Today I don’t have gangway until 2 PM, but we have a new crew member coming on board for both Club HAL and the Explorations Cafe so I will be showing them around and getting them oriented after about 1 PM. Until then I intend to find my way to Stanley Park. Last week James from Shore Excursions told me how to get there and that it was only about 30 minutes away, so today I’m going to find it.
The weather in Vancouver today is lightly rainy, so I’m going to wear quickly drying clothes and grab an umbrella. I desperately need to wash my hair anyway before wearing my gangway uniform, so it really doesn’t matter if I get wet or even soaked. The air isn’t too cold so I’m simply going to brave the elements and get out there.
Walking to Stanley Park took me about an hour this morning. It wasn’t further than I anticipated, but my route was quite scenic.
I followed the sea wall instead of taking direct streets, so I wound my way through all sorts of lovely condos and apartments - the kind that you’d expect near the waterfront and marina. There were a couple parks along the way as well as a really nice bike / walk path that leads all the way to the Park. Once I was there I found where the Aquarium is, I hope to get there maybe next week, and then it was time to start walking back already. On the way back I stopped at one of the parks that had a pond and saw ducks splashing in the water. After taking their picture (not very good though cuz I only brought my small camera with limited zoom out in the rain) I noticed there was also a heron (or is it a crane??) 
standing in the water along the side. I definitely took its picture a couple different ways. I was caught off guard as it was so unexpected! :) I then made it back to the ship taking the shorter route and it took much less time then going there. I enjoyed the walk but on the way back it started to rain harder. Actually I made it back just in time, as I got to the gangway it started to come down much harder. The sky was dark and heavy and overall gloomy. Thankfully we saw the sun yesterday or I’d have been really depressed by now. We haven’t had nice weather in weeks.The two new crew girls, Rebecca and Peg, arrived while I was on gangway duty so I was not able to take them around right away. After my shift ended though I caught up with them and we began the process of orientation. I am excited to have them on board - unlike our previous new crew member these are two responsible intellectually capable girls who will do a great job in their respective areas. Peg is from Chicago and Rebecca is from Dallas.
Our meeting at 5 PM went well, we had about 20 people there and the kids all seemed really nice. I look forward to this week being pretty fun. Last week’s kids were great and hopefully it’ll be two cruises in a row of fun kids.
The first night’s party was a blast. My 12 year olds are really fun kids and so far they all play really well together (from 8 - 12 years all together). Crystal came up again to hang out with the kids and they have such a fun time with her I love it when she helps! The energy is just right when she’s there - she gets the kids grooving to the music and laughing and playing. She leaves in 2 weeks and I’m really sad about that.
We had after hours baby-sitting tonight for a family that is staying on deck 7. The family is super nice and uber rich, so it’ll be interesting to see what this week brings.
Thursday July 19th: First Sea Day
Today was a partly sunny sea day with calm waves in the gorgeous inside passage. I’m learning to really enjoy sea days to their fullest this summer as they provide the only sunshine we see in Alaska. We took the kids outside for a bit to run around and enjoy the fresh air and they enjoyed it. This week the kids won’t be playing Ghosts in the Graveyard like last cruise - much too active - but that means they’ll enjoy games like tag!
Rebecca is fitting in nicely. We all really enjoy her a lot. She’s super sweet and friendly and really catches on quickly. She can already find her way mostly around the ship and it’s only the second day. Yay! She came up while we were running Bingo and helped our 4 year olds with their cards. Bingo is always quite the challenge when half the room doesn’t know how to read large numbers like O75 or B15 on their cards.
Raid the Arcade was a hit as was fusion beads and funky frames. The kids love to do crafts maybe even more than video games, surprising but refreshing actually. :) By the time we had Ice Cream Frenzy on our schedule for this afternoon we only had about 9 kids left and by the time we made it out the door we were down to about 6. Prior to that we had about 13 little ones and about 11 big ones, a little crazy being all in the same room. Six is a much better number for a field trip to the Lido.
