The Cruise - Part One

This post is the continuation of the chronicle of our 2 week trek through Italy and the Mediterranean. If you're just tuning in, you should start about 5 posts ago...

Several months ago we started planning several summer trips, including all of those that have been recently posted and some of those that will be posted soon. We were thinking of trips to Croatia and Greece, and at some point, I (Aaron) had the incredible idea of maybe doing a cruise. I'd never been on one and Jenna only went when she was much younger, so we thought we'd give it a try. As we started looking into it, we found one that went to a few places we were wanting to go, went round trip from Venice, and was incredibly cheap. We decided that if we just added it to the end of our Italian vacation, we'd save a bunch on the flights, so we booked it.

We've decided that there's no way to fit the whole cruise into one post, so we're going to split it in two. Here's how the first half went:

Saturday, May 9th - Day One - Departing Venice

We boarded the boat - the Royal Caribbean Splendour of the Seas - at about 4:00 after spending the day in Venice and about an hour at the port checking in and going through security. We dropped our bags in the room (the others would be delivered later), which was a lot bigger than we'd expected (we went cheap with an inside cabin on the lowest deck), and headed off for lunch. Yes, it was 4:00, and we'd already eaten lunch a few hours earlier, and dinner was at 6:30, but FREE BUFFET!!!

As we entered the restaurant, we came across what would turn out to be Jenna's second favorite part of the cruise (next to the beaches) - the mandatory Purell. Maybe it is something they always do or maybe it had something to do with Swine Flu, but every time we got on the ship or went to a meal, they required to hand-sanitize, which Jenna the Nurse was giddy about (even though she probably used her own personal Purell that she carries around with her an hour prior). We enjoyed a smorgasbord that left me grinning from ear to ear, sitting on the top deck overlooking the city of Venice. It was a good start to the week.

After a quick safety drill, where we had to put on our life jackets and find our lifeboat, we took a tour around the boat (2 restaurants, several bars, 2 pools, putt-putt, rock wall, shopping center, casino, etc) and then stood on the top deck for the sail away. It was really fun to stand on the deck and wave to all the people on the shore and in the smaller boats as we passed all the canals, gondolas and churches of Venice (the top deck of the ship gave us a great vantage point).

We then changed real quick and headed off to our first dinner, where we met the two other couples who were at our table - Howard and Linda from NW UK, and Bernie and Theresa from E Canada. They were both a bit older than us, but it was nice to have people who were a little different than us to talk to in the evenings. Dinner, served by our waiter Kiryl (from Bularus) and his assistant Agnelo (from India), was an excellent intro to what we would end up having nightly - 3 courses with a lot of good options, including some pretty good dessert (that more than once turned into a 4 or 5 course meal).

We ended up staying and talking to the other couples for a while, and by the time we left we realized that we'd missed the "Welcome Aboard" show in the ship's theatre, which was a bit of a bummer. We ended up going to the consolation art auction and then back to the room to crash.

Sunday, May 10th - Day Two - Dubrovnik, Croatia

We woke up on Sunday morning to the sound of the alarm, and knew something must have been wrong. We'd set it for 7:30, but the room was pitch black. Turns out the clock was right, it is just that the inside cabin doesn't get a lot of sunlight. We had our breakfast delivered that morning (which we ate in bed) and got ready to see our first port city. We walked out onto the deck while waiting to get docked, and were shocked by the beauty. Crystal clear blue waters, amazing cliffs and greenery. It blew us away.

We disembarked and headed into the old city center. Dubrovnik was a fortress town at one point, so the old town is surrounded by a city wall and numerous guard towers. One of the main attractions is walking these walls, so we headed off to hike along them. It was pretty interesting, though packed with other tourists. The best part was the amazing views over the cliffs and water. Just see the pictures.

After we finished the walls, we quickly got out of the city center, which was terribly packed with tourists - at least 2 cruise ships were docked. We took the bus to the city's best beach - which was pretty small but had incredible views. Again, unexplainable but you just need to see it (pictures are really only 2nd rate alternative). The beach was very rocky. As in every pebble of "sand" was about the size of a golf ball. We didn't have a ton of time, so we decided not to spring for a chair, but we began to regret that decision after about 30 seconds. Luckily the scenery made up for the discomfort.

We were able to spend almost 2 hours lazing at the beach before heading back to the boat.

We cleaned up really quick and headed to dinner. After dinner we watched the after-dinner show - a Rat Pack tribute. The show was okay, what we came back to in the room afterward was much better.

Apparently they clean twice a day (probably to make you feel like you need to tip more), and every night during the second cleaning the guy makes animals out of the towels. Jenna was hoping/expecting this, and we were happy to find a small white towel-elephant, wearing Jenna's sunglasses! It was a nice treat, and something that we looked forward to each night. (It's the little things!)

Monday, May 11th - Day Three - Cruising

The third day was spent at sea, so we slept in and went to the breakfast buffet (I only had 2 plates full). Jenna was worried that the deck chairs would get swooped up, so we were required to wear our swimsuits to breakfast and grab a chair at about 9:30. We ended up spending the entire day on the deck and by the pool. We read, we napped, and we chatted with fellow passengers.

I normally hate spending all day "laying out", but this wasn't too bad. Whenever I got bored, there was unlimited food and drink to be had just a few steps away. Also, it was nice to meet so many people from all over the world. The ship held about 2,000. From what we heard, there were 45 different nationalities represented. All on-board announcements were made in English, then followed by Spanish, German, Portuguese, French, and Italian. Maybe the most amazing is that one girl did all 6 of the languages (and seemed to be fluent, although it could have all been gibberish for all we know). The largest nationality actually seemed to be be the US, but we did see a lot of Canadians and people from the UK.

I think we finally left the pool at about 4:30 in order to shower and get ready for our first formal dinner. The formal thing was one of things I dreaded about the trip. We already were needing to lug a ton of luggage across Italy, and then I found out that I had to add a suit, a bunch of dress clothes, and dress shoes to the mix. I think I had envisioned shorts and a T-shirt for the entire cruise, but alas...The formal night was fun. We had a few photos taken and it is always fun to dress up from time to time, so we ended up enjoying it.

After dinner we again took part in the show - this time "Dancing Through the Movies". This was hilarious (though not on purpose). They sang tunes from some of the famous dancing movies (Footloose, Saturday Night Fever, Dirty Dancing, etc) and had their own little dance routines. The funny thing is that the performers were the ship's own, and they were about as good as you'd expect a troupe of people who were only good enough to perform on a boat where they live several months at a time. Also, they were all foreign, so it was pretty funny to hear two people from South America singing "Footloose". We're not sure what the labor rules are, but we assume that that the talent from Uruguay comes a little cheaper than from Broadway.

After getting our laugh in, we headed back to the room, and said goodnight to our towel-dog.

Thus concludes part one of the cruise. Please feel free to continue to the next post (or possibly wait a few days for it to be posted) to hear about the conclusion, including our crazy day in Turkey and beautiful Greece...(to be continued).