Helsinki, Helsinki... you kinda stinky...

HI FAMILY AND FRIENDS!

This is me!

Finally made it off the ship in Helsinki, Finland. Honestly, I was a bit underwhelmed by what it had to offer a tourist on foot. There just wasn't much there. I managed to see a few cool buildings and get a delicious lunch with my friend, Iain (he's from Scottland, and apprently they like to add extra Is to their words).


Church on the rock. Very pretty - I am not sure why my picture came out so dark.


An amazing cathedral - looking up at it - see how small the people are?


Statue in front of the cathedral at the bottom of the stairs.


A really cool street shot downhill at a very straight street. It just looks so much nicer than anything in the US.


Candleabra/prayer thing inside the cathedral. You weren't allowed to take pictures so this is the only one I snapped. However, in the back balcony was the most beautiful set of organ pipes I had ever seen. If I ever go back I will make that my one sneaky tourist photo. I was embarrassing Iain.


This picture is for my mom. :)


The train station clock tower. It was HUUUUUGE.


Downtown Helsinki train station main terminal.


Funny statues flanking the main terminal entrance at the train station.

Iain and I ended up going to a Mexican restaurant and I had amazing fajitas. It's a bit dangerous because I never really grasp how much money I am spending when I am out at port. I have four different currencies in my wallet, and can never understand receipts when I get them. I also get this distinct feeling like I will get stuck with a lot of weird currencies in my wallet after I leave the mediterranean in December.


Me on my way out for work tonight. I thought I would throw in another pic just for Bri Guy. <3

Farewell, Amsterdam!

So Voyage 318 (the current voyage) is the last Baltic run we will be doing this season. The weather is changing and getting much colder so it's just not a good tourist draw. Voyage 319 is a transition voyage where we will go from Amsterdam to Turkey where the next few months of voyages will originate. It will be nice to have a change of ports. However, transition voyages bring up a complication: you will only be at these ports once so you want to get off every where you go. In my world, that means REALLY long days... It will be an interesting balance!



Probably my last shot of the Amsterdam port.

Coopenhaaaagenn

Well today was a day full of big plans. Most of which fell fairly flat. BUT I did manage a lovely afternoon in Copenhagen, Denmark with my boss and Joe. Originally we were going to be out from about 11:30AM to 3:00PM. The goal was to go to Tivoli Gardens. Which I didn't realize until we were on the shuttle is an amusement park... not a garden. I really did not dress appropriately. Plus I brought my giant Vera Bradley "day bag" (as I affectionately call it which is funny because I pretty sure it could accomodate 4 people for an overnight).

However, by the time we took the 20 minute shuttle ride into town, lost our bearings, and then got distracted by a giant shopping district, we realized that we had no time to get to Tivoli Gardens. So, instead we ended up eating a nice little lunch at an adorable restaurant named Mama Rosa's. I had amazing pizza :D


Another crappy photo of the shopping district. It's a pedestrian mall about a mile long. Very fun and a good mixture of high and low-end :D


Beautiful town sqaure... well circle... The gardens and landscaping surrounding the statue are stunning!


I wish I had taken the time to stop and take a better picture of this than I did. It's a little inner city river lined with boats, trees, and beautiful buildings. Really much more breath taking than this picture would lead you to believe.


They have painted elephants all around the city, much like cities are doing now in the US.


An awesome clock tower that you can see the peak of in my skyline shot later in the post.


A really cool street corner where the angle is so acute you can see both sides of the buildings. And the buildings themselves are really quite huge - I couldn't belive they spanned the entire block.


Cool dragon sculpture over the doorway of a beautiful building. Reminded me a lot of Gringotts bank in Harry Potter. Yes, my inner nerd just stepped out for a minute.


An awesome statue.

Then we walked the 30 minutes back to the shuttle, and arrived back to the port at about 2pm. We were docked with the Eclipse again, so Joe asked if I wanted to go take another look (since there were lots of things onboard I didn't get a chance to see a few days ago in Russia). Of course I said yes. He took me up to the lawn (yes they actually have grass on the top deck where you can play lawn games and lounge).


A view of the grassy area on the top of the Eclipse.

He showed me around the onboard specialty restaurants. Super cool. One called Q-sine is very "new agey" with experimental foods and more interactive. Lots of "build your own" style courses.


The view of the Copenhagen skyline from deck 14 of the Eclipse. You can see the clock tower I took a picture of in the distance.


