monday 3.26.2007 (at sea)
Posted in eastern caribbean cruise on April 1st, 2007 by jenni | No Comments »
Tags: at sea, caribbean, casino, cruise, ocean
We didn’t sleep very well the first night because of the rocking of the boat, so we awoke fairly early and went up to breakfast at the buffet. I was thrilled because it was definitely European-style: fruit, croissants, and cheese. Also, gruel. I still daydream about it sometimes.
Sigh. Gruel.
We went down to one of the lounges to try out Super Quiz. We’re generally pretty good at trivia, but it was definitely geared towards old people; there are only so many Rat Pack questions younger people can answer. Team Awesome did alright, though.
After trivia, we decided to go lay out in the sun on deck chairs. I dozed off while reading. After an hour or so, Stephanie and Wendy were starting to turn colors. We went in to have lunch at the buffet, and were far too excited about the many, many dining options, including sugar-free dessert. We went back to our freezing cabin (we set it that way intentionally), stuffed, and Stephanie declared that she felt like a roofied cube steak. Our room instantly became the meat locker, and naptime was henceforth ‘meat locker time’. We made sure to have some every day, and this always involved turning on the TV to the boat channel that showed where we were in the Caribbean, and had Italian opera playing in the background.
I don’t really recall when this part happened, but we were apparently drunk in the afternoon that day. I have a photo of me giving Wendy the finger while she’s sitting with the minibar door open. Given the time we spent on the cruise, however, us being drunk was not a surprise. It was more shocking to be totally sober after noon.
We went to go play canasta in the card room, an activity that would also become a daily ritual. We’d sit in the same area, order drinks from the same waiters (who we got to know pretty well), watch our favorite bartenders, eat boatsnacks (the spicy peanuts were the best), put our feet up on the fancy chairs, and play cards. It was awesome. This particular time, there was a group of old people playing, too, and they were thrilled that we knew how to play canasta.
mojito!
Later in the afternoon, we went to the casino and played video poker for a while. Stephanie won, and bought us another round of drinks. (My travel journal at this point says “quadriplegic”. I’m not sure what that’s about, and that’s probably for the best!) We went to go tour more of the ship, and found the library, where the computers were. I sat down and emailed Matt to let him know we were alive, and find out how the Gophers were doing in the NCAA tournament. Let’s just say I was glad I wasn’t home to see it.
We went back to the cabin to get Wendy’s special water (Patron in a plastic bottle). Wendy and Stephanie examined their sunburns. Around dinnertime, we went back to the buffet; the main restaurant is nice, but it’s so much food, and takes a couple hours for dinner. We only ate there twice during the cruise. We had various items, including pizza, and ate out on the back deck under the canopy. It had rained during the evening, so the deck was wet. Also, the darkness on the ocean is kind of amazing. You can’t see anything else around you, just the lights of your own ship.
After dinner, we returned to our new favorite bar. The bartenders were Rodrigo and Casanova (he had a real name, but it was Bar Casanova, and that suited him better). Wendy had a major crush, because they were awesome. We sat and watched the goofy show going on behind us, and then suddenly the bar was full of people exiting the show in the theatre. The cruise entertainment staff was dressed up in Elvis-era clothing. One of the dudes let me feel his rubber Elvis hair.
Deborah, our ‘English-speaking hostess’ from Australia, was all over the place. We loved her, her awesome accent, and the fact that she told us that the cruise ship can afford to lose 10% of its passengers in ports (if, for example, they’re late back to the boat). She did a round of shots with us, and taught us a new toast that would change our lives forever:
UP THE BUM, NO BABIES!!
She left us with, “see you at the disco!” and headed off to harangue the doctor, who was again at the end of the bar.
wendy and, uh… never mind.
We went back to the cabin, fully intending to go to the 50s dance party at the club. But when we got there, I found couch cushions stashed under the bed, so of course we had to do the obvious: play American Gladiators. This also became a daily tradition. Wendy laid down on her bed, so I beat on her with cushions. We never made it to the dance party.
I couldn’t take my eyes off the temperature display, which kept climbing upwards. All of a sudden, I was in road construction, on a narrow 2-lane highway with a concrete barrier on my left and a wall of semi trucks on my right. I panicked. I was having trouble seeing. I had to keep reminding myself to just breathe, because I was worried about passing out behind the wheel. Even though I was doing 70, it felt like this slow-motion creep uphill. I had never been so scared; I was convinced that I was going to die alone in the desert.
When I got to Barstow, I pulled off at a truck stop, like she told me to do. I got out of the car and the backs of my pants were soaked through, dark green stains down the backs of my thighs. I was beyond caring. I went and sat in the bathroom for ten minutes or so, trying to calm down (which was an indication of my mental state, that I would prefer sitting in a truck stop bathroom). I bought a pop and commented to the girl at the counter that my hands were shaking because I was terrified of driving through the desert. She laughed and said that a woman had told her the exact same thing the day before. She asked if I had a cellphone, and told me not to worry, because I would be safe.
