Saturday, 27 January, 2001
Getting Ready for the Cruise
No entry yesterday. I was busy getting ready for our vacation. This morning Debra and I left Austin at 6:00 am for Ft. Lauderdale, FL, where we boarded the Sea Princess for a 7-day Caribbean cruise.
Other tour companies could learn a thing or two from how the cruise lines operate. All we had to do was book the cruise, and Princess Cruises took care of everything else. They booked the flights, arranged for transportation, and let us select the tours we wanted to take on the different islands. We checked our bags at the airport in Austin, and never saw them again until later this evening when they were delivered to our cabin on the ship. A representative met us at the gate when we arrived in Ft. Lauderdale, escorted us to the bus (for which we had transfer tickets), and dropped us off at Port Everglades next to the ship. Check-in was faster than most hotels I've stayed at. We were in our cabin less than an hour after landing at the airport. It doesn't take long to get into the right frame of mind: by 2:00, we had eaten lunch at the buffet and were drinking beer and catching rays. What a life.