I gave up trying to sleep anymore when the sun came up. I peeked out of my bedroom to see if Dad was up yet and noticed the living room curtains blowing around. Turns out our balcony door was slightly open. Whether that was an accidental error from Moses' evening cabin visit or an improper closing by us I don't know. I'm a light sleeper sound wise so I doubt knowing the door wasn't shut fully would have made a difference.
Once Dad was up, he wanted to run upstairs to Windjammer and see if they had chocolate milk to bring back to the cabin. Striking out, he returned to the cabin and discovered that the Cruise Critic Meet & Mingle invite had now been left tucked into our cabin number sign. Oh well, still didn't mean that it wasn't a time conflict. I found out after returning home that others on our cruise had been told that the group coordinator was ill and thus the invites did not go out in time. I talked to other cruisers and they reported never getting invites at all.
Our next suite perk (and yes pinnacles too as advertised on the sign outside the restaurant in the mornings) was to have our own sit down breakfast service in Chops. Most of our other cruises offer a special restaurant for suite guests to have breakfast (though nothing was preventing us from going to the main dining room if we wanted) and they will ask for your cabin number upon first arrival. This time when we promptly reported our cabin number, the crew member's reply was "Can I see your sea pass cards?" And of course once he saw the distinctive gold color they give to suite passengers, we were led to a table.
Last time we were on the Grandeur, it was in Giovanni's and featured a small buffet of pastries, fruit, etc. to go along with the hot item you ordered from the menu. No such buffet table in Chops and our pastry choices were limited to the small plate of 4 pastries that were brought to every table. On Princess and Celebrity they at least bring a large tray around and give you the choice. Most of the time the plate had a croissant, an apple filled pastry, a lemon Danish, and either a small bite size muffin or cinnamon swirl pastry.
Our waiter this morning was once again Dmytro. Dad loves getting a bagel with lox on cruises and thankfully Chops still offered it. He also got an omelet with bacon and sausage - a frequent go to for him this cruise. I often see Eggs Benedict offered on these suite breakfasts so I've made a point of trying it on every cruise line. RCL did a commendable job on this dish but I think Celebrity's Luminae suite restaurant edges them out. Or as Dad likes to call it, the Luminaire suite restaurant. He also frequently referred to Izumi as Isuzu so I've learned to decode what he meant, nod, and move on.
Apparently there's been budget cuts in the galley. Dad and I used to joke about the poor crew member whose job it was to put a halved tomato with melted cheese onto everyone's plate no matter what you ordered. Now, all we ever got was a naked halved tomato that ended up on every plate that no one ate plus the new addition of sheet pan style hash browns cut like someone was dishing out brownies. Is that supposed to be like a fancy restaurant's sprig of parsley?
On to the Schooner Bar for the first round of Progressive Trivia where we met Cori and Allan who agreed to be part of our team. When it came time to decide on a name so the trivia host could keep track of our cruise long progress, I asked for suggestions from my teammates. Cori's response of "Oh make something up" was the wrong kind of kindling for my warped sense of humor and I dubbed our group as "The Made Up Team." Our last Grandeur cruise, I combined our first initials to name us the D.A.D.E. team and Katrina kept asking "Like Miami-Dade?" This was also our first experience with the team of repeat cruisers. Usually the cruise staff (in this case and most often the case was Melissa) would simply collect the papers and move on to the next activity but this time prizes were actually given out for the winner of each round. And of course the team who dubbed themselves "The Troublemakers" (and I could have sworn we once corrected an answer sheet of theirs where they dubbed themselves "The Cheaters") won the round and Melissa gave them RCL branded keychains. One of their team came around to try and give away the keychains but took offense when we turned him down. No offense intended. Perhaps we should have invited him to our yard sale of cruise line branded trinkets we've won fairly so he'd understand why we encouraged him to pass it on to someone else. As we finished up trivia, the Cruise Critic Meet & Mingle crowd came out of the neighboring South Pacific lounge and several had prizes tucked under their arms. We stopped to chat with one cruiser and he told us that it was a great turnout and lots of people won things.
Stuck around for Celebrity Name Anagrams and they were very hard to figure out. We could only get 5 while the winning guy got 18! With our brains freshly taxed, Dad told me about finding proper donuts in the Windjammer breakfast buffet and that was one of my gastronomic magic words! I grabbed a couple and took them out to the pool deck seating to try.
The cinnamon sugar one was nicer than the chocolate one but they both were tons better than what Oasis had in the Suite Lounge. As I sampled, we spotted a guy walking out of the buffet with a couple cartons of chocolate milk. It does exist!
