Friday, July 25, 2014

Monday, July 7, 2014 – At Sea – North Sea – Partly Cloudy - 63F

A sunny but cool day in the North Sea…

20140707_ships position noon (Small)

20140707_At Sea (Small)

A strange, sleepless night (reasons unknown), so I am dragging this morning.

At 10:15 AM, we both attended Debra Fraioli’s port lectures on Lerwick, Scotland and Klaksvik, Faroe Islands.  She, of course, had a packed house – everyone needs to know where we are going and how to find things.  She’s a good speaker and looks like she has been doing this for some time.  She also mans a desk daily to answer questions about the itinerary.  I also think she may be a Princess employee since I think I spotted her wearing a badge.  She showed a lot of pictures of both ports but I really wanted to know where the Mickey D’s are and where I can find free WiFi.  That intel we will need to gather ourselves.

After her talk, we had lunch in the Steak House Grill, where this ship holds its “Pub Lunch”.  We had the Fish and Chips and they were very good – the place wasn’t very crowded and the lunch was unrushed and relaxing.

My first talk - “The CSI Phenomenon” is scheduled for 2:15 PM in the Cabaret Lounge.  I got there about 30 minutes early and there were two people in the seats and no AV tech.  Without about 20 minutes to start, I paged the AV Tech and he called back and said he would be right there (and he was in an instant).  The set up went quickly and they had a headset for me (this has really made a difference).  And perhaps, best of all, all three screens were available including the all important center screen.  I found out online that the Cabaret Lounge on the Ocean Princess has a seating capacity of 358.

At about 10 minutes to go, there were about 10 people in the audience but at show time, there were in excess of 100 attendees.  Perhaps they were finishing up their pub lunch or they were coming from the talk going on just before mine (on Jackie Kennedy).  I was about to start when CD Robert showed up and said he would introduce me.  Nice touch.  The talk ran exactly 45 minutes (important because the theater was needed to be set up for both dance practice and the Captain’s reception later – both following the movie at 3:15 PM).  At 45 minutes, the tech in the sound booth flashed a light – I was on my last slide so…perfect.  I met with a few people afterwards and the feedback was very positive.  Hoping that this translates into increasing attendance.  I should mentioned that I told the audience it was our anniversary today (and pointed out Ellen in the audience) and they all applauded for Ellen – as they should.

Back to the room to rest up a bit and then to the Casino Lounge to listen to Chico (Italian) and Dawn (Canadian) -  they are easy to listen to.

The first production show - “Stardust” – came on at 8:45 PM.  We had seen this show before on the Grand Princess but this show had some different songs so it seemed new.  The show was entertaining even though the song list was somewhat unusual. 

ShorEx informed us that we were both on tour tomorrow – even better, our tours don’t leave until 12:30 PM.

20140707_Anniversary (Small)  

Happy Anniversary to Us

20140707_Justin and Samantha Duval (Small) 20140707_Stardust Finale (Small) 20140707_ Stardust Finale 1 (Small)

Showtime – “Stardust”

After the show, we were able to catch a gorgeous sunset as well as the moon over the North Sea.

20140707_Sunset at Sea (Small) 20140707_moon over North Sea (Small)

Some more reading and then back to the room.

Seas are smooth – hoping for some sleep.

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