Days 04: Free Day
For brunch, we found some yummy tacos just around the corner from our hotel. After we left, I saw the abysmal score of 67 from the city health department. Here’s hoping they fixed it all and are just waiting to be reinspected. But they were sooooo good. (And we feel fine.)
We did a little travel day prep and organization, ran a quick errand to Target, took much-needed naps. As we were leaving for dinner, we made a fun inside joke with “our guy” at Guest Services, Ramón.
For dinner, we found a cool mostly-local casual bar. It was near a bougie shopping district with several stores we saw on Rodeo: Louis Vuitton, Tiffany, etc.. We walked through part of it on the way back from Target, but the after-dinner walk let us see more of it all. We wandered into a puzzles/toy shop and then into a store for consignment of high end bags and shoes. I didn’t care about any of the fussy brands (Louis Vuitton), but there was a woman running one of those live internet sales shows while we were there, so that was cool to see in person.
We found our way back through the “back yard” courtyards of the hotel, headed up, and packed our bags.
It was the lazy day we needed.
Day 05: Embarkation Day
To kick off our day, we went back to the same good taco joint….and then back to our room to tidy up and finish packing.
Our driver was early (which was nice after the previous debacle). Still, it was a whole hour to the dock. Once we arrived, it was a tad luxurious. We were sailing out from the dock next to the permanently-stationed Queen Mary (the original one? maybe?); it’s now a tourist thing.
After we cleared security, we enjoyed a welcome drink of fruit punch. They loaded the boat slowly to handle the delicate crowd. And while we knew we’d among the youngest on this voyage, we didn’t expect the gap to be quite so large.
We were surprised we got to go straight to our cabin where we had a welcome mimosa and got some info from one of our stewards. Our big bags arrived very quickly…and the little ones weren’t too far behind. We enjoyed our veranda. We watched some sea lions playing in the water. We also got to see a dive crew do some underwater maintenance on the ship. (Whatever it was was pretty small; it didn’t take them long and they barely had any tools.) Their dive barge was cool. Instead of tanks, they dove with crazy long hoses. They still had (small) tanks, so maybe they were burning off some barnacles.
We unpacked a few things and headed to the welcome lunch buffet before coming back to unpack the rest.
At one of the bars, we met a woman who was too stupid to realize that her black and purple top matched both her purple pants and her black “shawl” (which she adamantly said was not a “wrap” as she showed me how she wrapped it around herself. Ok, weirdo.). About two seconds later, she asked me how we voted. Guess what bigot party she’s and her husband are for? We got the hell out of there.
At dinner, they asked us if we’d like to sit alone or with someone. We elected to sit with others, but then once we were seated, they took away the other two place settings.
The main bar had two bands and a lot of old music. Several members of the ship’s crew packed the dance floor and sang along. I hope it set the tone for the rest of the voyage.