Our next stop was up to the Concierge Lounge where Carlington's latest update on our sea day lunch query was that Chops will always be open for sea day lunch but Giovanni's manager had cancelled all their reservations because he didn't feel like he'd gotten enough to be worth it. We showed him how the Compass listed Chops and Izumi as open today so he called over to Izumi and confirmed that they were truly open. The comical thing is that we could have just leaned out the door and asked since the two venues are neighbors. We had already planned to check out Chops for lunch and headed that way next.
When we got to Chops, the place was packed...with empty chairs. Us and one other couple were the only people having lunch. It gave us a good laugh to see this when we'd just been told Giovanni's manager cancelled reservations due to not having enough sign up.
When we got to Chops, the place was packed...with empty chairs. Us and one other couple were the only people having lunch. It gave us a good laugh to see this when we'd just been told Giovanni's manager cancelled reservations due to not having enough sign up.
Dmytro was again our waiter and surprisingly service was actually a little slow, especially since there was only two tables in use. The main difference in Chops' lunch menu versus their dinner menu is the addition of a steak topped salad and a burger. We'd both tried the burger on Oasis and except for not quite cooking it well enough to our preference, it was enjoyable and big enough to require cutting up with knife and fork. I remember our waiter then responding when we asked about fries "They aren't fries, they are more like potato wedges!" Ok Martha Stewart, a fry is a fry. This time I ordered the burger and it was barely visible under the toppings but cooked right. I did have to use a knife and fork this time too but more so because it wouldn't stay put together. Dad got the steak topped salad and really enjoyed it. Unfortunately, I never got the chance to try it myself.
After lunch Dad and I split up to do separate activities. He chose to go to the theater and watch the movie "Second Chance." I wish all cruise lines followed the concept of airing their movies on the pool deck or in the theater initially and then putting them on the cabin TVs for us to view later if we chose to do something else at the time. Grandeur did do a nice job of re-airing some of the evening movies as afternoon matinees in the theater later in the cruise. I instead headed to the Centrum to play/watch Friendly Feud. While I sat waiting for the game to start, a band was playing quite loudly. It was hilarious to look over and see that despite the noise, the two men in different nearby chair groupings had their heads back sound asleep! Oh how I wish I could tune out noise like that! And of course as soon as the band stops, the guy across from me woke right up!
Unlike the Family Feud TV game show, cruise lines will make up teams of random people to act as a family. This game was run by Jeff (his favorite joke was to introduce himself as being from Philly (pause for the hometown Philadelphia crowd's applause) and then clarify that he's really from the Philippines). Also from the Philippines on the cruise activities staff was Mark (or as John referred to him Marky Mark) and to hear him read trivia was like taking a foreign language course at the same time due to his thick accent. Mark made up for it by spelling the words and having enough enthusiasm for 10 cruise activities staff members. He was also always interested in learning from us trivia players on how to say an English word correctly. For this game though, Jeff filled the family member slots by asking for cruisers who were really a grandma/grandpa etc. Therefore each team ended up having older people, middle age, and millennial age people. He wasn't getting much response when asking for Moms so I volunteered. Thankfully I wasn't required to bring my offspring up with me since they don't actually exist. Tons of good laughs during the game with answers like condom for "What's in a man's wallet?" (to which Jeff quickly covered by referring to as raincoat for all the 4 kids present) and "your girlfriend" for "What do you replace even though the old one still works?"
Our family came in second place and earned keychains for the effort. Returning to my previous seat, the wife of the sleeping gentleman remarked that she can't believe I have a child since I look so young. (That's the only other reason I can think of for the concierge club snootiness - the assumption that they let an adolescent in. I've also had people on cruises admit that they assumed Dad just had a really young wife after they learned we were father and daughter) She was shocked when I truthfully told her that I'm 39. I may have told a few white lies about having a toddler at home when she continued her questions and made a quick exit before she started asking for pictures.
I tried to return to the cabin to relax for a while before afternoon trivia but found it so warm that it made me feel sick. Instead I grabbed my soda cup and headed back down to the machine on deck 6 to fill it and hang out in the Schooner Bar until trivia. Unfortunately while cooler, happy hour time of buy 1 drink, get 1 50% off was being held here making the lounge packed and noisy. In an effort to find a spot for Dad and I, I asked the one woman sitting alone in the back booth if we could join her. She said no that she was saving seats for friends and I asked if she really needed the entire wrap around booth. "Well I have five friends!" I wanted to reply "Well aren't you blessed then?" but just said ok and moved over to a set of four chairs where I was soon joined by Dad, Allan, and Cori in what became a standard meet up for trivia sessions. We also were joined by another woman named Danielle (though she went by the nickname Fifi) and her husband. Seemed like kismet to randomly partner up with a second guy named Allan and a 2nd woman named Danielle. We second guessed a few answers and straight out missed a few but still had fun. The winners of course was that team in the back booth dubbing themselves as "The Troublemakers" I referenced earlier. Another round of trying to give us their keychain prize and getting an attitude when we suggested they offer it to someone else instead.