Cool island structure thing you could see between the two celebrity ships from port.


The founder of Celebrity Crusies is a greek gentleman with the last name Chandris. The CH letter in greek is "X", hence the logo. This is Joe.


Me in front of the Celebrity 'X'. Horribly unflattering, thanks, Joe.


This puppy statue is outside of the Michael's Club on the Eclipse. It reminded me remarkably of the dog painting I did at CMU and gave to my Uncle Myron and Aunt Rezza.

Last night was CELEBRATE THE WORLD - our final production show of the voyage. And, I am happy to report - was the best show call I have had since I've gotten onboard. Two really solid performances with no technical issues from top to bottom. Very rewarding.

After the shows and my post-show paperwork, I went down to the staff bar for wine & cheese night. One of our lounge groups - Carl William - was playing. They're a bunch of really nice French guys with an awesome sense of humor. And it was prime entertainment since they are disembarking in Amsterdam on the 26th - they just had a good time.

After a glass of riesling, Joe and I went up to the martini bar where he recommended what is called the "20 Year Martini." It was the most delicious drink I've ever had. Martini coated in passion fruit and ginger foam, topped with a few leaves of sage. It was just like dessert :D The drink was designed and named after Celebrity Cruises' 20th anniversary.

All-in-all a really good day.

Another long one...

Today has been a long long long long long long long long day. And the really sad part is I still have one and a half shows to go! Uck.

My schedule looked like this:
1:00 PM - "Come Fly with Me" Tech
2:15 PM - Live@Sky Tech (please note that this is 15 minutes later than previously scheduled)
As noted on the schedule, this will be a full run through. With all departments except the Activity Staff who is doing an individual rehearsal at 9am.
3:30 PM - "Come Fly with Me" Matinee
4:30 PM - Stage Changeover (Brian, please ask your guys not to come in before 4:45PM)
5:00 PM - Suzi Woods Tech
7:15 PM - Suzi Woods Performance #1
9:15 PM - Suzi Woods Performance #2
10:45 PM - Live@Sky Performance

You might notice a distinct lack of meal breaks or time for administrative time… Actually, Suzi Woods is not quite my cup of tea – so I am working in my office during her show. Not exactly kosher, but I am not going to be a functioning person by midnight when Live@Sky is over.

This was the first time the aerialists did their full show, “Come Fly with Me” in front of an audience. They have been working together and with the tech team for months to pull it together. Their names are Celia and Julien and they are two of the most lovely, talented people I have had the pleasure of meeting. Which really means something since I have had the opportunity to meet many lovely and talented people.

They put together a production that is really one aerial/gymnast/adage sequence after another. It lasts about 50 minutes and is the most complicated show we have done as a theater since I’ve been here. It’s really quite wonderful. Some of the stunts and positions they do are absolutely breathtaking. I’m pretty sure Celia’s legs belong in a MCEscher drawing. You don’t know where they’re coming or going. Nutso.

But today has been so long that that show honestly feels like it happened yesterday.

My best ship friend, Joe, is signing off on the 26th. I’m already starting to get bummed about it. *sigh*

It’s just been a long day. I could go for a flight of mini-martinis at the martini bar :D

Oh, and I forgot to mention...

That today marks the day that I have officially been on board for 1 month.

The cruise director pulled me into her office today and really made me blush with flattery. She passed along her personal contact and made sure I knew that if I ever needed a letter of recommendation she would like to be first in line to write one. She called me one of the best production managers she has ever worked with onboard. I just... it made me really happy. To feel so incredibly appreciated in such a large company was just unreal. It's actually really nice to realize that in a work environment where I have 1000 coworkers, I am still becoming one of those people who knows everyone's name. I mean it's going to take me a while, but I am making an absolute genuine effort to do so. It's nice to see how many people smile when they see me. :D

I think they find me refreshing because I'm not an officer who refuses to talk to the crew members.

Did I ever mention that I am a 2-1/2 stripe officer? Oh yes. My boss is 3-1/2, her boss is 4, and the captain is 4-1/2. I'm over halfway there! Just kidding. I never want to be captain.

Bye!

I got on another ship!

