The Main Event

Yes, London was just to be the warm-up act.

To my great delight, it turned out to be so much more!

At 10:30 A.M. on Tuesday morning, October 27th,

I was picked up at my hotel by a 

Royal Caribbean Cruise Line bus for 

transfer to the cruise terminal in

Southampton, England.

Just look what was waiting for me there!

Didn't I get a great shot?
And all that printing I managed to get on there!


Actually, I was only able to snap bits of the ship
through the bus window as we arrived at the port.

 And there would be no more opportunities for
an overall shot of the ship.
No--I was off for 8 days at sea,
crossing the N. Atlantic to the good old U.S.A.


My stateroom was another small room for one only!
No paying double--no single supplement.
For the first time ever, my luggage actually
beat me to my room!
Here I am arriving at 7652.

 (No making fun of my quantity of luggage allowed.)

 

The size of the room was perfectly fine.
It had a balcony--but no chair in the room.
That was the only drawback.
The bathroom was standard size--plenty big.


If you will click on that last picture you will see
a black bracelet in a plastic holder on the bed.
That was my WOW band.
It opened my cabin door, charged items to me,
opened the Concierge Lounge door, etc.
I LOVED IT!
With the band on, I couldn't lock myself out
 of my room!
(Which I usually do a couple of times!)


I had studied the ship's features extensively,
so I didn't miss much!
I headed for "270" (degrees exposure, I think.)
That is where the famous roast beef
sandwiches are on the Anthem!

 270 is Huge!
Complete expanse of the back of the ship.
I don't know how my camera angle managed 
to make it look small.


Royal Caribbean did an excellent job with
my dining table placement.
I was with 2 other ladies traveling solo--
one from near Houston and one from Florida.

Here we are in the nicest restaurant--Grande.

That's Linda in the center and Donna on the right.

Donna was actually my next door neighbor--

7650 to my 7652!

Linda and I enjoyed some shows together.

Great match, RC!

For a person who had no chair in her room, this

was life saving--or at least back saving!

 I spent lots of time here.

Cappuccinos, lattes, etc. here 24/7.

Through the web site Cruise Critic I had volunteered
my cabin for the "Cabin Crawl."
Groups traveled around looking at all the
different cabin categories.
The ship was rocking and reeling so bad that
I joked that we might all have to end up
actually crawling to see the cabins.
In fact, here's a video taken in 270 as I was
waiting for the Cabin Crawl to begin.

We were hit by several exceptionally big waves.
I don't know if you can tell, but I just
happened to be filming when this one came along.
Those two ladies are rushing over to try to
photograph it.

After only about a day and a half of mind-bending
effort, I managed to get the wave visible from here!!!
Just click below,
even though the print is not very mammoth!



Mammoth wave


I got to visit one of the two story suites.
Fabulous!

Not only a chair--a sofa!!!

I got to sit out on my balcony for a while

a couple of days.

 I really have no idea how I took this picture!

At noon on Halloween the captain delighted in 

telling us we were exactly halfway between

Southampton and Bayonne, NJ, our destination.

Incidentally, I loved our captain.

He began every announcement with:

"Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen.

Good afternoon dear guests,  good afternoon

dear crew."

I hope there really was as much concern for

the crew on this ship as there seemed to be.

Here I am with Captain Claus:

(which he pronounced "Close.")

 Just a little f.y.i.
I can't stand fake backgrounds!
Now how could we possibly be standing as pictured
when we're in the middle of the Atlantic?
But the picture was free.

Sharing my adventure with you takes me almost
 as long as the adventure itself did!
But...do come back.
The best is yet to come!