask for a box of tissues
to be brought to my room, for I knew I’d want them with my cold.
The room itself was getting a draft from outside, which was OK for a
while, but eventually I did close the door.
Around 3:40, the train started rolling again, and this time it didn’t
stop. We were under way a bit early. 356 passengers and 183
cars, according to the conductor. The train rolled southward
through Virginia, passing through Quantico Marine Base, Fredericksburg,
Ashland, Richmond, etc. I didn’t see any familiar sights in
Fredericksburg, but I did take some pictures. I figured I’d send
them to my niece Heather (now attending the University of Mary
Washington in F’burg) and see if she recognized anything. She
didn’t; those were not parts of F’burg she regularly visited.
For supper, I had the first seating at 5 PM. My tablemates (2
Virginians and a Baltimorean) noted that they didn’t get a choice for a
7 PM seating, only 5 or 9, and they didn’t want 9. I had crab
cakes for supper; so did the Virginians, while the Baltimorean had
tenderloin. The crab cakes were pretty good, I must admit; the
Virginians though so, too. Back in my room, I read eBooks on my
iPad, mainly Bahá’í-related eBooks. Between 8 and 8:30, the car
attendant came by to make up the bed for the night. Once I got in
bed, I kept on reading for a while, and then I went to sleep.
Top
Sunday September 26
Historically, I have had difficulty getting sound sleep on trains.
Tonight was no exception, although I felt I had slept a bit more
soundly. I did need to get up to use the restroom a couple of
times, although when I actually went, not much came out. Guess I
was receiving some false alarms, or exaggerated alarms. When I
visited the restroom on the way to breakfast, though, I did not have
any problems.
Now the breakfast on board was limited compared to the western
trains. All that was available was cereal, a muffin or bagel, a
banana, and orange juice. “All that was available”, indeed!
That was a good spread. I ate with three Floridians heading home:
one to Daytona Beach, one to Jupiter, and one to Kissimmee.
As the sun came up, I noticed how the scenery reminded me of back down
home in Texas (“home” is now Michigan, but “down home” is and will
always be Texas -- the upper Texas coast, to be more specific; League
City, to be most specific) -- the flatness, the types of grass and
trees that grow, etc. It reminded me of the transitional areas between
East Texas and coastal Texas.
By 8:35, the train had arrived in Sanford, but it hadn’t officially
arrived. The train would have to be split into 3 parts first: the
car cars, the coach section and the sleeper section. The cars
went to their own area, and the passenger sections went to the two
platforms at the Sanford station. We could not leave the train
until 9; at that time, I went into the main station to use the restroom
and get a map of the area around the station, as well as pick up some
tourist literature. The station was much smaller than the Lorton
station but was in the process of being rebuilt. For a time, I
sat in the tent alongside the main station, but later I moved into the
main station. The gift shop had an Arcadia history picture book on the
Auto Train; it seemed interesting, but I didn’t pick it up. That could
wait for later. I did buy a pack of cookies to munch on while I
waited for my car to be delivered. That didn’t happen until 10.
I’d heard it could take up to two hours to get one’s vehicle offloaded
from the train. That would have the potential to affect my plans
for today. Would I be able to go where I wanted to go?
Fortunately, the train was early, and it only took an hour for me to
get my vehicle. That meant I could consider making the trip to
Weeki Wachee Springs that I had planned. As I rolled on Highway
46 toward I-4, I programmed my GPS to guide me to the park. But I
thought the chosen route took me out of my way, so I asked it to try
again. I liked those results even less, and so I went back to the
original route. This had me driving south to Orlando, then taking
two tollways to the west and northwest, then taking I-75 down to the
turnoff for Weeki Wachee. The only difficulty I had was in
downtown Orlando, where there was a big traffic backup. I took an
exit onto surface streets and tried to make my way west. I looped
around an area before finally finding a way to access the East-West
Tollway.
As I drove around Orlando and on the Florida’s Turnpike, I listened to
an American Top 40 from September 1973. The number 1 song that
week was “Let’s Get It On” by Marvin Gaye. And during the show,
Casey Kasem mentioned the Houston station that carried AT40 back then,
KRLY (now KKRW). I used to listen to it on that station, and
before that on KNUZ as well. When the show was over, I flipped over to
the Underground Garage and caught the last part of Breakfast With The
Beatles, which today paid tribute to the release of Abbey Road back in
’69. It’s always worthy of a good listen. Onward I went, up the
turnpike and over to I-75, and then down to Highway 50. By this
time, Breakfast With The Beatles had ended, and I turned on the Sunday
Drive on NFL Radio. This was a preview of all of today’s games.
It was 1 o’clock by the time I reached Weeki Wachee Springs; time for
the early football games to begin. Both Detroit and Houston would
be playing at this time, but I wouldn’t be hearing them. It cost
$13 to enter the park. After searching for and finding a
restroom, it was time to go to the Mermaid Theater. I had seen
pictures of it before but thought it looked smaller in real life.
There were several rows of bench seats arranged in a circular arc in
front of the curtains, behind which were the thick glass windows into
the spring. There was a music video played before the start of
the show, a video that promoted the park. Then the curtains rose,
and the show began. Fish Tales was a tribute to the history of
the attraction, which was founded by a retired Navy frogman in
1947. In the spring, the mermaids performed many of the acts done
by their predecessors over the years -- feeding the fish, eating and
drinking underwater, diving down to 175 ft below the surface at the
effective bottom of the spring, and offering a tribute to America,
unfurling the Wet, White and Blue. I was taking pictures, but I
had to change my batteries near the start of the show, so I missed out
on some opportunities. I did take pictures of a family of turtles
that were swimming around, though.
The show lasted 30 minutes. That was probably how long the
mermaids could last in the spring without a warmup, as the water
temperature was in the low-to-mid-70’s. For water, that’s
cold! There were two shows being offered today; the next one
would start in an hour. So I wandered around the rest of the park
for a while. I thought about riding the wilderness river cruise,
but I had just missed the latest boat. The next one was due at
2:35, but with a ride of 25 minutes, that would put me in jeopardy of
missing the next mermaid show, so I didn’t wait around for it.
Instead, I ended up following and taking pictures of a peacock family
on the grounds. None of the birds opened up its plumage, thus
depriving me of a chance to open a presentation with a variant of NBC’s
historic Living Color opening. I popped into the gift shop for a
time but didn’t see anything I really wanted. I took a few more
pictures around the area while waiting. Some of those pictures
involved the peacocks at the backstage entrance to the Mermaid Theater,
apparently munching on something left on the stoop. Would they
enter the building? No, they never did.
3 o’clock rolled around; time for the second show of the day, The
Little Mermaid. Actually, it was the third show overall for the
day and the second performance of The Little Mermaid. I decided
to get a front row seat this time, which helped in terms of taking
pictures and video. The story was not the Disney version (of
course not), but the basic story was the same: young mermaid yearns to
live on the surface, meets a man, visits an evil witch who gives her
legs at the cost of her voice, but things work out well at the end.
After the show concluded, I exited to the left, passing by a group of
scuba divers who were preparing to dive the spring after the park
closed for the day. They were all outfitted in wetsuits against
the cold. Back in the car, I turned on the radio for scores of
the football games. The Lions were losing rather convincingly; so
were the Texans. So let me see -- did I make the right choice in
visiting Weeki Wachee Springs and seeing several attractive women
wearing mermaid tails swimming around underwater, as well as following
the antics of the peacock brood, over listening to the Lions and/or
Texans? Yeah, I did! To be honest, even if either team had
won its game, I still made the right choice. I programmed in
Lakeland as the destination; the hotel I wanted was not offered as a
choice. And so I backtracked my route for a time. I passed
by a Carrabba’s on the left; it was too early to stop for dinner, I
thought.
The GPS had me get onto the Suncoast Parkway, a tollway leading towards
Tampa and St. Petersburg. Alongside of it ran the Suncoast Trail,
a bike trail that I wouldn’t have minded riding were I living in the
area, or even if I were visiting and had a bike. The trail
reminded me of the trail running alongside I-275 back in Detroit, much
of which has been under complete reconstruction this year. The
tollway took me to another highway which got me over to I-75.
Along the way, I passed by a second Carrabba’s. Nope, still too
early for supper. I-75 got me down to I-4, which would take me to
Lakeland.
Along I-4, traffic was heavy just east of I-75. Perhaps it was
football traffic, I thought to myself; the Pittsburgh-Tampa Bay game
had recently ended. But it thinned out and moved along well for a
while. All of a sudden, traffic slowed and nearly stopped. There
was a commotion on the side of the road and off the road. As I
got closer, I saw that a car had overturned and was off the
roadway. People were swarming all around it, suggesting that it
had just happened. I debated whether I should stop. I would
not have been among the first to stop, and I didn’t think I had
anything to offer, so I drove onward. Postscript: I heard on a
Tampa newscast the next morning of a fatal rollover accident in that
area, but that had taken place early Sunday morning, not the same
accident that I saw.
As I drove along, I saw a sign for yet a third Carrabba’s. But by
the time I saw where the restaurant was, I saw I had passed the exit
for it by. Fortunately, the next exit was right ahead, making it
easy for me to loop back and go there. Seeing that sign clinched
it: I was meant to eat there tonight. It wasn’t crowded at all
when I arrived around 5:30. For dinner, I had grilled chicken
(they used to call it “chicken gratella”) with mashed potatoes and
broccoli, along with a cup (most people might call it a bowl or dish)
of lentil and sausage soup. Yum, yum! Before my meal, I
used my iPad to check the location of the Hampton Inn in
Lakeland. It was a little tricky to get there, as it turned out,
and I almost missed the exit for it when I got there, but I did get
there. There was an Applebee’s next door; if I hadn’t eaten at
Carrabba’s, I would have eaten there.
In the hotel room, I downloaded and identified the pictures I’d taken
this weekend; I worked on this travelogue; I took a shower; and I
watched the Jets take on Miami on Sunday Night Football, which meant I
could watch my “nephew”, Miami wide receiver Brandon Marshall, play.
“Nephew” is in quotes because, although my nephew is indeed named
Brandon Marshall, he’s not an NFL football player. He’s still in
school -- elementary school.
Top
Monday September 27
I had fallen asleep to the TV, for when I popped awake a couple of
times, overnight news was on -- Up To The Minute on CBS, I think.
I awoke for good after 5:30 and started to pack. Breakfast
wouldn’t open until 6, and sunrise wouldn’t be until after 7. I
was going to put on a pair of shorts today, but when I went to put them
on, I couldn’t do them up. There was no button to hold them
closed! That would explain the button I found in my washer
earlier this week. But until I found a way to repair or replace
that button, those shorts were out of commission. So I decided to
put on another pair of pants.
The breakfast bar was in full operation downstairs by 6 AM. I had
some Special K, a muffin, a small omelet, some turkey sausage and some
home fries, a decent way to start the day. Back in the room, I
watched the morning news out of the Tampa Fox station (I thought the
traffic reporter was kinda cute) while waiting for the sun to
rise. I didn’t want to set off in the dark, not in this
unfamiliar area. I also called up the company that operated the
catamaran ferry to the Dry Tortugas that I was planning to ride
tomorrow; I called to cancel my trip. I didn’t think I should go
with a cold. No problem, they said; I’d receive my refund shortly.
By 7:45, I was checked out of the hotel and in my SUV, attempting to
program a route to Key West. Unfortunately, the routes it chose
seemed to take me way out of my way, so I disregarded it and selected
my own route from the road atlas. This took me through downtown
Lakeland, and it also took me right past Joker Marchant Stadium, spring
training home to the Detroit Tigers. It took me on Highway 98 to
Highway 60 to Florida’s Turnpike. There wasn’t a whole lot to see
in this portion of the drive.
Driving down the turnpike toward Miami, I once again noted how the
scenery really reminded me of down home. I guess I shouldn’t be
too surprised by that, since the climate and topography are
similar. I stopped at perhaps every other rest area/service plaza
on the turnpike, either for a bathroom break or a stretch. I
remembered what happened a few weeks back when I drove to
Fredericksburg, Virginia and had a leg cramp up due to insufficient
stretch time on the road. On one rural road, I saw a sign:
Panther Crossing, Next 13 Miles. That’s something you do not see
every day! I stopped for lunch at a Steak & Shake near Sawgrass
Mills mall in the northwestern part of the Miami area. Then it
was onward to pick up the turnpike again, and then a refueling stop
before the Keys. The turnpike came to an end at US 1; ahead for
southbound drivers lay the Florida Keys.