So the Constellation (affectionately called Conny by most), docks overnight in St. Petersburg. These days are referred to as "1st St. Petersburg" and "2nd St. Petersburg." Days of the week do not exist here. Days of the week are referred to by our ports of call or by sea day count. For example... instead of saying your week is Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, our week is:

Embark
At Sea 1
Rostock
At Sea 2
Stockholm
Helsinki
1st St. Petersburg
2nd St. Petersburg
Tallinn
At Sea 3
Copenhagen
At Sea 4
Disembark // Embark

So intead of talking in weeks, we talk in thems of voyages (right now we are on voyage 317), and our voyages are 12 days long. The ports/sea days change depending on the itinerary, but we are currently finishing up the second of our three baltic runs this season.

You might say somethign like:
"Do you want to grab lunch on Helsinki?"
which means something entirely different than:
"Do you want to grab lunch in Helsinki?"

The former implies getting lunch onboard the day we are at port in Helsinki (a 20 minute commitment), the latter implies that you will get off the ship together and find a local restaurant (a 2 hour commitment). Always good to get your prepositions correct. Also, you have to relearn the "days of the week" for every itinerary. I have just started to get used to this one, and now we will be going to a Mediterranean itinerary so everything will be changing soon.

So on our last Helsinki (Aug. 19), the Eclipse docked in St. Petersburgh for its "1st St. Petersburg." Thus, our 1st St. Petersburg and its 2nd St. Petersburg were the same day so the two celebrity ships were both docked at the same port. The production manager on the Eclipse emailed me inviting myself and my staff over to see the tech run of their production show. So yesterday I got to visit there ship. I arrived around 1:30pm, the tech was at 3:45pm, and was off the ship by 4:45pm. Perfect timing with their 6pm sail away time.

I am not sure if I have explained this before or not, but Celebrity's ships are broken down into three classes. Each class share it's name with the first ship to sail of it's class. I do not know all of the ships, but will give you the basics.

The oldest class is the Century class. Now this class only consists of the Celebrity Century. There used to be others but they have been sold to smaller companies to make way for the newer vessels.

The next class is the Millenium class. It consists of:
Celebrity Millenium
Celebrity Summit
Celebrity Infinity
Celebrity Constellation

The newest class is the Solstice class. It consists of:
Celebrity Solstice
Celebrity Equinox
Celebrity Eclipse
Celebrity Silhouette - this ship launched for its maiden voyage last month, so it is brand spanking new.
Celebrity Reflection - this ship launches for its maiden voyage in November 2012. There is already rumor that I may be on the start up team for that. We'll see.

The real point of me explaining the classes is to get to this: The Solstice class is BIG PIMPIN'! My ship is 12 decks tall, Solstice ships are 16. The ceilings are high. The PM office is huge. The shows involve so much flying I could die. It's awesome. The unfortunate part is that the shows on board just aren't that good. Celebrity contracts the shows from production companies. We use QDos on the Millenium Class, but they use Poet on the Solstice Class. The production values are very different between the companies.

It was really nice to get onboard another ship to see what it looks like and how things are run. But honestly, the best part was meeting another production manager. Her name was Heather and she has been with the company for nearly 4 years now and seems to have a good head on her shoulders. Also, the AVTL (AV Technician Lighting - there is also AV Technician Sound) on the Eclipse went to school at CMU with me. Apparently we had similar Julie-related hiring experiences. It was just funny to bump into him on a cruise ship... in Russia. Odd.

Things are going quite well. Everyone seems pleased with the job I am doing and how the theater is being managed. I'm a bit tired with what I believe are now permanent bags under my eyes. But am feeling the constant professional and personal challenge a bit refreshing. Not that I didn't like working with IN THE MOOD, but in all honesty I could not have found the job less intellectually stimulating.

Change is good.

Even though I miss Brian.

Our 2 year anniversary is just around the corner :D.

I don't even know what a long day is anymore...

As of yesterday I have been away from home for 1 month... I can't believe that a month as come and gone already. It's nuts.

In true Maddie style I am getting sick. Slight fever/sore throat/runny nose/sneezing today. I am hoping I can sleep it off tonight since tomorrow is a lighter day than today was.

The mail ended up being a sweet note from Harriet, a girl I studied with at Carnegie Mellon wishing me the best. Harriet: if you're reading this - thank you it was so nice of you to write me. It literally made my day :) Not a lot of people get mail here, so I felt very elite.

Tonight is Indian Independence Day so there is a huge curry party in the provisions area of deck 1.

