Day 2 – It Would Have Been a Perfect Day If…

At 9am, I headed down to the gangway to get off the ship and do what I’ve been looking forward to for the past year. I almost walked out without grabbing a towel. I took pictures as I walked amidst a traffic jam of supply vehicles & courtesy shuttle trams. I took more pictures and proceeded with my plan to do the beach first. I wanted to sit in the 4th row, because 4 is my favorite number, and sit in a blue chair, not aqua. I accomplished both and relaxed.

I enjoyed the people watching. There was an ample supply of chairs. My ship, Mariner, was joined by the smallest ship in the Royal Caribbean fleet-Majesty. Nobody sat within 2 rows of me for awhile. An African-American family sat 6 chairs away from me and one of the children was wearing a Chicago Bears t-shirt. I mention this because I was born & raised in Chicago, and I have maintained my loyalty for their sports teams. As tempting as it was to walk up to them and find out if they live there or used to live there, I stayed in my chair and relaxed. I knew from research that the island peak crowd times are between 10am-1pm. I decided to leave at 10:45. In the five minutes before I left, a couple sat 4 seats away from me. Then 2 couples traveling together sat directly in front of me. Once they got settled, I counted silently to 100 and then left. I returned to the ship, where I laid in bed from 11-12:30. I wasn’t trying to overly exert myself, spend too much tome in the sun. So I built in this break.

For the 2nd half of my day, I headed to the Oasis Lagoon. I found a chair in the next to last row to place my things. I did mostly walking in the pool, with a few swimming bursts. My freestyle is good, but I’m rusty when it comes to the breaststroke. I hadn’t gone swimming since my last cruise 2 years ago. After toweling off, I proceeded to lunch at Skipper’s Grill. After getting my food and lemonade to drink, I was able to sit alone without too much trouble. Nobody tried to talk to me. I wasn’t the only male sitting alone.

Finally, I entered the water park. Lucky for me, I found a locker number that would be easy to remember, the area code for Atlanta-where I lived for most of my adult life. My plan for the waterslides was to do the three tamest-both Manta Raycers and the Green Mamba. Then walk to the other waterslide area for the Twister. Finally, I spent time in the wave pool. I did this sequence twice. They

played mostly bubble gum pop music at the wave pool, so I listened to 5 songs during each visit. I had the hardest time launching myself the first couple of times on the waterslides before getting the hang of it. But none of them made me yell or scream. Also, I really liked that they have a DJ at the foot of the stairs to the slides. I enjoyed listening to the music as I approached and then walked up the stairs to the slides.

I really had fun on my day on the island. I enjoyed the people watching at the wave pool. This is the first time that I’d ever been to a waterpark. I didn't keep track of time the whole day. I would guess that I spent 1.5 hours on the beach, 30 minutes at Oasis Lagoon, 20 minutes for lunch and 1.75 hours at the water park.

The only thing that would have made my day the perfect day that Royal Caribbean advertises is if my close friend Kelly, who introduced me to cruising, was there to share it with me. But I knew when I chose to go to the water park that I was going to be alone because nobody in my age bracket (40s & up) would be interested in going. Plus, no one would've been willing to split the day up the way that I did.