The initial drive down US 1 was stop and go, most likely due to the
construction zone I was traveling through. But once through
there, I didn’t have much difficulty. I flipped around the radio
dial, and in between the static, I could hear a lot of stations in
Spanish. A few of them, it turned out, were Cuban. One of
the stations that I could hear at multiple locations on the dial was
Radio Reloj (Radio Clock), a Cuban news/propaganda station (depending
on your point of view). Each news item ran for one minute, with a
clock ticking in the background. The top of every minute was
marked by a tone and “RR” sent in Morse code.
Finally I saw the sign for Key Largo. I was in the Florida
Keys! I soaked in the sights as much as I could, pulling off at
least once for some pictures. One picture I wish I’d taken but
didn’t was of a sign for a doctor named Lawyer: Steven Lawyer, DO (do a
Google search if you don’t believe me). I also noticed a sign for
Taylor Creek Village, which I found a little amusing and a little
unusual, having grown up not very far from the city of Taylor LAKE
Village in Texas.
Traffic wasn’t bad at all heading towards the end of the road in Key
West. Flipping around the dial, I could hear the Cuban stations
more strongly, and as I passed through Marathon, I heard the US
government’s response station, Radio Marti (I could also hear music
underneath it, presumably a Cuban jammer). But I mostly listened
to NFL Radio, which among other topics covered the passing of George
Blanda. I remembered him from his days in Oakland, but he was an
Oiler during the first few years of the team’s existence. At one
point I saw a blimp -- a blimp that didn’t seem to move. It
turned out to be a blimp-shaped balloon that, if I recalled correctly,
was used by the US Government for border security operations. It
probably could detect smuggling vessels a long ways off.
At last, the end of my trip was in sight: Key West! Traffic was
on the heavier side here. You wouldn’t think there would be a
Sears store in Key West, but there was -- a smaller store than normal,
to be sure. No need for me to stop there, though, as I headed
towards downtown or Old Town. I navigated some back streets to
position me for a right turn for the La Concha Hotel on Duval Street.
Once I saw the hotel, I saw where to turn for check-in and
parking. But I missed the turnoff, so I went around the block to
try again. This had me getting back on US 1 and encountering Mile
Marker 0, the official start or end of US 1. This time, I didn’t
miss the turnoff, and so I parked behind a cab while I checked
in. After getting my key, I parked in the gated parking lot and
unloaded my luggage for the trip up to room 543. The room
overlooked Duval Street, the main commercial drag in Old Town Key
West. I wouldn’t take a picture of it through the window, though;
the windows were filthy. Nor could they be accessed for cleaning;
there was a non-removable interior window blocking access to the
original windows.
What to do after unpacking? Set up the laptop and get my Internet
access going, that’s what. And then? It was time to do some
wandering. So I put on some sunscreen, got my good camera, and
went for a walk. My first stop was the corner where I’d seen Mile
Marker 0 signs. Apparently, the signs are prime targets for
thieves or souvenir collectors, but they were here today, firmly
secured in my opinion. There also happened to be a sign saying this
road was sponsored by the southernmost Parrothead club; that, too,
rated a picture. Nearby was a bicycle/scooter rental place, one
of many in Key West. With that being so close, I thought it would
very very convenient to rent from in the next day or so.
Ahead of me, a rooster was walking along the sidewalk. When he
crossed the street, I saw a lot of roosters running around.
Free-range chickens, of a sort. Up the street I went, passing the
entrance to the Truman Little White House, until I came to the old
Customs House, now home to the Key West Museum of Art and
History. One couldn’t miss the statues in front of the building,
some life-size, two much larger than life (a dancing couple). One pair
of statues featured a tourist photographer taking a picture of a statue
of Ernest Hemingway (all sorts of references to him here, as you would
expect with his having lived here). I followed the example of the
photog statue and took plenty of pictures.
Next, I made my way to Mallory Square, where already a crowd had
gathered to witness tonight’s sunset. There were street
musicians, artisans showing their wares, and other performers.
One man was drawing on a big white pad; it turned out to be a testimony
for Jesus. There was a guitarist stationed where I ended up
standing, playing classic rock on his acoustic guitar. He was
doing an all-right job, so I tipped him a dollar. Nearby was a
scruffy street cat that seemed to be tolerant of the crowds. At
one point, when I looked over into the water, I could see fish swimming
near the surface. Out on the water, boats were passing back and
forth. In the sky, clouds were gathering. Would they make for a
scenic sunset, or would they block the sun altogether at the critical
moment? It turned out it was the latter, although I did get some
interesting pictures of the sky when the sun was higher, as well as the
top of a cloud that was lit pink by the below-the-horizon sun. It
was time to go, and so I wandered through the area, taking a picture of
a second street cat and watching a guy chase a chicken, having been
promised $10 if he caught it (he didn’t catch it).
Heading down Duval Street, I saw the original and current locations of
Sloppy Joe’s Bar, famous hangout of Hemingway’s. Live music was
pouring from both locations, as well as a few others in the area.
The evening street scene was in full swing. Meanwhile, I was looking
for a place to eat. There was the Hard Rock Cafe, but having just
had a burger, I wasn’t in the mood for another. I ended up eating
at the hotel restaurant, with a light meal of cream of mushroom soup
and a chicken Caesar salad. It was light but good, and it turned
out to be filling.
Back in the room, I turned on the TV for Monday Night Football.
ESPN was one of the few channels in HD in the room, and it made for
some great game viewing. Unfortunately, I started to cough during
the game -- a lot. Time to go down to my car to get cough
drops. As I sucked on them, I was wondering how I was going to
fall asleep tonight. I didn’t wonder that much until the end of
the game, though, with Chicago beating Green Bay in a squeaker.
Somehow, I managed to fall asleep.
Top
Tuesday September 28
My sleep was OK, I figure; I wasn’t awakened by coughing
fits. But I did start to cough shortly after getting up.
Yes, I made the right decision to cancel the Dry Tortugas cruise
today. Now what to do today in its place? First, a
shower. Second, breakfast in the restaurant downstairs, where I
had a Belgian waffle and some sausage of uncertain flavor and
meat. It was OK, whatever it was.
Now I had taken my computer and my camera out to the car before
breakfast, as I saw no way to secure the computer in the room.
There was no in-room safe, and none of the furniture was suitable for
looping a security cable around. The camera, I’d use later for my event
of the day, or the early part thereof: renting a bike and riding around
the island. I rented it from a location right behind the hotel,
four hours for $11. The bike was a clunker: single-speed, coaster
brakes. I found the coaster brakes rather annoying during the
ride; my instincts were to reach for the hand brakes I normally have,
and I was unable to spin the pedals to my desired takeoff position from
stops. But I managed. After all, I did learn to ride on a
bike like that. I received a lock, in case I wanted to stop anywhere,
and I requested a helmet. From what I saw, most riders did not
request helmets.
My first destination was the end of Whitehead Street, location of the
famous marker for the Southernmost Point in the continental United
States. Now that wasn’t really the true southernmost point;
that’s on a private key not accessible to the public. The
farthest south point on Key West itself is either a pier or is on Navy
grounds and thus inaccessible to the public. So maybe they should
have painted on it, “This is as close as you’re going to get to the
southernmost point in the continental United States”. But there
wasn’t enough room for it. There was a line of people waiting to
have their picture taken with the marker; I didn’t get in line, as I
had no one who could take my picture. Instead, I waited for a gap
and took a picture of the marker by itself.
Next up, the Key West Lighthouse and Keeper’s House. I thought I
wanted to go up to the top of the lighthouse, but as I got a quarter of
the way up the narrow, spiral staircase, I had second thoughts and went
back down. It would have been difficult for people to pass me on
the stairs, I thought; no intermediate landings to step off and let
others pass. So I didn’t go up the stairs, but I did go through
the keeper’s house, briefly. Next, I set off on a tour around the
edge of the island on bike paths and roadways. This part of the
ride was into the wind, for the most part (east), so I got a good
workout. The road curved north, and I saw where US 1 enters and
leaves the island (I was just there yesterday!). Now I rode on
the north side of the island, stopping for a drink at McDonald’s as
well as a wipe-off with lots of napkins; it was a real humid day, and I
was really sweating. I made my way back to Old Town and Mallory
Square, where I noticed that a cruise ship had docked for the day: the
Majesty Of The Seas of the Royal Caribbean line. In a few days,
God, tropical weather, and cold willing, I’d be on my cruise, albeit on
the Disney Wonder. I sat for a while, then maneuvered my way back
onto the streets for more pedaling, including another journey to the
southernmost point.
I had until 1:35 or so to turn in the bike, but I had had enough and
seen enough by a little after 1, and so I dropped off the bike and went
back to the hotel, where I had a Gatorade by the pool. Then it
was back to the car to retrieve my computer and back to the room to
work on the travelogue, retrieve e-mail, and check the weather
forecast. The forecast turned out to be a bit concerning: a
tropical depression had formed in the western Caribbean and was
forecast to move northward towards Florida. A tropical storm
warning was now in effect. I might not be doing too much
tomorrow.... Nor might I be doing too much this afternoon, for
thunderstorms were rolling through the area. The only lunch I had
was of the liquid variety, and I was debating heading out for a late
lunch or early supper. But with active lightning, I wouldn’t be
heading anywhere. My umbrella was out in the car, and I would
want that if bad weather threatened.
Finally the storm let up, and I felt like going out for a meal. I
decided to walk up to the Hard Rock Cafe and have one of their burgers,
along with a Caesar salad as an appetizer and a piece of key lime pie
as dessert (I couldn’t be in the Keys and not have key lime pie).
I brought along my iPad to check on a few things, and the waiter asked
me how I liked it. Many waiters have asked me how I like it over
the months I’ve owned it. Back at the room, I decided to upload
photos as well as post a sunset picture to Facebook. But I didn’t
date it; I didn’t want to tip anyone who wasn’t a Facebook friend that
I wasn’t home. When I was tired of that, I lay down for a while
and had some coughing fits (not bad, just annoying). Later, I had
to wash off everything in one of my front pockets because four cough
drops had partially melted on me during the day.
When sunset time rolled around, I took a short visit to The Top, the
rooftop lounge. Noticing that the weather had improved and that
there was the possibility of a good sunset, I went back to my room for
my camera and returned to the Top. I took several pictures around
the hotel, as well as several of the sunset. Once again, the
actual sunset was obscured by clouds. With the potential for
tropical weather tomorrow, the chances of an excellent sunset seemed
dim. So back in the room, I downloaded tonight’s pictures,
continued to work on the travelogue, and read for a little while.
I even fooled around with the radio for a bit, but there wasn’t
anything I wanted to listen to.
Top
Wednesday September 29
I think I had a reasonably good night’s sleep, given that I still
had a cough. Things were on the down side for the cold, it
seemed. That boded well for the cruise on Sunday. But for
those who were cruising today, they might have been in for some rough
weather due to a tropical depression heading up to southeast
Florida. The forecast track had it crossing the Upper Keys,
meaning Key West might escape unscathed. Regardless, I was still
glad I was in Key West rather than back home in Michigan, where the
morning temperature was 50.
After taking a shower, I headed down to the hotel restaurant for
breakfast. Today, I chose to eat more lightly, just having a
bagel and some bacon. Then I went up to the room to brush, pick
up my camera bag, and head to lower Duval. I wanted to take one
of the narrated tour rides around Key West that I’d seen
yesterday. But which one? I ended up selecting the one
whose depot I found first, the Conch Tour Train. I bought my
ticket shortly after 9, meaning I had a half-hour wait until the next
train pulled out. When I arrived at the boarding point, it turned
out I was the only one who was going to be on the ride. I asked
the “engineer” (tour guide), Tommy, if he’d had that happen
before. Yes, it did happen occasionally. And so it was that
the two of us had the train to ourselves as we rode through the streets
of Old Town Key West, seeing some of the sights I’d already seen, but
also seeing some sights on side streets that I hadn’t seen. It
wasn’t always easy taking pictures due to bumpy streets and an
inability of the train to come to a complete stop for photo
opportunities (except if traffic lights or signs dictated a stop).
There were two stops on the tour, one at the depot and one at Flagler
Station. At the depot, I took a bathroom break and looked at the
gifts but saw nothing that really caught my attention. At Flagler
Station, the train picked up two additional riders! Shortly after
that, the ride was over, and I’d gotten my money’s worth. Next
stop, a visit to a store to buy some things. What I bought and
for whom can’t be told at this time; the secret must remain until after
Christmas 2010. Purchase complete, I went back to the hotel and
put what I bought in the back of my SUV. I also retrieved one of
the hats that I had in the car, the hat promoting
KevinDegenIsMyHero.org. Then it was off to the Hemingway House
down the street. The ticket clerk noticed my hat and asked about
it. I explained that Kevin Degen was a man born with cerebral
palsy and partial paralysis who didn’t let that keep him from riding
his bike for scores of miles at a stretch, or participating in
cross-country bike tours. He even carried the Olympic torch in
1996. Sadly, though, he had died nearly two months before in
August, not long after a serious accident on his trike. A foundation in
his honor was starting up, and my hat was promoting it.
