En Route To Montevideo, Uruguay

We thought we’d start off by providing a few more details about last evening’s event. In between all of the wonderful dinner courses that were served to us, the entertainers performed a variety of acts from singing, to dancing, to juggling. Each of the dinner courses from the appetizers to the entrée to the desert to even the rolls were outstanding and each was prepared with special care. The effort that went into the planning of this event was unbelievable. We had a wonderful time and all of the passenger’s we spoke with afterwards echoed similar comments as well. We also enjoyed the conversation of our tablemates including the assistant Hotel Director who also sat at our table. It provided a wonderful opportunity to learn more about the crew and for us to provide comments (all positive) about our experiences on board the Crystal Serenity. We were also very fortunate to having been assigned to a table directly in front of the stage. And finally, we were very fortunate to have been assigned to a table with two other wonderful couples. As we learned, the Maitre d’ from the Crystal Dining Room was responsible for coordinating the table assignments and this is another example showing the thoughtfulness that goes into coordinating all of this. This was truly a memorable evening for us.

This morning we woke to clear skies. As has become our regular routine, we had breakfast in the Lido Café this morning. As we have mentioned, the Lido staff are wonderful. They always have a big smile on their faces, are very attentive with most of them knowing our names and knowing what we enjoy for breakfast and they are so very helpful and considerate to each and every passenger. At last nights dinner, we complemented the Lido staff to the assistant Hotel Director and she mentioned that this is a particular position that many on the crew try to attain. We also made sure to complement others from the staff around the ship who have significantly added to our adventure.

After breakfast, we worked out in the Fitness Center. Anne Marie worked out on the treadmill while Keith worked out on the Elliptical Machine. We really enjoy the routing of working out in the fitness center. Now that we are once again sailing in warmer climates, we plan to augment our work out by walking more on the promenade deck in the afternoons. Keith also lifted some weights while Anne Marie did some stretching exercises.

There are many activities on the schedule for today since this is a sea day. This will be the last sea day for those passenger’s on this segment who will be disembarking in Bueno Aires in two days.

We caught up on a variety of items after working out in the morning. At Noon we went to team trivia. Today is the Birthday for one of our team members and when we saw her as we were getting coffee this morning on the Lido Café we ended up leading a rendition of Happy Birthday and as we looked up passengers and crew all around us had joined in as well.

Today’s trivia was the last one for this specific segment. Our team did very well placing towards the top for today’s questions. Overall, we didn’t win for this segment but there is always next time. ☺ We had a wonderful time playing and that is what counts.

After trivia we had lunch in the main dining room. At the same time there was the American Classic Luncheon Buffet held around the Neptune Pool area. This classic buffet includes a whole range of food starting with various starters such as Cajun seafood gumbo, crisp coleslaw, mixed greens, Waldorf salad, carrot raisin salad and potato salad. There were a variety of barbeque items from baby back ribs, to beef ribs, to blackened fresh fish, to southern fried chicken.

If you are still hungry then there are a variety of other items from prime rib to chicken potpie to roast turkey to New Orleans Jambalaya. There are also baked potatoes, casseroles, baked beans, Texas style Chile, corn fritters, corn on the cob and many other food items. There was also Cobb salad, Caesar salad, grilled chicken, avocados, hard-boiled eggs, blue cheese and a variety of breads to choose from.

Are you ready for desert? There was chocolate fudge turtle cake, key lime pie, pumpkin pie, pecan pie, bread pudding, New York cheesecake, lemon bars, brownies, macaroons, crème caramel, chocolate pudding and apple pie. And the list goes on and on and on.

Given that we are cruising for such a long time, we purposely passed on this wonderful buffet and we each enjoyed a wonderful salad entrée in the main dining room.

This evening is the final formal for this segment of the cruise. The formal evening was kicked off with a Captain’s farewell reception. We had a great time at the reception as it provides another wonderful opportunity to sit with other passenger’s and to also hear from the captain. After the reception we went to dinner. It is always nice to see the men dressed primarily in tuxedos or dark suits and the women dressed primarily in long gowns and cocktail dresses. Hopefully, the tradition of formal nights will continue on most cruise lines for years to come as we really enjoy these evenings.

