Lessons learned, love shared: Golden Princess to Hawaii 3/27/13

LOL Tim that is funny. I am only 5' 1" and I have 2 kids. My daughter is a half inch shorter than me so that must have been why I got to go. It was the trip of a lifetime for us. My husband is Italian and does speak the language.

Virginia

Try a river cruise on the Danube!

A cruise on the Blue Danube? Wow! That's something I had never heard of, but a quick Internet search just revealed some interesting options. Thanks for giving me something new to dream about, letteanne!

Tim

On Saturday morning, as the Golden Princess continued sailing back from Hawaii, it felt cooler and windier on our balcony than it had been the day before, so we didn't stay out there long.

I wasn't surprised when Terri wanted to make sure we watched the Wake Show: it was always part of the way we began our Golden Princess days. Cruise Director Gavin Chandler and Deputy Cruise Director Marahscalh Stanton always recorded each day's show in a different part of the ship, starting the show with some light-hearted bantering.

A Wake Show response box, located in the Piazza on Deck 5 (near the Internet Cafe) provided a convenient way for passengers to respond to the question of the day, with those who responded correctly having the opportunity to win a small prize, such as a lanyard, flashlight or key chain. On the first few days of the cruise, we hadn't realized that there was a noon deadline for Wake Show responses, so some of our early entries were too late to be counted. But after we heard about the deadline, we won several times.

The little Wake Show forms could also be used to ask the hosts to deliver a special message or greeting to someone (Gavin called these messages "shout outs"). There was no Wake Show on Terri's birthday (because it was our embarkation day) so I hadn't even thought of having the hosts wish her a happy birthday. But apparently on our first sea day returning from Hawaii, Terri had found an opportunity to slip away from me and put a passionate message in the box, which Gavin read dramatically (accentuated by Marahscalh's facial expressions). This video with excerpts from Saturday's Wake Show includes Terri's "shout out," the announcement of one of her winning entries, and a typical demonstration of Gavin's unique silliness as he discusses something he supposedly discovered on the "inter-google-web" (a term he seemed to use daily).

As always, it was a pleasure to be on the receiving end of a surprise from Terri, and with the Wake Show repeating every 30 minutes, I wanted to watch it several times before we left our room.

Then we decided to finally break out of our habit of going to the buffet for breakfast. The Donatello Dining Room served breakfast until 9 am, but we discovered that their menu provided few options.

Even the breakfast menu itself seemed intended to appear less special than the dinner menus, being pre-printed on card stock, like something a franchised coffee shop might use.

I ordered scrambled eggs with asparagus spears and shredded Swiss cheese, accompanied by gratinated potatoes.

Terri ordered a ham and cheese omelette with hash brown potatoes (which came in a single patty).

The ketchup was poured, of course, by our waiter, apparently because the appearance of a ketchup bottle on the table is considered to be inappropriate for such a fine dining experience.

We also ordered orange juice with our breakfasts. The pulpy juice seemed to be fresh-squeezed, tasting even better than the delicious juice served at Horizon Court. (Or could it be that it was the same juice and that the atmosphere in the dining room just somehow made it seem to taste better?) But our enjoyment of the juice was short-lived, as it was served in tiny glasses which were quickly whisked away after we finished the juice, with refills never being offered.

Although our dining room breakfast did not fully satisfy my appetite, I knew that we would soon have plenty of other dining opportunities to make up for it.

But as we left the dining room, Terri decided to try something she would enjoy more than just watching me eat.

After breakfast, Terri wanted to go up one level to the nearby Grand Casino, where she found a somewhat entertaining game with a weird premise (dinosaurs mining for gold). Being in the casino made me nervous, with money so "conveniently" charged to our cruise cards for the slot machines. Thankfully, Terri showed her characteristic restraint, loading only $10 onto the machine, with each spin usually costing 20 cents.

Reaching a "bonus level" on the game, Terri had the opportunity to touch gold nuggets for rewards. In response to Terri's touch, an animated dinosaur holding a mining pick would chip away at the nugget to reveal its value. (I find it somewhat disturbing that Saturday morning cartoons are now seemingly converging with Las Vegas.)

Nevertheless, Terri found it to be a rewarding experience.

With less than an hour in the casino, Terri happily turned $10 into about $25 -- but it all remained on her card, "conveniently" ready to be spun away on her next visit.

After leaving the casino, a short walk down Deck 7 brought us to the Photo Gallery, where we took a few minutes to look through our portraits captured the night before. We left all of the portraits on the shelves that day, but whenever we walked by (as we did several times every day) we glanced at them, wondering if it might be worth the money to buy any of them.

Our daily ukulele class was scheduled to begin at the nearby Wheelhouse Bar at 11:15; we had learned by this time that we needed to arrive early if we wanted a seat. Arriving 10 minutes early, the best seats were already taken. But at least this time we could sit down.

After the class was over, I was eager to eat again, and thankfully Terri was ready for lunch too. So we found our way up to the Lido Deck, looking forward to the special "Italian trattoria" lunch buffet on display near the pool.

Italian food is probably Terri's favorite; when we have a chance, we like to treat ourselves to an Italian buffet near where we live, with over a half dozen hot dishes typically available.

The Golden's Italian Trattoria Buffet, however (like most of the poolside buffets), consisted primarily of cold cheeses and meats, with a live cooking station featuring just two hot pastas.

While the number of hot entrees available from the Italian Trattoria Buffet may have fallen short of our expectations, the desserts made up for it.

One of the desserts, which was like a pizza with mousse in the middle, was very hard for the server to slice.

I don't know if the desserts that day were truly Italian, but such thoughts didn't seem to hinder our enjoyment of the meal.

Terri had chosen that day to wear a very old red Hawaiian blouse that she used to often wear before we were married. Although I liked the way she draped the open blouse over a new lime colored top, I foolishly questioned whether she really should wear the old red blouse. Then she reminded me of the significance of the red blouse: it was handmade by her mother 30 years ago for Terri's trip to Oahu. I should have realized that wearing this top was another way for her to feel like her mother was part of this cruise to Hawaii.

