April 24 – April 29, 2023 – Atlantic Crossing – FLL to Ponta Delgada, Portugal

Since sea days are not very event heavy and somewhat repetitious, I thought I would summarize the entire half crossing in one post.

Weather.  The outside conditions were not conducive to deck time.  Although it rained occasionally, most of the time it was partly cloudy and in the high 50s to low 60s.  We spent our time indoors.  

Meals.  Breakfasts were either waffles or pancakes with cottage cheese and Jams along with scramble eggs (very good).  I set up an arrangement with the Head Waiter in the Oceanview Café for sour cream in the morning.  I usually brought Ellen her breakfast (lox, cream cheese, cucumbers, a cheese blintz (sometimes) and assorted fruit. Carmen has procured a hot water maker and that solved the problem of bringing down hot tea.

Had some dinners in the Normandie Restaurant because of the Brie appetizer and trout (sometimes). All of the restaurants have the broiled salmon with mashed potatoes and Hollandaise Sauce – a very reliable dish and not undercooked on this ship. As a result, we did not go to any of the other restaurants during this voyage.  We also ate dinner in the Oceanview Café – the pasta station is excellent – marinara sauce with veggies or spaghetti Olio (garlic and olive oil). Also, the Cafe provided a more peaceful environment for dinner as well as a good view every time. On two occasions, the Head Waiter arranged for those salmon dinners to be brought up to the Oceanview Cafe (verboten in the past); they were especially good since they had been cooked to order.  

Lunches were variable – the lunch in Eden was very good – the gorgonzola spinach salad with a lot of extra fixings and balsamic dressing is really good as is the tuna served as a scoop – if you get it on a pita you get a microscopic amount of tuna and some wonky sauce. If you ask, you can get fresh slices of sourdough bread and put together a sandwich or just each the yummy bread.  Lunch in the Spa Café was also good – I get the tuna “saucer” and the Caprese Salad.  Otherwise, it is the standard lunch in the Oceanview Café – they have a decent salad bar (with excellent Ranch and Thousand Island Dressings) and very good tuna and egg salad. If that doesn’t work out there is always pizza.

Some of the best items on the ship are found at lunch in the Cosmopolitan Restaurant (the only dining room open for lunch).  These include fried mushrooms in asparagus sauce and cold potato soup.  I also had a different version of the Celebrity Veggie Burger there – this burger was made from mushrooms and was really good.

Entertainment/Lectures/Notes

Each day's entertainment is noted below.  I also attended Resident Artist's Paris Cepada's afternoon sketch class at 2 PM in Eden four times.  It was fun to watch his approach to sketching which is quite different from mine.  He had good turnouts. I had plenty of practice drawing hands (always a challenge). 

April 24, 2023 – For me there is something special about the first breakfast on board especially when you witness the sunrise. 

As I indicated, I did have a waffle with cottage cheese, strawberry jam and orange marmalade plus some scrambled eggs.  The coffee was very hot on this ship but had to be diluted 1:1 with hot water. I generally get two cups of coffee - I like a lot of coffee in the morning.  I found that the second cup gets cold so I started using two to-go cups (one as an insulator) for my coffee. They are bigger than regular cups so that problem was solved. 

Lecture 1 – “The CSI Phenomenon: Forensics on Television. My first talk was in the Theater at 10 AM.  The turnout was pretty good for an Edge Class ship.  It is hard to estimate the crowd but the bottom section was about half full.  Alexa gave me a nice introduction and the AV and sound were both great.  Positive feedback from some audience members.

First Production Show – “Arte” – Involves works of art that come to life using the super graphics on Beyond.  Also involved singers, dancers, and acrobats.  This was a new show for us and the sound was kept at a tolerable level.  I really enjoyed the show.

Time Change No. 1 - Clocks move forward one hour tonight.

