My Challenge

On By D. EndoIn Goals, Ports, Ship LifeLeave a comment

Six Continents down, one to go. The only downside is I’ll have to book my own trip to Antartica since no Royal Caribbean ship has any walking tours on the continent.

I have to say, I’ve really enjoyed my time in Africa. I went on an African safari and had some really good ostrich on a skewer. I saw three of the Big Five while on safari. I’m just missing the tallest and the largest, oddly enough. My constant challenge, as is always on this world cruise, is finding a magnet with the port name. I’ve gotten lucky several times and have only missed one magnet so far since I wasn’t able to go to a place with heavy tourism. One of the hardest things to deal with is the currency. I will say this for the Caribbean, Europe, and Australia, I really miss having a common currency. I now have a bunch of foreign paper currency that I don’t really know what to do with. At this point, it’s doubtful I’ll be going to those places again. I don’t know if I should just hold on to it or see what my bank can do with them. I’m just lucky that the dollar is strong enough to be accepted when my credit card isn’t. Well, I’ll be in Europe soon enough and then I’ll be back home a few weeks after that.

You would not believe how hard it is to find a simple magnet with the port magnet. The hardest I had to look for one on this trip was in Osaka when I went to Universal Studios there. It was amazing and I highly recommend going there if you get the chance. I went to pretty much every store looking for something with either Osaka or Universal Studios Japan written on it. None of their magnets could be identified specifically from that theme park. I was just about to give up when I saw a Hard Rock Cafe by the City Walk entrance. I bought my most expensive magnet there at about $20 for a single magnet that could represent my time there. Lucky me.

Anyway, now I’m looking forward to delicious Italian food.

The New Plan

On By D. EndoIn Ports, Ship LifeLeave a comment

There’s never a dull moment at sea. We’re currently heading toward Dubai with stops in India. It’s been quite exhilarating to explore places I never thought I’ld go. If you told me ten years ago, this is where my life was heading, I wouldn’t believe you. Of course, I probably said the same thing when doing children’s theatre and touring up and down California.

Anyway, as we head to Dubai, there’s been a snag in the itinerary. The original plan was to head for the Suez Canal and spend some time in the Eastern Mediterranean. Due to instability in the area, it is not safe to use that route. Instead, we are going the long way around Africa. There are some guests who are upset to the point where they are getting off in Dubai and having their own adventures before rejoining the ship. Others are staying on the ship and just going with the flow. To be fair, those that are staying aboard will be able to say they sailed around the world taking no short cuts through canals so that’s something. I will say, I’m a little disappointed about not being able to go see the pyramids or visit Athens again. There was a painting of the acropolis in Athens that I really wanted to buy but decided not to last time I went through the area. I regret that decision. Someday, I’ll go back to Athens and will be able to get one but not this cruise. We eventually will get back to our original itinerary, but this does cut down on the Mediterranean ports to make up for the time traveled around Africa.

I’m excited to go to Madagascar and Cape Town among other places. Perhaps I’ll try for a wild safari while we’re there. I’m not sure what to expect, though I am happy I don’t have to worry about a yellow fever vaccine since I already got one. A lot of guests were not expecting to need it until the itinerary made it mandatory when visiting certain ports. I saw long lines in medical, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen it so full.

I can’t wait to say I’ve walked on six continents.

Work Comes First

On By D. EndoIn Goals, Ports, Ship LifeLeave a comment

Well, I was thoroughly disappointed on this second trip to Australia. I was told when I was thinking about joining cruise ships that one of the benefits was the amount of travel you get to do. There should a an asterisk next to the travel because of the potential problems with that statement. For example, one of the biggest ships in the fleet is doing three and four day cruises to the Bahamas. This means they are seeing the exact same ports over and over again. The route is leave from the east coast of Florida, go to Nassau, go to Coco Cay, and back to Florida. I should know. I’ve did this route as part of my first contract with Royal Caribbean. It does come with some benefits to new hires. You can easily get things you may want or need as your home port is never too far away. I didn’t have to worry about a language barrier anywhere I went as English is the most common language in the Bahamas. It did get boring. Thank goodness I got a change in itinerary.

Anyway, back to Australia, the last time I came through the area, I wasn’t able to see the Great Barrier Reef due to weather. I was all set to go on a crew tour and they had to cancel because the weather was too rough to even get ashore. I was super excited because I would have minimal duties that day as we were staying quite late so it wasn’t worth it to have an evening performance in the theater, so we made it a movie night instead. Seeing as I didn’t have to rush back for a rehearsal, I booked a ticket to go see the reef. The weather was going to be hot but nice for traveling. Everything was all set. Then came time to get off the ship, and here is another instance of that asterisk coming into play. If I was able to get off the ship by noon, I probably would have made my tour, but there is one thing that needed to happen before I could do that. I needed the captain to permit shore leave to the crew. In order to get that to happen, all guests who wanted to leave the ship right away needed to be off loaded first. Due to some difficulty in this process, I could only wait as time ticked away. By the time shore leave was granted, it was almost 1 PM. There was no way for me to make it to the boat to take me to the reef. I ended up just wandering in the town, which I often do. It wasn’t all bad, but it could have been better if I could have gotten off the ship by the time I wanted. Maybe next time.