After we finished eating, we went back down to the Photo Gallery for the raffle (having received several raffle tickets Friday night when our portraits were taken). The Photo Gallery was packed so full of people that others found it difficult to pass by.

After the raffle (which we didn't win), the next item on our agenda was the woven ribbon lei making class, which we had received tickets for on Friday morning. But the class was scheduled for 2 pm, the exact same time that Terri needed to be at the hula practice. Terri was trying to take her hula practices very seriously, but she also didn't want to miss out on weaving a ribbon lei.

We arrived at Sabatini's 20 minutes early for the woven ribbon lei making class, discovering that the "flip flop photo frame" class was taking place there. Terri would have enjoyed making a flip flop photo frame (and it even fit in perfectly with the charm I planned to give her that day), but apparently we hadn't noticed this activity in the Patter. (Although I consider myself to be a careful reader, in writing this review I have been shocked several times to realize that for some reason our eyes skipped over some interesting activities when we read the Patter. But we usually didn't feel like carrying the Patter around with us, and it was hard to remember everything we wanted to do without having the Patter handy as a reference.) If we had only been paying better attention, it would have worked perfectly with our schedule, because we had been right next to Sabatini's (in the Photo Gallery) at the time the class was starting.

(It seems odd to me that the Patter designated the Flip Flop Photo Frame class as "Creativity@Sea" while it designated the ribbon lei class as "Scholarship@Sea." But I digress.)

In an ironic twist, Terri slipped on her flip flops as we were coming down the stairs on our way from our room to the ribbon lei class, skinning her knee. If only we had stayed in Sabatini's to make the flip flop photo frames, Terri would have avoided her flip flop accident.

Terri had hoped that she might be able to start weaving her ribbon lei early, so that she could make it to Leialoha's hula class on time. Instead she had to wait until 2:00 to learn how to weave the ribbon lei.

The CD staff member distributed red and yellow ribbons to everybody, and then provided a quick and easy lesson on how to weave them into a lei.

After starting her lei, Terri hurried to the hula class, already in progress in the nearby Vista Lounge. About 30 minutes later, she returned to Sabatini's from the hula class, hoping to finish weaving her ribbon lei.

I'm embarrassed to admit that at 3:00, when the class ended, neither of us had finished weaving our ribbon leis! Of course Terri had a good excuse for not finishing hers, but I had been there for a full hour. What was my excuse? (I honestly don't know. It really wasn't that complicated.)

It also embarrasses me to admit that although we intended to finish the leis later that day, we never did so. To this day our ribbon leis remain half-finished, and we have forgotten how to make them.

In spite of our unfinished leis, we had to hurry to our 3:15 Princess Pop Choir practice. With only two days remaining before our performance, our group still hadn't learned half of the songs! Marahscalh didn't seem at all worried that we wouldn't be ready for the performance, however.

We finally found time to rehearse our fourth song that day: It's Not Unusual. The song was not too difficult to learn in one day, as it primarily involved the women singing in unison (while Marahscalh tried to coax us over-the-hill men to add some flair by swinging our hips like Tom Jones).

After the rehearsal ended, we decided to go to the "Reflection Highlights and Trivia" in the Explorers Lounge, where according to the Patter we would "relive the highlights" of our cruise. In actuality, however, this was just an extended commercial for the Reflections DVD. There were few times on our cruise that I felt that an activity was a complete waste of time, but this was one of them. (That's not intended to suggest that the DVD itself isn't worthwhile. We're glad we have it.)

At that point, we returned to our cabin to relax for a while. After trying in vain to finish our ribbon leis and starting to pack some things, we began to get ready for dinner.

When we arrived in the Canaletto Dining Room for dinner Saturday night, two of our tablemates were missing again. The couple who had chosen to skip the previous formal night returned, while I think the other couple had decided to have dinner at the Crown Grill. But once again, this just provided us with more time to focus on getting to know our other tablemates.

The dinner menu offered a variety of Italian specialties, which were of course much more impressive than what had been offered at the poolside Italian Trattoria Lunch Buffet.

For my appetizer, I chose Melanzane alla Parmigiana (grilled eggplant topped with tomato sauce, mozzarella cheese and basil leaves).

My entree was Capesante e Gamberi Gratinati (gratinated sea scallops and shrimp in light cream sauce crowned with floppy potato mash).

It seems to me that the Italian menus on Princess ships involve more seafood than a typical Italian restaurant, which is a nice treat for someone like me.

Terri, on the other hand, avoids seafood, always preferring more simple pleasures, so she ordered the Spaghetti con Polpette in Salsa di Pomodoro Fresco (which in spite of its exotic name simply means spaghetti with meatballs in tomato sauce).

The Princess special Baked Alaska was the featured dessert.

However, Terri chose instead to end her meal with a bowl of ice cream. I wanted her to try the creme brulee, but she let me finish most of it.

Terri chose to wear her golden pearl necklace for dinner that night. The necklace was one of the clue-gifts I had given her on her 49th birthday, a year before the cruise began (to symbolize the "Golden" Princess and Hawaii). I thought it went particularly well with her velvety black dress.

At 9:15, Elua was performing "A Tribute to Don Ho" in the Piazza, so we hurried away from the dinner table in time to catch their last couple of songs. (The Piazza performances were generally short, typically just 15 minutes long.)

Had I realized that the Horizon Court was featuring a special "Bavarian Bierfest Buffet" that night, I suppose we would have gone there next. I had assumed (until writing this review) that the buffet would have been following the Italian theme that day. (Typically during the cruise, I was too busy to read the Patter very carefully, with my eyes just skimming over the dining details on the back page. Obviously it can be important at times like this to read the fine print.)

We decided to go see the next show, which was set to begin in the Princess Theater at 10:15. While waiting for the show, Terri apparently heard the casino credits on her cruise card calling her name, so she decided to spend some time playing games like Goldfish and Tabasco. The results weren't overwhelmingly good or bad, but she enjoyed herself.

I left Terri in the casino for a while while I went two floors down to the International Cafe for some dessert and to use my UKP drink sticker for a virgin pina colada and Key West Cooler.

But by the time we sat down in the Princess Theater and world champion juggler Matt Henry took the stage, I was fading fast.

