A Relaxing Day in Italy

No fewer than three times during the middle of the night last night did I sit up in bed and say in a loud voice. Ow, ow, ow! First it was the left calf. Later on it was the right calf. And if those two body parts weren't enough, the left foot got into the action even later in the night. Dang it hurt and I was so tired and discombobulated in the night I couldn't even forms words as to what I had going on. I had to look it up to remember - they were Charley Horses. It has been a good many years since I've had one (and never three in one night) but I'm guessing the 24 hours of traveling had something to do with it. So Dr. Deb prescribed herself lots of glasses of water, a banana for additional potassium, ankle pump exercises to increase circulation, and feet above her heart today.

As today was already a planned relaxation day it was an easy prescription to follow. The hotel we are staying in has a free breakfast so we started our morning by taking our 13 steps to the restaurant. I always find free hotel breakfasts fascinating. Not because they are free, but because the variety of foods we find depends on the part of the world we are in. Today's was heavy on the sweets.

I love seeing the oranges with their stems still attached.

I'm a mostly-protein gal so I had just a couple options.

I'm also a gal who likes to taste a little bit of several things but not too much of one thing (if that makes sense) so I was careful not to overdo it with all the choices available. 

In my choices I found something unbelievable tasty. Something I've never had before; something I've never seen before. It has probably been around the US for a while but since I don't do many carbs I wouldn't know it if it was. This chocolate covered mini Belgium waffle thingy was one of the best things I've eaten in a very long time. It was like an old fashioned doughnut batter made into a mini Belgium waffle shape with a chocolate coating. Oh. My. Gosh.

I also discovered this salami and an oh-so-flavorful roll for breakfast. Another oh my gosh moment.

Hubby and I talked about taking the couple blocks walk down to the water after breakfast, but it was pretty chilly and windy outside so we hiked our 13 steps back to the room until things warmed up some.

Which is where my I don't care day started. I think it was the combination of being carbo-loaded and hubby deciding to watch Italian TV in the room. The Italian TV channels were fun to watch, but then he found a sports channel he stuck with. I decided the sports channel watching was a good time to close my eyes for a tiny bit.

And I soundly went to sleep.

The next thing I knew, there was a knock on the door from housekeeping, coming to clean the room. Hubby grabbed the door, I thought in my mind I don't care about the room being cleaned and without even thinking about it, went right back to sleep.

Later on, a thunder clap woke me up. We had left the patio door open so it was loud. But I thought I don't care. And went right back to sleep.

Then we had the big birthday party we heard in the restaurant. Singing Happy Birthday in Italian. It woke me up, I thought how nice, then I don't care, and went back to sleep.

So there went the day. We both got plenty of rest, skipped lunch (the restaurant here isn't open anyway, but I did have my banana to add potassium into my system), drank plenty of water, and never made it down to the ocean. Even the walk became an I don't care. Heck, we're going to be on a cruise ship for 27 days so we'll see plenty of water.

At precisely 7 pm we headed to the restaurant for dinner. Another I don't care happened there, too. Just like last night, cruise passengers were having a pissing contest talking loudly from across the room about who is more important and how many cruises they've been on and blah, blah, blah. (If you cruise a lot you know the kind of people I'm talking about.) We had more of those loud folks in the restaurant tonight, too. But not long into the meal a large family of locals showed up for dinner. About 20 people in all, speaking Italian and having a grand time. It was fun listening to their conversations and enthusiasm even though I could hardly understand a word they were saying. Much better than having to care about being distracted by the annoyingly loud braggart cruise passengers.

I had no idea what the locals were saying, just like I don't know exactly what this Coke was trying to tell me.

Delicious homemade pizza in Italy? Oh yeah!

It wound up raining most of the day and into the evening. And guess what? I don't care. I'm in Italy having a great, grand, magnificent relaxing and mind, body, and soul boosting day.

Tomorrow we're joining the Sapphire Princess. The big, beautiful brand new Sky Princess will be here in port with us, too. I hope to get a good look at her as well. (From the outside only, of course).

I'll work on keeping Charley and his Horses in the barn tonight and will see you back here tomorrow!

Civitavecchia, Italy it is!

When we stripped down to our underwear and climbed into bed at 4:30 on a Friday afternoon in Italy we fist bumped and high fived each other.

I guess that sounds like it’s about to get a bit naughty. I better back up and start from the beginning.

Yesterday and today were going to be big days for us. And they were. A big 24 hours, really. While I'd like to say everything was absolutely perfect, if you travel a lot you know travel days are not without bumps. The bumps we encountered over the last couple days made us realize The Universe really is working in our favor.

It started with our taxi driver arriving early to pick us up.
Which led to an early arrival at the Boise airport.
That gave me additional time for the I'm going to reach around the inside of your waistband and the spread your legs wider so I can feel the inside of your upper thighs pat down I get every time at the airport.
Which allowed us enough time at the gate to check and recheck to see if any of our Lufthansa flights were cancelled. (They weren't.)