Back to the Hemingway House: This had been the home of Ernest Hemingway
and his second wife Pauline during the 1930’s, and it was here that he
wrote several of his most-famous novels, including A Farewell To Arms,
For Whom The Bell Tolls, and To Have And Have Not. The house was
furnished like it was when he lived there, and we got to see nearly the
entire house, as well as his writing studio. We also saw a number
of cats on the grounds and in the buildings; many of these cats had six
toes on their paws. Six-toed cats were said by sailors to be good
luck, and Hemingway wanted to have as much good luck around him as
possible. The cats here were, for the most part, descended from
the first six-toed cat brought to the house by his sons.
Our guide also took us through the yard, which contained the largest
swimming pool in a private residence in Key West, built by his wife
while he was in Spain covering the Spanish Civil War and thus unable to
object to its construction. His revenge: giving her his last cent
(still buried and visible near the pool), and bringing a urinal from
the old Sloppy Joe’s and putting it near the pool. The urinal is
now part of a cat water delivery system. Speaking of the cats,
Hemingway gave them names of famous people, a practice still continued
today, for I saw Harry S. Truman (or should that be Hairy S. Truman?)
and Olivia de Havilland, among others. In a corner of the lawn
was a cat cemetery (if this had been the Stephen King house, they could
have called it a Pet Sematary), the final resting place for several
kitties.
At the conclusion of the tour, I visited the bookstore and felt the
urge to buy a Hemingway novel, preferably one written at the
house. I chose To Have And Have Not. By this time, it was
nearly time for lunch, and so I walked over to Duval Street and found a
Mexican place I’d seen from the Conch Tour Train, Salsa Loca. The
combination dinner of one taco, two enchiladas, rice and beans was
pretty good (filling, too). As I ate, I was watching a replay of
last night’s Orioles-Rays baseball game; Tampa Bay was winning.
Back at the hotel, I went to the room to drop off some stuff, but I
didn’t stay long, for housekeeping had not yet been by. I sat in
the lobby for a while before heading to my next tourist destination,
the Little White House. This used to be the commander’s home on
the Naval submarine base that used to be here, but President Truman
came here on the suggestion of Admiral Nimitz and the advice of his
doctors. He liked it so much, he came here frequently during his
terms in office, nearly 180 days in all. The house was furnished
as it was when he used it, so there were many items of his there,
including the piano that he played and the poker table where he and his
aides would play many a game. Pictures were not allowed inside
the building, unlike at the Hemingway House. Perhaps that was
because the building is still occasionally used by high government
officials. In 2001, Secretary of State Powell brought the
presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan here for peace negotiations.
More recently, Secretary of State Clinton visited and stayed with her
husband, the former president. The Truman grandchildren have been
known to stay there, as well (there are VIP suites in non-public areas
of the building).
After I left, I walked out through the grounds of the Westin resort
that was next door, found my way to Mallory Square and eventually
encountered the Blond Giraffe, purveyors of Key Lime pie. Yes, I
had a slice; yes, it was good. Then it was a short walk back to
the hotel. By this time, housekeeping had been by, and I laid
down to cool off and to rest for a bit. I also decided to go for
a swim. Yes, I was feeling well enough to consider doing that,
even though I still had the occasional cough. The pool was on the
warm side; it was definitely chilly out of the water with the
breeze. I think I swam for around 20 minutes before toweling off
and going to the room to change.
It was 5 o’clock, and that meant a tropical storm advisory would be
issued. Earlier in the day, a nearby tropical depression had
turned into Tropical Storm Nicole. But according to this
advisory, the storm had fizzled and had lost its tropical nature.
Southeastern Florida and the Upper Keys were getting rained on, but we
in Key West hardly got anything out of it. I got dressed and
ready for a walk in the neighborhood. I decided to walk to a
building I’d seen during the Conch Tour Train ride, for there was some
potentially interesting artwork there. It was some nine blocks
from the hotel. When I got there, I found that the artwork wasn’t
as interesting as it had seemed from the train. So back to the
hotel I went, but not without a detour into Fausto’s, a grocery store
near the hotel. It was a decent store, but there was nothing I
needed or wanted from there.
Now it was nearly suppertime; what to do, and where to go? I
decided to go to Wendy’s and get a Baja salad, which was all
right. Back to the room I went. As sunset approached, I
looked out the window and saw that the city was lit up. Perhaps
there would be a good sunset tonight, I thought. I got my camera
and went to The Top. It was more crowded up there tonight than
last night, but I still had a good vantage point. Everyone waited
and waited. Suddenly, a woman said that there was a double
rainbow on the other side of the hotel. Everyone dashed over to
the east side. Indeed there was a double rainbow. What’s
more, the main rainbow formed a full arc from ground to ground,
something I’ve rarely experienced, and never from that high up. I
took a number of pictures, when I wasn’t wiping off the lens due to the
rain that started up. It got heavier, so most folks went inside
the bar area for a while. Closer to sunset, it let up, and I went
back out. Once again, though, clouds prevented a clear shot at
sunset. A woman next to me said she’d heard December was the best
time to see clear sunsets and that September was the worst.
Back to the room I went. It was time for me to start packing, for
my next destination would be Orlando. I’d have another long drive
ahead of me tomorrow.
Top
Thursday September 30
I woke up around 5 this morning; I wouldn’t have minded sleeping a
little longer, but I couldn’t return to sleep. So I turned on the
Weather Channel to see what the day’s weather would bring. I also
checked my e-mail and did my final packing, for I would soon leave Key
West. By 7, I was out of the room and putting everything in the
car. I was sure I had checked everything and not left anything
behind; in retrospect, I shouldn’t have been so sure. More on
that later.
I didn’t want to hit the road without breakfast, and I enjoyed
yesterday’s breakfast of a toasted bagel and bacon, so I ordered that
at the hotel again. The bagel was still good, as was the
bacon. When I was finished, I went to the front desk to check
out, and then I got into my car and hit the road. I hadn’t moved
the car since arriving on Monday night; I hadn’t had to. I took
US 1 all the way out of town, noticing that there was a traffic jam
heading into town. There wasn’t one heading out of town, though.
The drive up the Overseas Highway was uneventful, apart from the
occasional school zone. I stopped for gas in Marathon; I stopped
for a bathroom break at a waterfront park a few miles east, at the
place where I’d stopped to take pictures on Monday, in fact (or on the
other side of the road from there). I flipped around the radio
dial, at times listening to KONK-AM, at other times listening to the
60’s on 6 on satellite radio.
Some three hours after I left the hotel, I was out of the Keys and
heading north on Florida’s Turnpike. The drive there was
uneventful, other than the huge numbers of lovebugs that smashed
themselves on my windshield the farther north I drove. There were
hardly any around Miami, but there were a lot between West Palm Beach
and Orlando. They were so bad, the service plazas had special
windshield washers for cars and trucks. I took advantage of those
on a couple of occasions. Around noon, I stopped for lunch and
had a couple of slices of pizza. By 4 o’clock, I had arrived in
Orlando and checked in at the Hampton Inn.
The room seemed to be nice at first, and it was, for the most
part. But there were problems. The bathroom was optimized
for someone in a wheelchair, thus there wasn’t a big counter where I
could put my toiletry bag with all of my medicines. I had to put
that bag on the toilet, not the optimum location. The top drawer
on the dresser didn’t want to stay closed; I eventually had to tape it
closed. One of the lamps appeared to have a burned-out
bulb. The deadbolt on the door wouldn’t fully engage unless I
lifted the door.
Now my nephew’s birthday was coming up, and I still needed to get his
birthday present. So I drove up a few blocks to the Florida
Mall. Fortunately, the Toys R Us had just what I was looking
for. And when I drove around the mall and saw a nearby Target,
that had what I was looking for in the way of mailing materials.
By this time, I was hungry, so I stopped for dinner at
Carrabba’s. Unlike on Sunday, I had chicken marsala instead of
chicken gratella, and I didn’t have any soup (they weren’t offering the
lentil and sausage soup, else I would have had some of that). On
the way back to the hotel, I stopped at a small strip mall that
contained a Best Buy and a Barnes & Noble. The Best Buy
didn’t have what I was looking for; the Barnes & Noble had quite a
bit of what I was looking for, and a few things I didn’t know I was
looking for. Some of what I got would make good reading material
on the cruise, while some of it would be left in the car at the
terminal.
Back in my hotel room, I dug out my toilet bag to get the medicines I
needed to take at that time of day. But there was a problem: one
of my medicines was missing! I had to have left it back in Key
West. It was too far away to consider driving back to retrieve it
myself. I called the hotel, but the lost & found manager was
gone for the day. I left a message for him or her to call me
tomorrow on my cell phone. Now would they be able to ship the
medicine to me here in Orlando -- assuming of course that they did have
it? If they couldn’t get it to me by Saturday, then it would miss me,
for I’d be on the cruise. Might as well mail it home.
Fortunately, I did have a few days’ supply at home. But I was
looking at up to a week of being off of the medicine. Now if I had not
been going on the cruise in a few days, some more options would have
been available to me. I could have a relative mail me the medicine from
home, or I could have called my doctor in Michigan and asked for an
emergency prescription. And if I’d inspected my bags more closely
and not confused one container for another, I’d have realized my error
before I ever checked out.
Top
Friday October 1
I was still waking up around 5:30 for the day. I took my time
getting started, watching the Weather Channel, reading some from the
latest installment of The Complete Peanuts (the volume I got last night
was 1977-78; the clerk at the store said he once had a family from
Brazil come in and buy all of the available volumes at a single time),
and taking my medicine -- well, except for the one that was left in Key
West. I turned on the phone to await a message from the hotel
lost and found manager.
Around 7:30, I went out to the lobby for breakfast. The Hampton
Inn breakfast bar was pretty popular this morning. I had a mix of
items - cereal, yogurt, toasted bagel, and a danish. The TV in
the lobby had on the local cable news channel, but I wasn’t paying
attention to it; instead, I was reading the USA Today that had been
left at my door. That paper would help stuff the box I was about
to mail overseas to my sister (my nephew’s birthday present).
Back in the room, I found where the nearest post office was; it wasn’t
very far from the hotel at all, as it turned out, maybe 2 miles or
so. I also wrote down the address of AES, an amateur radio dealer
in town (actually, they’re a national vendor, and Orlando has one of
their four stores).
Around 9, I set off for the post office. It wasn’t the easiest to
find because it wasn’t well marked from the outside - no sign on the
street, and the building signs faced the direction opposite of the way
I was going. But I found it, found out which customs declaration
form I could use for the package (the small and simple green one) and
mailed it. Then I used my TomTom GPS to direct me to the AES
store. One route it suggested involved a tollway; I didn’t want
that, so it gave me a way that didn’t need one. As I drove along,
I thought that the neighborhoods of Orlando I was going through
reminded me of Pasadena, Texas to some extent; I wasn’t sure why.
Later on, I drove through an area with a lot of Vietnamese stores; that
definitely did not remind me of Pasadena. The AES store was
located near the Orlando Executive Airport, a small airfield close to
downtown. Much of the stock was locked up, but antennas and books
were accessible. I found an antenna that had tri-band capability:
2 meters, 220 MHz and 440 MHz. Such an antenna would be useful on
my car because the Ford Amateur Radio League operates repeaters on all
three bands (my current antenna lacks 220 MHz capability). I
bought that antenna. A few minutes later, I was visiting a Barnes
& Noble down the street and found a couple of more books there that
I didn’t see last night, including one on paved bike trails in
Florida. Perhaps on a future visit, I will bring a bike or trike
of my own down. Then it was off to Downtown Disney. As I
drove, I passed by the new Amway Center downtown, which officially
opened today. The Orlando Magic will play there when the NBA
season begins in a few weeks.
It turned out that Disney World was quite some distance from downtown
Orlando; no wonder I never remembered seeing downtown Orlando on my
first visit to the area in 2000. But there was a lot that seemed
familiar as I drove onto WDW grounds and found my way to Downtown
Disney, parking near the World of Disney. I didn’t go into that
store right away; I wanted to save it for later, for the end of my
visit. And so I walked around and saw several different stores
and restaurants. Some seemed familiar from 10 years ago, but
others were new. By this time, the sun was out, it was warm out,
and I was getting hungry, and so I stopped for lunch at
Portobello. You might think it strange for me to be eating at an
Italian restaurant again so soon (Carrabba’s last night), but I had had
chicken there, no pasta. Today, I would have pasta, spaghetti
with meatballs to be exact, a very good house salad, and bread with
roasted garlic. Yum yum!