Terri had to nudge me several times to wake me up during the juggling act, so I'm sure I missed a few things. In spite of my sleepiness, I remember being impressed with the act, thinking that doing a juggling/balancing act on an undulating ship must be particularly challenging.

I think Terri would have liked to still keep going for a while after the show, but she could see that I was ready for bed, so we ended our day by taking the long walk from the Princess Theater at the front of the ship to our stateroom at the back of the ship.

To see more photos and videos from this Saturday of our return trip from Hawaii, go to:

Looking forward to more of your review.

 

I am surprised that Princess allowed your wife on board without proper identification. Did you find the wallet?

A copy paste from our reservation email from "vacations to go":

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Requirements for (U.S. Citizens): Mr. Charles *****, Mrs. Jennifer *****

For closed-loop cruise itineraries that begin and end in the same U.S. port and include ports in the Bahamas, Bermuda, Canada, the Caribbean, Mexico and/or select ports in Central America*, but that visit no other foreign ports:

For U.S. citizens passports are not required for this sailing but passengers must provide proof of U.S. citizenship. To board without a passport, adult passengers need a valid government-issued photo identification AND a U.S. state-issued original or certified copy of their birth certificate (hospital certificates are not acceptable) or a Consular Report of Birth Abroad, or a Certificate of Naturalization. If a woman has different last names on her photo identification and birth certificate she must also bring an original or certified copy of a marriage license and/or divorce papers to bridge the difference between the two names. Children under the age of 16 may board with a U.S. state-issued original or certified copy of their birth certificate (hospital certificates are not acceptable) or a Consular Report of Birth Abroad, or a Certificate of Naturalization as proof of citizenship. Photocopies of required documentation are not acceptable.

*If your closed-loop cruise visits Belize, Honduras or Panama passports are not required. If your closed-loop cruise visits any other country in Central or South America passports are required for all travelers, including travelers under 16 years of age.

For cruise itineraries that ONLY include ports in the lower 48 United States and/or Hawaii:

A valid government issued photo identification or a state certified birth certificate is required for all passengers. Photocopies of required documentation are not acceptable."

---------------------------------

So looks like the fact that it was this specific cruise is what made the difference. :rolleyes::cool:;)

On our first Sunday on the Golden Princess, I had foolishly been disappointed when I realized that the interdenominational church service would not be led by a "real" pastor. But by the time our second Sunday on the ship rolled around, I was looking forward to another opportunity to hear Deputy CD Marahscalh Stanton speak from his heart about the eternal truths of our faith.

We arrived at Explorers Lounge early so that we could find a place to sit in the front row. Soon the room was full of passengers who seemed to be eager for an opportunity to worship. (Of course, many Catholics had also gathered to worship down the hall in the Vista Lounge.)

Like the previous week's service, we only sang traditional hymns, with none of the more modern worship music. But to me, that distinction only made the service more meaningful.

Marahscalh revealed that at the end of the cruise, he would be leaving the Golden Princess and returning home to Alabama. (At the time it sounded like a sad announcement, as if he would be taking an extended break from cruises, but it was just a matter of weeks before I noticed on CC that he was back on another Princess ship.)

Using Joshua 24:15 ("choose this day whom you will serve") as his text, Marahscalh reminded us that (on or off a cruise ship), serving God is the obvious choice for us.

As I captured in this brief video excerpt, after we sang together "I Have Decided to Follow Jesus," Marahscalh closed the service in prayer, thanking God for "allowing our Golden moments to roll on just a little longer" as he prayed that we would all be reflections of God's love and kindness through the rest of the cruise and the rest of our lives. Then he dismissed us by saying that if he didn't see us again on "this side," he looked forward to seeing us on the "other side."

The church service lasted over an hour, much longer than any of the shows on the Golden Princess. But nobody seemed to mind.

After the service was over, we went up to Horizon Court for breakfast. Then we decided to go back to our cabin, but when we saw that our steward was at work in there, we went back up the stairs, deciding to supplement our breakfast with some oatmeal. This time our Horizon Court server brought us both large glasses of orange juice, while during our earlier visit we had received the juice in the usual smaller glasses.

Eventually we went back down to our stateroom again, where our steward had finished freshening up. After picking up our ukulele, we walked down to the Wheelhouse Bar, arriving 15 minutes early for our daily ukulele class so that we could be sure to get seats.

After enjoying another hour of music and learning from Dave Soreff, we hurried up to the Lido Deck for the Golden Dragon Buffet.

We had missed the food carving demonstration, but we got to see the cute pineapple dragon as we went through the buffet line.

The Golden Dragon Buffet offered mostly sushi and seafood, following its theme better than the previous day's Italian Trattoria Buffet. But Terri enjoyed the sweet and sour chicken most.

The Golden Dragon Buffet brought to mind some dear friends of ours, Chinese refugees who arrived in our country many years ago on the Golden Dragon and Golden Venture smuggling ships (surviving conditions unthinkable for us pampered Golden Princess passengers).

We knew that we were truly blessed to be experiencing the Golden Princess (especially when we could have missed the whole experience because of Terri's lost ID).

I just wanted to thank you again for taking us on along this journey of yours. We board the Star on Friday for Hawaii and your review has made us so excited.

I just wanted to thank you again for taking us on along this journey of yours. We board the Star on Friday for Hawaii and your review has made us so excited.

I'm excited for you too, Melody! There's nothing quite like that less-than-a-week-before-the-big-cruise feeling! :D I hope I can finish this review before your cruise begins :eek: -- but even if I don't, you'll have plenty of your own uniquely exciting memories by that time. (And I'm sure you'll have a very memorable Christmas!)

If you get a chance, say hello to Dave and Leialoha from us.

Tim

When we were done satisfying our appetites at the Golden Dragon Buffet, Terri wanted to go to the Nowhere Near A Millionaire Game Show in the Vista Lounge. That game show didn't interest me, so I told her that instead I would return our ukulele to our cabin and run some other errands.

It had become my habit during the cruise to leave Terri somewhere while I went to or from the cabin to return or retrieve something. I didn't mind the extra walking like she would. (Plus, times like this gave me more opportunities to prepare additional little surprises for her.)