After dinner it was Spy Night. I only had 6 kids, three girls and three boys, show up so we paired them girls against boys for the hunt. They did a really great job and their manners are amazing. I’ve never had kids who were so rules conscious and making sure they were doing only what is right. If they keep it up I’ll love them immensely this week.
We once again had after hours baby-sitting, one of the girls from last night and a little girl from a different family. The girl who came last night and tonight (Erin) loves us so much we’ve already been told that most likely she’ll be there until midnight every night this cruise. Normally I might groan inwardly a bit about that but she is such a great kid (and the extra money never hurts either) that it won’t be a problem. A little less sleep for sure, but not in anyway stressful.
Today was our Captain’s birthday as well as a crew party celebrating our passing the USPH inspection last Skagway. The party was held on the mooring deck with a free bar, food and music. Julie, my supervisor, was so excited that it was on the mooring deck so that I could actually show up as the smoking situation would be better than when parties are in the crew mess where I choke due to my allergy. I decided that I would actually show up, really only because it was the Captain’s birthday and because my friend Crystal was going to be singing. I don’t really enjoy standing all herded together with drunk people en masse, never have been anything but a party pooper in that sense, but I went. Unfortunately (fortunately?) the smoking situation was still bad enough that I put in about a 10-15 minute appearance and had to leave before Crystal started her set because the smoke was causing me to have breathing problems. I didn’t want to have a full blown anaphylactic reaction so I left before it got that bad so I missed hearing her sing. I was really sad about that, but other than that I didn’t really miss out on anything I wanted to be at.
Instead I watched a couple of episodes of TV on DVD that the crew has been passing around. It’s so great to have whole seasons of shows on DVD’s these days as I never get to actually watch normal television when it’s actually airing. Then I went to bed to get ready for Juneau day. Unfortunately it’s going to rain AGAIN tomorrow in Juneau for about the 6th straight week. It may have been even longer than six weeks? The last time it was sunny was way back at the beginning of my contract when I got really sick and slept through Juneau instead of getting off the ship. I am really wanting to see sun soon here because I want to do excursions again. It has been steady rain for weeks so that I don’t have the desire to do any. I hope to be able to before summer ends. It seems strange that I only have 6 cruises left.
Friday July 20th: Tracy Arm scenic cruising and Juneau, AK
This morning we were doing activities in the kids room and the captain came on the speaker and announces that due to fog and rain in Tracy Arm (mixed with icebergs in the water) that we would not be actually cruising through there today. Normally we can steer safely through the icebergs, but with fog to hinder navigation the captain decided to be safe rather than sorry. We certainly appreciated that! He is such a great captain.
We will arrive in Juneau at 12 PM instead of 2:30 PM so hopefully we’ll get off the ship sooner and be able to have a bit more time for shopping at Fred Meyer. Normally I have to really rush and only have about an hour, but today we should have about 2.5 hours. I’m going with Rebecca because she wasn’t told anything about theme wear and needs to find some costume items and Fred Meyer has absolutely everything. I also need more Bonine motion sickness medication as I’m now out of it and definitely need to have it. Because of Bonine and the wrist bands I’ve now gone 9 weeks without incident beyond my very first sea day. Yay!
We had to wait an hour for a bus, that was sad and a waste of our precious time, but unless you hit it just right you have to wait. With it raining quite steady here I didn’t want to walk over to the other bus stop and Rebecca wanted the express and not the long bus. Express bus gets to the valley in about 15 minutes and the other in 45. The only advantage of the regular bus would have been getting on sooner and being out of the rain but she didn’t want to ride the bus for 45 minutes. Thankfully both cost only $1.50 each way so we waited. She found basically everything she wanted except a pirate sash and I found all of the stuff that I wanted, so it was a good trip.
We had to ride the long bus back and we were riding sideways and both Rebecca and I felt very motion sick after the ride. I came back to my room and ate some ginger snaps (another must that I discovered as they have real ginger and are very snappy - Nabisco brand) and took a half Bonine tablet and then laid down until it was time to get up for work.