Now I was ready to visit the World of Disney. My main goal was to
find some shirts, preferable Hawaiian-style. I’d brought a couple
down with me that turned out not to fit as well as I thought.
Unfortunately, this was the wrong time of the year for Hawaiian shirts,
as what was on display tended to be a bit heavier -- great for back
home, not so great for cruising in a couple of days. I did get a
couple of hats, though, including a gag hat of Donald Duck’s bottom
half: all white with two webbed feet at the top. The DA haircut
was the rage in the 50’s, and now here I was about to wear a DA of a
slightly different sort. As I left the World of Disney, there was
a parade taking place: the Disney Princess Parade, where several young
girls dressed in varying levels of princess apparel were being led down
the main “street” of Downtown. It would be a great photo
opportunity if your daughter or relative were part of the parade.
On the way out of Downtown Disney, I noticed an outlet mall right off
the freeway. This would have been the Orlando Premium
Outlets. Perhaps I could find some Hawaiian-style shirts there, I
thought. So after a stop at a 7-Eleven for a bottle of Diet Dr
Pepper Cherry, I made my way to that outlet mall. The route had
me passing by Sea World and its associated parks. The outlet mall
was doing a good business today; I didn’t find the shirts, but I did
find a new pair of Crocs sandals to potentially replace the ones I was
wearing. Then it was back to the hotel to drop things off and
rest up.
Now all through the day, I’d kept my phone turned on for a call back
from the Key West hotel lost and found manager. I never heard
back from them, so I called back and left a message. Well, I
still never heard back from them. That’s poor service. When
I left a book in a California hotel earlier this year, they responded
and mailed back the book right away. Now there is a possibility
that the hotel has or will mail the prescription back to my home
address, which they have on file; I wouldn’t know until I got home.
In the late afternoon, I went back out again, taking the opportunity to
wear my new Crocs sandals. My first destination was Clear Lake
Park, several miles north of the hotel. Yes, there is a Clear
Lake in Orlando, and there is a Clear Lake Park. As I drove up
toward the park, I noticed that the neighborhood appeared to be
lower-middle-class economically, and its residents were minorities, for
the most part. I saw no need to get out of the car at the park;
all I wanted was a picture of the sign. It was obvious that this
Clear Lake Park was nothing like the Clear Lake Park I grew up
with. The same was true with the lake. But I did notice a
Seabrook Street near the park.
Then I drove back down to the Florida Mall to wander around, have
dinner, and see what there was to see. I did get a button repair
kit from the As Seen On TV store; the kit would help with the shorts
that lost a button. I visited the Apple Store but saw nothing I
needed to get right away. I saw some Tommy Bahama shirts at
Nordstorm that were too high in price and too small in fit. I had
an unorthodox meal at Ruby Tuesday: an appetizer sampler plate and the
salad bar, for I wasn’t in the mood for a regular meal (and I still
couldn’t finish it all). I went inside the Florida Hotel that was
attached to the mall, seeing if it would be worthy of a stay in the
future (maybe). Unfortunately, I also aggravated a sore spot on
my left foot where something had been rubbing. The new sandals
didn’t cause the sore, but they were aggravating it. I ended up
taking a handkerchief from my pocket and sticking it between the shoe
and my foot. It had to look funny, but I wasn’t feeling pain with
every step. The hotel was a short drive away, fortunately.
Top
Saturday October 2
Once again, I woke around 5:30 and took my time getting
ready. This morning, I took a shower to get ready for the day
ahead. By 7:30, I was out in the lobby having breakfast; today, I
made a waffle and had some yogurt with it. Now when I grabbed a
container of syrup and opened it, I found I had actually taken a
container of peanut butter. I didn’t know how that would be on a
waffle, nor did I care to find out, and so I went back for syrup -- not
too much, just enough.
Because of the sore on my foot, I decided to wear the nicest pair of
shoes I had -- the only closed shoes I had, for I needed to wear
socks. I may have been a tad overdressed for vacation, but so
what? I didn’t want my feet to hurt. Now what was I going
to do today? I really wanted to go back to Weeki Wachee Springs
to ride on the river cruise, which I was unable to do last Sunday, and
to improve on my pictures from the mermaid theater shows, as too many
of those were out of focus for my liking. And so I made the
2-hour drive back to the west side of the state following the same
route I had on Sunday, slightly modified to account for my different
starting location.
As I drove up the Florida Turnpike, down I-75 and over on Highway 50, I
was listening to the Underground Garage on Sirius XM, and the music was
great today. To be honest, it almost always is great on that
channel. By 10:45, I was back at Weeki Wachee, in time for the
first show of the day. For this show, I sat on the opposite of
the theater from where I had sat on Sunday. Then, I was stage
left; today, I was stage right. I was still in the front row,
though. There was a couple sitting next to me today, there as part of a
seniors group, possibly a seniors singles group; we had a bit of a talk
before the show began.
Since this was earlier in the morning than on my previous visit, there
were times when I could see the sun shining through the very top of the
window, where there was a slight gap between the waterline and the
window top. The sun was bright and could be a bit annoying, but
it didn’t take long for it to rise and be blocked by an awning.
It didn’t bother me during the mermaid show, which was The Little
Mermaid again. The performers were not the same ones that I saw
last Sunday, but that didn’t matter in the least. What did matter
to me was trying to figure out how to keep pictures in focus. Did
temporarily going to manual focus work? Not very well. What
seemed to work well was setting the camera on continuous mode, where it
would take pictures for as long as I kept the shutter button
down. That mode worked well for getting dolphin pictures in
California, and it ended up working well for getting mermaid pictures
in Florida.
When the show ended, many of the attendees headed for the landing for
the river cruise. I was one of them, for I’d missed my
opportunity last Sunday. I wouldn’t miss it today, though, as
there was a boat waiting at the dock, and there was plenty of room on
board. Maximum capacity was 35, and it soon filled up. The
trip took us fifteen minutes downriver from the spring, leading to a
30-minute round trip. The water was nearly crystal-clear, making
it easy to see the sandy bottom, the plants growing on the bottom, and
the fish that darted here and there. At one point, we saw a heron
and a raccoon together on the riverbank; the raccoon seemed to have
designs on whatever the heron was looking for. Off in the
distance, we could see a bald eagle nest. As we headed back to
the dock, we encountered a number of kayakers, some of whom came close
to running into the boat. Fortunately, everyone was alert, and
there were no disasters.
When the cruise was over, it was ten after noon. According to the
schedule handed out at the ticket booth, the second mermaid show
started at 12:30, so I made my way over to the entrance. Quite a
group had gathered by 12:30 when one of the mermaid hostesses came over
and told us the next show would actually start at 1, a half-hour later
than what the schedule said. Not wanting to stand around in the
sun for another half-hour, we went elsewhere. I went over to the
snack bar and had lunch, a reasonable thing to do at 12:30 in the
afternoon. I got a burger, which was edible. Of course, you
didn’t go there for the food.
The meal had lasted a half-hour, and when I finished, I headed back
over to the theater for the second show. I sat on stage left,
second row. Why not front row? I would have been too close to
pillars or posts blocking my view, that’s why. While I waited for
the show to begin, I couldn’t help but notice the cute cat video
playing on the iPhone belong to the folks in the front row. At 1,
the show began. It was Fish Tales again, the historical
spectacular. Once again, I used continuous mode to capture
several photographs with one press of the shutter.
When the show ended, I went out by the doors that led to the spring
view area. As I looked out over the spring, I saw one of the
mermaid performers exiting the spring by one of the two ladders in the
spring. Normally, they exit via a tube that lets them swim to
their dressing area. This one was not wearing a tail, otherwise
it wouldn’t have been possible for her to use the ladder. The
Buccaneer Bay recreation area on the other side of the spring was quiet
today, unlike last Sunday. That was because its season had ended
last Sunday. Perhaps I might like to visit in the summer when
Buccaneer Bay was open.
Driving back to Orlando, I decided to stay on Highway 50 most of the
way, wondering if there was a reason why the GPS directed me away from
this route. It was a usable route, but it did go through a few
towns, which helped slow me up a bit. It took around two hours to
get back to Orlando, I figure. Once Highway 50 reached the Turnpike, I
got onto it and headed back to the hotel, but not before stopping at a
service plaza for a bag of popcorn and a bottle of pop for later
snacking. The Michigan State-Wisconsin game was about to begin; I
had it on the radio, but I got back to the hotel shortly after
kickoff. ESPN was carrying the game, so I put that on the TV as I
downloaded my pictures. I’d taken close to 700 pictures
today! Some were better than others, to be sure. As for the
game, that was a close one for most of the day. Michigan State
ended up winning by 10 points -- hurray!
With the game over, what did I want to do for supper? I had a
desire to go to Fuddrucker’s, for I’d seen one yesterday. The
location closest to me was not the one I saw yesterday, though; that
was down by Disney, whereas the closer one was over by Universal.
I set off for that one, but along the way, I noticed a Sweet Tomatoes
on a corner. That’s the salad bar buffet popular in California
and Illinois. Now I could go to Fuddruckers any time I wanted in
Michigan; not so with Sweet Tomatoes, though, so I changed my plans and
went to Sweet Tomatoes instead. I took full advantage of the food
selection: the salad bar, the soup bar, breads, pasta, etc. Back at the
hotel, I watched Alabama soundly thrash Florida, read some more of the
Complete Peanuts 1977-78 and called it a night.
Top
Sunday October 3
My sleep was interrupted by noises outside around 3 or so; I don’t
know if they were outside in the hall or outside in the pool
area. Then I saw an occasional flash from a light. It was
the lamp next to the right side of the bed, the one that hasn’t
worked. I guess the bulb wasn’t burned out after all; the plug
was behind the bed, and the mattress must have been pushing it and
making for a bad connection.
When I got up for good, it was after 6. It was time to pack in
earnest, for today I would be leaving Orlando. Today I would be
heading for Port Canaveral. Today I would be taking my first
cruise! My carryon bag would serve as my day bag, carrying the
essentials until my suitcase was delivered to my stateroom. It
had the potential to be a heavy bag, because among those essentials
would be MacBook, iPad and camera, along with some clothes. At
7:15, I went for breakfast and had a mixture of items: cereal, yogurt,
a small quantity of scrambled eggs, two sausages (turkey, I think) and
a muffin. Next meal, on board the Disney Wonder!
The hotel Internet access was getting flaky for some reason, and so I
switched over to my MiFi access. It got the job done. And
so, I continued to pack and prepare, while mostly waiting for my chance
to depart in a not-too-early manner. I finished reading the
Complete Peanuts 1977-78; that could stay in the car and not go with me
on the cruise. So could a number of books I’d picked up, in
fact. I took one of my jackets that I’d put inside the suitcase
and put it back in the car; I didn’t think I’d need it on board.
I had two others, a yellow windbreaker and my nice sport jacket.
By 9:20, I was ready to leave. But I didn’t actually leave until after
9:30, at which time I drove to Target to look for small travel sizes of
deodorant and sunscreen, thinking I’d have to comply with airline
security rules. I also looked for bandages or something for my
feet, but I didn’t see anything that was suitable. Then I hit the
road for Port Canaveral.
As I drove along, I noticed a funny feeling in my mouth or
throat. I wasn’t getting another sore throat, was I? I
hoped not. It didn’t seem too bad, not then. And so I
wasn’t very concerned. In retrospect, though, I should have been
quite concerned.
The Beachline (formerly Beeline) Expressway wasn’t busy at all and by
10:30, I was in the Port Canaveral area. But it was too early to
check in, so I continued onward. I’d been listening to Breakfast
with the Beatles and a little bit of American Top 40 on the way in, and
I continued to do so as I drove onward on Highway 528. Off in the
distance to the north, I could see the Vehicle Assembly Building at the
Kennedy Space Center. Eventually, I could see three cruise ships
in port, and one of them was the Disney Wonder. I’d be boarding
her real soon -- but not yet. No, I continued driving south to
Cocoa Beach. Since I had the time, I wanted to visit the famous
Ron Jon Surf Shop. I also wanted to look for a pair of swimming
goggles, which might prove useful in the ship’s pools and
elsewhere. It took me a little while, but I found where the
goggles were (upstairs) and bought a pair. That business taken
care of, I took a couple of pictures out front, and then I started
north, back toward the port.
