He Said . . .

We are expecting the sea days to be fairly low key so we are planning to combine sea days to not spend cycles discussing how the chest rises and falls while breathing and waiting for the next meal to show up.  That said let me catch you up on our sea day and our stop in Tenerife Canary Islands.

Our sea day was spent reading a counselor’s book on marriage, nothing wrong but I am always on the lookout for ensuring that we are working on it so as to not let it go “unmanaged”; I will provide a few morsels from the Cliff Notes version.

First my own morsel, I was taught many years ago that marriage was really very easy by a couple I had heard on a cruise ship years ago while watching a self made version of The Newlywed Game, it was both profound and trivial I thought, here it is… Make your spouse your best friend, that’s it!!  At the time I brushed it off but over the years have come to learn that it is so very true; back to the book, the author says that your spouse/significant other wants to be loved in one of five ways, they are, Words of Affirmation, Quality Time, Gifts of Love, Acts of Love and Physical touch.  Now it’s his belief that it’s pretty easy to figure out which one of these is your spouse’s primary motivator, the one they complain about the most with regard to you not doing something is their key love driver.  Once you figure out which one is their primary love driver, fill that and you will never have a failed marriage.  Remember it’s not YOUR primary love driver, that’s for them to figure out for you, unless you tell them, this is their primary love driver and if you manage to fill that need their “love tank” will get filled, I’ve heard this referred to as “love bank” which I like much better but either way, focus on their love need and you will be rewarded with a much improved relationship.   That was day one of my readings, let me know if it works for you…

In port at Tenerife, we opted to take an excursion to see the volcanic crater that dominates the landscape of this small island chain; what we got was a drive that left me once again addressing my fear of heights and 1000 ft plus sheer cliffs and having to trust my life to a stranger that most probably had no training beyond passing a class C driving test, I was worried.  It was touted as a panoramic view of the crater that was marked as strenuous and mentions of hiking and getting in touch with the landscape of the crater.  It was extremely moon-esque in its look, all obsidian rock and totally void of vegetation; I recalled somewhere that one of the Planet of the Apes movies was done here, and that was confirmed.  Additionally, Raquel Welch did her clothing optional, worst ever, movie here as well, sometime back in 2000 I recall, and another 5-10 westerns back when westerns were still made, if you remember that.

Back on task, this was what we really received, we drove for an hour had to stop to let all the walnut sized bladders relieve themselves, back on the bus for 30 more minutes to arrive at the crater, then for the highlight, off the bus for “20” minutes to walk around and take pictures, I was really unhappy with the time given, I thought we would be there for a couple hours so we could fan out and really get personal with the surroundings, not to be and after checking out the tram, which I would have loved to take to the mountain summit, we were back on the bus and heading back.  It may have been one of the worst excursions we’ve ever taken and speaks to why we continue to venture out further on our own as we get more comfortable with not being left behind by the cruise ship.

I suspect the next cruise we’ll probably be totally on our own!!  Unfortunately we arrived back at the ship with about 2 hours left and were told that it takes 45 minutes to get to town so we were basically done with the Canary Islands without seeing a huge portion of it.  Now it has never been on my short list but I would like to get more up close and personal with another trip if it happens to work out.

One item of note that was new for me, the Canary Islands are only 240 km, 120 miles from Africa; I thought they were due west of Spain, not at all, much more southwest and much closer to Africa than Spain, lesson learned.  

Today’s only comic relief during a lull when the woman running the excursion if there were any questions and someone in back, at just the right time, yells out, isn’t this the airport where they had that terrible crash?  She says I won’t speak about that in public and if you want to discuss it see me afterward, I thought I hadn’t seen that on Air Disasters so it couldn’t have been to big a crash.  Later, on the way back she asked again if you there were any questions, I whispered to Ami, “yea, can we talk about that crash?”, I didn’t say it but it did bring a smile to my face.  

The rest of the day was just enjoying the last views of land before leaving as well as relaxing around the room before the world’s best shower that I am totally addicted to, 45 minutes per night in there, it’s unbelievable!!

Other than that my stupid quip of the day happened at about 10:45, it was almost lights out and Ami says there is some sort of squeak next to the bed that’s driving me crazy, can you take a look?  I said, I don’t have a tool box, I’m not sure what I can do but I’ll take a look.  I tore through the area assuming something was rubbing on something else but didn’t find anything, I said I can’t find anything.  She said, if I lay in this really awkward, uncomfortable position it doesn’t make the noise, see?  I said, good night, she called me an expletive and we turned out the lights.  BTW, in the morning it was still squeaking but by then we had learned to live with it, it was white noise by then…  

Gambling Update

We lost $35 bucks playing quick hits but it was all Ami’s idea so we are at

Blaise - up $1.67

Ami - Down $55.00 [Editor’s Note - It was a joint loss - we did it together]

Prune Watch

Not required!!!!

She Said . . .

Well, it is Friday, October 27 and our first day of 7 at sea across the Atlantic.  At the end of this, we will either want to get off this thing pronto or be so relaxed, it won’t matter.