Tomorrow morning we arrive in Montevideo, Uruguay and then the following day we arrive in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Keith & Anne Marie

Puerto Madryn, Argentina

This morning we arrived in Puerto Madryn, Argentina. This city is located along the southern coast of Argentina. Today’s weather was very nice with temperatures ranging between the low and mid 80’s.

As is the case each day, we woke early and had breakfast at the Lido Café. The café was much busier than normal as many of our fellow passenger’s were up early as they were booked on a variety of tours. Most of the tours were to see various forms of wildlife.

After breakfast we worked out in the Fitness Center. Since many passengers either were booked on tours or were just going to see this port on their own, there were very few people in the Fitness Center. After our workout we changed. We did not book an excursion for this port of call, but rather we decided just to walk around on our own. We walked up the main street for about 1 mile. There was a fairly large beach on the left hand side of the sidewalk and across the street from the beach area were some hotels, apartments, stores and restaurants. As we began our walk back to the ship we walked in a few shops, also went to a small multi-level shopping mall and we also walked around a supermarket.

We got back to the ship a couple of hours after visiting the port and then we went to lunch in the main dining room. After lunch Keith walked around the ship while Anne Marie wrote some letters.

This afternoon we went to the Crystal Hollywood Theatre to see the Movie: An Inconvenient Truth. This documentary presents Al Gore’s campaign to make the issue of global warming a recognized problem worldwide. We are glad that we had the opportunity to see the movie as we had not gotten the chance to see it at home during its showing at the movie theatres.

This evening we attended a special event for those passenger’s on the full world cruise event. It began at 6:30 PM with cocktails and was called “Under the Big Top Dinner”. For those guests not on the full world cruise, Crystal offered a selection of complimentary wines in the Crystal Dining Room this evening. Each passenger was assigned a table number. At around 7:15 PM our table was called and we were escorted to out table. We sat with two other wonderful couples who we know very well along with the assistant to the Hotel Director. The food was wonderful along with the entertainment. It was truly a wonderful evening.

Tomorrow, we will be at sea before arriving to our next port of call on Tuesday.

Keith & Anne Marie

En Route To Puerto Madryn, Argentina

Today we enjoyed a wonderful day at sea as the Crystal Serenity cruises to Puerto Madryn, Argentina. While cool on deck, the seas have been mostly calm. Beginning tomorrow, we will be visiting ports of call with warmer temperatures. In preparation for the change in weather, we put away selected clothing that we had brought for the cold weather elements in the Southern Areas of South America.

We woke up early this morning and had a quiet breakfast in the Lido Café as we normally do on most mornings. The Lido Staff is wonderful. Most of the Lido Staff know our names and they go out of their way to make our morning breakfast a wonderful experience each and every day. For example, normally they do not put the bananas out until around 7:45 AM to keep them fresh but they know that we usually arrive around 7:00 AM so every morning there is a banana on our favorite table. And they know what type of coffee that each of us prefers and they have that ready for us just about the time we sit down to eat.

After breakfast we worked out at the Fitness Center. Keith worked out on the Elliptical Machine, while Anne Marie worked out on the Treadmill. Afterwards, Keith worked out on the weight machines. We also spent another 45 minute in the Fitness Center in the afternoon.

After the morning workout, Anne Marie went to her Piano lesson. This was the final piano lesson for this segment of the World Cruise. At 10:00 AM we both attended the final lecture that Ambassador Peck will give during this segment of the World Cruise. The topic of this presentation is “Thinking About Our World. An Effort to Provoke Thoughts, Not People.” “Pcck’s Postulates. “The Four Keys to Total Understanding of International Relations.” “You know them, but may not have considered their implications.” It was a wonderful lecture and designed to make each person in the audience think about the world from a slightly different perspective. We will be dining with Ambassador Peck and his wife Ann the night before they disembark this segment of the World Cruise.