While our trivia teammates hit the Diamond lounge for their evening happy hour with free drinks, we headed up to the Concierge Lounge for the same. Ran into a lovely older couple who didn't treat us like riff raff invading on their turf and even ended up running into them several times during the cruise.
For the evening happy hour time in the conceriege lounge, the snacks would change to hot finger foods. Most every day had small cuts of cheese, fruit, and veggies for dipping. The rest would change around and included meatballs, spring rolls, pot stickers, shrimp, and pigs in a blanket.
Most of the time, the 1st sea day/2nd day of the cruise is formal night. For some reason, Katrina changed it to be the 3rd day of the cruise but you could tell some crew areas of the ship didn't get the memo. Returning to our cabin, we found the customary formal night (at least on Princess) more decadent delivery of chocolate covered strawberries. There were other nods to formal night like spa offerings to help you get dolled up for those formal photos.
After some relaxing back in the now much cooler feeling cabin, we headed to our first night of the cruise dining at Izumi, the Asian themed restaurant.
 |
Given the kind of bacon strips they gave Dad at breakfast, this was obviously only one slice torn in half
 |
Unlike the Family Feud TV game show, cruise lines will make up teams of random people to act as a family. This game was run by Jeff (his favorite joke was to introduce himself as being from Philly (pause for the hometown Philadelphia crowd's applause) and then clarify that he's really from the Philippines). Also from the Philippines on the cruise activities staff was Mark (or as John referred to him Marky Mark) and to hear him read trivia was like taking a foreign language course at the same time due to his thick accent. Mark made up for it by spelling the words and having enough enthusiasm for 10 cruise activities staff members. He was also always interested in learning from us trivia players on how to say an English word correctly. For this game though, Jeff filled the family member slots by asking for cruisers who were really a grandma/grandpa etc. Therefore each team ended up having older people, middle age, and millennial age people. He wasn't getting much response when asking for Moms so I volunteered. Thankfully I wasn't required to bring my offspring up with me since they don't actually exist. Tons of good laughs during the game with answers like condom for "What's in a man's wallet?" (to which Jeff quickly covered by referring to as raincoat for all the 4 kids present) and "your girlfriend" for "What do you replace even though the old one still works?"
Our family came in second place and earned keychains for the effort. Returning to my previous seat, the wife of the sleeping gentleman remarked that she can't believe I have a child since I look so young. (That's the only other reason I can think of for the concierge club snootiness - the assumption that they let an adolescent in. I've also had people on cruises admit that they assumed Dad just had a really young wife after they learned we were father and daughter) She was shocked when I truthfully told her that I'm 39. I may have told a few white lies about having a toddler at home when she continued her questions and made a quick exit before she started asking for pictures.
I tried to return to the cabin to relax for a while before afternoon trivia but found it so warm that it made me feel sick. Instead I grabbed my soda cup and headed back down to the machine on deck 6 to fill it and hang out in the Schooner Bar until trivia. Unfortunately while cooler, happy hour time of buy 1 drink, get 1 50% off was being held here making the lounge packed and noisy. In an effort to find a spot for Dad and I, I asked the one woman sitting alone in the back booth if we could join her. She said no that she was saving seats for friends and I asked if she really needed the entire wrap around booth. "Well I have five friends!" I wanted to reply "Well aren't you blessed then?" but just said ok and moved over to a set of four chairs where I was soon joined by Dad, Allan, and Cori in what became a standard meet up for trivia sessions. We also were joined by another woman named Danielle (though she went by the nickname Fifi) and her husband. Seemed like kismet to randomly partner up with a second guy named Allan and a 2nd woman named Danielle. We second guessed a few answers and straight out missed a few but still had fun. The winners of course was that team in the back booth dubbing themselves as "The Troublemakers" I referenced earlier. Another round of trying to give us their keychain prize and getting an attitude when we suggested they offer it to someone else instead.
While our trivia teammates hit the Diamond lounge for their evening happy hour with free drinks, we headed up to the Concierge Lounge for the same. Ran into a lovely older couple who didn't treat us like riff raff invading on their turf and even ended up running into them several times during the cruise.
For the evening happy hour time in the conceriege lounge, the snacks would change to hot finger foods. Most every day had small cuts of cheese, fruit, and veggies for dipping. The rest would change around and included meatballs, spring rolls, pot stickers, shrimp, and pigs in a blanket.
 |
| Today's unique treat was a breaded fried cauliflower floret which was tasty and steamed just enough to be soft but not mushy. |
After some relaxing back in the now much cooler feeling cabin, we headed to our first night of the cruise dining at Izumi, the Asian themed restaurant.
No comments:
Post a Comment