April 25, 2023 – Lecture 2 – “DNA Testing: Cold Cases Closed” - was at 9:00 AM in the Theater.  Even though it was early, and we moved our clocks forward, there were more people attending than yesterday. 

The cruise doesn't officially start until I get my first Iced Decaf Mocha.  We found a nice seat in Cafe Al Baccio and enjoyed the iced coffee.  The barista did a really good job on this drink.  Don't know how many I will get on this ship but this was the one that counts.

I looked out the window and noticed that we were not moving.  The captain announced that we had a medical emergency on board, and we had diverted to Bermuda to disembark a passenger.  I had heard the "Star Code" announcement earlier on the PA so I knew something was up.  We anchored in Bermuda, 

and the passenger was transferred to another boat and taken ashore.  We were in the Oceanview Cafe when Beyond restarted her engines. 

and we were back on course for the Azores.  The captain said we would get to the Azores on time.

It was a cold and miserable day outside (went out on the pool deck just to take this picture) and also watched the rain from a seat in Eden.  Even the elephant on the pool deck looked cold.

So we spent most of the day in the Solarium – we had primo seats and kept them for the day. 

We took a break at 2:00 PM to see “Top Gun Maverick” on the 16 million pixel screen in the Theater.  I missed this movie while it was in the theaters, so this was a bonus.  I really liked it even thought it was a lot like the first movie.  And any movie with Jennifer Connolly is worth seeing – a terrific actress who wasn’t in the first movie but provided an important role in this one.

The headliners tonight were Branden and James – great singing duo (Branden does most of the singing and plays the piano; James plays the cello).  We had seen them before on Azamara and they continue to be terrific.

Hallelujah

\

Time change No.2. 

April 26, 2023 – My third talk on The Romanovs was cancelled (no one told me, and it had been announced the evening before by Luigi) so that Captain Kate, who is vacationing on Beyond, and her dog could have a trivia show at 10 AM in the Theater.  Passengers were confused but that’s show biz. 

Ellen had gotten a complimentary tour of the bridge and other out of sight places on the ship.  While I was at the sketch class, she got an amazing behind the scenes look at Celebrity Beyond, She took some great pictures of the kitchen and bridge.  I'll try to caption the pictures.

Bridge Controls (Readouts)

The Bridge

Bridge Screens - Ship information

Engine Room Monitoring

Food Orders coming to the Kitchen 

Food Supplies

Kitchen Staff

Kitchen

Pictures of how food should look

Activity on the Bridge

View From the Bridge

The Headliner tonight was Saxophonist Julian Smith.  We passed on this show and went to Eden to watch the Acoustic Duo.  They were pretty good - other duos in Eden (there were several) were not as entertaining.

While there, we caught a "magic moment" as we continued our eastward crossing.

Time Change No. 3.

April 27, 2023 – My third talk, “Forensics and History: Search for the Unknown Titanic Child”, was at 11:00 AM in The Club.  I don’t know the capacity of The Club especially since the entire dance floor was now filled with chairs (set up by a whole army of crew members).  Every seat in the place - on both levels - was occupied and about 10 or so passengers were sitting on the stairs leading to the upper level.  The Club has screens everywhere so people can see wherever they are.  This ship doesn’t have its AV set up on a ledge overlooking the stage.  The AV crew set up a podium on the stage and my computer was set up on the stage. 

The talk ran long due to the fact that to my surprise, Andre from the Entertainment Department showed up to introduce me and that I had to add background slides from the Romanov’s talk so that people would understand the data shown.  The crowd loved the talk –great round of applause.  It was the largest turnout yet on one of these ships and the first time I had an SRO crowd in The Club.  Alexa was there, as well.

Branden and James are performing their Matinee Show at 2 PM in the Theater.  They were great again and this time outdid themselves with a music video of "Vincent".   

Tonight’s Main act was Jared Freiburg and the Vagabonds, a fifties music tribute group.

