A Trip Down Memory Lane – Day 14

We had another sea day and were in no particular rush. We were up a little earlier that day, but we still managed to sleep until around 08:30. We got up and ready and then headed to the crown lounge for breakfast. We had some coffee, fruit, and some pastries. As we were leaving, the concierge approached us advising that the loyalty ambassador needed to see us. We headed down to deck two. Normally I could not even tell who the loyalty ambassador is. We generally have no ned for them. I did meet this particular loyalty ambassador earlier in the cruise as this our first cruise as Diamond Plus. One of the perks is that you get a gift in the cabin. There is a list of gifts that you can choose from.  You can select your gift by calling the Crown and Anchor Society hotline at least 10 days before the cruise. There is just one issue with this. There is no number for anywhere outside the USA. I did not really want to pay a small fortune on an international call, and we had arrived in the USA less than 10 days before the cruise.  I expected this to be put in place for our next cruise, but she managed to sort this out for this cruise. One of the gift options is a bottle of my beloved Caliterra, which nowadays is about as rare as hens’ teeth. Our bottle of Caliterra had arrived a couple of days after we had this conversation with her, and I had no idea what she wanted from us. When we got there, somebody was already speaking to her and whatever it was, took forever. We were close to giving up as we did not want to waste anymore of our last day of the cruise when they wrapped things up. In the end it was about an invitation we had received about lunch with an officer. This had been in our cabin when we arrived. I was a little surprised by this as this is normally for people with at least 340 cruise points and we are a long way from this. Still, I figured that as they get a lot of first-time cruisers on the Mexican Riviera cruises and therefore do not have a lot of Diamond Plus and Pinnacle members. The reason the loyalty ambassador wanted to see us was to advise that we received the invitation in error. We really did not care one way or the other. I am sure she could have left a note in the cabin or a voice mail to let us know. She even could have left the message with the concierge. We were not bothered about the error being made. We are all only human after all. However, we were not quite so keen on wasting so much time for this.

After we had spoken to the loyalty ambassador, we briefly went back to our cabin. Our stateroom host had left us our luggage tags. This was another irritation. Very early in the cruise, we were prompted on the app to submit our departure details. We had an evening flight and therefore were in no rush. I submitted the details and two days earlier, the ap had been updated with our luggage tag number and estimated departure time, which was 09:30. This worked great for us. When we saw the luggage tags, they were for one of the first departure groups and we were supposed to get off the ship at 07:00 straight after the people who were carrying off their own luggage had left. On the app, it still showed the original departure time. I sent Graham down to the Schooner bar to save us some space while I braved guest services. Fortunately, it was very quiet. I showed the person helping me the app and she gave me the correct luggage tags. I quickly took the luggage tags ack to the cabin and then I went to join Graham in the Schooner Bar.

Even with all the stops and starts, I still managed to get down to the Schooner Bar in time for the morning puzzle, which that day was a word search consisting of ships past and present. We both did OK, but somebody else finished this quicker than we did. Graham had managed to snag one of the larger tables in the corner. They are not visible from the entrance and Graham figured that this would give us a better chance that seats would be available for everybody. Another group snagged the other table in the area and used some of our chairs, but we still managed to have enough space for all six of us for morning trivia. We scored 20 out of 24, but that was not enough. The winning score was 23.

After morning trivia, the team split. Laurie, Sandy, and Carol wanted to go to Captain’s Corner. Ken, Graham, and I stayed behind to play Name That Tune Disney. Ken was definitely an asset there and we scored 25 out of 34, which I think was the highest score that we ever achieved on this particular trivia. However, the winning score was 33. Laurie re-joined us for the final trivia of the morning, which was Food and Drinks Trivia. We got 17 out of 20 and the winning score was 18. I got a hearty “I told you so” from Graham. I had overruled him on one answer and his answer was in fact right. Had I taken his answer, we would have drawn. Having said that, a can Koozie was not worth the effort of a tiebreaker, and we have enough of them already. There was no trivia until evening trivia that appealed to us, and we arranged to reconvene for that.

