Monday, July 12; Tuesday, July 13, 2010 – Atlantic Ocean – Bermuda Bound – Partly Cloudy - 80s

Bermuda is approximately 600 nautical miles from Bayonne NJ but the itinerary has two sea days outbound and a single sea day returning.   The seas as smooth today and the Summit is not really at Warp 9.

Monday, July 12, 2010

 

Sunrise over the Atlantic Ocean

Smooth Seas

We spent most of our time either in the Aqua Spa solarium area or out on Deck 4 – most everyone on the ship is on the sun deck so there are plenty of open spots on the open deck. 

At 12:30 PM, I headed to the Cinema for my first talk, “The CSI Phenomenon”.  The talk is advertised on the events screen and that’s a mango yoghurt cone in my hand.

I was introduced my the Cruise Director, Rob Wheatley (from South Africa)

Introduction by Rob Wheatley 

The presentations are announced during Rob and Kirsty’s Morning TV show as well as over the PA system during the Noon announcements.  The Summit does a great job of promoting the Beyond the Podium events.

The crowd leveled off at about 200 attendees – all arriving within five minutes of start time.  Many fans of the CSI shows and a pretty enthusiastic crowd including an ex-FBI investigator and crime scene evidence technician.  It went well.

Formal Night tonight – we opted not to bring along formalwear for this cruise - so we are in the buffet again.  I forgot to check with the Maitre D earlier in the day so we don’t have any seating in the Dining Room yet.  After dinner, I did manage to find Larry and he was able to give us a first seating table for two, Number 313.

Showtime Tonight:  “A Night of Stars” – a compilation of numbers by various stars – Tina Turner, Elton John, Barbra Streisand, etc.  We attended the show even though we had seen it a week ago. 

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

The weather is pretty much a carbon copy of yesterday with just a few more clouds.  Sunrise has a cool metallic look.

Today’s talk - “The Science of CSI” wasn’t part of the last cruise so I spent a little time going through and tuning up the slides.  One of the attendees came up after the talk to tell me that the “Grim Sleeper” Serial Killer had been arrested in Los Angeles.  I will need to check on this before my final talk.

Another good crowd (200 plus) at the 1:00 PM Presentation. 

The afternoon is spent relaxing at the Solarium. 

We are at Table 313 for the first time.   Our waiter is from Turkey and is very official and efficient.  He does a great job of making sure our meals come the way we want them – no meat or seafood.  The table is near the entrance but after the crowd comes in, the area is pretty quiet.

Showtime Tonight:  Mark James, Comedian Juggler.  We had seen him on a previous Celebrity Cruise and his act was exactly the same but still entertaining.

We check out the Piano Player, Tom Listebarger, in Michaels Club.

Bermuda Cruise – Celebrity Summit – July 11-18, 2010 Bayonne NJ (July 11)

Just finished a wonderful family cruise from Bayonne Cape Liberty to New England and Canada and now we are on the same ship, the Celebrity Summit, for a seven day voyage to Bermuda.  I presented on the first and last days of the journey – good audiences (about 150 for both sessions, the second one being in the Celebrity Theater).

Disembarkation-Embarkation was handled very efficiently by the Celebrity Summit folks and soon we were back on the ship ahead of the other passengers.

We are in the same spacious cabin (3004) with its really spacious bathroom and shower.  Very nice.  Even though this stateroom was under the Celebrity Theater and near the bow thrusters, the cabin was very quiet.

The ship was a little late departing due to the finals of the World Cup.  While we were waiting for departure the dock about 200 yards or so on the port side was struck by lightning – one narrow bolt – instant flash and boom.  I saw it all and it was fascinating. 

It was a bit overcast and drizzly as the Summit left NY Harbor.

But the rain brought the most fantastic half rainbow – it looks like the end of the rainbow may be near Wall Street but I doubt it.

The Celebrity Summit followed the Norwegian Dawn through the Verrazano Narrows Bridge out into the open waters of the Atlantic Ocean.