Jared looked young and he turned out to be just 27 years old.  He started off as a folk singer and now he is doing Jerry Lee Lewis, Roy Orbison, Elvis Presley, etc.  He’s entertaining and is a good storyteller.  He is a bit loud, but we did stay for the entire performance. We got to the show just as it started so we sat in the back of the balcony.  Jan, an older woman and a passenger, danced to every one of this numbers just off to the left of the stage (Jared acknowledged her).  She was tireless.

Just a note - the "Odyssey" tunnel is now better lit - I wonder if someone tangled with one of the brass objects.  Also, as Ellen and I were headed to Eden for lunch, I found one particular statue interesting and familiar - is it Apollo?

April 28, 2023 – Gave my fourth talk – “Forensics and History: The Lost Dauphin of France” - today at 9:00 AM in the Theater.  The time change and the early time slot really affected the turnout.  It was difficult for me to get myself together to deliver the presentation.  Got a lot of nice feedback but I didn’t think I delivered it as well as I could have.  I did finish within the 45-minute limit because Jim Teslow was up next to talk about Moon Landings.   

One attendee asked me if Ellen and I could join them for lunch at the Cosmopolitan Restaurant at Noon.  We did have a nice lunch with him, his brother and their wives.  They are very interesting folks who are doing their first crossing.  We had a good time and they even bought me a margarita which was terrific. BTW, I had the mushroom soup (good), Iceberg wedge salad with Blue Cheese dressing (good), and filet of Mahi Mahi with quinoa (would not get it again).

Last night was a tough night as the banging in the room intensified to the point where the earplugs could not handle it.  I called Alexa about this and told me to go to Guest Relations and request a room change (as we were not sailing full).  Alexa said the banging was a result of the ship’s creaking – very loud for a creak but she was sure that was it.  I did go to Guest Relations, who told me that there had been a lot of room switching due to the creaking. After some research on the part of the agent she asked us to check out Cabin 9131, which is an infinite Veranda room forward port side.  We did and did not hear any banging, so we moved (Ellen and the two room attendants from our old room dragged our stuff to the Deck 9 – no carts available – while I was having lunch).  Ellen joined us for lunch and was able to get her meal.

Our new digs.

Tonight's Showtime is the Production Show "Elements", which will involve sequences involving earth, air, wind, and fire (those elements).  The show sounded familiar, but it was not the same show we had seen on other ships - upgraded for Beyond.  It was entertaining and not too loud.  Lots of strange effects and some wild aerial work.  Combine that with the amazing screen and you have an amazing show.

Time change No 4.   

 

April 29, 2023 – A nice day at sea (including a sunrise)

provided the backdrop for breakfast. To change things up, I tried fried eggs and pancakes.  They were OK but not as good as my standard items.   Ellen had the steel cut oats in Eden for something different. 

No BTP talks today. Our new room was so much quieter than the old one.  I only needed one earplug and that was close to morning, when the ship bounced around and a small creak appeared.  Not a big deal.   

Most of the day was spent in the Solarium.  

At 2 PM, we went to the Theater for Jared Freiburg’s Matinee Show.  

Different songs – same decibel level.  We did stay for the whole show.

Jesse Hamilton Jr. is the headliner tonight. We saw him on the Edge previously. His claim to fame is playing Simba in The Lion King for six years.  He was pretty loud but his Lion King Medley ("Can You Feel the Love Tonight" and "The Circle of Life") was a little less amped.  He also did a nice version of "Somewhere". 

Time change No. 5.

April 23, 2023 – Ft. Lauderdale, FL – 87F – Partly Cloudy

I guess we slept OK.  I had pretty much the same breakfast this morning – I also had some dry cereal (frosted flakes, I think).  The breakfast again was just OK.  They also had waffles, but the makers were occupied. Still, the biscuits were really good.

We had plenty of time this morning, so it was very relaxing.