I have not been off the ship for 8 days... I'm getting a bit stir-crazy. I just find it so difficult to get motivated to leave the ship at 9am when I work until 1 or 2 every morning. I have been trying to rest more, and especially now that I'm getting sick... *sigh*

It is very difficult to establish routine here since personnel is constantly changing over since people are usually on 6 (or fewer) month contracts and even when they come back they usually rotate throughout the fleet... so you really never get the same combination of people twice. The activity manager who I have become besties with is signing off on the 26th and my supervisor (the cruise director) is signing off on September 6th... So I feel like I have to start all over again with my working relationships. Whereas the AV manager I don't much care for is stuck here until mid-November. Oh well.

We also just got a new hotel director and associate hotel director (my boss's boss onboard the ship), so that is changing the dynamic around here as well.

There is a lot of butt covering going on.

I mostly just try to get my job done with the minimal amount of effort possible. :D

There are two kids onboard right now that remind me of... well... me. They are stage-managers-to-be, so they will be shadowing me running technical rehearsals tomorrow. I think it's really nice to be giving back to the technical theater community. Lots of good karma.

I miss you all.

I got mail!!!

Most exciting email I've gotten since I arrived onboard is that I have mail waiting for me in the crew welfare office! I can't pick it up until 5 but really... SUPER EXCITED!

Houston... we have... friends :)

Last night was the first night I really felt like I had made friends onboard. Not to say that the cast and av team haven't been lovely, but I have to draw a line with them since, at the end of the day, I am their boss.

People I would consider my friends: the Activity Manager, Joe, one of the Activity Staff, Victoria, and two guys who work in the shops Ian & Christian (Christian actually has some crazy spelling of his name that I failed to remember from last night). Anyway, its just nice to feel like the social settling is happening. It's also nice to be friends with people outside of the theater... so we talk about different things all the time.

* * *

On a more serious note, during Sizzle last night one of the casings for a moving light fell from the ceiling and hit a six-year-old girl in the head. So now we are in full force of "cover your ass mode." The girl is perfectly fine. The casing weighs a maximum of 2 lbs and fell a maximum of 8 feet before hitting her. But still not good. Not good. Not good.

The Productions Onboard

So I’ve realized that I have actually managed to speak little to none about the actual productions onboard. I’ll attempt to rectify that now while I am currently in my office between shows.

In general…
There is a production everyday. There is always a technical rehearsal of that production in the afternoon, and then there are two performances (otherwise referred to as “seatings”) that evening. The theater is designed to be able to hold half of the ship’s capacity, so in theory all guests may see all shows if they so choose. Seating times are either 7:15pm & 9:15pm (early shows) or 8:45pm & 10:45pm (late shows). The times are structured around the two available dinner seatings for the guests. Each guest is assigned to either late dinner or early dinner. So, if we do late shows, you eat at your dinner seating and then go to the performance afterward. If we do early shows, those with an early dinner reservation go to the late show, and those with a late dinner reservation go to the early show. For some reason this never ends up working out as designed. But that’s the logic behind the evening’s scheduling anyway.

Production shows…
On any given Celebrity ship there are 3 full-scale, full-cast production shows. These shows are almost always on formal nights and have late seatings. The three onboard the Constellation are:

1. iHollywood
2. Land of Make Believe
3. Celebrate the World

They are all of the same genre – a mishmash of popular songs (mostly popular in the US, but in Celebrate the World especially there are hit songs from many countries). Land of Make Believe has a loose plot line that is some combination of The Wizard of Oz and Alice in Wonderland. iHollywood is the most technically complex, and just features a lot of great moments in film history – largely focusing on pirate movies, James Bond, Judy Garland, Little Mermaid, etc.

These shows are each performed 1 day per voyage. They use all 5 singers, 10 dancers, and 2 aerialists. iHollywood uses the onboard orchestra, and the other two run off of track. During these shows I operate from the rigging booth (shown in a picture in a previous post). That is where I run the fly system, turn table, and lifts. I also call any track cues, deck cues, and pit cues from there.

Opening & Closing Night Shows…
The exact content of these shows varies from cruise director to cruise director (they really get to decide the entertainment makeup while they are on board). Currently, our cruise director’s name is Sue Denning. She is a lovely British woman with a fabulous taste in shoes and short blonde spiky hair. For her, the opening night show (which is performed one time on embarkation day at 10:45pm) is called “A Taste of Things to Come.” It opens with an orchestra feature, goes into a cast “bumper” (a piece 10-15 minutes long that is a mash-up of many songs in very similar style to the production shows), a piece done by the aerialists, a number by the onboard a cappella group, and perhaps one or two more pieces contributed by onboard musicians.