We didn’t have dining room seating for tonight so we are in the Waterfall Cafe buffet.

Kirsty Fraser, the Activity Director, has informed me that she has scheduled me for all three sea days and does not need a promo video – she will use the one from the last cruise.

Monday, May 17, 2010 – Los Angeles, CA – 60s - Overcast

It is time to go home…

Up before the wake up call.  The room was very quiet.  We’ll need to remember this place the next time we wind up in LA.

The breakfast was great…fresh scrambled eggs and pancakes along with the usual La Quinta cereals, bagels, and muffins.  It’s nice when there is a restaurant in the hotel.

We caught our shuttle around 7:45 AM and it was only a few minutes to the airport.  Ellen’s gold status got into shorter check in and security lines and we were at our gate in plenty of time for our 9:30 AM flight. 

 

Our 767 is ready to go home

Our flight – on a 767-300 – boarded on time.  Our exit row seats (bulkhead) were very comfortable.  We also found out that seats in row 17 (attendant rest rows) are available on domestic flights.  Those seats fully recline and have their own curtain.  It’s better than first class.  Need to remember that.

The climb out is through the famed “marine fog layer” so we don’t see blue skies until the plane makes it turn back over land.

Climb out over LA and blue skies at last

Lunch was great – salami on challah and chips.  We could have sold the food to other passengers. 

The flight was generally smooth – some thunderstorms over the plains put us in our seats for a while.

Being veterans of transatlantic and South American flights, the 3 hour and 30 minute flight seemed like a short hop.

 

Final Approach – Cloudy Chicago

The landing was smooth – we were about 30 minutes early and had to wait for a gate – the luggage was there and the cab showed up as requested.  

I would rate this trip as great…

Friday, May 14, 2010 – San Pedro, California

A successful trans Panama Canal Cruise

 

The Island Princess is the only ship here today.   We have enough time to get a good breakfast and still make our meeting location, the Explorers Lounge.  When we do arrive at the lounge, we find that, due to a shortage of immigration officers, the disembarking is about an hour behind schedule.  As it turns out, the process through immigration was relatively quickly and soon we were on our way.

We picked up our car and made our way to the Rodeway Inn on Beverly Blvd across from CBSTV City.   The room turned out to be a smoking room so we had to have the room defumed by an air cleaner – only slightly effective.  We will move to a different room tomorrow.  We did some food shopping for the weekend and had a nice dinner at my sister’s house, and then back to our motel room.. 

The windows had to stay open all the time to air our the cigarette smoke odor. 

Sunday, May 16, 2010 – Los Angeles, CA – 70s – Mostly Sunny

A better night without the smoke…

The plan today is to visit the cemetery where all of our parents are buried (for me it’s been over four years since I’ve been in LA).  We all went in Sid’s new SUV and spent a few minutes at the cemetery. 

Back to Nalsey’s place for a nice Sunday Brunch.  Lainna and Mirin were there – we had seen Lainna about three years ago when we were in New York for a cruise but it has been a pretty long time since we had seen Mirin.  The brunch was very good and it was good to chat with the girls a bit – another highlight was Mirin’s basketball highlights DVD (the one you send to prospective college coaches).  It was set to either rap or hip hop music and pretty entertaining.

It was a very nice day and we had our car (a Jetta by the way), so we drove out to Beverly Hills to see both Rodeo Drive and environs as well as an Art Fair along Santa Monica Blvd.  Parking is tough in this area but we did wind up parking for free in a city lot.  As we walked along, I did get a kick out of a parking meter that took credit cards.  Pretty soon, you won’t need to carry any money at all.

Credit card enabled parking meter – Beverly Hills

We did get to Rodeo Drive, which hadn’t changed all that much since we last visited.

Ellen at the famous Rodeo Drive

On our way back to the car – without spotting a single celebrity or at least one we knew – we arrived at the Art Fair.  The Fair spanned several blocks of Santa Monica Blvd and sported some neat works of art in various media.

