Cruise

We are back and not-so-rested up. The cruise was nice but we will probably never go on a cruise again. Mostly due to the fact that Miranda gets so seasick (more on that later).

We flew into Montreal and got on the boat there. Pretty much lost/confused so we started exploring. The boat was huge but as we later saw, it was pretty small compared to other cruise ships.

Overall it felt a bit like I imagine a prison feels like. You are stuck in a confined area and everything rotates around what the time is. 8:30? Ok, now we get off to go on an excursion. Go through security. Sit on a bus while someone talks. Go back to the ship. Through security again (complete with X-ray machines). 3:00? Go to a specific function on board. 8:00? Go to dinner. This same routine happens every day.

Now onto specifics... Going down the St. Lawrence was nice. On the day that we were going out to the Atlantic, Miranda started having side affects from her patch for sea-sickness. Blurry vision and headaches. So she took the patch off. Big mistake. A storm hit that night and add in the rough Atlantic, we were rocking and rolling. She spent the rest of the evening throwing up.

The food was haute-cuisine and pretty pretentious. It was good but we gained no weight. Everyone says that you gain 5 lbs at the end of the trip. Not us. Although we did walk A LOT (and I complained the whole time).

At 7:00, they had a nightly-show. They mostly had the Maasdam singers/dancers. It wasn't awful but we didn't really enjoy any of those shows. The background dancers lip-synced to music and it was reminiscent of the Lawrence Welk Show except quite a bit worse. Luckily for the other passengers, they were mostly hammered on the flow of wine/beer. Unluckily for us... we weren't. It's not as bad as it sounds but it wasn't good. They had a couple of other shows that were very good but only performed one full show and a half show together. They were awesome. They had a juggler/comedian and a Celtic/Rock/Country fiddle show. The group was called Livewire. More on this later.

99% of the staff were Filipino or Indonesian. They spoke great English but we weren't used to their accent and so we said, "Pardon me?", "What?", or a simple "Huh?" a lot.

Everyone was very friendly (even in Canada which was a huge relief).

We paid for a view of the ocean and all we got was 2 portholes about 12 inches in diameter BEHIND THE BED. You had to climb on top of the bed to look out.

Next step... Montreal.

nc