A Look At What Is Happening Today:
St Lucia; Almost ✔ French Night Dinner At Crystal Dining Room ✔ Crystal Society Party ✔
Although we dined in Prego, these are the restaurant menus from last evening from the Crystal Dining Room.
For those of you whose favorite is dessert, we listed that menu first.
One of the wonderful aspects of cruising is the evening on board the ship including fine entertainment and dining and being with good friends. Last evening had all three and more.
We began our evening with a drink in the Avenue Saloon. As we mentioned this venue went non-smoking starting with this voyage. When we arrived unlike the previous night when only a few people were there, this time around there were several guests already seated. We each ordered a drink and a few minutes later we spoke with the Magician and his lovely wife. He would be performing at a venue in close proximity of the Avenue Saloon and he and his wife had stopped in just to have some water.
They are a very nice couple and we applaud their outlook on life. As we had mentioned the Magician also gives motivational talks and we discussed his approach to these talks and we share the topic he covers. He mainly gives the talks to high school and college aged children and he talks about various topics including to pursue a career you will love. He makes the point that even if you think the salary is lower then say another career that in the end if you go with the career you love you likely will become more successful then if you chose the other career and that could also include in the longterm making more money. Keith shared his own career experiences and that he was fortunate to work for a company and to have jobs within that company that he loved and in the longterm that led to his own success. The magician is an example of this too. While he majored in Public Relations his love was magic and he feels that he will be much more successful as a magician whereas he might have just be a very average person in Pubic Relations.
Afterwards, we attended a show which was performed by Musical Entertainer Duncan Tuck. He played a wide range of songs while also performing comedy in between the songs. This was only his second time performing with Crystal. He performed for about an hour.
We dined last night at Prego. For those of you who have not yet sailed Crystal, Prego is one of two specialty restaurants on board the ship and features Italian Cuisine from Piero Selvaggio. It is a very intimate restaurant and has that "old world" charm. When we dine there we feel that we are dining at a local restaurant in Italy and one that we would dine at often.
Anne Marie outside Prego.
Ricki and David organized the dinner and the four of us arrived and were seated first.
A few minutes later friends Mary, Helen and Georgia arrived. They are three sisters and it is so wonderful that they cruise together.
(From L-R Standing Keith, Specialty Restaurant
Maitre d' Antonio, David, Ricki and Anne Marie)
(Seated, Prego Head Waiter Mario, Georgia,
Mary and Helen)
The smiles on everyones faces says it all. We enjoyed a very special evening together with good friends. We never ran out of conversation. Everyone was engaged. The wait staff was wonderful. We dined with wonderful people and friends. When we toasted we toasted to friendship, to a wonderful cruise and to the saying that "Life Is Good".
We had a choice of four wines; two whites and two reds. Senior Sommelier Christian took care of our orders and when he got to Keith he said I know what you will enjoy as he had selected our wines very often when we sailed on last years World Cruise. We had him do this so that we would try a wider range of wines. Keith was very pleased with the selection made by Christian.
We began our meal with a small appetizer portion of one of the two additional entrees. This pasta dish was very tasty. The sauce was light and tasty while allowing you to enjoy the taste of the cheese. It was fantastic.
Ricki and David had the Carpaccio of Black Angus Beef. It is very thinly sliced beef that is not cooked that is a favorite of many guests.
Keith enjoyed the Sea Bass which was served with Spinach, Eggplant Puree and Melted Baby Heirloom. This is a fairly new menu ite as it replaced another seafood entree. Keith really enjoyed the entree. He found the fish to be moist and very tasty.
For our dessert, Keith had some fresh fruit and Anne Marie had a decaf cappuccino. A new dessert addition has been added to the menu which is a soufflé that some at our table had. You are asked to order this at the time the server takes the initial order for the other items. Our server for the night was Marina who did a fantastic job.
It was a truly amazing dinner with great friends.
We did get back to the room and to bed later then we normally do but somehow Keith managed to get up at his usual time and to get his daily workout in and his regular stop at the Lido Cafe for coffee.
Anne Marie was also able to walk for an hour on the Promenade Deck and got back to the room as Rao was setting up our breakfast.
Today's port of call was St. Lucia. This was our fourth of six consecutive ports of call that we are visiting. We have visited this port of call two times in the past two years. On those two visits the Crystal Serenity docked in port. Unfortunately, with three other ships in port today (Princess, Carnival and the German Based Ship the AIDAluna) we were anchored off shore and tender service was offered to take guests over to St. Lucia and then back to the ship.
(AIDAluna Cruise Ship With It's Unique Exterior)
(Princess Cruise Ship)
St. Lucia is a relatively small island and is 27 miles long and 14 miles wide at it widest point. St Lucia got its name as it was named by the French. By 1814, the British took control of this island and in 1979 Saint Lucia achieved independence.
As they say it is important not to judge a book by its cover. If you visit St. Lucia by cruise ship and only walk around the nearby area you will not get a good impression of this island. Of course the same can be said of many ports of call including those in our own home nation. The island does boast many nice attractions including its rainforest and other tropical areas. It has also become one of several popular destinations for honeymooners and others seeking to stay at some of its very pretty resorts.
Since we have visited here a couple of times and seen many of these beautiful areas and with the seas choppy the plan was for Keith to take the tender over to the tender port while Anne Marie stayed on the ship.
Keith was first in line for the second tender of the day and friend John arrived a few minutes later. They chatted for awhile until the signal was given to walk down to the tender. The seas were very rough so they were asked to wait and the tender was bobbing up and down for quite a while. It was then that Keith turned to John and said that he was going to pass and what did John think and John said he was also going to pass. So, that was the extent of Keith's attempt to get over to St. Lucia.
The good news is that all of the organized tours ran and that most guests sailing here for the first time who wanted to go ashore were able to do so.
Keith walking around and found friend Dave on the Lido Deck and they spoke for awhile and then Anne Marie found them both. We then walked for awhile and stopped by Tastes where they serve a Late Breakfast. We were asked by a couple of the wait staff if we wanted to have breakfast and we kidded around that for us it was almost time for lunch. We did say to ourselves that we should have breakfast there sometime during the cruise. Like lunch and also on those night when there is evening dinner, there is a menu and there is table service.
Since we didn't go into port we treated the rest of the day as a sea day and since we were not docked in town we were truly at sea anyway.
We spent the rest of the morning reading and writing.
We then visited with some fellow guests and then ran into Elise Ivy, the World Cruise Hostess who just boarded the ship earlier today. We also chatted with Hotel Director, Josef Lumetsberger for a short time.
We had lunch at the Lido Cafe. It was fairly quiet while we had lunch so there was lots of time to took to several of the Lido Deck Stewards.
After lunch Keith played Paddle Tennis for a couple of hours while Anne Marie walked on the Promenade Deck. Like the past couple of days, it would lightly rain, then become sunny and continue with this pattern back and forth so Keith and the other player would play, then sit until the court dried and do it over and over again.
This evening we are dining at the Crystal Dining Room and attending the Crystal Society Party.
In Keeping with the spirit of Friendship........
TODAY'S THOUGHT FOR THE DAY............
“A friend is one
who walks in when others walk out.” – John Fitzgerald Kennedy
Keith and Anne Marie
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