After a rather circuitous route where I had to keep aware of which
cruise line I was heading for, I found my way to the parking lot for
Disney. I got my card/ticket and found a spot close to the
terminal. When I made my way to the entry, there apparently was a
place to check in luggage -- but I didn’t see it, and so I went through
the security with a full-sized suitcase. What’s more, it did fit
in the scanner -- just barely, but it fit! It turned out that I
didn’t need to limit my liquid volumes or put them in a clear
bag. I took the elevator up and checked in. When I checked
in, I had to sign a form confirming that within the last 72 hours, I
had not had cold symptoms in conjunction with a fever. And that
was true, to my knowledge; any fever I’d had was several days ago, and
so I had no qualms signing it. I got my Key to the World card (my ship
ID), my boarding pass (group 15), today’s Personal Navigator (what was
taking place every day on board), and an invitation to have a seat
while I waited to board. My having the suitcase wouldn’t be much
of a problem; I could just leave it outside of my stateroom until the
stateroom was ready at 1:30. And so, after a trip to the
restroom, I sat down near a TV monitor showing Mickey Mouse cartoons
(of course) and waited. There was a photo opportunity with Mickey
and (later on) Minnie that drew quite a line.
My Key to the World card explained that I’d be eating at the second
seating, at 8:15 PM every night. That would be a bit later than
normal for me, but I understood that that was the seating more oriented
toward those traveling without children. There was a code APPT
that I surmised was the sequence of restaurants in which I’d be eating:
Animator’s Palate, Parrot Cay twice, then Triton’s.
While I waited, I looked over the Personal Navigator to see what was on
tap for today. There was quite a bit on tap, including the Adventures
Away departure ceremony, The Golden Mickeys show in the Walt Disney
Theater, football in the Diversions sports bar, etc. I filed it
away for later use and took out my MacBook to work on the
travelogue. Every few minutes, I heard the boarding
announcements: those with boarding pass numbers 2 through 7 may proceed
to boarding. My pass number was 15, so I had a while to
wait. Eventually, though, my number was called, and I proceeded
to board. There was an opportunity to take a pre-departure
picture, but I passed on it. A turn to the right, and I was on
board. I was even announced on board (with reluctance on my part;
they didn’t really need to bother). When I boarded, I was on deck
3, midship. Now I had started toward my stateroom, thinking about
leaving my suitcase outside of it, but I ended up going to the 9th deck
and Beach Blanket Buffet.
It wasn’t easy to go through a buffet line with a rolling suitcase and
a carryon, but I did. I selected a few items - salad, a little
pasta, a little rice, some grilled salmon, etc. and tried to find a
seat. Outside on the deck looked appealing, but there was a
problem: raised barriers near the doors, making it hard to navigate
with both suitcases and food tray. A server saw my difficulty and
offered to take my tray, an offer I graciously accepted. And so
it was that I sat at the stern and had my first onboard meal -- and a
good meal it was!
By this time, it was after 1:30; my stateroom would be ready. So
I went down to deck 5 and found stateroom 5626. Compared to other
hotel rooms I’ve been in, it was on the small side (although I’d say
Microtel rooms were smaller), but there was a decent amount of room for
myself. I started to unpack everything, putting shirts and
jackets in the closet, other items in the dressers, etc. I got
out my Canon camera and my camera bag and prepared to tour the
ship. With the nice weather, there would be plenty of photo
opportunities all over, especially of the surrounding area from deck
10, the highest deck accessible by adults (deck 11 featured a club for
teens). The Kennedy Space Center and some of the Cape Canaveral
range were easily visible; I could see the Vehicle Assembly Building
and one of the Shuttle pads. I could see Cocoa Beach and the
Beachline Expressway. I could see the two other ships in port,
the Carnival Sensation and Royal Caribbean’s Freedom of the Seas.
After walking around deck 10, I found my way to Diversions, the sports
bar on Deck 3. It was part of the Route 66 entertainment
area. This afternoon, it would be carrying NFL football.
The main games on in there turned out to be Denver at Tennesee and
Cincinnati vs. Cleveland. The Lions were playing Green Bay and
were losing every time I saw the score (they ended up losing by 2
points). I nibbled on some of the snack food they had there,
knowing that my dinner seating would be late.
It was nearing 3:30. At 4 o’clock, there would be a mandatory
safety drill, where everyone was to don their life jackets and assemble
at their designated area. For my cabin, the designated area was
area Q, inside the Animator’s Palate restaurant. The drill went
off well with little trouble, and I went back to my cabin at its
conclusion. But before I took off the life jacket, I took a
picture of me wearing it, using the mirror to help out. With the
life jacket returned to the closet, I went to deck 9 for the Adventures
Away celebration, our sendoff party and the official start of the
cruise.
There was already a big crowd there when I arrived. The emcee
encouraged everyone to sing along and dance along; many did, but not
everyone (I didn’t). Eventually, Mickey, Minnie, Chip & Dale,
Goofy, Pluto and Donald made appearances; of course, they were
well-received. And during the celebration, we were asked to count
down: 10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1-hooray! With streamers flying, the
cruise had officially begun. And a few minutes later, I thought I
could see and feel a little bit of motion. I didn’t stay for the
whole celebration; I went off toward the stern. We weren’t moving
at that point, but while I was back there, I did notice some definite
forward motion. We were definitely under way!
Ahead of us in the channel was the Royal Caribbean ship Freedom of the
Seas. They were leading us out into the ocean, it seemed.
As we passed by the banks of the shore, we waved to those out there,
and for the most part they waved back. Soon we passed the end of
the channel, and we were in the ocean. I was busy with my camera
as we headed out. The ship ahead of us made a nice subject, as
did the Carnival ship as it followed us out of the channel.
After a trip down to Diversions and the retail stores, I went back up
to deck 10 to try to take pictures of the sunset. Unlike down in
Key West, there was hardly a cloud in the sky to interfere with the
sunset, and I got the entire sunset, from first contact to last.
This, I would have to post to Facebook. Back in the room, I
downloaded all of the pictures I’d taken today to iPhoto and started to
identify them. That took me to 8 o’clock. And now it was
time for dinner.
There was a long line outside the Animator’s Palate, where my dinner
would be tonight. Once the restaurant opened, though, the line
moved fairly quickly, and I was soon taken to my table, #42.
There would be one other diner at my table, Lynn or Lynne from east of
Cleveland. Like me, she was a solo traveler, and so we’d been
paired up for dinners. This wasn’t her first cruise altogether,
unlike me; she’d been on a couple on the west coast. Now the dinner
arrangements were unusual: we would rotate among the restaurants during
the cruise, visiting all of them. We’d sit with the same
individuals, and we’d be served by the same waiters. Dinner for
me this evening was a mushroom risotto, baked potato and cheese soup,
and pennette pasta, with apple crumble for dessert. Everything
was good.
I haven’t mentioned anything about the restaurant itself. As one might
expect from the name “Animator’s Palate”, the theme of the restaurant
was animation. Initially, the decor of the restaurant was black
and white. As the meal progressed, some of the drawings became
fully realized in color.
After dinner, I went back up to deck 10 to see what stars could be
seen. Quite a few could be seen, although the deck lights were a
bit bright for my liking. Perhaps I should have brought some star
charts on my iPad; I’d have to remember that for future nights.
As I walked around, I saw that the Chicago-New York Giants game was
being carried on the big screen TV at the midship pool, and I watched
it there for a while, at least until the display malfunctioned.
Then I went back to the room and worked on this travelogue while also
watching the game. ESPN was carrying it (must have been an
international ESPN, because this was NBC’s game in the US).
As I walked through the ship, and as I sat in my stateroom, I could
definitely detect a slight rolling motion to the ship. It made it
hard sometimes to keep a straight line. Seas were fairly smooth,
which meant the rocking would not have been too bad, and it
wasn’t. That was all right by me.
Top
Monday October 4
It seemed my cold returned with a vengeance, for I had a
terrible night. I was really goopy, and there were times I felt
like I would barf from post-nasal drip. Fortunately, it never got
to that point. But I had a very hard time falling asleep.
At one point, I pulled out a jacket from my closet and put that on, as
the covers on the bed didn’t keep me warm enough. I turned on the
TV and flipped around the channels, finally settling on the Pixar
channel, where I caught the last half of Cars. It is still a good
movie, and Cars 2 is supposed to be arriving next summer. In
retrospect, if this had happened 24 hours earlier, then I don’t believe
I would have been allowed to board the ship. Also in retrospect,
it seemed like I’d actually come down with a second cold before being
completely over the first one.
Eventually, I believe I did get some sleep, and I got up for good
around 6. Now I felt I was in dire need of a shower, and so I
took one this morning. There were no signs encouraging one to
take the shower in the style of the Navy (i.e., run the water briefly,
lather up all over, then rinse), and so I didn’t. The soap and
shampoo were rather upscale, coming from H2O+. So what, as long
as I got clean. And as I dried off, I decided that I would bite
the bullet and buy some Internet access. With my cold flaring up
again, I thought I’d use more than I might otherwise, and so I got 200
minutes of access for $75. That is not cheap! But it might
be for satellite rates. And thus I checked e-mails, wrote one of
my own to relatives, and sent out one of my sunset pictures from last
night. I uploaded that one to Facebook, as well.
There would be no corresponding opportunity for sunrise pictures this
morning, for it was overcast as we approached Nassau. When 7:30
rolled around, I went up to Beach Blanket Buffet for breakfast,
bringing along my iPad to read some eBooks. Mickey Waffles were
on the menu today, but I passed on those. I did have some
oatmeal, yogurt, smoked salmon, some cheese, a breakfast burrito, and a
croissant. The buffet reminded me a little bit of the breakfast
buffets in Israel, but there was one big difference: this buffet served
bacon and sausage, definitely not kosher. I ate inside this
morning, not feeling like eating on the deck. One of the
waitstaff noticed my iPad and asked me about it. Many waiters
have asked me about the iPad, in fact.
Back in the room, I collected my laundry (actually, I’d already put it
in a laundry bag) and set out for the launderette (British for
laundromat) on the 6th deck. I ended up going down the wrong
aisle to get there, but I eventually found it. Now I was washing
mainly underwear, handkerchiefs, a pair of pants, some pairs of socks,
and at least one shirt. Detergent, fabric softener and bleach
cost a dollar each; a wash was $2, and a dry was also $2. I got
some detergent, loaded up a washer, and went back to my room for 25
minutes, the length of a cycle. While there, I did some
travelogue work. Turned out I went back to the laundry room a
little early, and so I had to wait while the cycle ended. Once it
did, though, I loaded the dryer, paid for it, started it up, and then
wandered around for 25 minutes or so (the full cycle was 45
minutes). We were pulling into Nassau around this time, and so I
went up to deck 9 to watch the process. I’d seen some of our
arrival from my verandah; one of the hotels I noticed was the Nassau
Hilton. Not the Nassau Bay Hilton, the Nassau Hilton. The
two hotels looked nothing alike. Back to our berthing: ahead, I
could see the famous Atlantis resort standing apart from the main
city. I could see dock workers pulling in the lines that would
hold the ship to the dock.
Around 25 minutes after I’d started the dryer, I went back to check on
my clothes. They were, in fact, quite dry, and so I folded them
and brought them back to my stateroom, which was in the process of
being cleaned. The attendant, Ron, had no problem with my
dropping off the clothes.
By this time, the gangway had been brought up, and people could leave
the ship. Everyone leaving the ship had to go to level 1
forward. There, you had to show your Key to the World card and
(for adults) photo ID to leave. I did so, and I was officially on
the ground in the Bahamas. Now I didn’t have anything planned for
today, nor did I really want to do anything, not with the cold coming
back in force. So all I did was stay at the dock area, not even
adventuring past the welcoming center. Many folks wanted to offer
me a cab ride somewhere; I declined all offers. All I did was to
take some pictures from the dock area, including a cute setting on the
stern: Donald Duck is painting the boat, while one of his nephews (no
way to tell if it was Huey, Dewey or Louie) was going to cut one of the
ropes holding Uncle Donald up. Bad idea, boys!
When I boarded again, I had to show my Key to the World pass and photo
ID, and I also had to pass through a metal detector as well as empty my
pockets. Once I did that, I was back on board. I made my
way back to my cabin, which was where I figured to spend a good chunk
of the day. I didn’t think I was contagious again, unless the
flareup of the cold was actually a separate one from the first.
Still, I didn’t really feel like doing much else at that time.
And so I stayed in the room, doing a bit of reading, doing a bit of
computer work, doing too much of blowing my nose. I could hear
the wind really kicking up outside. Those hoping for a sunny day
at the beach were bound to be disappointed.
For a change, I decided to go to the fitness center in the spa area and
ride an exercise bike. I got four miles in before calling it; I
could certainly do far more than that, but exercise biking is not as
exciting as real biking. The fitness center had some good
equipment and a great view from the deck 9 bow. There weren’t too
many people using it at that time, which was all right with me.
After I was done there, I went back to my cabin for a while, and then I
went back to Beach Blanket Buffet for lunch. It seems like I had
a little bit of everything today (no soup, though), leading to a very
crowded plate. I went outside to sit, but it started to
rain. Even with a roof over my head, enough rain was blown in
underneath it that I was getting soaked, and so I scurried inside and
found a table.