At 12:00 Noon we had team trivia and let’s just say this was not one of our finer performances. Following Team Trivia we went to lunch in the main dining room. Today was the Grand Gala Buffet, which is held one time per cruise segment. It is a wonderful buffet with a large variety of appetizers, breads, salads, entrees, fruits, and deserts. The amount of hours that go into preparing for this gala has to be vast. Before the gala, we ran into our senior waiter, Patricia, and our assistant waiter, Tolga. The senior waiter on Crystal is analogous to a waiter on most cruise ships and the waiter on Crystal is analogous to an assistant waiter on most cruise ships. When we also refer to a headwater, this position is responsible for several senior waiters and waiters and their associated tables. On some cruise lines this might be analogous with the responsibilities of an assistant Maitre d’. Our headwaiter’s name is Bruno and we will miss him when he departs the ship for a well-deserved vacation at the end of this segment. He is very friendly and outgoing and extremely professional. He is also very well informed about the food served in the dining room and always makes wonderful suggestions. We have learned a great deal from him.

This evening we had a wonderful dinner. The night before we had asked our headwaiter Bruno to prepare a special seafood entrée for us and we really enjoyed it. Our headwaiter has gone out of his way to make each and every meal very enjoyable by offering to make special meals for us.

This evening we went to a variety show after dinner. It starred a guitarist, Fabio Zino and then our cruise director Gary Hunter. One of Gary’s many talents is being a Ventriloquist and we thoroughly enjoyed his show tonight. We had last seen him perform his Ventriloquist act when we sailed on this ship in the Mediterranean in the Fall of 2005. He is very talented and overall an outstanding cruise director.

We look forward to visiting Puerto Madryn, Argentina in the morning.

Keith & Anne Marie

Port Stanley, Falkland Islands

After five wonderful days at sea, we arrived at Port Stanley of the Falkland Islands at approximately 8:00 AM this morning.

Although the Falkland’s consist of approximately 700 Falkland Islands, there are two main inhabited islands. The Falkland Islands are most known for the war in 1982 when an Argentina force invaded the Falklands. Only about 3,000 people live on the two main islands. The major economic drivers are tourism and fishing. About three cruise ships visit the Falklands during the tourism season, starting in November and ending in March.

The town of Stanley is the capital of the Falklands. A dedicated tender took the passenger’s on our tour over to the island at 11:00 AM this morning. Our tour was called the Sparrow Cove Penguin Exploration. After we disembarked the tender we traveled about 30 to 45 minutes in four-wheel drive vehicles to a spot on the island where we would then spend about 90 minutes viewing the penguins. Our trip was literally over rugged terrain as there were no roads. We viewed an extremely large number of penguins, mostly a colony of nearly 1,600 Centoo Penguins along with a small colony of King Penguins. There were several hundred penguins, mostly baby penguins. The adult penguins gather food during the daytime and early afternoon hours and by around 3:00 PM are feeding the baby penguins.

Thank goodness that we dressed properly for this excursion with The North Face Jackets, sweaters, gloves, waterproof pants and gloves as it was very cold and windy. When we first disembarked the tenders it started to rain but by the time we began viewing the penguins the rain had stopped. However, about half way through the penguin viewing ice and sleet started to come down for a little while.

Since our tour did not leave until 11:00 AM, after having breakfast we worked out in the Fitness Center this morning for over an hour. There were very few people working out this morning since various tours were running throughout the day so this turned out to be a perfect time to use the center.

After returning to the ship, we ate in the venue called Tastes. We each had a seafood salad. After lunch we headed to the laundry room to wash our shoes and pants since each had gotten somewhat muddy from the excursion. Many of our fellow passengers did likewise.

Since this is the last very cold area of the World Cruise we will pack up those items that we purposely brought with us for the areas of South America that are quite cold in order to create additional room in our closet. As we had North towards places such as Buenos Aires and to Rio De Janeiro, the weather will become quite hot.

This evening we had a wonderful dinner in the main dining room. We ordered a special entrée of Sea Bass. It was wonderful and we really appreciate the enthusiasm of our head waiter, Bruno.