Since we last wrote, we had another day at sea and visited the Canary Islands.

Day at Sea

Wednesday we spent another day at sea traveling out of the Mediterranean and into the Atlantic to get to the Canary Islands which is 240 kilometers (about 148 miles) from the continent of Africa.

It was a relaxing day filled with lounging around and reading in the Solarium pool area and our balcony.

I finished my book The Rosie Project.  If I had more internet time, I would look up who recommended it and thank him/her.  It was a delightful book but, dammit, there is a sequel.  Which I must now read.  It will have to wait until I have unlimited internet and can download it.

We specifically have chosen to not buy an unlimited internet package because one of the points of going on a cruise is to turn off the communication devices.  The only reason we can blog is because of our status on Celebrity Cruises - we each get 90 free minutes of internet.  If we didn’t have that - no blog for you!

We saw some news about the uprising in Catalonia, where Barcelona is.  Looks like their regional government is going to try to take over for Spain.  I am not sure that is going to go over too well with the Spain’s national government.  Catalonia is significant portion of Spain’s economy.  There were more demonstrations in Barcelona after we left.  Don’t think I would be paying much attention to this if I had not just been there but it will be interesting to see how this plays out. I will be following it.

Tenerife, Canary Islands

We booked an excursion this time.  What we got was not what we expected.  Where we went was, but what we did, was not.  The excursion was marked “strenuous” and said we would walk and explore the crater next to the dormant volcano, Teide (pronounced “tA-dA” with the A’s pronounced as they are in Ami).  This was more of a let’s-ride-around-in-a-bus-and-observe-through-the-windows kind of excursion.  Not our favorite.  

We got out once to take pictures, once to potty, drink coffee, and shop, and once at the crater for only 15 minutes.  15 minutes is all we had to “explore!”  That’s it.  We thought we would have time to hike around the crater for a while.  Nope.  Very disappointing since the terrain was unlike anything we had ever seen before. Just amazing!  The area is a national park.  I would love to return and hike there.

We were quite late coming back to the boat so we didn’t get to wander around the town.  That was a bummer.  The last thing we wanted was to go roaming around and miss the boat being that our next stop was over 3,000 nautical miles away in Florida.

I have to mention to drive.  The road was your typical winding road up a mountain with a grand fall on one side of the road.  I could tell Blaise, with his fear of heights was extremely uncomfortable at times sitting next to the window.  I sat by the window on the way back and even though I really don’t have a fear of heights, I have to admit it quite harrowing at times.

Sangria Tour of Spain

Sadly, the sangria tour of Spain ended in Malaga.  We had zero time to go back into town after being dropped off at the ship from our excursion.  So in my limited exploration of Spanish sangria, I found the best to be in Barcelona, followed by Malaga, and then Cartagena.  All quite yummy. Blaise’s order is Cartagena, Barcelona, then Malaga.  I will miss the sangria.  It is not the same in the U.S.

Dana’s Food Watch

Wednesday’s Dinner:  While I cannot remember what we had for breakfast or lunch that day, the waiter offered to do a surf and turf for me for dinner.  I said that is fine so long as it isn’t a full portion of both.  I received a full portion of the sirloin steak and of the fettuccine with calamari and shrimp.  Blaise and I both ate some of both but not all of either were completely consumed.  Blaise had the barramundi on a bed of bean puree.  If you have never had barramundi, you must have it at least once in your life.  That was Frank and Barbara Litt’s recommendation when we went to Australia last year since it is only found in the waters off of Australia.  We had it in Cairns, Australia the night before we got back on the boat after my broken nose debacle.  I would have been “in” this time had it not been for the bean puree. I cannot recall what we had for our appetizer.  For dessert, Blaise had the cheese plate and I had some sort of chocolate dessert with vanilla ice cream.  Mine was lovely.  Blaise’s cheese plates feature one special cheese with corresponding complementing accoutrements

Since we don’t do anything special for breakfast or lunch, I will only talk about dinner from now on unless there is something of note otherwise.

Last night for dinner, we had a scallop ceviche for the chef’s mers bouche.  Blaise and I both had pate’ for the appetizer.  It was tasty but the portion was so large, I could not finish it.  Blaise had roasted chicken with creamy polenta which looked delicious.  Blaise said he really enjoyed it.  He doesn’t normally like polenta (I think that’s crazy!) but said he loved that one.  I had braised short rib ravioli in hopes they would redeem themselves from my disappointing short rib two nights earlier.  They did.  I love this chef’s pasta!  I don’t know what he does to it, but it is some tasty stuff.  For dessert, I had the chocolate souffle’ with some sort of ice cream.  I’m not a huge souffle’ fan, but this was the best souffle’ I have ever had. It was amazing!  Worth every calorie!  I could not define the flavor of ice cream but it was not vanilla.  It took me a few bites to determine the perfect souffle’ to ice cream ratios but my, oh, my!

Injury Watch

No injuries.  How can you injure yourself if you are on a bus all day?  The acrylic nail on my left pinky popped off though.  I kept it in case the salon on the boat can somehow glue it on.