We also had plenty of time in the Denver airport as the Lufthansa systems were down. No printed boarding passes, no new seat assignments, and no passenger manifest. Thank goodness we had our boarding passes printed in Boise! Every passenger had to be checked in manually and physically checked off a list before boarding. Whew, it took a long time.

Since we had a 9+ hour flight ahead of us, we were able to make up time in the air.

Vickie, at one point Cape Breton popped up on the map and I thought of you.

We had time for a dinner and breakfast onboard. Hubby loved the BBQ beef, polenta, and green beans for dinner. We only had the fruit and half a roll at breakfast and by the looks of the eggs you can probably see why.

 

Before breakfast we saw a beautiful sunrise over Ireland from the camera on the tail of the plane. We had three different views we could look at from the monitors on the back of the seats. 

Good morning, Ireland!

Looking forward

Looking straight on down

A screen that actually wound up again, like last year's Air Alitalia flight, about six inches from my face. Today (well, really today and yesterday) it was due to the lady in front of me who reclined all the way throughout the entire flight. Even when she was up walking the cabin and standing up and using the restroom multiple times and reading, and well, you get the picture. 

Before we arrived in Munich, announcements were made about multiple cancelled Lufthansa flights. We listened carefully (first in German and then in English) and didn't hear our Munich to Rome flight on the list. We doubled checked again upon landing and we were good! But not so good for all these other people. I took a shot of one of the screens, but there were several screens full of multiple cancelled flights. This photo shows the cancellations for just 35 minutes of the day.

In total Lufthansa cancelled 600 flights today because of a strike, with most of them coming in and out of their hubs in Munich and Frankfurt. All those cancelled flights left us in a very quiet terminal in Munich. I headed down one way to see the gates. Empty.

When we boarded our plane, I looked the other way. Empty there too, but for one lone plane. (And ours, of course.)

If you wanted a seat at a restaurant in the terminal in Munich today would have been your day. Shops had no lines, either. But the biggest bonus came for hubby for two reasons.

1. The mobility assistance services provided at the Munich airport, according to hubby, were the best he's ever experienced. Ever. At anywhere in the world, including the US. (Actually, the services provided disabled people in airports in the US are among the worst we've encountered.)

2. Every person who dealt with us pronounced our last name correctly. It's Pfeifer, pronounced like "Fifer". It's a German name and most people everywhere else butcher the name. But we're in Germany and they know how to pronounce it!

Goodbye, Germany. Wish we could have stayed longer.

Finally a small bit of blue sky

Hello, Italy!

When we arrived at the Rome airport, we already knew our plans would be different from last year's. Last year we grabbed a bus and headed to a hotel in Rome for a couple days of sightseeing. This year we knew we had to preserve hubby's stamina so we are staying in a hotel near the port. They were able to arrange transportation from the airport to the hotel, even. Although again this year, we thought we were on the Autobahn with the speed the driver went. I couldn't see the speedometer from where I was sitting but I'm certain we were doing over 90 MPH. I tried taking pictures out the window and nothing showed up on the camera but blur.

With one exception. 

A rainbow.

It was magnificent - wide and full and brightly colored. And a double rainbow even started to form. The pictures taken through a shuttle window while zipping down the Italian Autobahn certainly don't do it justice.

We arrived at our hotel after 24 hours of travel with absolutely no sleep on any of our three flights (full disclosure - hubby did nod off a couple times in the front seat of the shuttle going 90 MPH) so we were exhausted.

And excited. We made it! We stripped off our clothes down to our underwear and climbed into our hard double sized bed and couldn't have been happier. (Hence, the fist bump and high five.)

You can tell by the sharp corners on the mattress how hard it is. No softness here.

Hanky panky? Nope, nappy nappy.  A few hours of sleep had us ready for dinner at the hotel. I counted the steps from our door to the restaurant doorway. 13 steps. With a day like today, I think 13 might just be a lucky number for us.

Tomorrow we have no plans but to just relax and recharge. 

Ever try and work on a blog in Italian? Good thing I know my way around my blog!

It may be 2:45 in the afternoon at home but it's 10:45 in the evening here in Italy, so buona notte!

Around the World in 31 Days?

So yeah, we're really doing this.

The air portion of our voyage begins tomorrow. 

Wish us luck on that one, though. We are flying into and out of Munich, Germany on Lufthansa Airlines. On the same two days the Lufthansa flight attendants are going on strike. 1,300 flights have already been canceled so I'm crossing my fingers ours doesn't wind up popping up on the list.

Then the sea portion of the voyage begins on Sunday. And boy, it's a long one at 27 days.

By the time we're done we will have circumnavigated the globe by air, sea, and land.

It's going to be a trip of firsts and of lasts, so stay tuned...

10 Reasons You Should Foster a Cat

When I'm not cruising I'm crafting. Hence the Cruising & Crafting slogan. But I'm really cruising and crafting and catting.

If you've been around the blog for a while you know I've been fostering kittens for the last few years. I work with Simply Cats, Boise's cageless, no-kill feline shelter. Baby kitties who are too small to be adopted come into my home where I get to have kitten fun until the babies are grown up enough for spaying or neutering. When that time comes they head back to Simply Cats, get scheduled for surgery, and wind up on the adoption floor a few short days later.

