Cruising!

It's been a pretty good few days since I last blogged. It would have been excellent except I've been ill for the last three days. Anyway, I left you last on June 8th just before my final AM shift of the week. That went fine and once we were done, Vikki, Nia and I went to the Florida Mall for the evening. I needed some shoes for my graduation dress, Vikki needed a dress and Nia just needed some retail therapy! We spent the whole evening there and I picked out a really nice blue and white dress that I thought would look good on Vikki. It didn't look good, it looked absolutely amazing! She is so pretty anyway but that dress really makes her look beautiful. I am so jealous! Still, I feel a sense of pride that I helped pick it out. Especially as it was the only one in the whole shop and it just happened to be her size!

We went on the cruise this week and it was brilliant. It felt really weird for me though. I never expected to even see the Wonder ever again but I got a huge thrill of excitement when I saw her in Port Canaveral. It was a strange mix of the familiar and unfamiliar. I knew the ship, I knew the procedures, I knew where everything was and the difference between forward and aft but I didn't know what the guests could do and I've never had whole areas of the ship that are off limits before. I can see why people would come on a cruise and decide "wow, I want to work here!" The guests are treated so well. Plus, there is just so much to do! We were busy from the second we came onboard.

Our first night we got onboard at around 1pm and had a buffet lunch at Beach Blanket Buffet (Deck 9, aft). Then we had a quick look round the ship and I said hello to the people who remembered me. We played shuffleboard out on deck 4 and then played the gameshow Mickey Mania. That was followed by the very impressive show, The Golden Mickeys and then dinner in Animators Palate. That is a great restaurant. It starts off in black and white and changes to colour throughout your meal. Even the server uniforms change! I ditched the boys for an hour while they went up to the hot tubs on deck 9 so I could go and say hi to a few friends. I spent an hour in Flounder's Reef Nursery (Deck 5) reminiscing with Neil and Yuri. Neil still tells a certain story about me to the new hires and it's my claim to fame on the Wonder (and the Magic as Neil told them too!) I can't repeat it here but I know for a fact, anyone on that ship knows what I'm talking about. Oh yeah, and Stephen? Say anything and I'll give your class full permission to attack you with Hannah Monatana CD's!

The second day was Kevin's 24th birthday. We docked in Nassau and Captain Henry gave the same lame "we've found Nassau" joke that I've heard a million times. I'd arranged for the cabin to be decorated for Kevin's birthday so we had to get Kevin out of the cabin as fast as we could. The poor guy must have wondered what the rush was!

AJ, Kevin and I had booked a shore excursion out to Blue Lagoon Island where we did the sealion interaction. It was great! We got to stroke, touch, kiss, hug and play with our sealion, Maggie. We even touched her tongue and teeth! I was a bit disappointed that you couldn't swim with them though.

Once we got back to the ship, we'd missed lunch so we ordered room service which is free on the ship!!!! We ordered so much food and relaxed for a while. Then Kevin went off to play Bingo and AJ went upstairs to sun himself on deck. I had a slight headache so I took some Resolve and slept for a while. When we all got together again, we went to see Toy Story The Musical - a new show for me too as it was Hercules when I was onboard. It was a decent enough show but not as impressive as the Golden Mickeys and not as Magical as Disney Dreams (my favourite). After the show, we had dinner at Parrot Cay (Deck 3). Our server brought over a cake for Kevin which was really cool. We finished the day by watching "Up" in 3D which is a really good movie but the beginning was so sad I was in tears!

Our final day we docked at Castaway Cay, Disney's private island. We had another very busy day! We hired bikes in the morning and cycled out to the observation tower on the island (I think that must be new, I don't remember seeing that before!) Then we hired floats and sat back on huge rubber rings in the ocean. The water was so warm it was like bath water. Salty bath water, anyway. Next we did snorkel lagoon which I wasn't too keen on. I love to snorkel but there needs to be something interesting to look at. All they had was sand. I ended up going right to the back to find something to see and then had to kill myself swimming back. Finally, we did the stingray encounter where we snorkelled with huge stingrays. It was okay but nothing spectacular. Still, we managed to get some relax time on the beach too so it was a nice relaxing day.

We missed lunch again so we ordered more roomservice (free?!?! I may have mentionned that before!) Then we went down to see my absolute favourite show, Disney Dreams. It's had a little bit of a makeover since I last saw it which was nice as it wasn't all exactly the same. Still, Peter Pan was still the main lead and the songs were all the same and I sat there watching it with a huge smile on my face.

After the show it was dinner at Tritons followed by a few meet and greets with the characters. Then we watched "Til We Meet Again" which is a short goodbye and then headed for bed.

The day we disembarked the ship, Captain Henry was at the gangplank. He not only remembered me but he knew my name! Even after all this time! I felt quite special!

We got a taxi back to The Commons where I slept for a few hours and went to work. Work was pretty good. I had one five top that were especially lovely. Their meal came to $95 and the tipped me $65 on top! That's the best tip I've ever had and I was really grateful for it.

The last three days I've been in pain. I won't say why as it's not very nice but it's been a nasty three days. I've had to call in sick at work, pretty much one of the first times I've done that! Still, I'm feeling alot better now. So glad it's sorted.

So, once again, you're up to date. I've got a few days of work (and I'm hoping to pick up some mids) and then it's graduation! Guess that will be my next report!