Tomorrow we will enjoy another sea day and all of the activities while at sea.

Keith & Anne Marie

En Route To Port Stanley Faukland Islands

This morning we woke up to relatively calm seas and to clear skies as we make our way over to Port Stanley, which is part of the Falkland Islands. We will arrive in Port Stanley sometime tomorrow. By the time we arrive, we will have been at sea for five consecutive days.

We woke up early and had a wonderful breakfast in the Lido Café. We really enjoy this venue for breakfast as it provides a nice opportunity to look out on the open seas and to get an early start to the morning activities. The Lido Staff are outstanding and each morning several members of the Lido Staff assist us with our breakfast items and each of them knows not only our names but what we enjoy in the way of breakfast items. The headwaiter for the Lido Café, Willie, is also the headwaiter in Silk Road. Last evening, Anne Marie commented to him that she thought that Silk Road had the best coffee on board the ship, so this morning two of those special cups of coffee were brought over to our table, without us asking for them. Now, that is outstanding service and more importantly is a fine example of the Crystal crew going out of their way to make the cruising experience a delight for their passenger’s.

After breakfast, we went over to the Fitness Center. This time the Fitness Center was busier than it had been. It was nice to see so many passengers’ working out. Anne Marie worked out on the treadmill for 35 minutes and then spent the remaining hour working out on most of the weight machines. Keith worked out on the Elliptical machine for an hour and then worked out on one of the weight machines. During the workout on the treadmill/elliptical, we each watched television on our respective television monitors. We watches some news in order to keep up with both national and world events and we also watched the morning Crystal Cruises show starring Krista Pope (World Cruise Hostess) and Gary Hunter (Crystal Serenity Cruise Director).

After working out, Anne Marie practiced on the Piano while Keith did some writing and some reading.

We had trivia this morning and our team tied for first place. We had fourteen of fifteen questions correct, our best total of this segment of the World Cruise. After lunch, all but two couples from our trivia team went to lunch together.

There are plenty of activities on today’s schedule to keep everyone busy. By the way for those of you who have never cruised or who have not cruised on Crystal, each evening we receive in our staterooms a daily program featuring the following days activities and the program featured by Crystal Cruises is called Reflections. It usually provides a nice write-up on the next days port of call for a sea day information on the waters that we are sailing. It also provides a detailed listing of the activities scheduled for the following day and also provides some other useful information. Today is filled with activities ranging from Spanish and French lessons, to various Fitness Classes, to Religious related activities, to various levels of Bridge Classes, to Movies, to Lectures, to Needlepoint and other related Arts and Crafts activities, to a variety of other activities. In general, those who have cruised often enjoy the sea days as it provides a nice opportunity to participate on a diverse set of activities and to take full advantage of the ship.

This evenings attire is formal attire and will be kicked off with a Crystal Society Reception for those passenger’s who have cruised Crystal before. The reception is held in the Palm Court, which provides a nice venue for dancing, and for observing the seas from a seated area all around this very large room. On this particular sailing, close to 90% of all passenger’s have cruised with Crystal Cruises on at least one prior voyage. Crystal cruises has a very loyal following and works diligently to build a strong on-going relationship with each of its passenger’s. In general, they do not know the word no and they go out of their way to make each passenger feel very special. We sat with a lovely couple who we had first sat with at the World Cruise Gala and two other couples joined us at the reception.

Following the Crystal Society Reception, we went to dinner in the main restaurant where we dined with one other couple. The headwaiter made us a wonderful Caesar Salad and we each had fish this evening. We have been ordering fish or other types of seafood each evening and have really enjoyed how each of these entrees are prepared. At the end of dinner, we the headwaiter showed us tomorrow evenings menu and we asked the headwaiter to order sea bass for each of us which was not on the menu. Our headwaiter, Bruno, has gone out of his way to offer to have the kitchen prepare special requests for us and we are most appreciative to have these additional choices to consider.

We decided to pass on the shows this evening in order to use the laundry machines. We thought this would be a night where the machines were free, and we were correct.