Brave the Night theme night went well, even though I only had 3 kids tonight. Crazy! They are all older kids though, so I wanted to keep them with me instead of going into the kids room where they had 11 or so little ones doing camp night.
We had after hours again tonight, not a shocker at this point, with the same two girls as last night and also the second girl’s brother who is 10 from my room. We also found out that tomorrow we’ll have to stay on the ship for in port activities ALL DAY until 5 PM. Because it’s Country Carnival night I’ll have to be back on the ship by 6:30 at the latest so I’ll get a whopping’ 1.5 hours off the ship. Oh well, rain is predicted for all day tomorrow. This is great napping and tv watching weather and not much else. I really want to be able to do another excursion soon and it’s just not working out at all. Ok done whining.
Saturday July 21st: Skagway, AK
I slept in this morning until 10:30 AM because I won’t be getting off the ship as I have to help with in port activities. We have two girls on board - the two in after hours baby-sitting each night - that have been on 4 cruises and know that Holland America offers baby-sitting while in port. Bummer. We do not receive compensation for this at all and it is our time off so we do not relish this task at all. Thankfully I did not have to do the morning shift, I’m going to work at 11 AM. The only upside is that it is once again raining in Skagway, only not foggy today like last week, so there isn’t anything I want to do in this port anyway. Skagway is my port to go hiking. Everything costs a lot here due to its remoteness so I tend to hike and then get back on the ship after making phone calls, but because of the rain I don’t desire to do either as I’d just be getting wet.
The girls watched 2 movies in a row and then we played a game briefly and then went downstairs to get some lunch. Some of the other families were very upset with us that we wouldn’t take their children off their hands as well because they were bored and excursions had been canceled, but IPA is something that needs to be signed up for ahead of time. So we simply told all of them that we were doing private baby-sitting for that family and weren’t actually “open”. It was the truth, but we just called it something other than in port activities because we try our best to NOT advertise it so they won’t leave their kids in the next port. I know we’re terrible but it is the only real time off we get. Otherwise we’ve been putting in 16-17 hour days and we don’t get paid any extra for the overtime.
The parents came back at 5 PM and then we went to dinner and had to get ready to work again by 7 PM to set up for Country Carnival. The night was a success and afterwards we again had after-hours baby-sitting with 4 kids tonight. Each night we’ve simply popped in a movie for them and they seem to enjoy it enough to keep coming back the next night for late night baby-sitting.
I was supposed to be leading the Sunday night fellowship meeting and singing a duet this week, but we already found out that we have after hours tomorrow for sure so that’ll have to wait I guess.
Sunday July 22nd: Glacier Bay National Park
The sun is shining and it is warm outside in the sun today!! Yay!!!!!!!!!! I haven’t seen the sun since the first sea day and then it was partly sunny, that was three days ago. Today though is gorgeous and I’m so glad. I actually had some guests say they didn’t care if every single port rained they came on this cruise just to see Glacier Bay - so for their sakes I was thrilled we had such gorgeous weather.
The kids this week are being so excellent. They are having fun with our activities and they have great manners. I LOVE them and want to keep them!!! We had 3 guest speakers in the park and for the park ranger talk it was so beautiful outside we actually relocated outdoors on the tennis court. The other reason though that we went outdoors is because the kids room is only 17.5 C, which is roughly 58 F? Something like that. It’s COLD in there. I guess the temperature sensor in the room is reading at 25 C which is plenty warm and so the air kept trying to cool off the room. Hopefully it’ll get fixed soon because we wear lots of layers and wrap up in wool blankets and still freeze. I knew that it was really cold because the second I walk in the room the tip of my nose starts to freeze. Yikes. That’s not healthy for little kids at all. The good thing is that the Chief Electrician’s daughter is four and in our care this week and so he saw first hand what was going on and resolved then and there to champion our cause and get it fixed.