The closing night show is called “Everything Musical” and it is literally just that. The cast does a bumper, the orchestra does a feature, and every musical act on board comes through with one piece. It is a technical nightmare with a million changeovers. Right now on board we have a band called Great Ideas (the cheesy party band), Carl Williams (a ballroom dance music group), Expression Strings Trio (violin, viola & piano), Lemon Squeezy (an a cappella group), Jefferson Ang (a guitar/vocalist)… and probably more that I’m forgetting.

//so now I’ve accounted for 5 nights of a 12-night cruise.//

Guest entertainers…
At any given point in time there are 2 guest entertainers onboard. They always swap out mid-voyage so they can perform for one group of guests at the end of their voyage and the next group of guests at the beginning of their voyage. So 4 nights of the cruise you will have guest entertainer performances. These range from vocalists, to pianists, to comedians, to magicians, to ventriloquists, to (playing tonight) a violin duo. You name it, they try to have it. Just like every other show, they do a rehearsal in the afternoon and perform twice on their evenings.

///so now I’ve accounted for 9 nights of a 12-night cruise.//

Local Folkloric Shows…
When a ship does an overnight, they will try to bring a local group on to perform one evening (one seating only). For this voyage, the local group is called Moroshka and they are from St. Petersburg, Russia. I pick them up from the gangway at 9pm, they immediately rehearse and ravage the backstage hospitality, and then they perform once at 10:30pm, and they’re off the ship by midnight. Pretty easy.

//so now I’ve accounted for 10 nights of a 12-night cruise.//

Variety Night…
Not much of a variety, really. The two onboard guest entertainers do a split show. Two 25-minute sets each, typically.

Perry Grant…
Perry is the onboard pianist who plays mostly in the Michael’s Club (usually a VIP lounge). His style is very… umm… flamboyant. And his jackets are very sparkly. He is a terrible singer, but a great entertainer. He sounds a lot like a goat when he sings. I don’t quite get it, but there are literally hundreds of people a year who book cruises just to attend his shows. Literally. No joke. They’ve done studies on it. Anyway, he’s always feeling a bit “under the weather” to get a bit of “sympathy.” So we appease him just so he’ll get on the damn stage every 12 days.

//so that’s it for performances in the Celebrity Theater.//

Theme Nights…
Usually on nights where there isn’t a full production show there is what’s called a Theme Night. Simply put, this is like a miniproduction that happens late at night, using some contingent of the cast, and ends up being a pain in the butt most of the time. Our onboard theme nights that I am involved in are Live@Sky, Broadway Nights, and Sizzle.

Live@Sky is a 1940s theme that has … well … most of the music from IN THE MOOD. Not done as well, but there are many more swing dancers.

Broadway Nights is a cabaret-style evening where each of the singers sings a few Broadway hits. Which was probably exactly what it sounded like so why am I still writing?

Sizzle is a latin dance night. It’s really to get the party atmosphere going. The singers don’t do sizzle, but there are many choreographed dances done by the production dancers. It also features the brass and saxophones from the orchestra.

There are also…
Captain’s Club Celebration
A Cappella Matinees
Aerialists Show
Sue’s One Woman Show (the cruise director)
Captain’s Toast
Crew Talent Show
Star Chef
… and probably more that I’m not thinking of right now.

Getting worn a little thin...

I have bags under my eyes. They are big and dark and I can't hide them with makeup and even if I manage good sleep they don't go anywhere. I'm tired.

Someone stole my black flats out of the dryer. So now I am down to 4 pairs of shoes, 2 of which have started smelling quite terrible. I really wish I had packed more clothing. I have this pair of perfect black heels sitting at home right now... why didn't I bring them?

One of my cast members is in trouble for flirting with a girl who is 14-going-on-28 (if you catch my drift). I was supposed to call him at 8:30 this morning to tell him to go down to security by 9am - that way they could surprise him with a confrontation of the issue. I set the alarm, but forgot to turn it "on," so now I'm on today's shit list for Security and the Cruise Director.

