The best day on a cruise is a day at sea. The absolute perfect day to relax with a Bahama Mama by the pool. If you buy her a drink… well, that’s a bad joke.
Speaking of bad jokes, a guy walks into a bar, and says to the bartender, “Do you know how to make a fruit cordial?” The bartender replies, “Yeah, buy him a drink.”
I wasn’t planning on running up a big bar tab on this cruise, but there’s just something about a few ice-cold beers on a hot day. Not to mention the (double) Manhattans that start around cocktail hour and end somewhere around the cold shower.
Between the bar bill and the Internet fees, I’m afraid to see what gets slipped under my door Friday morning. I just used up the remaining minutes of my $250, 1,000-minute Internet plan. I think 980 of those minutes were spent waiting for my email to download, as I haven’t been able to do much else because of the poor speed.
I’ve never experienced such bad Internet access on a ship before and according to several crew members I spoke with, new equipment and better satellite access were just installed not too long ago. They feel the crunch too, as guest Internet is given priority access over crew Internet, so while all of us are emailing and trying desperately to post pictures of last night’s dinner on Facebook, Yudi from the laundry is pulling his hair out trying to Skype with his 12 children back home.
Internet be damned, whether at home or at sea, I know I just can’t live without it, so another 1,000 minutes just got added to my account. (My friend Beverly, who describes herself as “thrifty,” just had to reset her pacemaker as another $250 just got posted to my account – and she’s not even paying the bill!)
I awoke early, not by choice, but all that beer has to come out at some point. So after breakfast on the verandah, it was time to partake in part two of the “Behind the Scenes Ship Tour” on the ms Zuiderdam. If you read yesterday’s installment, the first part of the tour took a lucky group of ten of us to the Bridge and Engine Control Room. We even got a group picture with the captain. Woo hoo! (If you read yesterday’s installment, you would know what that was all about too. If you didn’t, now would be a good time to read it, as who knows what other references I may make to it.)
The first stop on the tour was the show lounge, where we toured backstage and got to meet with the stage manager, dance captain, and lead singer. The singers and dancers are not employees of the ship but are employed by Stiletto Entertainment in California which produces shows for Holland America Line. They go through casting calls just like land-based entertainers would before landing a gig onboard ship. They get four weeks to learn the shows in California before the troupe heads to the ship for 8 – 9 months of entertaining guests nightly.
One interesting note, the cast is required to send a photo of themselves, scantily clad, to the company once a month, and if they’re packing on the pounds due to too many trips to the Lido, they can be replaced.
The next stop on the tour was down into the bowels of the ship well below the waterline into a stifling environment called the laundry. One member of the tour asked if anyone actually volunteers to work in this department. The answer was a soft-spoken, “no.” Piles and piles of towels, linen, napkins, sheets, blankets, anything you can think that needs to get clean is here. Dirty laundry is loaded into massive machines and then dried in other machines that look like huge ovens. From the dryer they go into giant folders that press and fold at the same time, popping out a perfectly creased sheet or tablecloth on the other end. The guys who work in the laundry deserve a lot of credit, the temperature there was intense, but they all were focused on their task at hand and did it with pride.
From the laundry to the garbage room where every piece of trash is sent including food scraps from the dining room. Garbage cans are emptied onto a table, where a crew member picks through it piece by piece and separates paper, plastic, glass, batteries, tin, aluminum, etc into appropriate bins. What can be recycled, gets recycled, and what can’t gets burned in the incinerator, and the ashes are offloaded while in port. All food scraps are dumped into a huge grinder where we were told they are ground down into rice size pieces and incinerated as well. Years ago they used to dump food waste into the open ocean, but that practice has been abandoned, leading to fewer overweight fish and a good grade in environmentalism.
The next stop was the provisions area where all the food is stored for both passengers and crew in refrigerators, freezers, and dry storage rooms. This is also where the ship’s bakery is located and where thousands of rolls, croissants, and hundreds of loaves of bread are baked fresh each morning. The liquor room was quite fascinating with pallets and pallets of beer, wine, and liquor everywhere. It’s also the room where we took a break to enjoy some fresh Mimosas.
If you follow me on Facebook, you would have seen a photo taken in this area of the “Coffin Store” room. Yes, people do die on ships and when they do, they’re taken to this area where they’re kept at 39 degrees until they can be taken off at the next port. The Coffin Store room holds three, and we were told that so far this cruise, there is a 0% occupancy rate.
From booze to food. Off to the main galley we went where tens of thousands of meals are prepared each week for guests and crew. We were passing through right during lunchtime when things were busy, so there was quite a hustle going on to get lunches out to the main dining room guests, those who were eating in the Pinnacle Grill, and those who called for room service. It’s a well-oiled machine in a factory-like environment where there’s little room for error when you’re feeding close to 2,000 guests at one time.
We ended the tour with a cocktail reception where our guide, Marketing Onboard Manager Tunde Kosa, gave us each a gift bag and invited the Hotel Manager over to answer any other questions we had. For a ship buff like me, this was an amazing tour. Not often do people get to see what life is like behind the glitz and glamor of the cruise ship. Behind the scenes, it’s a world devoid of all that. Steel walls painted white, bright yellow watertight doors, and miles of pipes and wires overhead are the backdrop to where these people live and work when they’re not on the passenger decks.
I’m always amazed when a crew member will say they’ve been on board for 10, 15, 20, or more years. Sometimes I’m a tad bit jealous, other times I’m happy I don’t have to share the toilet in my room with three others, especially on “Curry Night” in the crew mess.
After the tour, I camped out in the sun before getting ready for pre-dinner cocktails and dinner once again in the Pinnacle Grill. The one-too-many doubles wreaked havoc on me, and I was under the covers by 10pm Atlantic Time, which made me feel like an 80-year-old on Eastern Time.
But hey, I won’t complain one bit. Early to bed… early to rise…
I’m just thankful I didn’t end up going to sleep in the Coffin Store.
Personal Day-By-Day Zuiderdam Cruise Review:
Photo Tour of the Zuiderdam:
Capturing memories through photography is an integral part of any vacation, and my voyage aboard the Holland America Zuiderdam was no different. Throughout my journey, I snapped countless photos, highlighting various aspects of the ship such as the stunning interior design, the inviting swimming pools, and my own cozy cabin. If you’re interested in viewing these snapshots, you can check out the Zuiderdam Photo Tour or browse the daily cruise review, both accessible through the links provided above.