But after going up and down these flights of stairs so often, I had decided to start switching stairways on alternating floors just to break up the monotony. When possible, I also tried to use other stairways besides the aft stairways (which were of course the closest to our cabin). This also gave me more opportunities to enjoy more of the artwork featured on the stairways. (I would later wish that I had taken pictures of some of this artwork, with certain pieces being very relevant to our relationship history.)

If (as was often the case) I was heading to deck 7, I never had to bother counting floors or looking for signs, because the stairway between decks 7 and 8 is longer than the others. If I was going to our cabin on deck 11, the sound of the squeaky doorway told me when I was "almost home."

While Terri was at the game show, the "Wild Photo Hour" was going on in the Photo Gallery, where we could get our photos for free if we found a Princess stamp on the back of them. We still hadn't decided to buy any of our photos, so I was hoping to find a Princess stamp. None of ours were stamped, so all of our photos remained in the Photo Gallery for the moment.

Leialoha's final hula class was scheduled for 2 pm in the Vista Lounge, so Terri didn't need to go anywhere after the game show (which must not have been particularly memorable, because I don't think she ever said a word about it).

The hula class was focused on final preparations for the Aloha 'Oe show, set to take place two days later, on our final afternoon on the Golden Princess.

The Aloha 'Oe hula was of course an important focus of this practice, as it would be the final number for the show. Leialoha and Dave had emphasized the significance of Aloha 'Oe as the touching way that Hawaii's final queen said goodbye to her people, but knowing that it would also be our way of saying "goodbye" to our Golden Princess cruisemates made it all the more poignant.

Leialoha encouraged the hula participants to wear something Hawaiian for the performance, but she warned them that coconut bras would not be permitted, not only because they are not truly Hawaiian but also because they create too much of a distraction. (Apparently some men had even dared to wear coconut bras in the past for this performance, generating laughs which changed the intended spirit of the hula while drawing too much attention away from the other performers!)

After the hula rehearsal, we went straight to the Hearts and Minds Chapel for yet another rehearsal, where our Princess Pop Choir started practicing "We Are the Champions" for the first time. Although our performance was set for the very next day, by the end of the rehearsal we still had not learned the final song! I knew that we would be able to use our music binders during the show, nevertheless I was starting to think that we wouldn't be ready for the performance, and considered asking Marahscalh if we could skip the final number. But I should have realized that Marahscalh was very experienced with such situations, and that he already had a plan.

When the rehearsal ended, we went down one floor from the chapel to the Lido Deck, where we caught the last part of Back to the Future on the Movies Under the Stars screen.

After watching the famed DeLorean vanish into the sky, Terri was ready to take a nap in her own bed, having been out and about for over eight hours.

I wasn't tired, so after Terri fell asleep, I escaped for an afternoon snack. I had chosen that day to wear one of the Aloha shirts Terri had bought me in Hawaii, and as I walked around the ship, I noticed several other men wearing the exact same shirt, so I joked with them that we must have been shopping at the same place. (Actually, I suspect that the bargain Aloha shirts, like the ones we bought, are mass-produced so that they can be sold at low prices in various low-end shops throughout Hawaii. Personally, I didn't mind being caught wearing the same shirt as someone else, but that might be something to take into consideration if that would bother you.)

Terri woke up from her nap at about 6:30, so we decided to catch a pre-dinner show in the Princess Theater. We arrived a few minutes late to hear comedian Kevin Hughes and his "Comedy for Couples: crazy about love" show.

It took just a couple of minutes to get used to Hughes' odd on-stage persona, as we watched him nervously pace back and forth on the almost-bare stage flashing his bright yellow sneakers while occasionally taking a sip from the water bottle which sat on a nearby stool.

But it didn't take long for the power of Hughes' words to distract us from his mannerisms. He spoke quite explicitly, but we had known from the start that this "comedy for couples" show was intended for an adult audience. Nevertheless, it never seemed that his language was gratuitous or vulgar or that he said something simply for shock value. In fact, his humor always seemed to take the back seat to a legitimate point he was trying to make, which I often found hitting home.

For example, Hughes challenged me to stop trying to convince my wife that she is sexy, but just help her know that she is safe. Speaking to her quietly, Hughes explained, helps her feel safe. (Obviously I've forgotten the humor he used to make this point, but I haven't forgotten the point.)

Not all of his humor, however, was relationship-oriented. I particulary enjoyed his detailed explanation of the "big bang theory," and the way he concluded (after a dramatic pause) with "it's easier to believe 'let there be light!'"

As

When the comedy show was over, we decided that we would see Kevin Hughes again after dinner, hoping to catch what we had missed. We didn't realize that our second Kevin Hughes experience would be quite different from the first, placing him in an awkward context.

A copy paste from our reservation email from "vacations to go":

 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Travel Documentation Requirements

Requirements for (U.S. Citizens): Mr. Charles *****, Mrs. Jennifer *****

 

For closed-loop cruise itineraries that begin and end in the same U.S. port and include ports in the Bahamas, Bermuda, Canada, the Caribbean, Mexico and/or select ports in Central America*, but that visit no other foreign ports:

For U.S. citizens passports are not required for this sailing but passengers must provide proof of U.S. citizenship. To board without a passport, adult passengers need a valid government-issued photo identification AND a U.S. state-issued original or certified copy of their birth certificate (hospital certificates are not acceptable) or a Consular Report of Birth Abroad, or a Certificate of Naturalization. If a woman has different last names on her photo identification and birth certificate she must also bring an original or certified copy of a marriage license and/or divorce papers to bridge the difference between the two names. Children under the age of 16 may board with a U.S. state-issued original or certified copy of their birth certificate (hospital certificates are not acceptable) or a Consular Report of Birth Abroad, or a Certificate of Naturalization as proof of citizenship. Photocopies of required documentation are not acceptable.

 

*If your closed-loop cruise visits Belize, Honduras or Panama passports are not required. If your closed-loop cruise visits any other country in Central or South America passports are required for all travelers, including travelers under 16 years of age.