On ships it definitely pays to know the right people. Don will fix our AC problem, Megan’s friend the Chief Officer Tom got our shower fixed instantly (it had been broken for 4 weeks when I came on board and for the first 2 that I was there until she came), our friend Linda the Lido Restaurant Manager ordered all the arts and crafts supplies the former manager wouldn’t, etc. I believe it’s important to treat everyone with kindness, not just to get favors but because it’s the right thing to do towards others, so I’ve noticed that most people on the ship tend to respond positively towards me in return. Amazing how that works out! :)
Movie night was fun, the kids watched “Cars” and the tweens watched “Open Season”. I hadn’t seen that film yet so it was even enjoyable for myself. The kids that came were cute. We had 4 stay again for after hours, so I didn’t go to the fellowship meeting - which I’d thankfully already warned the others that I probably wouldn’t be so they wouldn’t be shocked that the speaker wasn’t there and could plan accordingly.
Monday July 23rd: Ketchikan, AK
Today it is not just raining, it is pouring. I slept until 9 AM, and then had the responsibility of going upstairs to put out the sports equipment but because of the rain I didn’t. I don’t have an umbrella out there and I refused to get soaked even if it was my responsibility so I just opened up the Playstation room and then had Brendan the internet manager look at my internet problem. We figured out that Google Mail needed to get reset in the internet portion of the mail program, it wasn’t something on my computer causing the problem, so I can now send AND receive mail again, YAY!! So, if you send me mail I will try really hard to get back to you. My hours this summer have been slightly crazy, but I’m going to try. Just so you all know, I do think about you even if you don’t hear from me.
Tonight I had only 3 kids show up for the scavenger hunt and they are fun kids. They decided to take on pirate persona from “Pirates of the Caribbean” even though the little kids were doing pirate night and not them. They were super funny and extremely well behaved. Have I mentioned that I want to KEEP all of them??!
We had after hours baby-sitting again tonight - what a shocker I know. :)
Tuesday July 24th: Final Sea Day
There was definite motion in the ocean today. I took half a Bonine pill and I’m so glad that I did or else I would have “tossed my cookies”. I forgot to wear my wristbands and so I felt nauseous. I thankfully had the other half of the pill in my pocket and so I ended up taking it about 2 hours after the first half and then by lunch the seas were calm again.
The cooking class was fun. We had about 6 kids there of different ages. Chef Valentine was gone now, we have a new guy who isn’t as good. I’m hoping that he’s just shy and will warm up to the kids, it was fine overall just not as good as when Valentine was there. He was REALLY good with the kids. We’ll see how it goes in the future. Teresa the party planner helps and I help and we get the kids all motivated so it’s still a fun class.
The last sea day afternoon is really easy. We color a farewell banner, write letters to the captain, watch cartoons and then after 1 hour it’s time to close and get ready for Build a Bear. We had 2 girls build bears, I got to build one too and bring it “home” with me. So now my moose from last summer has a Club HAL cousin to hang with in Milwaukee.
Our final party was fun with all the kids and then we ended up with about 8 kids in after hours baby-sitting. It was crazy how that all worked out this week, but here’s the really crazy part: we earned $390.00 collectively between tips and baby-sitting fees this week, so each of us took home $130.00 Normally I don’t get into stuff like that in detail but I am so shocked I had to share. :) I will be able to buy a couple more internet cards with that money! Yay. It’s all working out in that department which is great.
Well, this cruise is over and it was super fun. Even though we had more kids than last week these two weeks were very relaxing and great. It may be my midsummer reprieve (like I got last summer when I spent a day in the infirmary because my roommate had Norwalk) in order to be able to handle the last five cruises of the summer, but hopefully it is simply 2 fun weeks in a row and 5 more fun ones ahead. We’ll see. In two weeks time I’ll be training in 1 to 2 new crew members and taking the lead in Club HAL as the senior staffer. Maybe by that time Rebecca will want to step up, but I think most likely it’ll either be me alone or we’ll split the tasks evenly. She’s very competent and catches on quickly, so I trust that she’ll do great once we all leave at the end of August and she’s doing it by herself until she goes home in November.
Hope your week was sun powered as well as Son powered. My batteries need recharging, but I see on weather.com that it is supposed to be beautiful in Vancouver tomorrow.
I will write again soon!
Luv,
T