Want to know more about why you should foster a cat? Check out my video:

Want to help contribute to the work I do with foster kittens? I have an Amazon wish list right here. These are the things I use again and again, year after year. With daily laundry and frequent cleaning, items have to be replaced often. I’d love anything you’d be willing to send my way!

Royal Princess Cruise to Cabo Wrap-Up

I'm going to combine both the September 29 sailing and October 14 sailing together for this wrap-up. They were both the same cruise, going to the same port for the same hours...

and we had the same type of cabin (mini suite) on both legs.

Things to know about these 5 day Cabo overnight sailings, in no particular order of importance:

*It leans towards a party cruise. Lots of younger people, lots of drinking, and lots of families. We had a 10 day Mexican Rivera cruise smack dab between these two voyages and the difference between the passenger make-up was night and day.

*Tender tickets were still a pain. On past trips, when your entire party was ready to go ashore you headed to the dining room to pick up tender tickets. Then you waited there until your number was called. Here on the Royal you can send someone to pick up tickets for you group several hours before even anchoring. You don't have to wait in the dining room; you can be anywhere in a public area to listen for the announcement of your group number. Good idea, right? But we overheard one passenger who had grabbed 12 tickets for her group. When she met up with the rest of the group in the Piazza two other members had also made separate trips to the dining room to pick up 12 tickets. So 36 tender tickets were in the hands of just 12 passengers! It took until after 3:30pm (we had a 1:00pm arrival) for all tender ticket folks to get on a tender. Ugh.

*Speaking of tenders...they aren't calling them tenders anymore. They are being called "water shuttles". (Although the local Cabo tenders the ship uses actually has "Cabo Tender" on the side.) Not sure why we're changing language now, but I don't care either way.

*We had an overnight in Cabo with the tenders running all night about every 30 minutes. We kept our balcony door open at night and could hear some of the groups coming back. Lots of happy and cheery crowds. It sounded like several had quite the fine time ashore. Come morning they fired up all the tenders for constant runs back and forth.

*As usual, our go-to spot was the Horizon Court Terrace. Even with the warmer weather cruise (as opposed to our five weeks in Alaska) it wasn't too busy up there. Never had a problem finding a great table. With a great view.

*If you are getting a minute steak from the buffet, don't choose a thicker one. I did only twice and both times it looked like this. Compared to past cruises, steaks on the buffet line have definitely gone downhill. The thin ones are overcooked and the thick ones are cold on the inside. 

*The International Cafe has redone some of their sandwiches. Even how they warm them have changed. Not only will they press it panini style, they can also warm it in their oven. Cheese actually melting on a sandwich from the IC? Oh, yeah. Yummy!

*The check in process with the Medallion sucks big time. Again, we already had our Medallions and were directed to a very long line to check in. Can we use the Priority line? Nope. It has to be the long Medallion line. Maybe if they had all the Medallion check in stations it would have helped. Next time I'm not going to bring my Medallion and go to the Priority Line instead. It has to be quicker than this stupid line we stood in:

*It was nice to find out about all the dining options on embarkation day. One thing to note on both of these 5 day cruises - on embarkation day the back part of the Horizon Terrace was closed off. One day it was for a wedding and another for a private group function. I guess these short day cruises are popular with groups.

*We tried watching the "Good Spirits" thingy going on in the Good Spirits bar in the evenings. It was pretty much a flop. Once we saw one drink being made...

but after that night we never saw anything else being show on the screens but the Good Spirits logo during the scheduled presentation times.

Princess has wasted a lot of money on the Royal Princess for Good Spirits. While the bartenders there sure like entertaining lady customers sitting up at the bar, they do nothing with the special drinks or the Good Spirits scheduled presentations. Heck, they even stopped putting out the special menu during those times. They better get themselves a bartender willing to do the Good Spirits evening presentation or it's going to be a complete flop. (Actually, it's already there. Get a Good Spirits Bartender. Now.)

*I turned in my free Elite minutes for the MedallionNet unlimited package. The WiFi in Mexico was definitely an improvement over what we saw during our five weeks on this ship in Alaska. But not as good as in the Caribbean.

*Since this was a short cruise there was no Captain's Circle Party so we got the free drink coupons like we have in the past.

*I was only able to catch Matt O' filming the Wake Show a couple times this trip. He and his team were running like crazy on these short cruises. Compared to the Wake Show filmed on other Princess ships, the one Matt O' films is in a league of its own. Matt is highly entertaining and the engagement and excitement he shows with his cohosts is just fun to watch. There is no script, and he certainly doesn't need one. If you are a passenger on a ship where Matt is the cruise director, definitely tune into the Wake Show!

*I say this all the time, but it's worth saying again. On the Royal Princess you will find almost every crew member telling you hello, good morning, good afternoon, or good evening. Like every single one. From cabin stewards to deck attendants, waiters to maintenance crew, and everyone else in between. I do believe this is the friendliest crew at sea!