I have decided that I will only buy tickets for things when I know I can do them. I may miss out on some things that sell out early, but at least I won’t waste as much money regarding missing a sight seeing trip.

On the bright side, I was able to go to Disneyland Hong Kong and see pandas, so this cruise was not a complete loss.

The World Cruise and Visas

On By D. EndoIn Home, Ship LifeLeave a comment

I’m back to work after an odd schedule. With Royal Caribbean going on its first world cruise, I was asked to take part in the install process. They put in 5 new shows to replace the 2 that were originally there. After about a month, they were mostly finished, but I was all set to go home. Thank goodness I got to have the holidays at home. As I waited at home, the ship traveled south down the east coast of the Americas down to Antartica. After that, they went up the west coast to Los Angeles before heading across the ocean to Australia. I was originally going to join them in Tahiti but found out later that they wanted me to join 2 weeks earlier than I expected in Los Angeles. This sent me into panic mode to get the proper visas. I needed to get two visas to be allowed on the ship, an Australian visa and a Chinese visa. I was not too concerned about the Australian visa. I had gotten one years earlier and it was a painless process. All you need to do is fill out the form online and submit it. Hours later, they got back to me confirming my visa. The Chinese visa, on the other hand, was a lot more annoying. I had to fill out the form online which required a picture with a pure white background. That took many tries before I got one with a plain enough background to be accepted. Once everything was filled out, I had to submit an online copy as well as turn in a physical copy to the embassy in San Fransisco. I was fortunate enough for my dad to know someone who was a travel agent who exclusively does travel to China. I submitted the paperwork a week later, I got my visa. Unfortunately, I got the wrong visa. I got a tourist visa, and I needed a business visa. At this point, I’m panicking. One of things that is needed for a business visa which is not needed for a tourist visa is a letter of invitation. That’s right. Someone in China has to invite you to come over for business. This step adds to the amount of time needed to get your visa. So there I was, waiting at home for the visa. They decided to go with worst case scenario, and I began getting paperwork for a second Australian visa that would allow me to fly there and board my ship. Then I get the message. Turns out I didn’t need the Chinese visa. According to them, I won’t be allowed off in China so I don’t need a visa. I could have joined in Los Angeles. So they booked me on a flight to Hawaii to join the ship.

Once I got on the ship, they decided to change the itinerary for later on in the cruise. The original plan was to go from Dubai up through the Suez Canal and into the Mediterranean Sea. Due to wars and terrorism, the company cannot guarantee safety, so we are going to go the long way around. I don’t know if I need any new visas for this change. I guess I’m either going to get one on board like for India or I just get to look at land while stuck on the ship.

The only good thing to come of this whole debacle is I now have a Chinese tourist visa. Disneyland Shanghai is a possibility in the next ten years.

Hurricane Delay

On By D. EndoIn Ports, Science, Ship LifeLeave a comment

We got a surprise sea day yesterday. With Hurricane Idalia hitting Florida, we were lucky enough that our home port of Tampa wasn’t hit directly. Idalia was a category 3 hurricane when it made landfall, classifying it as a major hurricane with winds up to 129 mph. While I normally don’t have to deal with tropical storms and hurricanes, I was still quite surprised at how far the effects of a hurricane can go. Idalia pushed a lot of water in front of itself, striking all of Florida’s shores that face the Gulf of Mexico. Tampa is about 150 miles from where the storm hit and it still saw a storm surge of up to 7 feet in some places. This was not helped when the tide came in which added even more to the huge amount of water there. For safety reasons, we cannot go into
Tampa until the channel checked for safety and water levels recede. We’ll still try to do a modified cruise for our customers, but they will no longer have a leisurely day in Cozumel as we’ll be getting in much later than intended, having lost a day of sea travel. There were tentative plans to cancel this coming cruise, but our captain has deemed it possible to make it and still have a satisfactory cruise. Doing the math, we will probably arrive early to mid afternoon if we rush there at top speed. I’m guessing this will turn into a shopping trip for most guests now as some shore excursions will probably not be possible.

I was not surprised by the plans to cancel the next cruise due to the way US maritime laws work with cruise ships. I actually learned about this in my time working for American Cruise Lines. If you are a passenger vessel and you only do US ports, your ship must be American. This means only American made parts and American steel while only hiring American workers. Our ships don’t qualify for this so we must have at least one foreign port on any of our cruises with Royal Caribbean. If you’ve ever been with a major cruise, this is why you can’t have just an Alaskan cruise with only American ports. You will always stop in Vancouver or have that be your home port. This got me wondering if we would even have the cruise having lost a day of travel. There are no close foreign ports we could go to while going out of Tampa. We’re on the wrong side of Florida for a quick trip to the Bahamas. The Yucatan peninsula is also pretty far. Key West doesn’t count because that’s still Florida. Even if we had the proper paperwork, we’re too big to get into Havana. Everything else is even farther away.

While there is a bit of a scramble right now, my plans to go home don’t seem to be affected at the moment. I still have about a week before I fly home, so (fingers crossed) everything should be fine by then.