Tomorrow morning we will depart the ship at approximately 11:00 AM by tender for our shore excursion. We are looking forward to visiting the Falkland Islands as this is our first visit to this port of call.

Today is our daughter Jennifer’s birthday and we wish Jennifer a very Happy Birthday.

Keith & Anne Marie

Sailing Antarctica - En Route To Elephant Island

More on last evening. After dinner, Anne Marie went to the Crystal show called El Amor de Argentina. She enjoyed the show and it included a variety of Argentinean music and dancing. Her favorite part of the show was a spoof on Dancing With The Stars. This included four crewmembers and two professional dancers. Each professional dancer danced two times, thus creating four dancing couples. All four couples did a wonderful job and they each danced a Tango. Of particular note were the third and the forth couples. The third couple was Captain Otto and one of the professional dancers and they did a variety of dance moves including the dance professional leaping onto the Captain’s shoulders. The forth couple included the Cruise Director, Gary Hunter, dressed as a woman, and he was with a male professional dancer. When Gary first appeared it was difficult to precisely know which crewmember it was. He did several elaborate moves with the professional dancer, including Gary being spun around several times. It was definitely a highlight of the evening. Each morning, there is a 30-minute television talk show hosted by Krista Pope, the World Cruise Hostess, and Gary Hunter and they spent a portion of the program discussing all of the preparation that went into his dance including his costume and all of the practicing that went into the dance. One passenger called in to say it was the most memorable performance they had seen in all of their cruising. Gary is a wonderful cruise director and we are very happy that he is on-board for the full world cruise.

This morning we woke early and when we looked out our verandah we saw snow on the balcony. This is the first time it has ever snowed on any cruise we have taken. While having breakfast in the Lido Café we could see large snowflakes all around us. We also observed a variety of icebergs in the ocean of varying sizes and shapes throughout the morning. Following breakfast we worked out in the Fitness Center. Anne Marie worked out on the treadmill while Keith worked out on the Elliptical Machine.

The captain announced that due to the poor weather conditions that the ship would sail directly towards Elephant Island for our cruise around this island starting at 5:00 PM rather than the original plan of 7:00 PM. As it turned out when we passed by this island visibility was poor so we could not see land.

As is the case with all sea days there are many activities planned for today. Anne Marie went to her Piano Class at 9:00 AM while Keith read and then Keith attended a lecture given by journalist Ken Rees; title “Operation Falklands – A Close Run Thing”. It deals with the British/Argentinean 1982 conflict in the Falkland Islands based on reporter Ken Ress’ experiences while covering this war. Almost 1,000 individuals died in this war and the total cost of this war was approximately two billion dollars. He also discussed the impact that this war had on the Falkland Islands, post war, and also provided a description of today’s environment in this area of the world. We are scheduled to tender off Port Stanley this coming Friday although all of this is dependent on weather conditions. Should weather conditions hold up we are scheduled to take an excursion, which will include the viewing of sparrows and penguins at this port of call.

Later in the morning we had Team Trivia. The good news is that we tied with a few other teams for first place for today’s game. After Team Trivia we ate lunch in the main dining room.

Before dinner we went to see the Repertory Theatre At Sea titled The Frog Prince. This play was written by Playwright David Mamet who gave a new and quirky spin to the classic story of a Prince who is turned into a frog and needs the kiss of a Fair Maiden to turn him back to a Prince. Repertory Theatre At Sea is unique to Crystal and is offered from time to time on Crystal’s Cruise Ships. It involves actors (usually three or four) who perform a short play. We really enjoyed the Repertory Theatre At sea.

This evening we went to Silk Road, the Japanese Specialty Restaurant with three other couples. One of the couples is on the first two segments of the World Cruise and the other two couples are on the entire World Cruise. We had a wonderful time at dinner with wonderful food and wonderful conversation. As we have mentioned, Nobu was developed by world renowned Chef Nobu who has restaurants in some of the major cities around the world. The food served in this restaurant is outstanding, along with the terrific service provided by the entire staff who works there.