We were in the lobby at 11:45 AM and in the shuttle on time at Noon.  We were the only people in the shuttle and the ride took about 15 minutes – there were only two ships in the port today, Celebrity Beyond and Celebrity Reflection according to the shuttle driver.  

We passed our suitcases off to a porter and then proceeded through Security and then to Check in – we went into a short line for Guest Entertainers. Per instructions from Celebrity, we ran a COVID self-test the night before but no one asked about it and no one wanted to see our VAX cards (even though the Celebrity website said we would have to show them).  I thought the whole COVID screening process was lacking and less than thorough. 

The check in agent took our photos and gave us a boarding pass (our SeaPass Cards would be outside our room).  We are in Cabin 3098 – Starboard far forward – under the Celebrity Theater.  I am concerned that noise from the theater will be a problem, but we shall see.  We went to the room, which was ready for us, and dropped our backpacks. The cabin is nice, but it seems a bit smaller than I remember Edge-Class cabins being.  It did have a nice bathroom and a large window.

  

We had lunch up in the Oceanview Café – salad bar and pizza along with some tuna salad.  The Café was a zoo – don’t know how full the ship is but everyone seemed to be getting lunch at the same time.  The food was OK.

NOTE - I found out later that the ship was sailing just under 70 percent capacity (2250 vs 3260) - and yet, the ship seemed crowded at times.  

Ellen took a picture of the Reflection in the port.

I had a letter waiting for me from Alexa Helsby-Lue, the Activity Manager from England (she and I had actually been communicating via email prior to the cruise).  The Cruise Director is Luigi de la Cruz (from the Dominican Republic).  Alexa and I met at the theater at 3 PM to do a tech check – everything looked great on the huge screen.  

She told me that the talks would be in the theater with those at the end possibly being in The Club.  They would be at 9 or 10 AM and that time would alternate between me and the other speakers, a whale biologist named Eloise Cartner, who is young, Scottish, enthusiastic and completely unintelligible to me, and an astronomer, who surprised the ship by showing up – Jim Teslow. As was the case on our last cruise on Edge, the ship did not have any of Jim's information. Jim said we had met previously on an Azamara Cruise, but I couldn't recall, and I couldn't find him in my cruise logs. 

Leaving the theater I took a picture of a chair in the shape of a bejeweled mask - this item is also on Apex and Edge, but I hadn't yet documented it.  Here it is.

Back at the cabin, our bags showed up and we met our Cabin Steward, Carmen.  We have plenty of hangars. 

We walked around the ship to see what was different.  Again, the amount of seating was a major change.  The Grand Plaza now had two swinging couches and the Cafe Al Baccio had more seating (and more comfortable seating at that).  

There was a group - Jazz Quartet Cappuccinos - playing in the Plaza that sounded good - 

The tunnel leading to Eden was different in that it was populated by brass structures - called "Odyssey" - that required some maneuvering to avoid a collision.  The tunnel again was dark which made it a difficult transit. Ellen sat in one of the brass seats (I wouldn't be able to get out of that seat).

We captured the sail away from the cabin.

We had dinner at the Normandie Restaurant because Ellen likes the Brie appetizer. We both had the broiled Salmon, which was good and shared the Pappardelle Funghi, which was very good.  No dessert just coffee and tea finished off the meal.

The restaurant area had some new statues, like this one.

We went to the 7 PM show in the theater for the sort of Welcome Aboard Show.  Luigi, the Cruise Director (never sailed with him before)

previewed the upcoming entertainment on board including a small nod to the BTP Speakers.  Luigi has a cute entrance shtick/dance that he does, and he is funny in his own way.  The headliner tonight was comedian Darrell Joyce.  I took a shot of the theater before the show and the screen is even more vivid than on Edge or Apex - there are 16 million pixels (or mini LED lights) making up this high-tech screen.  It's simply fantastic.

Darrell was both funny and potentially borderline offensive to some demographics.  

I like a comedian on the first night of a cruise instead of an entertainer or Production Show. 

