Tomorrow I’m taking Apollo to the vet at 9am and then have to renew my passport.
We’ll then head to Edmonton for dinner. Just Montana’s.
I’m taking my sister in law home to High River on Thursday morning and then will continue to Crowsnest Pass to pick up my friend and we are continuing on to Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming.
From there, we head to Twin Falls Idaho for a day or two and attending a BBQ on Sunday afternoon.
We’ll head home on Monday via Oregon and Washington states and the BC, we’ll head east on Highway 3 back to Crowsnest Pass.
No, this isn’t Star Trek IV, it’s about my voyage home.
It started this morning early. I left the ship around 9am. I headed though the maze of exits off the ship and ended up outside where the journey began a week ago.
I fired up Uber and discovered it was going to be $290 for an Uber, an hour long ride. That’s absolutely ridiculous. Anyway, two couples of people heading to the airport allowed me to join their van for the drive. We made it to the airport in an hour or so. That was a relief, I didn’t want to spend a ton on an Uber.
Check-in and security at the airport was a breeze. I had a quick lunch, pretty decent food, but fairly expensive, I suppose it was an airport after all. We boarded on time and headed to Chicago.
I stopped at a restaurant in Chicago as well, but, they wanted me to scan a code for the menu, nothing printed and I don’t do that so I left and let em know why I left as well, they didn’t care.
Boarding was delayed by 30 minutes or so, but the pilot is making up time and we’ll land on schedule.
This vacation officially closes shortly as I’ll be back in Calgary with the normal routine ahead of me. I’m looking forward to it.
We are almost in Port, back in Florida. It has been an absolutely amazing 7 days. The weather has been perfect, well, I suppose anyway, a bit hot and humid for my tastes. Temps have been in the 30s with oppressive humidity. I’m unsure who would find that weather perfect.
The air conditioning on the ship has been great, for the most part. I’ve been cold at times when I actually wear shorts and I’ve worn them all the time. Prior to this trip, the last time I wore shorts was in grade 8.
Today I’m preparing for a flight home and will be wearing jeans and my Bills jersey with an undershirt. I won’t be outside too much, it’ll be fine.
I pick up my bags at 855am and it’s an hour or so to Orlando and the airport. The flight is at 1422, the first leg to Chicago and then off to Calgary with a 2237 arrival. I’m getting picked up at the airport by Tim and Apollo and I’m hopeful that Apollo will warmly great me. I know he’s been well taken care of by my sister in law and Tim and his family.
It’s Saturday morning, 3:23am Eastern Time and we are somewhere in the Atlantic Ocean heading West towards Florida and Port Canaveral. My cruise has just over 24 hours to go.
To say it’s been a great time is an understatement, for sure. It’s been better than that.
The food has been fantastic. The ship is amazing. I haven’t gone to any shows and I doubt that I will. I was in one of the bars and a dude with a violin was playing, he was majorly talented. I also accidentally wandered into someone’s stand-up comedy routine, I listened for 30 seconds but wasn’t brought to my knees, so I left.
I have slept sparingly, I’ve napped when I can and eaten when I want to. I’ve hooked up a few times, I’ts been great.
We dock tomorrow around 7am and my bags get picked up and delivered at 855. I’ll take an Uber to Orlando International Airport and fly to Chicago then continue onto Calgary. My friend Tim will pick me up at 2245, with Apollo and I’m hoping Apollo isn’t going to show me a cold shoulder for leaving him for a week. I’m sure he won’t.
I’ll get home around 2315 give or take and will shortly after be asleep. The normal routine will return.
I’ll be picking up my new car on Monday morning at 11am.
I get home to Calgary later Sunday evening, my flight arrives around 2237 and Tim picks me up with Apollo riding shotgun. I’m sure, and hoping that Apollo will be happy to see me. It’s by far the longest he’s been left in the care of other people.
So, I’ll get home around 2315 Sunday night. I need to go to the bank Monday morning to get a back draft for $52k or so, whatever the full amount is. I’ll then pay for it and get shown how it all works.
I take it in to get the windows tinted on Tuesday morning. That’s the front windows. I’ll be using Tint Tech in NE Calgary for that.
On Wednesday morning, Apollo and I visit his vet at Glamorgan Animal Clinic to discuss putting Apollo on a human food diet.
That’s all next week. Until then, I’m sailing home, we are currently in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean heading to Florida.
My on board account was getting out of control. LOL
I had a full spa day, that wasn’t cheap, but the massage and pedicure and mud bath were amazing.
I didn’t really need the souvenirs I bought, but I needed to commemorate the trip. The small model of the ship is very cool. I needed to get souvenirs for my sister in law and my friend who’s looking after Apollo this evening though Sunday evening.
Thus far I haven’t found a souvenir for Apollo but I’m sure me coming home will be good enough for him.
I have paid my onboard account now to the tune of about $2000 CDN funds, insane.
I get home Sunday night, late and Apollo will greet me at the airport then we’ll go home and crash. I get my new car Monday morning and the front windows get tinted Tuesday morning and Apollo goes to the vet Wednesday morning. It’ll be a busy week.
To say that I’m enjoying myself on this cruise it’s putting it too mildly.
I’m really enjoying it. It’s relaxing. The food is amazing. The people are pretty damn cool as well. I think that was hard to admit. LOL.
I had two travel agent friends put together quotes for my next cruise yesterday.