 

For cruise itineraries that ONLY include ports in the lower 48 United States and/or Hawaii:

A valid government issued photo identification or a state certified birth certificate is required for all passengers. Photocopies of required documentation are not acceptable."

---------------------------------

 

So looks like the fact that it was this specific cruise is what made the difference. :rolleyes::cool:;)

The problem wasn't that Terri didn't bring a passport (which this passage is about -- some itineraries require one while others don't), but didn't have any government issued-photo ID on her. She didn't have her drivers license. If she had brought a passport, that would have been acceptable (my 16-year-old daughter who refuses to learn to drive as of yet brought her passport to the SAT test last month as her photo ID), but it's strange that she was allowed to board without any acceptable photo ID. I have done this itinerary three times now and have been asked to show a photo ID just to get back on board in each port. So again, she was lucky.

I remember when we had our dress rehearsal for the Aloha 'oe show on my last cruise and we were told it was going to be recorded for the official cruise CD (the actual show for an audience would be too late to be included). One woman came in very non-Aloha wear, a black sweater and jeans. And then took her place in the front row. And she was very tall to boot, so very conspicuous. I was just shaking my head over that. I think every other hula dancer and uke player managed to wear a Hawaiian print dress or shirt. When we were at the photo gallery and the CD on the monitor was showing us, I pointed out the woman to my hubby. Even if she hadn't bought any Hawaiian wear as everyone else had, why not try to wear something festive at the very least, or put yourself in a back row.

When we arrived in the Canaletto Dining Room, we were pleased to see that all of our tablemates were present. Our head waiter, Albuquerque, had previously promised us that one day he would personally prepare us a delicious cherries jubilee dessert, and that Sunday night he welcomed us to the dinner table by informing us that this was the night when we would have a chance to taste his Cherries Jubilee!

Of course, we started first with appetizers. I ordered Steamed Green Asparagus.

But I was more interested in Terri's appetizer (which actually seemed more like a dessert): Iced Watermelon with Honey-Citrus Mascarpone Cream, infused with fresh mint.

Next I enjoyed a creamy soup, "Fennel Veloute with Poached Bay Scallops," while Terri chose a rich Mexican meatball soup.

Seeing Piemontese-Style Veal Scaloppine on the menu that night, I couldn't resist giving it a try.

Terri, however, easily resisted the veal, gravitating again toward the familiar Home-Style Cuisine option of roast chicken.

As anticipated, we ended our meals with Albuquerque's freshly-prepared Cherries Jubilee, served with very large spoons. Yes, it was worth the hype.

While we were enjoying our dessert, we asked our waiter, Ram, to take a minute to pose with us for a photo, taken by Ram's assistant, junior waiter Luis.

Then Albuquerque offered to take another shot so that both Ram and Luis could be in the picture.

During the dinner, we encouraged our tablemates to go to Kevin Hughes' comedy show, while also warning them that they might find some parts of it to be embarrassing.

The next comedy show was not set to begin until about an hour after our dinner ended, so on our way out of the dining room, Terri wanted us to pose for more portraits in the Piazza.

Then I left her at the "That 70's Night" party in Explorers Lounge while I brought some things back to our cabin. Although Terri and I met in the 70's (and have many romantic memories associated with that decade), the party didn't interest me (I think because its name made me think of an irritating TV show). I thought that it was strange that the Patter described this party as a "Cruise Cult Classic."

While I was gone, Crimson played two tunes from our youth, with Terri sitting by herself wishing that I was there to dance to these slow songs with her. But when I returned, there was no time left to dance: we needed to get to the Princess Theater for the start of Kevin Hughes' final show.

As we sat near the front of the theater, we noticed our tablemates coming in the back. I think they may have wisely chosen to sit in a place where they could easily slip out if things became too uncomfortable.

But from the moment when Kevin Hughes first took the stage, it was obvious that he was the one who was uncomfortable. It wasn't long before he identified the problem: a 10 year old child was sitting in the very front row, directly in front of Hughes.

For the first several minutes of the show, Hughes tried to convince the child's parents that this show would not be appropriate, but they insisted upon staying. So instead of hearing the no-holds-barred act we had anticipated, Hughes forced himself to be much more restrained. It was a painful experience, like watching a handcuffed magician struggling in vain to break the lock.

The Princess Theater exit brought us to the Grand Casino, where Terri reminded me that she still had credits on her cruise card. While she played some games, I ordered a Macadamia Madness drink, thinking that such a drink should help to complete our Hawaiian cruise experience. Usually I love macadamia nuts, but this drink with chopped up nuts didn't fulfill my expectations. If I had another chance, I doubt that I would order it again.

We didn't stay in the casino for very long, but I'm not sure exactly what we did after that. (We probably went back to Explorers Lounge to hear more of Crimson's music.) I think we just both wanted to linger, as we started to realize that our time on the Golden Princess would soon be coming to an end.

It was well after midnight when we decided to go back to our stateroom. The only reason I know how late we stayed up is that before returning to the Baja Deck, I asked Terri if I could take her picture in front of the starry Skywalker, as it fulfilled a clue I had given her before the cruise. (We didn't actually go into Skywalker's, but it looked to me like there was nothing going on in there anyway.)

(The timestamp of this blurry photo indicates that it was 12:42 am!)

Monday would be our final sea day on the Golden Princess, and also the day of our big Princess Pop Choir performance. Little did we know, it would also present us with significant new difficulties. But in the midst of the problems, a beautiful seed would be planted.

More photos and videos of our Sunday at sea returning from Hawaii can be viewed at:

http://flic.kr/s/aHsjENXEbp

The problem wasn't that Terri didn't bring a passport (which this passage is about -- some itineraries require one while others don't)' date=' but didn't have [u']any[/u] government issued-photo ID on her. She didn't have her drivers license. If she had brought a passport, that would have been acceptable (my 16-year-old daughter who refuses to learn to drive as of yet brought her passport to the SAT test last month as her photo ID), but it's strange that she was allowed to board without any acceptable photo ID. I have done this itinerary three times now and have been asked to show a photo ID just to get back on board in each port. So again, she was lucky.

