UPON THE BALTIC SEA!

On the Crown Princess

This ship is like a gigantic, floating, 4**** hotel.

This monstrous vehicle seems impossible to navigate, let alone accommodate 3000 guests with the type of luxury they expect. Just docking this behemoth is amazing to watch. It seems to always have to turn around when it reaches the dockside, and then back up and parallel-park to the pier. Sometimes tug boats help, but sometimes it uses it’s side thrusters to navigate. When sailing forth, it picks up speed surprisingly fast and moves along through the water with almost no vibration or rolling. We hardly knew we were moving unless we looked out the window.

From the balcony of our cabin.
Three pools, the one below with a huge movie screen.

Our cabin was amazingly large, much more like a motel room than what I expected a ship’s cabin to be. And of course with lots of closet space for all the fashionable clothes one must bring aboard for a cruise.
	Just as we set sail, all 3000 passengers had to “muster” to get instructions for life saving in case of icebergs.

Exploring and learning our way around the boat was the first day’s job, while we sailed to our first port. Many activities kept us constantly busy, especially eating at the many restaurant venues. Because we’re doing “Anytime Dining”, we met new folks each time we go to our choice of two elegant dining rooms, the Michaelangelo or the DaVinci. This is much better than eating the same time with the same people every night. At almost all of our dinners we met some very pleasant folks from all over the world and particularly the states. Lunches and breakfasts we almost always went up to the pool deck and had buffet meals – lots of very good food (except their attempt at sushi).
We met Adele, with her husband Michael, at one dinner; and I hope to see her again.
First “Formal Night”.
The Princess Theater offered an huge array of entertainment for a packed house every night and throughout the day. Especially good were the three shows that the Princess singers and dancers put on (I didn’t take photos). Below you see a rather embarrassing show by the head chef and monitored by the Cruise Director, the smarmy Billy London. Featured every day were wonderful lectures by John Lawrence on the history and practical facts about all the cities we visited. These were entertaining and invaluable, so we attended all of them.

Life on the Crown Princess was just delightful!!!

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