As I was about to go for some dessert, somebody sitting in an adjacent
table asked me about my iPad. I was telling him about it, but as
I did so, a server started to clear my table. I didn’t have a lot
of food left on my plate, but I was by no means done. I stopped
her, and then I continued talking about my iPad. I went over to
the dessert area and picked up a chocolate chip cookie. When I
got back to my table, though, I found that someone else had cleared my
food away. I was not happy about that, and I let a server know in
no uncertain terms. Then it was back to the room to more or less
take it easy for the afternoon.
As evening approached, I felt a little chilled (sure hope that wasn’t a
fever!), so I decided to take another shower. That warm water
felt good on me. It was dress-up night tonight on board, and so I
put on fancier clothes. They weren’t much different than my
regular work clothes except that I wore my sport jacket as well.
I went down to Diversions briefly, mainly to get a hot dog (I needed a
little something to tide me over before late dinner). After that,
I was feeling a bit warm, so I did go back to the room briefly.
The lobby was set up with camera stations for families to have their
pictures taken; they were in between sessions at the moment I went
past. It seemed to me that most people had taken the suggested
attire recommendations. It wasn’t designated formal night, so I
didn’t see anyone in tuxes or elaborate evening gowns.
8 o’clock rolled around: time to get in line for 8:15 dinner at Parrot
Cay, the Caribbean-themed restaurant on board. I was closer to
the front of the line this evening. The restaurant opened
slightly early, and the big rush started to get inside. When I
arrived, my tablemate Lynn(e) was already there. She’d briefly
gone into Nassau to see some of the shops but wasn’t impressed; they
broke down into two categories, the T-shirt shops and the Rolex shops,
and she wasn’t into either. Her pocketbook stayed closed.
She made it farther out than I did, for as I’d said earlier, I didn’t
even leave the port terminal. Back to dinner: Everything on the
menu was supposed to have a Caribbean theme, and I guess you could say
that it did. I had as an appetizer some Martinique crab meat dip,
a cold soup of mango and papaya (good, as was the crab meat dip) and a
ribeye steak. The servings of corn on the cob were cut so that
you could hold them between your thumb and index finger on one hand --
a bite wide, effectively. I didn’t recall seeing that
presentation before. It was rather convenient, actually.
Parrot Cay seemed to be a noisier restaurant than Animator’s Palate; I
wasn’t sure why that was. One of the contributors came toward the
end of the meal, as a very noticeable vibration and rattle
started. The engines had started, it seemed. And
eventually, we were moving forward, out of the channel and away from
Nassau, towards Castaway Cay. Now there were a number of
activities that one could still participate in during the evening
hours, but with my nose clogged as it was, I thought I should head back
to my room. Monday Night Football awaited, as did another attempt
to check e-mail via the satellite connection. Once again, I could
not log on. I felt myself falling asleep waiting for the login to
proceed. That wasn’t a good sign, so I closed up the laptop for
the evening. I didn’t want to burn up all of my time while I
snoozed.
An Aside: On-Board Television
Yes, one could indeed watch television in the staterooms on board
ship. The channels seemed to be grouped into various natural
categories. First came the status channels and news
channels. The Program Guide channel listed all of the channels
and carried all shipboard announcements. One channel had a fixed
view from the bridge; watchers could see what the captain saw off the
bow. At least they could during the day; at night, it would be
pitch black, and so the channel went to a loop of astronomical artwork
and classical music. One channel had a continual report from the
bridge, giving key information such as shipboard time, position,
distance sailed from home port and last port visited, distance to next
port, windspeed, direction, and relative direction to the ship, and
wave height. A related channel had the ship’s projected and
actual course plotted on a map. Next came HLN and CNN, followed
by a special event channel. This channel carried key sports
events on international versions of ESPN that were not on ESPN in the
US.
Next came the Disney Channel (of course), WABC-TV for ABC network
programming (the remainder of its schedule was blacked out), ESPN and
ESPN2. There were several channels that promoted port adventures,
the Disney Vacation Club, Disney Adventures, etc. A number of
channels aired movies that had been in theaters a few months back; on
this cruise, the movies included the remake of “The Karate Kid”, the
latest in the Shrek series, “Iron Man 2”, and “Nanny McPhee Returns”.
One channel had a loop of classic Disney shorts, for those who needed a
Mickey fix, a Donald fix, etc. I saw that one of the Goofy shorts
was made within the last few years; it dealt with setting up your home
theater, in the vein of classic Goofy cartoons on how to ski, how to
play baseball, etc. One channel ran classic Disney animated films,
while another aired more recent Disney animated films. There was
a separate channel for Pixar’s films and yet another channel for Disney
live-action films. Sitcoms had their own channel, as did older
ABC programs (whenever I tuned in, it always seemed to carry “Lost”)
and ABC Family shows. Oh, yes, there was also a channel that
aired whatever was taking place in the Walt Disney Theater, the main
place for large-scale live entertainment.
Top
Tuesday October 5
My sleep this evening was better than last night’s, although I
did wake up a couple of times. When I woke up for good, I tried
an e-mail check again. This time, I got in. I doubt there
were many people using it at that time of the morning. I
retrieved my e-mail, sent a message out, and then logged into my credit
union’s online banking service to transfer my house payment into the
savings account That couldn’t wait until I returned to Florida.
Speculation: the dwarf Sneezy is named that way due to allergies.
If he had a cold, I bet he’d have the name Goopy. Well, for the
last few days, I have felt like Goopy. I have marveled at how much can
be blown from a nose.
As I got dressed this morning, the ship was arriving at Castaway
Cay. It slowed down and turned about to back into its
berth. That gave those on the starboard side (including me) a
great view of the whole island. It would still be a while before
folks could get off the ship, so I had my breakfast at Triton’s.
It was a fairly light breakfast, consisting of some oatmeal and a
toasted bagel with cream cheese. My waiter Arlan happened to be
the waiter who was serving Lynn(e) and me during all of our dinners
(small world - “it’s a small world after all”). By the time I was
done, I was ready to hit the island.
As I got off the vessel, the first thing I noted was the station for an
island survival pack (bottled water, bag, etc.) as well as beach
towels. I had my own bottle of water, so I just picked up a beach
towel and headed in. The post office was nearby along the path;
this was a real Bahamian post office, where folks could mail letters
and postcards. In the harbor with us was the Flying Dutchman of
Pirates of the Caribbean fame. I took some pictures along the
way, using my Olympus camera instead of my Canon, which I’d left aboard
the ship.
When I got to the main beach that served as a snorkeling lagoon, I was
still not sure if I felt well enough to attempt the water activities
I’d paid for, meaning the stingray adventure and the snorkel
rental. So I decided to try it out by wading into the lagoon. The
water was reasonably warm, and I didn’t feel too uncomfortable. I
had my Olympus camera with me today, which was capable of going
underwater. And here, I tried it out for the first time in salt
water. So close in to the beach, there wasn’t a whole lot to see,
but it worked, and I worked. Yes, I thought, I could at least try
the other activities. As I got out, someone said they saw a
stingray in the water. I could see they were right, there was a
stingray there. I took a picture, but it didn’t turn out the
best. I’d have more opportunities to see stingrays later.
I put on my shorts and shirt and shoes and continued walking
around. There were a couple of stores on the island, but I didn’t
visit them. As I walked, it started to rain -- a light rain
indeed, but still rain. Would that keep the numbers of visitors
down today? Maybe for a while, but there were plenty of people on
the island later on. A little before 10, I made my way to the
Stingray Encounter, checked in, received my equipment and was directed
to go to the meeting area. I took off my clothes (other than the
swimsuit, of course and put on the flotation vest, mask and
snorkel. I’d used mask and snorkel before, of course, but the
flotation vest was new to me. I wasn’t sure how to use it at
first until I heard someone else describe how to blow air into it to
inflate it. After a 10-minute introduction, we were told to put
our stuff into one of 4 storage bins, then head to one of the feeding
areas. The 55 stingrays in the enclosure -- 53 females, two males
(“26 1/2 girls for every boy” to paraphrase Jan & Dean) had been
trained to come up to the stations and look for a target shaped like
Mickey Mouse. There, if you had food held between your fingers,
the ray would come up and grab it. You needed to pull your hand
away quickly lest it get confused and try to nibble on you (no teeth,
though). There was a little girl in my group who insisted she
didn’t want to feed the stingrays. Then she wavered, and
eventually she did feed the rays. I fed them three or four times
myself -- calamari, other fish, and “stingray Jello”. I also
petted a couple in the feeding station, and I did have a couple brush
up against my legs. Feeding done, we proceeded to swim with them
in the lagoon. I had my camera with me, of course. The
floatation vest kept me on the surface with a minimum of effort as I
swam around. I got some pictures of a ray burying itself in the
sand, as rays tend to do. I got a picture of two rays together on
at least one opportunity.
By 10:52, it was over; time to return the gear and head on to the next
adventure. That turned out to be a bicycle rental. The
bikes were beach cruisers, but unlike ones I’ve encountered elsewhere,
these were in very good condition. I needed to top off the air in
one of the tires and adjust the seat height, but once I did that, I set
off on the trail. Part of the trail involved a disused
airstrip. Another branch (5000 feet long, according to the signs)
took riders and walkers to an observation tower where one could get a
view of the whole island. I rode that trail but didn’t stop the
first time around. Another part of the trail went to the western
part of the island, another scenic vantage point. I took some
pictures, but not as many as I wanted to, for I began to receive
reports of low battery. I had a spare, but not on me; I’d left it
back aboard ship. I pedaled back to the observation tower and
climbed to the second level; from there, I could easily see the ship,
and I took a couple of pictures. But I knew I needed a fresh
battery. Fortunately, I had one back on the ship, and so I cut my
bike time short and headed back for the ship. I wore my beach
towel on my head as I walked back, for it was hot out by this
time. Yes, I had a hat in my bag, but the towel was more
convenient. There weren’t many people heading back towards the
ship around noon. When I got there, I happened to see Mickey,
Goofy and Pluto arrive and board through the crew’s ramp. They
saw me and gave a wave; I waved back. I dropped my towel off on a
table near the entrance, and then I went back on board.
Back in my cabin, I made sure my camera was dry, and then I swapped
batteries. My t-shirt was rather damp, so I took it off and hung
it in the bathroom to dry. With a fresh and dry shirt, I went to
lunch at Parrot Cay (Beach Blanket Buffet was not open for lunch
today). But like BBB, Parrot Cay had a buffet/cafeteria line for
lunch. The temptation to stuff the plate was too strong to
resist; I took a little of a lot, and what I took was good. I saw
my dinner tablemate Lynn(e) at another table having her lunch; she must
have arrived before I did. There weren’t many people in the
restaurant today, for most people were on the island and probably
having meals on the island. If I hadn’t had to return for a fresh
camera battery, I might very well have done the same.
After lunch, I went back to my cabin and changed back into my shirt I’d
worn in the morning, which was still damp. I retrieved my camera
and my day bag, and I set off for an afternoon on Castaway Cay.
Now my Extreme Getaway Adventure had two items left on it, a snorkeling
session and a float rental. I had no intention of renting a
float, just engaging in snorkeling. So I went over to Gil’s Fins
and Boats to pick up a mask and snorkel, a pair of fins (size 12), and
a flotation vest, as well as a blue mesh bag to hold everything.
I found a beach chair that was unoccupied, and then I took off my
shorts and shirt and put on my gear except for the fins. I waited
until I was at the shore to put on the fins. This was the first
time I was snorkeling in the ocean; all previous times had been in a
swimming pool.
The ocean bottom was very sandy and very cloudy close to shore, but it
cleared up the farther out one went. The bottom sloped away very
gradually, still sandy with some grassy areas. Eventually, I
started seeing structures on the bottom where fish and other life began
to congregate. My camera was getting some heavy use, although I
wasn’t sure everything was going to turn out all right. I was
changing the settings frequently, trying to find the mode that would
give me the best pictures. It didn’t seem like the special
underwater modes were working as well as they should. Since this
was my first time shooting underwater in the ocean (not counting the
stingray encounter earlier today), I’d be happy for any of the pictures
to turn out.
I had a lot of problems with my mask fogging up. Perhaps I should
have spit in it beforehand, as I learned later on, but I didn’t.
I just rinsed it out when needed. The fins worked very well,
though, propelling me through the water with ease. I swam around,
marveling at the items deliberately sunk to form habitats. I
started to see a few fish swimming about. As I swam farther out,
the fish became more plentiful. It wasn’t easy to keep track of
direction out there, and I found myself getting close to markers, but I
repositioned myself. I’d heard there was a statue of Mickey in
the lagoon, but I never found it. At one point, I found that the
fish seemed to be heading towards me. I wasn’t sure I cared for
that; what was I, fish food? Later, I found a shipwreck that had a
school of fish inside of it; I took a picture and a short video.