 

I remember when we had our dress rehearsal for the Aloha 'oe show on my last cruise and we were told it was going to be recorded for the official cruise CD (the actual show for an audience would be too late to be included). One woman came in very non-Aloha wear, a black sweater and jeans. And then took her place in the front row. And she was very tall to boot, so very conspicuous. I was just shaking my head over that. I think every other hula dancer and uke player managed to wear a Hawaiian print dress or shirt. When we were at the photo gallery and the CD on the monitor was showing us, I pointed out the woman to my hubby. Even if she hadn't bought any Hawaiian wear as everyone else had, why not try to wear something festive at the very least, or put yourself in a back row.

Correct me if I am wrong terrific_surprise, but I believe she had a "Six Flags" photo id coupled with her government issue birth certificate.... ?

Don't get me wrong Cruisin' Chick. I too am still surprised she got on and would have not been surprised to hear they wouldn't her on.

Correct me if I am wrong terrific_surprise, but I believe she had a "Six Flags" photo id coupled with her government issue birth certificate.... ?

 

Don't get me wrong Cruisin' Chick. I too am still surprised she got on and would have not been surprised to hear they wouldn't her on.

That's essentially correct. However there were some other non-photo documents abd I do have reason to believe that Princess was able to access an electronic copy of her valid driver's license which they had received the previous month for a BVE.

Nevertheless Princess and the authorities would clearly have had every right to refuse to let her board, and we can only conclude that our whole cruise experience was a huge example of grace (unmerited favor). :)

Tim

Sent from my iPhone using Forums mobile app

Our sea days returning from Hawaii had been less difficult than our days traveling to Hawaii, but throughout the night before our final full sea day, the Golden Princess began rocking strongly from side to side, and we could see white caps on the water again.

Although Terri was starting to feel seasick again, she still felt up to making the morning quite pleasurable and memorable for me, providing me with an opportunity to practice saying Hawaiian words like "ono" and "nani" (and the Hawaiian nickname I had given her, "maika'i no," which means "terrific").

Having been up so late the night before (and with Terri starting to feel sick), we were kind of lazy that morning. "I guess being sick for a fourth of the cruise isn't bad," Terri said (but I wondered if she may have been overestimating the number of days she felt sick). And of course, I tried to make sure she felt safe, following Kevin Hughes' counsel.

For the past several days, the Wake Show had been strongly promoting the advantages of making a future cruise deposit during the cruise. At first I paid little attention, trying to ignore any thoughts of another cruise. When Terri asked whether we could make a future cruise deposit, I gently crushed her dreams, saying that I didn't think it would be possible, and I meant it. In my mind at that point, this was the big one, the cruise of our lifetime. Perhaps it would be nice to take a 7 day cruise every five years or so, but I didn't think that we could afford to take another cruise within the two year timeframe of the future cruise deposit. In addition, our finances had already been stretched to their limit to take the existing cruise, and I wasn't sure if I could afford $200 for two future cruise deposits and still have enough to settle our shipboard account. Nevertheless, when I heard that the future cruise deposit would be fully refunded if we didn't use it before the end of the two years, I began to consider it. I had been looking for some way to extend the big surprise beyond the cruise (as an antidote to the post-cruise blues), so perhaps the future cruise deposit would help.

As usual, we enjoyed watching the Elua segment on the Wake Show, which always included a Hawaiian word of the day. We recorded a

But Dave and Leialoha seemed to be providing incorrect information on TV that day, saying that there would be no regular ukulele class and that the dress rehearsal was scheduled for that day! In both the ukulele class and hula class, they had told us that the dress rehearsal would be held on Tuesday, the day the ship would be going to Ensenada. During the ukulele class later that morning, Dave explained that all of their Wake Show segments were recorded previously, chuckling "didn't you wonder why we were wearing the same thing every morning on TV?"

While Terri stayed in bed, I used up some of my Internet minutes to check my email and voicemails (which were transcribed and sent to my email through Google Voice). With 91 minutes remaining on my Internet package, I wondered if I would ever use up all of my remaining time.

At 9:40 am, the Captain made an announcement throughout the ship, warning us that he expected rough seas throughout the day, and that we should secure any loose items in our stateroom. We hadn't heard such an announcement previously on this cruise (even though we had already experienced some days we considered to be rough), so we were apprehensive about what the day might bring.

When we finally opened our door to leave our cabin, we were pleasantly surprised to see a Happy Anniversary sign posted on our door above the Happy Birthday sign.

Although our anniversary was 20 days later, I had included our anniversary date when I filled out the cruise personalizer, so we were able to celebrate both special occasions with one cruise. I usually try to plan something special for our anniversaries, but I had been so focused on the cruise that I had no anniversary plans. But thoughts of an anniversary present decreased my resistance to pondering the future cruise deposit, as I realized that it might be nice to reveal on our anniversary that I had made a deposit. Nevertheless, I continued to agonize over whether I could afford it.

This was the last morning when the lei making class would be offered, so Terri decided to make one final lei (her third).

This time she made it a little too long (the limit is apparently 32 inches), so she had to remove some beads at the end to avoid being charged an extra 50 cents per bead.

Terri had been feeling too queasy for breakfast, so while she was making the lei, I slipped away to the International Cafe for a light breakfast.

Having already found seats in the Wheelhouse Bar for the lei making class, we were early enough to get good seats for our final ukulele class. Being in both the ukulele and hula classes, Terri needed to make a decision between hula and ukulele for the Aloha 'Oe Show, so she decided of course to choose hula.

That decision provided an extra blessing, freeing up Terri's hands so that she could record some video to help us remember Dave's ukulele classes.

Note: Due to persistent technical difficulties I have been experiencing with Flickr (where my cruise photos and videos have been posted), it has become necessary for me to post some of the remaining videos on YouTube. However, I have included a link to the YouTube videos on each of the corresponding Flickr photos to make the situation less confusing. (If I ever resolve the Flickr problems, I will eventually post the videos there too.)

Correct me if I am wrong terrific_surprise, but I believe she had a "Six Flags" photo id coupled with her government issue birth certificate.... ?

 

Don't get me wrong Cruisin' Chick. I too am still surprised she got on and would have not been surprised to hear they wouldn't her on.

