The U.S. and Canada

We have really really enjoyed being in the US for the past week or so. When you are mostly in Europe, it teaches you to be appreciative of just how comfortable it is to be back in your home country. You don't need to worry about language barriers, you know where everything is, you know which stores to visit in order to find what you need, all the products you know and love are there instead of European versions, and your phone works!!! Wonderful. :-)

One huge highlight has been visiting with my two best friends and my roommate from the Rhapsody - Tracy, Tim and Mandy. Tim and Mandy lived near enough to Boston to come out, and Tracy's ship happened to be in port that day!! The only day our ships meet, and its the place where Tim and Mandy live.....what are the odds of that! It was a fantastic day of sightseeing, shopping, talking, and eating. After Tracy had to leave I took Tim and Mandy on a tour of the ship. They were duly impressed as the old Rhapsody is their only point of reference. :-) I loved showing them around.

I also really enjoyed walking around the port towns of Portland and Bar Harbor, Maine, and Newport, Rhode Island. We had some great food and great times in those ports, despite fighting a bit of fog.

Then it was on to Canada! We had a miraculously warm day in Halifax, Novia Scotia. I actually got sunburned just from walking around a bit. The harbor walk is beautiful. I got to meet up with my friend Deedee from the Voyager, who now works on Princess. We had lunch at a pub called My Father's Mustache, which apparently has some fame there. It was yummy. From Halifax we sailed north and had a day at sea on our way to Quebec City. What a surprise we had at night as we sailed when the deck cadet made this special announcement - the Aurora Borealis was visible!!! It was an amazing display that took up the whole horizon. Not terribly colorful, but beautiful nonetheless, and much bigger than the one I saw last year in Alaska. What an unexpected surprise! We went out on deck and watched it until the wind had completely frozen us and sent us back inside.

Quebec City!! What a neat place. Part new world, part France....a very interesting place. I sure wished my french was better, but we got around ok. They are used to tourists in most areas. I tried the famous Poutine that I remember my first ship roommate, the french-canadian Marie, raving about. We were treated to lunch by our musician's agency Proship, which is based in Montreal. We wandered around the Chateau Frontenac, and up and down the Rue St. Jean with all its cafe's and shops. At night I went back out to a big club on the Grande Allee, it being a Tuesday night the only people there were really us crew members, but we were all grateful for a change of scene from the crew bar and stayed out til the wee hours. What a great night!! Today we had a marvelous breakfast at a creperie called Breton, got some coffee, and are headed back on the ship soon. I have loved this cruise - we don't want to do the crossing back!! :-)

NYC!!!!

We finally finished our crossing and made it to NYC!! I was up before 6am to watch our approach into the harbor. We sailed under the bridge at 6 am or so, then by the statue of Liberty around 6:20. The lights of the city were still on as we approached Manhattan. The front crew deck was packed with other crew, all equally excited to finally be reaching the legendary New York City. Many of my acquaintances were seeing America for the first time in their lives, and it was a very special moment to share with them. After a morning of inspections, immigration, and a coast guard drill, we were finally allowed off the ship around 11:30. I have never seen such a line of crew anxious to get ashore!! I got off with my friends Adrian and Christy, and we were led by our friend Jeremy, who lived in NYC for 4 years. He took us downtown, to the best pizza in New York (so he says, I thought it was awesome, anyway) at a place called Lombardi's. After that we walked around downtown and then to ground zero to see the new construction there. We walked down to Battery park and sat there in a cafe for a while, then took the subway back uptown for our evening's activities.
I was able to meet up with my fried Teal Frost, a friend from my months on the Norwegian Majesty in 2009. She came with us to the Jazz Standard, where we ate dinner at Blue Smoke and got to hear the Mingus Big Band. They were absolutely incredible....my mouth was open a lot. Trombonists Andy Hunter and Conrad Herwig blew my mind and made me want to quit....ha ha. After that amazing set we explored some of the smaller jazz clubs and caught a couple of jam sessions at Small's and club 55. It was such a succesful night!!! We got back on board around 3am. We dragged ourselves out of bed the next day to catch a few more hours in the now-rainy New York before rehearsal. Shopping and food and sightseeing....it was a great time. I was so sorry to leave New York....I feel like I haven't seen a thing, despite having a great couple of days. It would take weeks!!! But I am glad for the 2 days I had.