7 October 2005:

Morning:

Day 15 of the cruise…...

With apologies to “The Legend of 1900”…..

“There is one person on every voyage. Look closely and you can tell who it will be by the look in their eyes. They may be from Germany or Poland or Italy or from any other place where opportunity and freedom are rare. They come with little more than the clothes on their backs and a burning desire to create a new life for themselves. But the one person….the one who will be first….is the one with the brightest light in their eyes…the one with the strongest desire. They watch the horizon for hours and then it happens. They see it. The Status of Liberty, the symbol of freedom, emerges from the mist. Their faces fill with awe and wonder and the words burst from them: A-May-Ree-Ka……A-May-Ree-Ka!”

That’s how I thought coming into New York would be. Docking was scheduled for 6am and Commodore Girly-Man generally docks early….when he docks at all….so we were up at 4:30am and out on deck. It was dark and misty, with intermittent rain. There were lights on the shore and a few multi-story buildings but it looked like we were just sailing into some remote industrial area. After a few minutes on deck we finally gave up and went in for a light breakfast and coffee. After breakfast we were on our way back to the room….a bit disappointed with our arrival in New York…but we decided to take one last look on deck. The starboard view was uninteresting, as we moved to the port railing we stopped for a last look and then it happened. Out of the mist she appeared: Lady Liberty, brightly lit, with torch held high in the receding fog. “A-May-Ree-Ka!”

After watching the Statue of Liberty pass by and seeing a few large buildings approach off the port side I happened to turn around and without thinking, exclaimed: “Whoa, Nellie”. (Note: for those of you who were not raised by an Ohio farm girl, ‘Whoa, Nellie’ is an exclamation of extreme surprise. Those of you who are Native Texans may substitute your own barnyard euphemism.) Off the starboard side, looming up into the sky, dwarfing the ship and seemingly so close that you could reach out and touch it was the skyline of Manhattan. After so many days in small ports, where the ship was the largest building in town, or at sea where it was the only structure from horizon to horizon it was really a shock to see buildings that large and that close.

One of the reasons we were up early was to clear immigration in New York so that we could by-pass it in Fort Lauderdale. I assumed that would be a real problem: nearly 4000  passengers and crew who would have to clear immigration and the usual complement of 2 or 3 bored civil servants to do the clearing…..a recipe for hours of standing in slowly moving lines that would stretch around the decks of the boat. But I was pleasantly surprised; the line moved quickly into the Vista show lounge and approached a long line of tables staffed by 12-15 immigration agents who didn’t really seem to care whether I was an Islamic Terrorist or not.; not a single question about my national origin, my feelings about the U S of A or whether I voted for George W. Bush in the last election, then I was approved for entry and unrestricted access into the United States. Total time required: about 5 minutes. 

The sail-in and sail-out of New York was interesting, but not very photogenic. Cloud cover, flat lighting, fog and the occasional bit of rain kept the photo opportunities down. But the most interesting part of the sail-away was when we passed the Status of Liberty on our way out of New York harbor. I think that all of the crew that wasn’t on duty…..and probably a bunch who were on duty….came up on deck to watch the Statue and have their pictures taken with Lady Liberty in the background. Most of these people are from Thailand, the Philippines, Romania, South Africa and they all thought the Statue of Liberty was a major event. As we continued out of the harbor we approached a large bridge that spanned the harbor. One of the waiters who is from Romania asked: “What is that bridge?” and another passenger told him: “That’s the Varazanno  bridge. It’s named for an Italian.”  The waiter asked: “Where’s the Romanian bridge?....You should have one from Romania.”  A minute later he said: “You know, I’m going to come to America and build the Romanian bridge. I have degree in civil engineering. I will come back and build bridges and tall buildings in America.”  And I think he just might do that.

Evening:

We are once again alone at sea.  The Gotham skyline has receded in the distance and the Star Princess is the only visible feature from one horizon to the other. The sea has become ‘Moderate’ with waves around 7.5 feet……a bit rougher than we’ve been used to for the last day or two.

We had dinner tonight at Sabatini’s one of the alternate dining venues on the ship. Very nice. It took us a little over 2 hours for dinner….and apparently we were rushing it, because the normal time for dinner there is nearly 3 hours. I am still too miserable to fully appreciate the experience, but as I remember it, there were 6 appetizer courses, caviar, 4 pasta courses, soup (which we declined), special breads, an entrée, cheeses, dessert and coffee. All in all, more than enough to send me over the allowed weight limit for my flight back to Dallas.

8 October 2005:

Day 16 of the cruise…..5735 miles sailed since Copenhagen…..221 miles remaining to Fort Lauderdale. Off the coast of South Carolina heading into the Sargasso Sea and the Bermuda Triangle.

Sometime in the night we sailed into some serious weather. There were lots of creaking, groaning, shuttering noises in the dark. When I awoke the deck was rolling more than it has ever done on this cruise. The sea was listed as ‘Moderate’ but the ship was rolling more than it had in the ‘Very Rough’ conditions of the North Atlantic. It’s the wind. The wind is fantastic. It is blowing across the ship….coming in from the 10 o’clock direction at…..are you ready for this…..Gale Force 12: Hurricane strength.  And we are sailing into a falling barometer, meaning that the weather should be getting worse. I haven’t seen a weather forecast for days so I’m not aware of any hurricanes or tropical storms that are in the area, but somehow Commodore Girly-Man has managed to find one to sail us through on our last full day of the cruise. At breakfast it appeared to be raining violently.…but it was not…it was just water being stripped off the tops of the wave by the wind and flung onto the windows….14 floors above the surface of the water. I haven’t even attempted to go out on an open deck. I tried opening our balcony door a while ago. Just opening it a couple of inches was enough to cause papers and bed linens to start flying on the other side of the room. So, it could be an exciting final day of the cruise.

I’ll send this email shortly. Today is a sea day, and in the morning we arrive in Fort Lauderdale and disembark early. I doubt that there will be time for another email before I get off the boat. So this should be the last email; thanks for listening…..I’ve enjoyed having someone to send these messages to. If something truly interesting occurs tomorrow, I’ll try to find time to communicate it.

…..sent from the ever heaving deck of the ill-fated Star Princess somewhere in the Bermuda Triangle……