Now you might wonder how I was feeling with my cold. It wasn’t
bothering me that much out there, although I certainly hope that the
gear I used was cleaned off or sterilized properly before the next user
got a hold of it. But I wasn’t really pushing myself out there; I
didn’t dive below the surface to any great extent. I’d want to do
this again when I was feeling better. Yes, I would definitely
like to return to Castaway Cay and snorkel again, or do so at any other
port, for that matter.
When I had had enough, I swam back toward shore. I felt a little
unsteady getting back on my feet, but that soon passed. I dried
off at the beach chair where I’d left my stuff, and I drank my bottle
of water there. Now where would I want to go next? I walked
around for a bit and visited a couple of the stores, but I had now done
everything I wanted to do. And so I walked back to the
ship. While I walked back, someone noticed a crab walking across
the path. It sure looked like a small hermit crab.
Back aboard ship, I took a shower to wash the salt off of me and get
clean. I soaked the camera in fresh water to wash any salt off of
it, and then I proceeded to download the pictures I’d taken today and
identify them. That was a lot of work. Now during this
time, the weather had deteriorated; it had clouded up and begun to rain
again. What’s more, the wind started to pick up. The island
looked pretty deserted with all of the passengers back aboard
ship. We got under way again around 5.
I went up to deck 9 to see what was what, and it was pretty wet up
there. I had a cheeseburger to tide myself over until the late
dinner, but I had a hard time finding a seat, for many of the tables
were unavailable. They were getting rained on!
Now the evening’s theme aboard ship was Pirates IN the Caribbean.
Everyone was encouraged to dress in pirate garb. I knew this
before the cruise began, and so a few weeks ago, I’d bought a few
elements of a pirate costume back in Westland. This evening, I
was wearing a Hawaiian shirt, but I also had on a bandanna a la Captain
Jack Sparrow and an eyepatch, which gave me a sort of Key West pirate
look. This was how I went around that evening. Some went
all out in dressing as a pirate, while others didn’t bother at all (it
wasn’t mandatory). The Disney characters who were out and about
were indeed dressed as pirates, as Mickey and Minnie demonstrated
during their photo session in the atrium lobby. Peter Pan was one
deck up, although I couldn’t tell if he was particularly piratical --
although given that Captain Hook is his enemy, I could see why he might
not be. I saw Chip and Dale in pirate garb, as well; I even got a
picture of them as they were leaving the Oceaneer’s area on deck
5. Earlier in the evening, I went to Diversions briefly, and then
I paid a visit to the Treasure Ketch shop. Was there anything I
wanted to get for myself? Tonight, it turned out there was: a
print of a sketch showing one of the Disney ships (I couldn’t tell if
it was the Magic or the Wonder) docked at Castaway Cay, drawn from the
point of view of the main beach. Having just been there today, that
view resonated with me in ways it could not have before, and so I
decided to buy it. It was a decent-sized print, but it wasn’t too
large to fit into my suitcase.
As I waited in line for Parrot Cay to open, I saw someone who was
dressed either as Captain Hook or Captain Morgan (of rum fame).
Since I didn’t notice him wearing a hook, and since he made the Captain
Morgan pose (leg elevated as though resting on a barrel of rum), I
suspect he was intending to pose as Captain Morgan. My tablemate
Lynn(e) wasn’t posing as anyone; she had opted out of the pirate
costuming. She hadn’t spent much time on the island today,
either, being cowed by the threatening weather. Tonight’s menu
was different from last night’s, for it reflected the pirate theme as
well. The other restaurants on board were also serving this
special menu, as I’d discovered when I took a peek at the Triton’s menu
earlier. This evening, I had pineapple appetizer, jerk chicken
salad, and shrimp and scallops with linguini. For dessert, I had the
mango mousse pie or cake for dessert (no sugar added). I also bought a
souvenir cup that lights up at the push of a button. Why, I don’t
know; I guess I got into the spirit of the moment.
Ever since we’d left Castaway Cay, the weather had been dreadful, with
rain and high winds, as well as seas that were a bit rougher than we’d
previously experienced. There were doubts about tonight’s Pirates
In The Caribbean party: would it be able to be held out on deck?
The cruise director had promised word later in the evening about
whether the celebration would take place inside or out on deck.
Finally, word came: the celebration would take place out on deck!
The captain found a spot where there was no rain. I went up to deck 9
and 10 to watch the festivities, which were to include fireworks at the
end. When I went out on deck, though, the wind was really kicking
up. I was still wearing my pirate bandanna, but I took it off and
stuffed it in my pocket. If I hadn’t, I feared it would have
blown off into the ocean. I should also have worn a jacket, for
even though it was fairly warm out, it felt a little chilly with that
wind. The party was pretty fun, with it being divided into two
parts, a “good” part and a “bad pirate” part, although Mickey saved the
day for the good guys. At the end, there was indeed a display of
fireworks, which I caught on video using the Olympus camera.
Back in the room, I downloaded the pictures and video from this
evening, and I also filled out the form for having gratuities to the
restaurant wait staff and room attendant charged to my account.
It was customary to present gratuities directly to the individuals, and
envelopes were provided for doing so. They could be filled with
cash or with tickets showing the amount charged to the account. I
went to the guest services desk to turn in my gratuity form, but the
hall on deck 3 was jammed. It turned out that cake was being
served after the pirate party, and this was the line for it. I
ended up doing a zig-zag through the decks to get around: deck 5 (my
stateroom) to deck 3 to deck 4 back to deck 3, where I dropped off my
form, then back up to deck 4 and then back up to deck 5. Back in
the room again, I continued identifying photographs. I also
worked on the travelogue for a time and was able to make an internet
connection of 12 minutes. By that time, I was tired and called it
an evening.
Top
Wednesday October 6
I woke up before 6 AM, making my first bathroom visit of the
day and my first nose-blowing of the day. And I had a lot to blow
this morning, as I had become really goopy overnight. I did an
e-mail and web surfing check this morning, beginning to increase my use
of time, because my onboard minutes would expire at the end of the
cruise, and I wanted to get my money’s worth. It turned out that
there wasn’t anything vital in the e-mail. Will I be glad to
return to my MiFi, and will I be glad to return to my high-speed
connection at home!
I decided to go back to Beach Blanket Buffet for breakfast, for I knew
they had a great selection. And this morning, I did indeed try
one of the Mickey waffles. As waffles go, it was all right,
though nothing special. Once again, I had to go back to the
serving line because I forgot a spoon for the oatmeal.
Days at sea have several special programs for passengers, things there
wouldn’t be time for on days in the various ports. Several caught
my eye today. The first was at 9 o’clock in the Buena Vista
Theater; it was a presentation on the top 10 innovations of Disney’s
theme park and resort experience. Number 10 was the creation of
Disneyland itself; number 2 was the development of audio-animatronics,
and number 1 was the total resort experience first seen with Walt
Disney World. Overall, an interesting topic oriented towards the
adults on the cruise. The second item was the question and answer
session with the captain, chief engineer, cruise director and assistant
cruise director. Although I didn’t ask any questions, I thought
the ones that were asked were interesting. For instance, in
responding to one question, the captain said that he was no fan of the
current generation of cruise ships, the ones that are built like big
boxes afloat, ones that try to fit as many people in as possible.
They’re lumbering compared to the sleek lines of the classic ocean
liners, which the Disney Cruise Line ships all try to replicate.
Someone else asked if any adjustments to the course had to be made due
to the iffy weather we’ve had this week. Yes, said the captain,
giving the example of finding good weather for the Pirates in the
Caribbean party last night and the fireworks show that closed it.
Also, our departure from Nassau was delayed two hours or so due to bad
weather and approaching squall lines. Someone else asked about
the schedules of the crew. They’re all on a seven-day-a-week
schedule for the duration of their contract, which can be and is
grueling, but they have to take several weeks off between contracts.
After the Q&A session ended, I went back to my cabin to change into
my swimsuit. Today was my last day to try out one of the swimming pools
here. Now really, only two were available to me, the Goofy Pool
for families and the Quiet Cove pool for adults. I chose the
Quiet Cove pool. I got a beach tower, found a spot where I could
put my stuff, took off my shoes, shirt and watch, and then I went
in. Now the temperature of the pool had been reported all week as
around 80 degrees. That would have been very chilly. But
when I got in, it was not chilly at all. I also found that the
markings of a 4-foot depth weren’t accurate, either; it was closer to 5
feet deep. The pool had a wide wading surface of a few inches
deep surrounding the main pool. The steps on the ladder were
narrow and were very uncomfortable, so later on I just pushed myself up
to the wading level. After 20 minutes, I got out. With the
wind, it was chilly, and so I went over to my towel and dried off
quickly. After getting semi-dressed, I walked around the deck for
a bit, especially deck 10. I had my camera with me, and at one
point I thought I’d seen a city on the horizon. I took some
pictures. What could it have been? I’d find out a bit later
on that it was probably Freeport (that’s the Bahamas’ Freeport, not the
one in Texas).
I went back to the room to get dressed. Ron, the stateroom host,
was in the process of cleaning my room. I took the opportunity to
give him his gratuity envelope, since I wasn’t sure when I would see
him again. After getting dressed, I went for lunch, carrying my
camera bag and my iPad. I tried going to Parrot Cay for its
buffet, but I would have had to have been seated with strangers, and I
didn’t feel like that, so I went back to Beach Blanket Buffet.
The food was still good, but eating out on the deck posed some
problems: bread blowing off your plate, lettuce being blown from the
salad into the soup, etc. I finished fairly quickly and got a
cookie for dessert. Back to the room I went, dropping off the
iPad and the camera before heading to the Walt Disney Theater to see
the matinee of Disney Dreams, a show that had been voted as best in the
cruise industry for several years running. This was my first
opportunity to see the theater. It was a large one, extending
down one or maybe two decks from the entrance on deck 4. The show
concerned a young girl who dreamed of learning to fly like Peter Pan,
as well as having other Disney-related dreams come true. Stories
like that are what Disney does best, and this was no exception.
The lead girl reminded me a little bit of Lea Michele from Glee.
Now I thought it a little odd when the show began with a saying like
“All this has happened before and will happen again.” That was a theme
of the reimagined Battlestar Galactica series, and part of me wondered
when the Cylons would come out. I’d learn later that Peter Pan
also opened with that phrase, so who ripped off who?
When the show ended, I visited the Treasure Ketch, which was next to
the theater. The captain’s autograph session was tonight, and I
had entertained thoughts of him signing the art I’d bought
yesterday. But I decided instead to get a model of the Disney
Wonder and have him sign that. It wasn’t easy taking it out of
its package back in the room. If I had my pocket knife, it would
have been easy, but that was left in the car at the cruise
terminal. A set of keys worked well enough, though, and soon the
model was out of the box and ready to be signed.
Also in my room was a Customs declaration form and a Welcome Home
letter explaining the procedures for tomorrow. My breakfast
tomorrow would be at Triton’s, where I would have dinner tonight.
I would have to have any checked luggage outside my door by 11 tonight,
so I started to pack things up. I’d actually made pretty good
progress by the time 4 PM rolled around, when I decided to stop and do
some travelogue work. I also took a picture of something on the
horizon that turned out to be a container ship passing us by on our
starboard side. I tried Internet access and downloaded some of my
e-mail, but not all of my accounts were accessible. I tried again
later on, and this time I had a better connection, for I did indeed get
my mail from all of my accounts.
An aside: earlier today, on the way to the Q&A session, I saw a
photo opportunity that involved Daisy and Donald Duck (there were
others, but I forget who they were). I took a picture or two,
although they may not have turned out the best (they weren’t in the
greatest of focus, it turned out).
I spent much of the 6 o’clock hour on the port side of the promenade
deck for a view of the sunset. It was much less windier than on
deck 10, although I did detect the occasional burst of spray. I
thought I saw a couple of Navy or Coast Guard vessels go past us at one
point. Once again, just like on the first night of the cruise,
there was a fantastic sunset on the last night. I could see it
barely encumbered by clouds. A few other people came out for
sunset photos, as well. Then it was time to head over to the
Treasure Ketch store, for the captain’s autograph session would start
in 15 minutes. I thought it would be rather busy, and it
eventually was, but I was the first person to arrive and the first
person to get his item signed. The captain signed mine on the
base: “Capt. Marco 2010”. I mentioned that this was my first
cruise, and he suggested a longer cruise next time, perhaps a 7-day
cruise on the Disney Magic. Perhaps not coincidentally, he would
be transferring to the Disney Magic next year when the Wonder moves to
the West Coast for Alaskan cruises and the new Dream comes to the
Bahamas.
