Cruise Day - Monday January 11 2010

I was disappointed with breakfast this morning. This Quality Inn boasted, "Free hot breakfast which includes including waffles, sausage, hard-boiled eggs, fruit, cereals and yogurt." This was one of my reasons for choosing them. Sorry to report, they only provided the waffles, cereals, rolls and toast. There wasn't any fruit, eggs or sausage to be found. Thank goodness free buffets of food were anticipated later in the day.

Disaster struck when Theresia's glasses broke. We drove to the Walmart in National City where they wanted $150 for the least expensive frames to fit her lenses. Superglue saved the day and the break was hardly noticeable.

We arrived at the Cruise Terminal hours ahead of time. Theresia and PeeWee went in search of a place to park ourselves and came back with a porter on a bike. He carried our bags less than 1/2 a block along with Theresia and Dez and told us that we should park across the street and then we could start our embarkation. SO in a nutshell:

- Show your boarding pass and passport to the security at the front of the terminal (outside).

- Herd yourself into the 'cattle" corral inside the "warehouse." There is a nice bathroom located inside of a portable building, inside the warehouse.

- Relocate through the next area which is security. Private security will xray your carry-on baggage and you will walk through a scanner. We were pulled to the side because they were alerted to something in Tiny's bag. They busted us with two bottles, but when they opened the first bottle and saw that it was wine, they allowed us through. Had they checked the 2nd bottle, we might have been in trouble.

- Fill out your H1N1 questionnaire.

- Check in! Just show your passport, the credit card you used to pay for your cruise and get your "sign and Sail" card. (the card you use for every aspect of your cruise.

- Sit and wait......until your section is called. We were in section #2

- When your section is called, you go to a big tent and have your 1st of many pictures taken.

- Proceed onboard! You go to the "Tiffany" Restaurant, deck 10 (AFT) and have your 1st buffet of the cruise.

- Around 3pm, you should be able to check into your stateroom

After we were settled in, we headed off for the safety briefing and Muster Drills before our first dinner onboard. I was surprised that the briefing and Muster Drill wasn't as formal as the previous ones on RCCL. They seemed a bit disorganized and the crew didn't seem to take it that serious, to me. The gang really enjoyed our send off, however I was terrified when the ships horn sounded, right by my ear. I decided that I didn't belong on the top deck, so I made my way to the pool and waited until everyone else caught up with me.

We were scheduled for the 1st dinner at 6:00 at Inspiration Dining room. Since we had 8 in our group, we had our own table.

Our waiter introduced himself, learned all of our names and then proceeded to take our napkins and place them in our laps and give us his dinner recommendations.

I had the Sweet and Sour fried shrimp appetizer, the shrimp cocktail, salad and the flat iron steak for my dinner and the cheese tray for dessert.

After dinner we went and enjoyed the show that they had. It was just a little "sample" of the big shows that we would enjoy later. We really enjoyed the comedian, whose name I've forgotten.

For Brianna's take on the trip, read her blog Remote Control: The Split Diaries entry LMFO: The Doorman Week.