A photo ID from an amusement park would not be a government-issued photo ID.

Last week I went through TEAM training (alcohol training) so I can serve beer at this year's Rose Bowl and BCS Championship games (as part of a fundraising endeavor) and we were told that if we needed to check IDs for anyone looking under 35 years of age who wanted to buy beer, we can only consider government issued photo IDs. Basically a drivers license or a passport. Not even a school ID is acceptable.

Dave Soreff started our final ukulele class in the usual way, by having us tune our ukuleles and then having us play some chords together to warm up. The first song we rehearsed together was Little Grass Shack (Terri recorded some of this on

Later we rehearsed Aloha 'Oe, first with Dave calling out the chords and then with no extra help. During this time, Dave seemed to be surprised to see Leialoha in the back of the room. Halfway through the song, she began gently dancing into the middle of the room, as if she couldn't resist gracing us with a hula. (This

Leialoha's beautiful hula moves seemed to flow out of the depths of her soul.

Explaining that those who planned to be in the Aloha 'Oe Show would be standing during their performance, Dave suggested that we might want to stand during the final part of this practice. When some seemed to hesitate, Dave grinned and said "I don't want to guilt you into doing something that you really should be doing."

At the end of the class, Dave gave us pointers on caring for our ukuleles. In particular, he warned us to be careful with our ukuleles during our travels, being sure not to check them as luggage, "unless," Dave joked, "you want some kindling."

Before we left, Dave passed around a guest book for all of us to sign. Then Terri asked if she could take my picture with him.

After taking the ukulele back to our cabin, we decided to go to the Crown Grill for the Pub Lunch. I had previously thought that the menu was always the same at every Pub Lunch, but this time we had some additional options I hadn't seen before.

The Scotch egg piqued my curiosity. I had never heard of such a thing before, so I decided to give it a try.

The "quintessential English dessert" offered that day was a sherry trifle, "a layered melange of sponge cake soaked in sherry and covered with jam, custard and cream."

While we ate, we heard a rumbling vibration every few seconds. We hadn't heard such a sound on any of the previous days of the cruise. Terri asked our waiter if he knew what the noise was, and he explained that it was the stabilizers. The sound of the stabilizers was much louder in the lower midship area than anywhere else on the ship.

We then returned to our cabin, where Terri wanted to spend some time practicing her hula moves, using the videos of the hula classes (which had been recorded on her phone) as a guide.

The large photo on our cabin wall showed Terri with her deceased parents. I had surprised her with the photo at the start of the cruise, thinking that she would enjoy feeling like her parents were smiling down on her during her 50th birthday celebration. It was mounted to the metallic wall using inexpensive magnetic disks (similar to refrigerator magnets).

terrific_surprise - you are so good at uploading these photos...I just joined Flickr and spent a good amount of time yesterday trying to figure out how to post the photos in a thread. All my attempts failed, even though I had printed out instructions from a previous thread and tried to follow them step by step. I'm sure it's quite simple and likely user error, so can you please tell me what you do to get these photos into your thread??? Thank you so much...and again, am really enjoying reading along. Merry Christmas!

terrific_surprise - you are so good at uploading these photos...I just joined Flickr and spent a good amount of time yesterday trying to figure out how to post the photos in a thread. All my attempts failed, even though I had printed out instructions from a previous thread and tried to follow them step by step. I'm sure it's quite simple and likely user error, so can you please tell me what you do to get these photos into your thread??? Thank you so much...and again, am really enjoying reading along. Merry Christmas!

Hi LollyMoz, and Merry Christmas to you too! I would be glad to help. My experience for the past week or more has been that I usually can't get the "new" uploader to work, so I have had to use the "Old Uploadr" (the link near the upper right corner after selecting "Upload"). Also, for over a week I have been unsuccessful in getting any videos at all to upload (after several dozen attempts of various videos). :mad:

Once a photo has been successfully uploaded, click on the photo in Flickr and then click on the "Share" button toward the lower right of the photo, which looks like a rectangle with a right-pointing arrow coming out of it. Then click on "Grab the HTML/BBCode" and then make sure "BBCode" is selected before you copy the code and paste it into a CC post.

Unfortunately, just to confuse things, Flickr has been switching the user interface for some users recently, so it is possible that what you see might not quite correspond to my descriptions above. :eek:

If you need additional help, can you send me an email at the address terrific327 (at) gmail (dot) com? Thanks!

Tim

Although our Princess Pop Choir concert was scheduled for that evening, I was glad that we still had one final practice that afternoon -- one final chance to try to smooth out some rough spots. On our way up to the Hearts and Minds Chapel, Terri felt like her stomach could tolerate a light snack.

The first order of business for our Princess Pop Choir rehearsal was to finally learn our last song, Sweet Caroline. Marahscalh taught us the simple hand motions quickly, and of course I assume that we were already all familiar with the melody and most of the words. Within just a few minutes he seemed to feel good enough about it for us to go back through the other songs.

At the end of the rehearsal, Marahscalh gave all of us slick Princess Pop Choir pins to wear on our lapels for the performance! (That was a nice little bonus we hadn't expected.) Then he reminded us to dress in formal wear, preferably in black and white. Unfortunately, I hadn't brought any black and white formal wear, so I hoped that a gray shirt with a dark blue suit coat would suffice.

I felt like we still needed more practice, but Marahscalh apparently considered us to be ready, dismissing us a full 15 minutes early. His calm, confident attitude made it hard for me to keep feeling so nervous. "Certainly he knows better than we do what is in store for us," I told myself.

Before leaving the chapel for the last time, we took some photos of our group and exchanged contact information with these friends we had enjoyed singing with every afternoon.

That's Shirl in front, who by this time had endeared herself to our choir and many passengers and crew members, becoming known throughout the ship for her smiling pineapples in particular.

Terri and I wanted to make sure we got a picture with Marahscalh, who had become such an important part of our cruise experience.

The motion of the ship was starting to bother Terri during the rehearsal, so afterwards she asked if we could return to our cabin.