We went to Eden to see the acoustic act. Eden is a little different on this ship – different seats and murals. In fact, this ship not only has an extra deck but tons of seating here in Eden.  Outside of Eden, we found this statue of two deer that had no plaque or description.

The Acoustic Duo (their actual name - two women) was pretty good and we stayed for a while before heading to the cabin.  I had to do some work on my first talk because Alexa wanted it to be about 45 minutes.  

The cabin does have some noise – clanging, which seems to be outside our window but could be coming from the theater through the walls.  There are earplugs for that.

NOTE- because we are at the farthest point forward and the restaurants are at the farthest point aft, I am registering about 6000 – 7000 steps just getting back and forth.  The calories burned (about 500) neutralize some of the food.  Forced exercise.

April 22, 2023 – Ft Lauderdale, FL – 89F – Partly Cloudy

A hot day in South Florida.

Not a bad night – still got up real early and saw the sunrise.

At 6:30AM, I went down to the breakfast room.  The breakfast in the hotel is modest.  I had two buttermilk biscuits (really good) and some of their reconstituted eggs.  I also had one tiny maple syrup waffle.  The decaf coffee was ice cold so I had the real stuff.

Today, the plan is to get over to the River Walk and stroll the New River.  

The River Walk is very nice – maybe about a mile of restaurants and shops on both sides of the New River.  Lots of boats, large and small, run up and down the river (there are drawbridges that open to let the taller ships pass through the river).  The day was perfect even though shade was hard to find, and it was very warm.

We spent some time in Huizenga Park (found a bench in the shade), 

a beautiful green space surrounded by modern condos and businesses.  One building that I thought was a condo was actually a fancy hotel, the Hyatt Centric Las Olas Hotel located on Las Olas Boulevard.  

Las Olas Boulevard is one of the more well-known streets in Ft. Lauderdale, containing restaurants, shops, and people watching opportunities.   

We were originally going to get Fish and Chips at a place called the Downtowner Restaurant (I did my research). They did have some very nice fish items on their menu but we decided to try something more exotic instead, so we crossed the river to see what options there were on the other side.  I got some great shots of the New River from the bridge.

It didn't take long for us to end up as a restaurant called “Pura Vida”, which is, of course, the national saying of Costa Rica.  This restaurant, which had nothing to do with Costa Rica, had outside seating and a most interesting entrance (you enter through this woman's pried open chest (kind of weird) to get into the restaurant).

The menu - I would call it "California Healthy" - offered a variety of wraps and salads.  We started off with an Ahi Tuna wrap and a fancy Tomato and Lettuce Salad.  The salad was OK – fu-fu lettuce – but the tuna was essentially raw (the description didn’t say it was raw) and was also filled with other unidentifiable flavors.  When the waitress came by to ask us how it was, I told her I didn’t like it.  She said she would swap it out for a tuna salad wrap, which was much better.  I also ordered a passionflower iced tea for $5 which did not include refills (?).  Anyhow, it was “exotic”.  Here are some shots of "Pura Vida".

While we were eating, we heard some music and discovered that there now was a singer near the entrance - she sounded pretty good.  She seemed happy to get her picture taken.  

We went from the restaurant to the river and found a bench in the shade.  We watched the boats move up and down the river and even saw the drawbridge open a few times to let sailboats through. 

Back at the hotel, we spent a little time out by the pool, but it was warm and there were skeeters. 

After that lunch, we ate the leftover bagels from the plane for dinner.  Still good.

We found out from the desk that the hotel offered transport to the cruise port for $5 per person (about a third of what other hotels charged) so we signed up for a Noon shuttle.

We spent the rest of the evening reading and hanging out in our room.

We didn’t unpack much so our suitcases would be ready to go in the morning.