From Beverly Hills, it was off to the Pico Robertson area for a kosher meal that needed to include some kind of meat.  We checked out an Iranian restaurant before choosing the Chinese-Persian combination restaurant we used to go to with Louis (Ellen’s father).  We shared a very tasty Almond Beef dish.  After having fish for so long, it was nice to have a prepared meat dish.

Tonight we are staying at the La Quinta LAX so we can be close to the airport for our morning flight back to Chicago.  The process is a little complicated – return the car, take the shuttle to LAX, catch the hotel shuttle at LAX to La Quinta (on Century Blvd).  We pulled it off with no big problems.

The La Quinta LAX is a massive hotel.  We got our keys to room 712 and headed to drop off our bags.  There was only one slight problem; we opened the door only to find a women in bed watching TV.  I am pretty sure that she missed part of what she was watching.  We called the front desk from the floor and soon a security guard came up with another key.  Those darn computers.  The room was very nice and quiet. 

Got to get up early tomorrow to catch the 7:30 AM Shuttle…

Saturday, May 15, 2010 – Los Angeles, CA – 70s – Mostly Sunny

Survived our smoky night at the Rodeway Inn room – the open window helped somewhat.

The included breakfast at this hotel is very modest – dry cereal, bagels, sweet rolls, and coffee.  The lobby (which is small) and the courtyard, which is usually filled with smokers, are the only two places to eat breakfast.  Today, we lucked out and the courtyard was empty.

The plan today is to attend the Library Minyan at Beth Am – this is the minyan that my late father-in-law, Louis, used to attend.  The minyan is very nice with a lot of exuberant singing and very good attendance.  The kiddush had the legendary Cholent.  We also had a chance to spend a little time with some folks from the past.

Our hotel is pretty close to CBS Television City, Farmer’s Market, and the Grove Shopping area, so a walk is indicated.  Just across the street, I recognize some familiar faces on one of the walls of CBS TV City.

NCIS Poster – CBS TV City

We started first at the Grove and were met by a literal ocean of people – mostly girls in the 12 –15 year old category.  This should have been a clue to what had just transpired.  We asked one of the police providing security and he told us that a concert had just ended.  As it turned out, the Jonas Brothers had just given a free concert at the Grove and we were in the middle of the crowd dispersal.

Jonas Brothers Concert Stage – concert ended just minutes ago

It was more difficult than we thought, but we did make it through the crowd and wound up in Farmer’s Market.  There are so many new stores in Farmer’s Market.  Some of the oldies are still there – DuPars Restaurant – but there are plenty of new and upscale eateries in the Market.  One of the neat things we ran across was a reproduction of a vintage Gilmore Gas Station.

Gilmore Gas Station (18 cents per gallon – Jurassic Period)

Our route home took us through Gilmore Park (the site of the art deco theater in the Movie “Xanadu” and originally known as the Pan Pacific Theater).  This park will house the new Los Angeles Holocaust Memorial, which is under construction, and has quite a way to go to completion. 

Logging enough miles for the day, we returned to the room to do some reading and move to a different and smoke free room.  The room, just down the hall in this small hotel, has such a different feel because of lack of the smoke smell. 

A quiet evening…

Thursday, May 13, 2010 – At Sea – Pacific Ocean – Coast of Baja Mexico – 59F – Mostly Sunny

Beautiful sunrise on a chilly day at sea

Today to do list:

Finish the book I am reading (“By My Hands” – supernatural thriller written by a pastor; I also finished “Third Degree” by James Patterson) – done.

Present my final talk: “DNA Testing: Solving History’s Mysteries”.

The talk, scheduled for 2:30 PM in the Princess Theater was well attended – again about 250 plus people attended.  Great feedback from the attendees. 

I played some team trivia in the afternoon – only the second time for trivia on this cruise.  Our team won and I donated by prize (a tote bag) to the team.

Mike Marino, a very funny comedian, was the final act on this cruise.  A good one to quit on – very funny guy.

We are not walking off tomorrow so the bags are out in the hall by 10:30 PM.

This one is about over…