Turning the TV to the channel which had the Report From the Bridge, we could see that the sea conditions were rough (of course we could already feel that). Someone said later that the waves reached up to 17 feet high!

However, seeing the ship's position gave us a slight sense of relief, as we could see that we were now less than 400 miles from land.

While Terri rested, I went to the Vista Lounge for a Technical@Sea and Navigation@Sea presentation on the Golden Princess. The ship's officers explained that the purified water which the Golden Princess produces is more pure than any other water source. But if we drank the ship's water in its completely pure form, it would leach minerals out of our body, so minerals have to be added back in after purification.

The officers went on to explain that even the sewage water on the ship is impeccably purified -- but I was relieved to hear their absolute assurance that they don't let us drink the sewage water!

I would have been particularly interested that day to learn more about how those noisy stabilizers work, but it was never mentioned.

After the presentation, the cruise's navigational charts were auctioned off, with the proceeds going to a Princess charity foundation.

I left before the auction was over, deciding to see what was happening on the Lido Deck. In spite of wintry blasts of air, there were quite a few people in hoodies covered in blankets as they watched the NCAA basketball finals on the Movies Under the Stars screen. All of the pools and hot tubs were drained and roped off (but I'm sure that nobody objected to that).

After wandering around for a while, I decided to give in to the whispering voice inside my head that had been telling me that there would be no harm in just having a talk with the Future Cruise Consultant. So I went back down to her office on Deck 6, near the Crown Grill.

She explained that there was no need for me to decide yet which cruise we might wish to take next. Then she gave me a simple form I could fill out to place a future cruise deposit, explaining that all I needed to do was to complete the form and to put it into the nearby box (which was always conveniently available, even if her office wasn't open). The deposit would be charged to the debit card I had registered with our account before the cruise. Unfortunately, I was pretty sure that I wouldn't have enough in that account to cover the balance on our shipboard account if I deducted $200 for the future cruise deposits.

The stabilizer sound and vibration resonated throughout that area every few seconds, much more loudly than it had been during lunch. I asked someone who was working nearby if the stabilizer sound bothered them or if they get used to it after a while, and the crew member sighed with unmistakable exasperation "honestly, after eight hours of this, my brain is fried!"

Once a photo has been successfully uploaded, click on the photo in Flickr and then click on the "Share" button toward the lower right of the photo, which looks like a rectangle with a right-pointing arrow coming out of it. Then click on "Grab the HTML/BBCode" and then make sure "BBCode" is selected before you copy the code and paste it into a CC post.

I also wanted to thank you again for this wonderful review. The love that you and your wife share shine through on every page.

Watching the news as we dressed for dinner, we learned that former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher had died that day. Throughout the cruise, Terri had said several times that one of our tablemates reminded her of somebody famous, and suddenly she realized that she had been thinking of the "Iron Lady."

As we started down the hallway on our way to dinner, we met one of the passengers who was staying in the Grand Suite next door (this was actually the first time in the entire cruise that we had met). We asked our neighbor for a favor. No, we didn't ask if we could take a peek inside the Grand Suite (although I admit that we were very curious about it). Instead, we just asked if he could take our picture. He gladly agreed.

Before dinner we decided to pose for some more formal portraits. Not long after we arrived in the Canaletto Dining Room, a photographer arrived to take more pictures.

Eventually we decided to buy this one, partly because it showed us wearing our Princess Pop Choir pins.

When the subject of Margaret Thatcher's death came up at dinner, we told our tablemate that she reminded us of the former Prime Minister. That led to a discussion of some past health problems our tablemates had experienced. When one of them commented that I seemed very healthy, suddenly I had to stop and ask myself "am I really healthy?"

Racking my brain as if I were trying desperately to recall an important dream, I slowly began to remember that I hadn't felt very healthy in the weeks leading up to the cruise (with painful shingles being one of several problems). Somehow the cruise environment had temporarily erased my memory of my health problems!

Usually I don't like to eat before I sing, but that was the night for the Captain's Gala Dinner, and there was no chance that I would miss the opportunity to enjoy some lobster. I forgot to take a picture of the menu, but I think the same menu (from a different cruise) can be seen here and here. (The Captain's Gala Dinner as posted on the CC thread "Food, Food and More Food" differs slightly from the menu we had that night.)

My gala meal began with Tian of Crab, Scallop and Shrimp ("poached seafood layers with duo of caviar and papaya dressing").

Those who ordered the escargots were delighted with the reportedly delectable flavor. On our 2010 Sapphire Princess cruise, our tablemates had similarly raved about the escargots. Seeing how much they relished it, I was tempted -- just slightly -- to try it. I do generally enjoy trying new foods, but somehow sampling snails was one line I had never been willing to cross, and I decided to keep it that way.

However, I certainly could not resist the Broiled Lobster Tail and King Prawns ("with lemon butter fondue, paired with a side of grilled asparagus and rice pilaf").

Before I could figure out how to delicately remove the lobster meat from the shell while retaining some decorum, our waiter Ram expertly and quickly did the job for me.

Once again, I was amazed by the overwhelming level of service we received from Ram. (And the food was wonderful too!)

While I feasted upon crab, scallops, shrimp, caviar, king prawn and lobster, Terri kept her meal simple, as usual. She started with a chicken broth soup (Chicken and Vegetable Petite Marmite).

Then she decided to order Fettuccine Alfredo (with the Parmesan bowl) again.

This time the Parmesan bowl was much better than the limp bowl I had been served earlier in the cruise.

We had received a little coupon at the beginning of the cruise which entitled Terri to a Princess birthday cake dessert. Having missed dinner on her actual birthday, she still hadn't had her birthday cake, so we presented the coupon to our waiter Ram that night.

After we sang Happy Birthday to Terri, she promptly decided not to taste her cake, because we needed to hurry to our Princess Pop Choir performance. She asked Ram if the cake could be packaged to go, so he quickly wrapped it in foil, even forming a functional little foil handle.

I predicted that Terri never would get a taste of her birthday cake, and unfortunately I was right. Even though we somehow found a safe place to put it during our show, eventually it was so damaged that we just threw it away. But we still had one more unused coupon which we could use for another Princess cake (this time to celebrate our anniversary).