Parasailing at Half Moon

Tuesday 2 January 2007

Today was a sea day. We ate breakfast with a girl who was in her first year of law school

Ceiling of the dining room

and she told us that on deck 5 at the stern the inside cabins had MUCH more space than most of them, and in addition had no neighbors because they were between storage closets.

She also said that the Senior Assistant Cruise Director was an a**hole. The Junior Assistant Cruise Directors said (maybe joking or maybe not) that they would throw him in the pool at the end of the cruise and the SAC said they would be fired if they did. So the girl's brother asked what if he (the brother) threw him in and the SAC said they would still get fired if that happened too.

Ship company

We went to the crew show, and then went to lunch

Caribbean island fritters with plantains appetizer

Master Chef's favorite meatloaf

Chocolate ice cream and nuts

Caramelized pineapple, coconut ice cream and coconut meringue - I liked it before so I had it again

Tier of poinsettias in the dining room

That night we had the Farewell dinner.

Celebration of Fruit Cocktail

Escargot Bourguignon

American Rib Eye Steak

March de Passion, French Style Seafood Selection

Cookies

Sparklers on Baked Alaska

I took a photo of the photographer

Photographer

Tom and Sheila took our photos and we took theirs - then we exchanged

Baked Alaska with a sparkler

Waiter with Baked Alaska

Serving Baked Alaska

Serving Baked Alaska

Baked Alaska

Crab towel animal telling us to set the clock back

Wednesday 3 January 2007

When we dropped anchor at Half Moon Cay the next day, the Volendam was already there.

Volendam

They were also using the tenders, so we had to use the lifeboats.

Life boat davits and life boat going around the ship

Bob said at least we could see that they worked.

We had breakfast (I had an omelet)

Omelet

and watched other people parasailing out the window.

From the ship

Then I got on my bathing suit and took my cameras and my ticket for the parasailing, and went down to the auditorium to get my ticket for the shuttle to the beach.

Maasdam and Volendam

From the lifeboat

Bob went with me.

Entrance

On shore in the fake town, there were a lot of shops. I had forgotten the strap to hold my glasses on, and so I bought one in one of the shops ($6). I used my ship card as they didn't take money.

Charge it on your ship card

I wanted to get some post cards and mail them, but I didn't have any money for stamps and the one place that didn't take the ship card was the post office.

We sat around in the patio of the fake town for a bit.

I wanted to take a tram around the island,

but that was by ticket only until the BBQ at which time the tram train was a free shuttle to where the BBQ was. So Bob went back to the ship, and I went out to where the boat was.

Since the Volendam was their first, they had to do the BBQ setup, which made the crew on our ship very happy.

The parasailing boat people didn't ask for my ticket - they just took my word for it that I was on the 10:30 trip. There were three others. An older man called Buddy who went first, a young girl and a young man. They gave each of them a life jacket - except me. They said that I would use Buddy's jacket when he finished with it. I assume that was because they didn't have two big ones.

Getting the parachute ready

Ready

Buddy getting ready to go

One of the others parasailing

As each of us went, we got into a harness which was hooked to a line and then attached to a parachute. We sat on the aft deck of the boat and they reeled us out

The girl and the boy went after Buddy and then it was my turn. When it was my turn (the guy running the boat said I wasn't going to chicken out was I? as if I would) I took my film camera up and took a whole roll of photos.

Island from the parasail

The Maasdam

Looking down-the corner of the life jacket in the frame

I was up - I think higher than the ship. I saw the horseback riding where they swam the horses from the beach - I saw over the island, and to the other side. It was quiet up there - not even any wind.

Looking down

Wake of the boat

Looking down on the boat

Coming back on board

When they wanted us back, they reeled us back in, and we were supposed to come in and stand on the deck. When they pulled me back in, they dunked me in the water. So when I came in, I wasn't standing up - I pulled up my feet and came in just above the deck sitting down. Then because of the pitching deck, I couldn't stand up without help from Buddy and the parasailing boat guy because there was nothing to hold onto.

Bob tried to take pictures from the ship,

Bob's photo from the ship

Bob's photo expanded

but you can't rally tell it is me, as even at the max zoom the parachute is less than the size of a penny.

The cruise director said that he wanted one person from each cabin at the disembarkation talk, and then he didn't announce the talk over the loud speaker system so I was a little late. Since I had been to the previous one, I doubt if I missed much.

After we left Half Moon Cay, we had to get packed up, ready to dis-embark in Ft. Lauderdale. Bob was, of course, packed early and went to bed. I was still up shifting things around in the suitcases a good bit later. Fortunately I had put a small fabric folding suitcase into my bags, so I had enough room to put the small amount of things that I had bought. Bob had the problem of packing his Xmas presents (3 books) and the three bottles of wine that were a gift from the travel agent.

I also had a 5x7 photo gift from the photo shop, but when I went up there to redeem it, the guy said that only gangplank pictures "counted", and I couldn't have the one taken at the formal dinner unless I paid another $4 for it. There was nothing about that in the information I received and we had not had any gangplank photos taken. I asked if I could have just the photo of me and not Bob (because his eyes were shut and it was a horrible picture of him, but he said no, that I'd still have to pay extra for that. He allowed me to take 3 'postcards' instead, but I thought the guy behind the counter (not the same as the photographer) was quite snippy and annoying.

Fruit cocktail

Caesar salad

Salmon

Roast beef

Grilled mahi mahi with roasted corn salsa with black bean rice

Strawberry sundae

They gave us luggage labels with colors and numbers or letters, but I could make no sense of what the colors meant. They seemed to be random. So one couldn't figure out when they might be called. Maybe they did that on purpose, but if I had a deadline it would have worried me

Tomorrow - the end of the cruise - Port Everglades