*sigh*

Also, my daily schedule today looks like this:

August 11, 2011
At Sea 3

12:15PM - Captain's Club Backstage Tour
2:25PM - Lemon Squeezy Mic Check
3:00PM - Lemon Squeezy Matinee
3:45PM - Laszlo & Claudia working with lights
4:15PM - Laszlo & Claudia working with sound (without band, though you may be setting up your stations at this time)
4:30PM - Laszlo & Claudia Tech
6:00PM - Sound Check Sue's One Woman Show
7:15PM - Laszlo & Claudia Performance #1
9:15PM - Laszlo & Claudia Performance #2
10:15PM - Sue's One Woman Show
11:15PM - Sizzle (exact start time will be determined by when the ship crosses under the bridge)

And that just drains any energy left in me right out of me. I need Warnemude to come faster so I can have a break.

I have to tell our lighting technician - a grown woman about 6 years older than me (has been working on cruise ships since before I was in college), that people are complaining about her hygiene standards. Strategy: Quick like a bandaid. I'll let you know how that one goes.

Tallinn, Estonia

I managed to get off the ship for a grand total of 1 hour in Tallinn. Which was long enough to walk right to the entryway of old town, turn around, and return to the ship. Once you get off the pier, the port sidewalk is lined with little shops and stuff, like a miniature bazaar. You could tell that most of them rely on it being really to help sell their merchandise (mostly scarves, hats, gloves, etc.). There were some AMAZING natural wooden bowls and serving dishes. I almost got one, and then I realized I would have absolutely NO WAY to get it back home. And I don't know how much they cost, but that's neither here nor there...

Getting to the old part of town was about a 25 minute walk from the ship.


This steeple was my beacon. I just followed it and figured it would be surrounded by cool stuff, or, if nothing else, it would be cool on its own.


I walked up what felt like a million stairs (speaking of which, my stair tolerance is slowly going through the roof right now), finally arriving at what looked like a giant citadel (that's probably not really the word I want, but it sounds good and the internet is too slow to look it up). I had no idea what I would see as I slowly walked around it to peer through the archway...


Only to begin to see beautiful buildings on the other side...


Honestly it looks like something from a happy Harry Potter movie. Beautiful side-by-side quirky buildings. So unique. Right as I saw this, it was literally time for me to turn around and start walking back to the ship or I was going to be late for rehearsal. So next time, I know which direction to head, I will walk faster, and I will leave earlier. Because now all I want to do is explore what's there.

On my way back I overheard an older woman trying to find someone who spoke English. I piped up and asked if I could help. She was lost, trying to find the shuttle stop to head back to the Constellation. I explained that I didn't even know there was a shuttle (nonetheless where the stop was), but that I was about to walk back and she could join me if she cared to. So she obliged, and I walked back with a very lovely Canadian doctor who explained to me that her two middle-aged sons had taken the shuttle map and somehow managed to ditch their own mom. She was peeved to say the least. It was nice to have a real conversation with someone who doesn't work on the ship. By the time we were walking back through the bazaar, she stumbled upon her husband and we parted ways. It was definitely my good deed for the day.

Stockholm, Sweden

I didn't have much down time today to wander Stockholm. I in fact, did not even have enough time to walk downtown (approximately 45min walk from the port). But I did manage an hour of exploration up to a lovely overlook. I can't wait until I get better at my job so everything goes faster so I can actually do REAL stuff.


To help me keep track of where what set of pictures are from I am now trying to snap a shot of something with the locations name on it. Hence... the crate.


To eliminate the language barrier, and likely so that port security stops getting pestered by tourists, the port literally has a sign off the gangway that states "Yellow downtown, Blue overlook, Red boat excursions." Sure enough, painted right on the ground are lines you may follow every step of the way until you reach your final destination. First-it's genious. Second-it's impressive since some of these lines are several miles long (as per the line that spans the whole 45 minute walk to downtown).


This just made me laugh.


Another awesome staircase. Why do all of our fire escapes have to be so ugly, yet they make it an architectural feature in Sweden?


View from the overlook off to the left.


View from the overlook off to the right.


Me doing one of those awesome self-executed tacky shots in front of the overlook.


I zoomed all the way in to get this picture because I wanted you to be able to see the Swedish flag flying from this building. Perhaps if you click on the picture to see the full-sized image you can?


REALLY awesome building.


This was right outside of the port security. I just thought it was so cool. Because of the direction it was facing I didn't even notice it until I was on my way back from my walk. Just something different.


* * *

Tonight I ate dinner in the Seaside Cafe, the buffet on Deck 10. I like to eat up there because the variety of foods is better than in the messes, and you actually get a view while you dine. The pictures below are the views that passed by my window as we sailed out of Stockholm. Times like these I feel REALLY lucky to be where I am.





