After over a year of planning, it was time to embark on the next big adventure. I had packed very early by my standards due to the shifts I was on that week. I then ended up partially repacking when I came home from my late shift the previous day as I had changed my mind about some of the outfits. I had taken my luggage to work in the morning. I was heading straight from work to one of the airport hotels. It was a minor miracle that I had managed to work through my various to do lists before I set off to work that morning. For once, my private to do list was longer than the work one. Part of this was self-inflicted. It was not one of my brighter ideas that with less than a week to go, I decided that this cruise would be a great time to jump on the bandwagon and hide rubber ducks around the ship. I got a very good deal on a pack of 50 rubber ducks and then spent considerable time filling out the tags that come with the ducks. Still, has this was a very special trip for me, I thought it was only fair enough to do something that makes other people smile.
I had a bit of a surprise when I came to work that day. My desk had been decorated for my upcoming big day with banners, bunting and balloons. I was raised with the superstition that if you celebrate your birthday early, it is very bad luck. I therefore had kind of hoped that my last day at work before the holiday would be a day like any other. However, the desk looked so pretty, and I did appreciate the sentiment. I did end up taking the fabric banners with me. I figured they would look nice in the cabin.
This was not the end of the surprises. I got called into the board room under some kind of pretext in the afternoon where our leadership team was waiting for me with a photo cake, an amazing, personalised card, helium balloons and presents. I got a pamper kit, a beautiful necklace with one star for every decade and a custom birthday t-shirt that my colleagues made for me with the ship and the itinerary on it. I also got some spending money for New York. My manager got me a beautiful wooden wall ornament with Disney characters. Unfortunately, as I was heading straight to the airport, I could not take most of this. I left the goodies with one of my colleagues for safekeeping until my return. I did however take the shirt and the spending money.
I finished work at 15:00 and for once, I was ready on time. One of my colleagues was kind enough to drop me off at our hotel. I got there about 15:15. I sat down in reception waiting for Graham. I have to say I was a little nervous if he remembered which hotel we are staying at. I had tried to get hold of him earlier in the day. His mobile phone was switched off. The landline was permanently engaged. I assume he knocked the receiver off. I also only got his out of office on the email. I just had to hope for the best.
To calm my nerves, I read while I was waiting for him. I was not entirely successful. Just as I thought I may just spontaneously combust; I saw Graham coming towards the hotel. Once he had arrived, I checked us in and made a dinner reservation. Then we headed up to the room for some down time.
I checked what was happening on Facebook. The two Facebook groups for our cruise had a lot of activity. I knew shortly afterwards why this was. I had an email from Royal Caribbean confirming that our port call in Valencia had been cancelled and replaced with Palma de Mallorca. I started to wonder if we need to find a different hotel at Manchester airport. Every time we stay here something gets cancelled. When we stayed here in February 2023, we found out that our cruise for the coming autumn had been cancelled. All joking aside, we both felt that Royal Caribbean made the right decision. With the devastation caused by flash floods only a few days earlier, they did not need a cruise ship full of tourists. We were not sure if we would get off in Palma de Mallorca. We went there on a cruise in 2023 and although, we were glad we went, we both felt it is probably once and done.
Around 17:30, we headed over to terminal 1 to check in. EasyJet is now offering twilight check in for flights departing up to 08:00. We figured this would mean that we could sleep a little longer the next morning. This worked out really well. There was hardly anybody at check in. We had to weigh and tag our luggage at self-service machines. Then we dropped them off at the counter. Less than 10 minutes after we arrived, we were heading back to the hotel.
We had a dinner reservation at the fantastic Turkish restaurant at the hotel at 19:15. Graham sat down in the lobby. I quickly went upstairs to drop off our document wallet and my coat. Then I went back to join Graham. Suddenly we had a steady of very familiar uniforms. I have to admit, this still makes my heart beat faster. I was coming up to my second anniversary of returning to Emirates, but still every time I see our uniforms or one of our aircraft, my heart could just burst.
Soon it was time for dinner. We checked in at the podium and were seated. We had a bottle of White Zinfandel. We shared the baked haloumi with tomato sauce and flatbread. For his main course, Graham had the Turkish cod in a tomato and caper sauce with roasted new potatoes. I had the chicken shish kebab with salad and skin on fries. There was a lot of salad and Graham had some of this as well as the flatbread that came with my meal.
After dinner, we headed back up to the room. I got myself organised for the next day. Graham went straight to sleep. I had every intention to read for a bit, but only managed a couple of pages. I have some medication I need to take at 22:00. I had set an alarm for this. When the alarm went off, I quickly went to take my tablets and then I went back to sleep.
Dolphingirl’s Travels 
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