Keith & Anne Marie

Antarctica Day 3

We woke early this morning to cloudy skies and to fog. We went to breakfast at the Lido Café. It was not too busy as many passenger’s appeared to be sleeping in this morning. By the time we arrived at the Fitness Center, the fog had cleared and we had good visibility. This was a prelude to a wonderful treat that awaited us as our ship made its way toward Deception Island, which is part of Antarctica.

As we worked out, various wildlife of the sea could be seen from the ship so we had a perfect view in which to observe our friends from the sea. We saw several whales, which were just a couple hundred feet from the ship. About 30 minutes later we saw hundreds upon hundreds of penguins as their heads bobbed up and down in the ocean. The naturalist explained that it does not get better than this. Off the bow of the ship towards the beach area there were literally thousands of penguins. Formal attire for our ocean friends was certainly the attire for the day. ☺ Between yesterdays perfect weather coupled with what we observed this morning we consider ourselves quite fortunate. Antarctica has truly exceeded all of our expectations. It is truly a wonderland and a place that we would highly recommend cruising to.

In addition to sailing near Deception Island, we also cruised by the South Shetland Islands in the Bransfield Strait.

As the ship began to cruise to its next destination we took part in other activities during the morning. Anne Marie attended her piano class while Keith read and wrote and then we each worked out for another 30 minutes on the treadmill until it was tine to attend the second in a series of lectures given by Ambassador Edward Peck. The title of this mornings lecture was “Thinking About Our World: An Effort to Provoke Thoughts, Not People.” “The shock of foreign cultures – especially ours, different peoples can see exactly the same thing differently”. Several of the points of the presentation could easily be applied to a book that Keith is currently reading. We sat next to Ambassador Pecks’ wife, Ann, and enjoyed talking with her prior to the lecture. Following the lecture, it was time for team trivia. There are close to twenty trivia teams. Our team finished in a tie for second place today. After trivia, we went to the main dining room for lunch with most of our trivia teammates. Once again, we each had our usual; a salad entrée.

This afternoon we walked around the ship, and we took in the beautiful and magical scenery of Antarctica. As this is a sea day there was a diverse set of activities for the passenger’s to enjoy. This included a lecture on the television and film industry, music instruction, a movie, needlepoint, a world cruise quilting project, duplicate bridge, social bridge, a computer course, a French class, a Spanish class, afternoon tea, yoga for beginners, a rehearsal for those in the Chorus, an organized afternoon walk on the promenade deck, along with complimentary hot chocolate with dark Bacardi rum served on the outer decks for one hour. By the way, Mr. Bacardi and his wife are passenger’s for a couple of segments of the World Cruise.

The highlight of the day began at around 2:30 PM when we went up to the Palm Court, which is on Deck 12 looking over the bow (front or forward) of the ship and one deck below the uppermost deck. From this vantage point we saw beautiful scenery and the most whales we’ve ever seen at one time. As we moved fairly close to an enormous iceberg, we observed three whales on the port (left side). About 30 minutes later we saw approximately 10 whales at the bow of the ship. Keith was able to get a picture of two of them. We once again were treated to sunny skies while we had the opportunity to view this pristine area. And to think that we are seeing just a small portion of Antarctica. Again, for those of you who are avid cruisers, we highly recommend this part of the world for a cruise.

While we observed all of the beauty around us today’s daily tea in the Palm Court included a variety of chocolate deserts. We passed on the goodies and Keith had green tea while Anne Marie enjoyed a cup of coffee.

This evening we had a wonderful dinner in the main dining room. The headwaiter always asks us if we want something special for dinner so when he asked the other night we asked for swordfish for the two of us this evening and it was wonderful. Overall, we have been very pleased with the quality and diversity of the meals served in the main dining room. For dinner, we have almost exclusively had fish or some other type of seafood each evening and have really enjoyed it. Tomorrow evening we will be dining in Silk Road with one of the two couples from our dining room table along with two other couples. We still have not dined at Prego which is the Italian Specialty Restaurant.

Keith & Anne Marie