Celebrity Beyond - Transatlantic and Europe - Ft Lauderdale to Civitavecchia, Italy - April 23 - May 10, 2023

April 21, 2023 – Travel Day

After reviewing the travel options offered by Celebrity (Jet Blue, JFK, Aer Lingus), we decided to decline those offers and set up our own travel arrangements.  That resulted in a non-stop flight (AA1424) departing ORD at 10:00 AM and arriving in FLL around 2:15 PM.  No getting up at dawn for this trip (even though I still got up at dawn).  The American Taxicab arrived right on time at 8:15 AM and although he took a different route, we still got to ORD at around 8:45 AM.

All the kiosks were not in service at the entrance we used so we took our bags to an agent (there was no one in line) who checked us in took care of our bags.  We walked a bit to the TSA PreChek line, got through security relatively quickly.  One first rodeo guy had to drink the rest of his bottled water before going through.  It’s probably been more than a decade since the liquids thing, and he still brought a bottle of water to security.

We walked a half mile to gate H17 (the end of the H Concourse) where our plane, a B-737-8 was waiting.  

We wore our masks in the terminal because there was a crowd waiting to board their planes at the end of the Concourse and on the plane (because the trip is just starting).  That's Ellen photobombing my selfie.

We boarded in an orderly fashion right on time at 9:25 AM and pushed right on time.  We did wait about 15 minutes at the active runway before being cleared to go.  The pilot told us that we would be flying through bumpy air for about 45 minutes and everyone including the flight attendants would have to stay seated.

The pilot was correct – our plane was flying straight through a line of storms before turning East toward Florida.  

Take Off ORD

Flying through the bumpy shmoo

Blue Skies but still bumpy

The flight attendants got up briefly at about the 30-minute mark and then had to put away the carts and sit back down as the bumps returned.  When they got up again (about 45 minutes from FLL), they only served cold drinks (hot drinks and a bouncing plane are not a good combination). So I had two orange juices with my bagels and smoked salmon.  We are in Cabin Extra seats – Exit row – 16 E and F so we also got two bottles of Bailey’s.

It was one of our bumpiest flights – the turbulence became manageable when the plane descended under the cloud tops and we landed in FLL about 20 minutes late. After another long walk to baggage claim we were pleased that our bags were one of the first to come out.

I called the Hotel – Hampton Inn and Suites, Plantation FL (no idea where that was) and told them we needed a ride from FLL.  The wait would be 20 minutes at Location E (our usual waiting area).  The van came within a half hour so that made spec and we were the only people going to Plantation.  The hotel seemed like a long way from the airport, but it was in a very nice area – big homes and lot of greenery.  The Hampton Inn Plantation is a huge hotel with a nice pool but in need of sprucing up (a good cleaning and repairs). 

There was only one person at the desk checking people in a manning the phones, so it took a little while to get our room.  We are in Room 407, away from elevators and ice machines and, as it turned out, away from animals.  It’s an accessible room (assigned and not requested) but with the exception of handles in the bathroom, it looks like an ordinary room. It also had a decent view of the area around the hotel.

We looked up restaurants in the area and found a restaurant within walking distance called Brios Italian Grille.  The restaurant was about three blocks away and we decided to eat outside.  There were a lot of people in the place already.  We decided to share a couple of dishes – a chopped salad and a pasta dish consisting of portabella mushroom filled ravioli along with roasted tomatoes. The chopped salad came with balsamic vinaigrette dressing, but I asked for creamy ranch as well.  The salad was very good.  I liked the pasta dish.  The restaurant was clearly upscale, and the service was great.

We checked out the nearby Broward Mall (there’s a JC Penney and a Macy’s) and then went back to the hotel.  We spent a few minutes out by the pool until the mosquitoes decided to join us.

According to our boarding instructions, we were supposed to self-test for COVID-19 before boarding.  Our tests came back negative.  At least, we didn't have to spend the next five days in isolation and miss our ship.

I took pictures to show the people at the cruise terminal.

The A/C is so loud that we have to cool down the room and then turn it off.

Hoping the room will be quiet.