I felt a little better, having survived the first leg, and knowing I only had 200 miles to go to Vegas. I ate a banana and felt less shaky, so I got back on the road. Since I was past the big uphills, I turned the air back on. The engine temperature needle hadn’t budged the whole time, so I relaxed a little. I was going to make it to Vegas before 1pm. Apart from the freaking-out part, I liked the desert. I saw Joshua Trees and salt flats where they race cars. I couldn’t believe people lived in Baker, out in the middle of nowhere. I saw Primm, Nevada, one of those cities trying to make itself a mini-Vegas. I saw a huge waterpark complex that had closed, with some of the slides starting to collapse. I came over a rise and saw Vegas, and regretted just a tiny bit that I wasn’t approaching it at night, and seeing the neon. Instead, I saw smog. But, still. It was Vegas!
I went to the north end of the strip, turned at Circus Circus, and I had arrived at my perfect oldschool casino: the 
Also, things in Las Vegas were a lot farther apart than I had expected. I know now that the strip is 3 miles long, and I wish I had known that when I was walking it. However, it was fun to see all the casinos, and I stopped to take lots of pictures. Lots of them had water misters and giant fans set up near their entrances, so those offered a little escape from the heat. Walking past the doors was like torture, though, feeling the air conditioning blasting out into the street.
I had avoided it for two reasons. First, it was a seafood restaurant. Second, Heather’s deep, burning hatred for Emeril had rubbed off on me. I recalled the time we were driving down St. Charles Avenue in New Orleans, past his restaurant, and Heather spotted him standing in the front window. She let out a string of expletives that surprised even me. So, yeah. We hate Emeril.
From MGM Grand, I crossed to New York, New York. It was pretty cool inside, but I got lost trying to get back out the other side. I was hoping to be able to work my way up the strip mostly staying indoors, and out of the hellish heat. No luck; I ended up walking a few blocks outside anyway. I stopped into CVS and bought a giant bottle of painkillers for the pounding headache I had since I had started walking earlier that day (as Heather pointed out, I was dehydrated, and the coffee was just making it worse. Of course, I didn’t realize that at the time). I crossed to the Aladdin and went into the shops entrance. After walking around for a while, I decided that this was my favorite casino. The shops were laid out in a big circle with the casino in the center. I thought that was kind of ingenious, as it allows you to buy souvenirs and window-shop while making your way from one entrance to another, without having to deal with the casino insanity. Also, it’s divided into four sections, each decorated in a different middle-eastern theme. I liked the giant couches for lounging and the simulated thunderstorm, which was mildly entertaining. From there, I went to Paris. It was one of the better casinos, too - the legs of the Eiffel Tower inside the casino were cool. I went into a couple shoppes and used les toilettes.
I crossed to the Bellagio. It was swank, but in that ridiculous Vegas way - so overdone that it’s obscene, and incongruous because all the tourists are still Bob and Ann from Omaha, and Bob is wearing a Hawaiian shirt. The lobby was amazing, and they were piping in flower scent. I was confused about the giant liberty bell, though. Why is it there? Weird. The Bellagio offered me no coffee, nor did Caesar’s Palace, or the Flamingo, or the Barbary Coast (ha). I decided to go back to Paris, because I had passed a coffee shop there where I could sit down for a while. I wound my way through the maze of escalators and moving sidewalks back to Bally’s. I had noticed a trend on this type of public transport, by the way: I radiate impatience. I must, because every time I would be standing behind someone on an escalator or moving sidewalk, they’d turn, look chastened, and move out of the way with a quickness. Sometimes, I was just standing there, being calm and trying not to curse them for being slow, and they could still tell. It’s funny.
I tried to sleep in, really. I woke at 6 and forced myself to go back to sleep, but I was up again by 7am. I got coffee and went to my car, which, surprisingly, had not melted into a pool of metal and rubber after sitting in the heat all day. I got on the freeway and headed towards the Hoover Dam. Apparently, Boulder City has some kind of scam going with the state highway department, in which all the tourist traffic is routed right through the center of town.
I sat there, squirming, surrounded by tourist families, thinking, this is not what i want to be doing, either. I did learn a couple fun facts from the presentation, however: first of all, there’s no way a body could be buried in the dam, because of how they poured the concrete (although I choose to adhere to the theory that the mob can do anything it wants, and if it wants a body in the dam, it gets a body in the dam); second, Las Vegas gets none of its power from the Hoover Dam. So there. Some learnin’.
After it stopped raining, I got dressed and headed to Circus Circus. I went up and watched some of the performance. It was kind of a cool setup, and I liked that they put on the show for free, considering some of the crap that people paid to see in that town. I walked around the shops and checked the restaurants, as usual. The one place that looked promising was closed; I was mistaken in my assumption that everything in Vegas was open 24 hours a day. I walked back to the Stardust, and found a long line outside the one cafe I had chosen the night before. Sigh. I waited anyway, and it only took about 10 minutes. They got me in fast because I was willing to sit in the smoking section. I mean, the entire city is like one big smoking section. So why not?