After trivia, we went up to the Windjammer to get some lunch. For some reason, the buffet that day was very heavily leaning towards fish and seafood, which I don’t eat. Graham had salad, bread, and various types of fish. He was in his element. I had a Mediterranean burger, which was a beef burger with grilled red pepper and feta cheese. This was very nice, but not particularly big. I decided to pick up some food from El Loco Fresh and bring it back to the Windjammer. I had Mexican rice, with beans, marinated chicken, cheese, sur cream and guacamole. This hit the spot.

Once we both had finished out lunch, we went down to the photo gallery to check out our photos. To my immense surprise, we had over 100 photos. I did not think we had that many. However, it was not difficult to reduce it down to below hundred so that I still had some available credits for photos from that evening. I have only encountered it twice before that they still took photos on the final evening. We picked our two complementary prints and then I selected the photos I wanted in digital format. The photo system on Navigator works a little differently and we needed some help to get this activated. Once this was done, I then got the download code. They will send an email after the cruise as well with a link through which you can download the photos, but I always prefer to have the photos on my iPad or phone before we get off the ship. As this works via the ship’s intranet and no internet package is required, it is no hardship to spend some time to download them.

With the photos taken care off, we headed upstairs to the solarium bar to have one last Lime and Coconut cocktail. The solarium was very busy again, but me managed to get some seats in the main pool area. When we had finished our cocktails, I got one last soft serve ice cream and then we headed down to the crown lounge to just chill and have a decent coffee. While we were relaxing in the crown lounge, I started to download my photos. Once we knew that the last of the themed trivia events had finished, we headed downstairs to the Schooner Bar. The seats in the corner were taken, but we managed to get another large table. I had a desert pear margarita and Graham had a glass of Chardonnay. I finished downloading my photos.

The rest of the team cut things very fine. When Ken and Laurie arrived, there were still some seats at the table when we were sitting, but Carol and Sandy arrived just as the trivia started and there was no space left. I had hoped to get a photo with the whole team, but that was not to be. At least, we managed to get a photo of the four of us after evening trivia. For some reason I do not have the quiz sheet for this trivia. We did OK, but it was not a winning score.

 

After trivia, we stayed behind for another drink as there was still a bit of time until the photographers were due to be out. I wanted to get the photos as early as possible so that I could view and download them a reasonable time. I had another desert pear margarita and Graham had another glass of Chardonnay. We had been told the evening before that there would be one backdrop, but that did not materialise. They did however take photos on the stairs and by the hanging sculpture. We got photos at both and then we headed back to the cabin to pack. This thankfully did not take long. While Graham went to find our stateroom host to give him an extra tip, I quickly took a photo of our door. Then we headed to the dining room.

 

The menu that evening was Bon Voyage. Graham had two starters that evening: the Mediterranean tapas medley with hummus, tzatziki, Greek salad and pita bread and the vegan pan-seared asparagus with creamy white bean hummus, hazelnut pesto, toasted pumpkin seeds and a drizzle of truffle oil, which was Rohan’s recommendation. I had come to the realisation earlier that day that for some reason I did not have the baked French onion soup all cruise. I put this right that evening. For his main, Graham had the braised lamb with garlic mashed potatoes, bean ragout, sautéed spinach, and rosemary lamb jus. I had the grilled Mediterranean flank steak with roasted garlic potato wedges and roasted vegetables. For dessert, we both had the Crema Catalana, which was essentially crème brûlée in anything but name. I was delicious though.

 

Dinner took a bit longer than usual, as there was the dreaded last evening “show”. On the next ship we will be sailing on, they do a flag parade in the centrum, which is the hub of the ship, on the last sea day. I think this makes a lot more sense. Eventually Rohan and Winston came back, and we chatted with them for a bit and gave them an additional tip each. Then it as time to say goodbye. I stopped by the photo gallery to see if the photos from this evening had already materialised. They had not been uploaded yet. We went back to the cabin. I put our luggage out for collection. Graham headed to bed, and I read until it was 21:00, which is the time I was advised the photos would be ready. This time round when I got to the photo gallery, the photos were ready. I selected my last photos, picked up our prints and then went back to the cabin. I downloaded the photos, which did not take very long. Then I got ready for bed and soon I was asleep.