I'm not sure if you can tell or not, but there is actually a wedding reception going on in the picture. I just thought that was an incredibly stunning setting for one's nuptials.





Yeah. I'm lucky.

Warnemude, Germany

My first... sort of... day off.

Well, it was a day off in the sense that there were no shows being produced in the theater today. But a lack of shows does not turn off my deck phone, cell phone, email or boss. So there you have it. A moderatly administrative day.

I managed to get off of the ship for about 4 hours in the afternoon and for another 2 hours in the evening. We were at port from 0800-2359.

When you walk off the ship, after going through a customs inspection, you immediately stumble upon a overly-touristized shop - where, on my perfectly tourist cue, I bought a postcard and paid about 3x as much for it as I would have if I had waited about an hour into my walk.

What was the coolest thing about this souvenir shop/restaurant that was surrounded by giant sand sculptures. They were absolutely fantastic and there were 5 of them (each depicted below). Oh, and you might notice that vertical pictures are now oriented correctly. I finally figured out how to turn on my brain and realized that I could modify them on my personal computer and then upload them from my office computer. Sheer genius I tell you. Sheer genious... *sigh of exasperation*











I am actually really glad I got a picture with someone standing in front of it so you can begin to grasp the scale of these rediculous sculptures.


Strange seating gondola things outside of the restaurant/souvenir shop.


So I took this picture because I wanted to share the sign advising parents to keep a hold of their children. The hidden gem, you might notice, is the Brautwurst sign. True German Brat stand. No, I didn't have one. I'm trying to get back down to my natural birth weight, thank you very much.


The little smooth gutters between the handrails and the steps allows people to easily push their bick up and down stairs. I watched someone try to do it with one side of a 4-wheeled stroller. That was an entry for FailBlog, not here.


A little river running right through town was super pretty.


An atmosphereic street shot.


I just thought this street was so lovely with the cobblestones and the trees perfectly placed.


This building had the coolest modern architecture. It was a hotel.


This was my initial viewing of the beach. A very nice and welcome change from the inside of the ship.


Awesome beach trampoline setup for kids.


I couldn't figure out what was up with the weird chairs at the restaurant/souvenir shop until I saw this. You rent them from a little stand. Very cool and movie-esque.


When you look at postcard racks in Warnemude, it becomes immediately obvious that they are known for their collection of lighthouses. So I decided to make it my day's adventure on foot to visit all three of them. And visit them I did. This one was absolutely beautiful.


A slightly closer look.


The plaque at the bottom of the lighthouse. You had to pay to go up to the top so I decided my view from the bottom was perfectly adequate. I'm saving up for a down payment and all, ya know?


This picture in particular is for Roger. I'm not even sure if he reads this or not. But it was too perfect to pass up.


The red and white lighthouse was actually inaccessible by food - though I gave it a good old fashioned college try. But I went out on the closest pier I could to snap this shot.


I could get right to the base of the green and white lighthouse. Nothing particularly special, but EVERYONE seemed to walk to it - the boarwalk leading to it was just packed. Along the pier were the dispatches for local tourist outings. On the ship we are warned to be very wary of locals offering tours by boat/bus/etc. There are certainly horror stories out there. However, you have to wonder how much of the information is factual vs. how much they are just trying to ensure that if you want to go sightseeing you book their tours so that Celebrity gets the income. Food for thought.


The view from the green and white lighthouse back to the beach.


Just thought this was cool. Being a squid lover myself.


This building was stunning. I'm a bit bummed that I didn't manage to get the tops of the Corinthian columns in the picture, but they were beautiful. I may try to retake this photo when I am back there next week.


I thought this poster was hilarious. Reminds me a lot of the Home Alone picture.

On my way back from the beach I didn't take the same route I took there because I wanted to see different things. I managed to stumble across a grocery store where I bought a much needed bar of soap - and a much less needed tin of amazing German chocolates. Yum!

I also managed to get SEVERLY lost. I ended up passing the port by about a mile and a half. and it took me forever to find my way back. After about an hour of aimless wandering on a port walk that should have been about 2 hours shorter than it was, there was the most beautiful sight:


Certain words are distinguishable in any language. Thank goodness!

I do realize that had I gotten lost at a normal port (where embarkation is usually 4pm) I would have been royally screwed. Luckily, that was not today.