There was a decent line behind me as I left the signing and returned to
my cabin to drop off the camera and the ship model. Several
minutes later, I was heading back midship to wait for Triton’s to
open. There was a rather long line there, but that was actually
for an appearance with Mickey and Minnie. The Triton’s line
wasn’t too bad; it enabled me to see Mickey and Minnie very clearly. At
one point, three children went to see them, but one was in a cast and
in a wheelchair. He couldn’t have had as much fun as he would
have wanted on the cruise.
Triton’s was a very elegant restaurant, with the waitstaff dressed in
turquoise-blue jackets. The theme for the dinner was
French. Now the restaurant would never have received the Donald
Duck seal of approval, for there were two items on the menu that
included duck. I had one of them this evening, the appetizer Duck
Confit. It was good, I thought; it reminded me of smoked liver
(that was our name for braunschweiger). For soup, I had some
French onion soup (tough choice between that and the tomato and basil
soup), and for the main course, it was Triton’s sea bass (yum!).
After dinner, I went up to deck 9 to see what conditions were like at
the Quiet Cove pool. It was quite breezy, so it was cool.
With the up and down motion of the ship, there was some significant
wave action taking place there. As the ship pitched, the upper
level of the pool at one end would be drained away while the water
piled up at the other end. Then the action would reverse as the
ship pitched in the other direction. No one was in the pool, although
there were some in the two whirlpools located nearby. The outside
air temperature seemed too low for me, especially with the cold I had,
and so I decided to pass on the evening swim. That would have to
wait for another cruise.
Back in the room, I packed away my jacket and put my suitcase outside
for it to be collected and brought to the terminal tomorrow. Now I’d
have to worry about just the carryon bag in the morning. I
finished filling out the customs form and started on the customer
survey, and then it was time for bed.
Top
Thursday October 7
I woke up once during the night for a restroom break. I
was up for good around 5 AM. We weren’t in port yet, but we were
very close, for I could see lights on the shore, presumably the space
center. My nose was clogged again, but after a few blows, it
opened up. I used up most of my internet access this morning; it
was a use-or-lose situation. I ended up leaving some 11 minutes
in my account. And it occurred to me that I could probably use my
MiFi here in the port. But the MiFi was in my car and still
inaccessible to me.
Around 6, I heard some clanging outside. I looked outside my
verandah door; we were at the dock. We had returned home.
The clanging was the start of the unloading process for luggage and
waste. Soon, my luggage would be taken to the terminal for
claiming. I flipped around the channels; Roy Halliday had thrown
a no-hitter during a playoff game last night, only the second time that
had ever been done. And he allowed only one base runner the whole
game. Impressive! I finished up the survey and read over
the welcome home letter again. It occurred to me that the
staggered breakfast times were designed to manage the flow of folks
leaving the vessel, for once we had our breakfast, we were to
immediately leave the ship. I’d have to take my bag with
me. I guess I’d be staying for breakfast after all. There
was time for me to wash my hair in the tub. Finding Nemo was
airing on the Pixar channel; I turned that on for the morning. At
some point, my account statement had been slid under the door.
One charge I didn’t recognize at first, for a non-alcoholic beverage at
Pinocchio’s, turned out to be for the 12 bottles of Evian water.
There was an extra charge for the laundry I didn’t recall making.
It was $2, not really worth fighting over.
As I sat around, I heard the tones for an announcement, so I turned on
channel 201. The announcement was that passengers could now leave
the ship. That may have been true for some time, in fact, as I
could see people in the gangway from the ship to the terminal.
Now my breakfast seating was at 8:15, but I wanted to hit the road as
quickly as possible. And so I decided to forego my breakfast at
Triton’s and left the ship around 7:40. Once I left the ship and
entered the terminal, I found where my bag was located, and then I put
my carryon on top of my suitcase and rolled them both to the customs
line. The customs inspector reviewed my form briefly and waved me
through; however, my suitcase tipped back and fell to the ground.
I thought it might have hurt the agent, hitting him in the foot, but
no, he was unharmed. I was back in the US.
I found my way to the parking lot, loaded up my car, and got in line to
pay. It was $15 a day to park there, meaning I had racked up $60
in parking charges. Once those were taken care of, I was on my
way. The route out of the port took me very close to the Carnival
Sensation. Soon I was on 528 heading towards I-95. When I
reached I-95, I turned north. My plan was to drive to
Jacksonville, pick up I-10 there, then take I-75 all the way to
Michigan. It was a good plan, and at the start, it worked very
well. There weren’t any problems heading up I-95 to Jacksonville and
the eastern start of I-10. As I traveled west on I-10, though, I
felt like I wanted to nod off a few times. That wasn’t good, so I
stopped at a rest area for a half-hour. I didn’t nap, but the
rest did me some good.
After that rest stop, I continued down I-10 until I saw the signs for
I-75. Go north to Valdosta and beyond or south to Tampa and
points beyond. Now part of me wanted to go back south, but no, I
couldn’t do that; I had to head north. Suddenly I started to
cough frequently enough that I got a headache. I pulled over on
the shoulder until it passed and I felt better, which wasn’t that long
(dang cold!). After allowing traffic to clear, I moved back onto
the ramp and continued down the freeway. Fortunately, I didn’t
have to cough like that again the rest of the day. But I did have
to guard against nodding off. It got to the point where I thought
it would be best if I stopped short of Atlanta today, to take the time
to rest up. And so, at a rest area, I got out my MacBook and
looked for a Holiday Inn around Macon. There were several, but I
found one in particular in Byron, near Warner Robins and south of
Macon. That would be where I stayed tonight.
I arrived at the hotel after 4 and checked in. The air
conditioning in the room had been going full blast; I turned it down,
and eventually I turned it off. But the room was comfortable
enough. Now what would I do for supper? I could see a
Denny’s across the street, and the hotel directory mentioned a
steakhouse and a Mexican restaurant nearby. It turned out that
the latter two restaurants were in a small outlet mall off of the main
highway. I ended up eating at the Mexican place, figuring the
spiciness of the food might help contribute to open sinuses. It
might have, to some extent. I had mixed fajitas for dinner
(steak, chicken and shrimp), and they were good. I couldn’t quite
finish it all, even with having skipped lunch (although I’d nibbled a
lot during the day). After I left, I stopped at a gas station to
fill up so I wouldn’t have to do so in the morning. Then it was
back in the hotel to soak in the tub a little bit. Only then did
I notice how sunburned my back was from my Castaway Cay adventure -- or
I should say, only then did I see, for I could definitely feel the burn
the last couple of days.
There was a college football game on tonight: Nebraska was playing a
team that I don’t recall and was beating them soundly. I was
watching it off and on. At some point, I turned off most of the
room lights and lay down; you guessed it, I feel asleep during the
fourth quarter.
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Friday October 8
Once again, the cold made its presence known in undesirable
ways. A clogged nose woke me up too early again, and it took its
sweet time unclogging. Later on, I had to cough up some really
disgusting stuff, but better I did that than have to contend with it in
my respiratory tract. Once the breakfast bar in the lobby opened,
I went down and had two dishes of cereal, some cinnamon rolls, a
half-glass of orange juice and a full glass of water. The woman
who was minding the breakfast bar encouraged me to have a banana, but
the bananas were far too green for my liking. Perhaps I could
have taken one for the road, though, but I didn’t.
I was on the road a little after 7. Macon was easy to bypass on
I-475. Atlanta was also easy to bypass on I-285. Having
been in downtown Atlanta during rush hour, I didn’t want to repeat that
experience. Traffic on I-285 was heavy but not exceptionally so,
and I eventually got around to I-75 again and continued north.
Two hours later or so, I had arrived in Chattanooga. Once again,
I’d felt like I was going to nod off at times; this cold was really
affecting my driving ability. Since it was lunchtime, I decided
to find a place to stop for lunch. It turned out to be the
Hamilton Place shopping mall. In the outlying parcels was a PF
Chang’s, home to good spring rolls, good hot and sour soup (recommended
by my chiropractor for helping with colds) and good shrimp lo
mein. I had all of those for lunch today, and I enjoyed
them. When I was done with lunch, I walked over to the mall,
first visiting MacAuthority, an independent Apple store. Their
store reminded me of Apple’s official stores, although they carried a
few items I’d not seen in a regular Apple Store. Perhaps
Chattanooga was too small for a regular Apple Store, and this company
stepped into the void. Then I went over to the Barnes & Noble
and picked up a few items, including the 2011 version of the Disney
Cruise Line guidebook. This mentioned the new Disney Dream and
the new Alaska and Mediterranean cruises but had few details about
either.
As I drove along I-75 northeast of Chattanooga, a dark pickup passed
me. That wasn’t unusual, but what was painted on the rear window
was: “In Memory of My Sister Georgine Corrigan, on Flight 93, Sept. 11,
2001” (most probably not the exact quote). This was near mile
marker 29. That was not something I would ever have expected to see,
and when I did see it, it gave me pause. Some thoughts of that
flight and what the passengers did came to mind. Their actions
kept the hijackers from completing their mission, whatever it was: the
Capitol, the White House, Camp David - we’ll probably never know for
sure. Doing a web search later on found that Georgine’s brother
was Robert Marisay, who lived northwest of Atlanta, so that was
probably him driving past me. One of those events that make you
think....
The extended stop in Chattanooga had done me some good, as I did not
feel like nodding off the rest of the drive. I made it through
Knoxville and the rest of Tennessee without any problems. When I
reached Kentucky, I stopped at the rest area and welcome center for a
bathroom break and an opportunity to find a hotel for the night. Given
my pace, I thought that Lexington would make a good stopping
point. Unfortunately, when I checked room availability, I found
that very few rooms were available, and what was available was at a
very high price. It turned out that a major world equestrian
competition was under way in Lexington. My options were to stop
short of Lexington or to press onward to the Covington/Cincinnati
area. Given my cold, I didn’t feel up to pressing onward, and so
I arranged for a hotel in London, north of Corbin, the birthplace of
Kentucky Fried Chicken.
There were two Hampton Inns in London; I had reserved a room in the
newer one, the northern one. When I arrived, I found that this
hotel was already rather full and was expected to be completely full
later on, mainly from other travelers who couldn’t find rooms in
Lexington. I took it easy that evening, getting takeout from
Wendy’s, reading the books and magazines I’d bought in Chattanooga,
blowing my nose way too much for my liking, etc. I’d considered
going for a swim in the hotel pool, but I passed on the opportunity; I
didn’t feel like it any more, not with the way the cold was now.
I watched some college football on one of the ESPN channels before
calling it a night.
Top
Saturday October 9
I popped awake a couple of times during the night, but each time I went
back to sleep. By 5:45, I was up for good. I spent some
time checking my e-mail and doing a bit of reading before getting ready
for breakfast and going down to the lobby. The breakfast bar had
the quality I’ve come to expect from Hampton Inns.
By 7:45, I had checked out and was on the road. The weather
started out as clear, but I did pass through a few of areas of fog
before reaching Lexington. Later, it was sunny the whole way up
to Detroit. I made it through Lexington and Covington on the way
to Cincinnati. There was construction between Cincinnati and
Dayton as well as in Dayton itself, but it didn’t slow me up too
much. The stretch of I-75 between Dayton and Monroe had become
very familiar to me through a number of trips to the Dayton Hamvention
in May. I didn’t stop for lunch, for I had a number of nibbles in
the car with me.
The cities passed by: Lima (the home of Glee), Findlay, Bowling
Green. At noon, I turned on ‘70s on 7 to see from what year this
week’s American Top 40 repeat would be. It turned out to be from
1970, near the beginning of its run and before I started listening to
it. It was very enjoyable listening to the show; many of the
songs, I was very familiar with (such as “Cracklin’ Rosie” by Neil
Diamond, the number 1 song), but there were a few that were obscure to
me. Case in point: Candi Staton’s version of “Stand By Your Man”,
number 40 that week. When the show ended around 2:15, I started
listening to college football games and eventually turned on the
pregame show for Michigan State versus Michigan, which would kick off
at 3:30. Onward I drove, passing through Toledo and Monroe, briefly
coming to a stop in Monroe due to road construction.
Would I make it home in time for the kickoff? It looked likely,
for at 3, I was in the intersection of I-94 and I-275. It wasn’t
much farther now: the exit for Ecorse Road; the exit for Michigan
Avenue; the rest area; and finally the exit for Ford Road. Some 15
minutes later, I was pulling into my garage. My vacation had
ended. I wish I could say the same for my cold. That would
persist for another week after my return. AFTERWORD: when I checked my
mail, there was no package from the hotel in Key West. They never sent
the medicine I’d left behind.
Top
THE END
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©2010 R. W. Reini.
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rights reserved.
Written
by Roger Reini
Revised October 18, 2010
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