I toyed with Alaska but alas, it’s more expensive probably because there are a limited number of ships and a very limited time frame.
We looked at a Panama Canal and that would have been fine except I’m planning on driving to the dock and all of the Panama Canal cruises end up on the East Coast then I’d have to rent a vehicle to drive back across.
My friend Al then came across an Hawaiian Cruise, Los Angeles to Hawaii and back. Sixteen glorious days and nights. Most of the time at sea, believe it or not.
Sounded good to me.
So I asked a friend of mine is she wanted to go. Long story short, yes, she does and she will.
We’ll drive down to LA and take the cruise and then drive back. So, I struck a deal and we leave at the end of September and get back around October 20th or just before that. Sasha well need some time to get her Halloween display setup done as well.
It’s day three of the cruise. I’m absolutely loving it.
I arrived in Florida on Saturday evening, greeted by blazing heat and high humidity. We headed to Kissimmee for my overnight stay.
The motel was clean, comfortable and the air conditioning worked really well. I went to Golden Corral for dinner, a bit of a mistake. The food was ok, but gave me major runs for the next 24 hours.
Sunday morning I woke early, per usual, and headed to the 24 hour Waffle House. Sure, 24 hour walk up for takeout but the restaurant didn’t open until 6am, so, I talked to the dude at the take out window for 50 minutes until I was allowed inside.
I had a few large cups of ice water and two cold brewed coffees. Very refreshing.
Breakfast was a Philly cheesesteak breakfast with shredded potatoes and a large Simply Orange juice, amazing OJ. The dude at the take out window gave me a quick lift back to my motel, thankful that I didn’t have to walk outside with the blazing yellow thing in the sky shining down on me, trying to melt me.
I showered and called an Uber to retrieve me and bring me to the dock. The drive was a bit over an hour. They collected my suitcase and I wondered to the terminal, check-in was a breeze.
I boarded the ship and dropped off my backpack and wandered around a bit. The ship was wonderfully cool.
I was able to get into the room at 1pm. I unpacked in my new home and relaxed.
I had a few drinks, more than a few actually and dinner was in the buffet. The chicken strips and fries were amazing. I met some people and did the whole bar scene and later at night I actually got to the dance club. I hooked up with a great guy, which was completely unexpected.
Day 2 at sea had us in the middle of the ocean, making out war South and East of Florida. Smooth sailing which is nice. I was woken at 4am by my cousin, short call for sure. I went immediately back to sleep and was woken again at 630am by room service delivering breakfast.
I went back to bed and slept until after 1am. I had lunch, 5 slices of delicious pizza and more booze, amaretto and OJ with 2 cherries. I had a massage in the afternoon which was painful yet relaxing.
Dinner consisted of 2 grilled chicken sandwiches and fries, really tasty. I also had a water and a Coke over ice. Dessert was a gigantic sundae, I was stuffed.
We arrive at 9am and I plan on going ashore with a couple from Ohio I think it was. Not a long whore leave I don’t think, enough time to take a dip in the ocean.
I’m going to search for a beverage now, water, coffee, booze, in that order. Have a great day.
I have not slept more than about 1:10 since Thursday morning at 2:10am when I woke up from 4 or 5 hours sleep.
Oh Wednesday evening, I went to bed between 930 and 10 pm and was awake, up and showered by about 230am.
Thursday I was supposed to take delivery of my new vehicle, I think, but my funds didn’t arrive, so I had to push it off until Tuesday, August 25. I’ll pick it up at Noon on that day.
I started to get ready to travel. I had cleaning to do, I had laundry to do, I had packing and organizing to do.
Friday morning came around and I had made relatively good progress and I headed to High River Alberta to pick up my sister in law who was charged with looking after Apollo.
We got to my place, let Apollo out at the dog park and he did his thing, pooping and peeing. I prepped a massive tomahawk steak with salt and pepper and put it on the smoker for dinner.
About 3 hours later, the last picture was the result. A perfect medium, I think and by God it was tasty.
Roasted potatoes rounded out the meal and I attempted to plate it well. It was beyond good but, despite it’s amazing flavour, we weren’t sure it was worth the price tag of $102.
Edie had 10ish ounces, I probably had 16-20 ounces and Apollo had at least 10 ounces. Apollo was the happiest of the bunch, that I guarantee.
Dessert was a strawberry cheesecake from Costco that we are hours later after dinner. Apollo had a small piece of cheesecake as it’s not really good for him, or is.
Edie helped me sort and fold laundry, I printed bag tags, loaded my suitcase and was ready to leave at 3am hitting the airport by 330am.
I’m unsure why I had to get to the airport so early, security didn’t open until 430am so that was ridiculous. Security was quick, the came US Customs and they didn’t open until 5. Or was it security at 4 and customs at 430, YES, that’s what it was.
Customs was slow but I made it through and had no wait to board the first of 3 plans. We headed southish to Denver, then southeast to Houston and finally across the Gulf of Mexico to Florida and my final stop for the day.
It’s 430pm Eastern Time (I believe) as it write this and the plane lands in about 1.5 hours. Again, time zones are messing with me and my absolute lack of sleep.
I check into the hotel, I’ll have a bite somewhere and then a shower or the other way around and then, then I’ll crash.
I’ll likely be up early and I’ll make the hour long trip to the East coast of Florida to Port Canaveral and then I’ll get on the ship.
Kevin's Ramblings... 