The weather on our first full day in Osaka was rainy but it still didn’t dampen our spirits. As Captain Glenn mentions from time to time it is always sunny inside the Crystal Serenity and for us that is very true.
Yesterday marked the beginning of the final segment of this journey and this has been an amazing adventure for us. During the course of this last leg of the World Cruise we will sail from Osaska, Japan to Los Angeles, California. This segment will feature a very nice mix of port and sea days with stops in one port of call in Russia, several stops in Alaska, along with stops in Victoria and Vancouver, Canada followed by San Francisco, California with our final stop in San Pedro, California.
There were many visitors on board the Crystal Serenity throughout the day yesterday. This included travel agents, friends/relatives of guests on board the ship, and other visitors either visiting the Serenity for the very first time or visitors who have sailed on either the Crystal Serenity or the Crystal Symphony before. The owner of Crystal Cruises also operated the Asuka II which was formally the Crystal Harmony which focuses on the Japanese Market so yesterday was also a nice opportunity for some people who have previously sailed on the Asuka II to visit the Crystal Serenity. Some members of the Crystal Crew gave guided tours to some of the visitors.
We celebrated an anniversary milestone and some of the personnel who take good care of us surprised us later in the evening.
We had a very nice dinner in the Crystal Dining Room and our guest was Cruise Director Rick Spath.
We had pre-ordered a special meal with our Headwaiter, Augusto. We began our meal with a seafood appetizer served family style on one plate, which included some cold seafood including lobster and prawns. Our second course was clammed chowder soup. For our third course, we had a spinach salad. Our fourth course was the entrée, which Augusto prepared for us, which was a pasta with lobster and a very tasty red sauce. It was superb. Anne Marie had spoken ahead of time with Pasty Chef, Harald Neufang, and she ordered a St. Honoree Cake and Augusto added ice cream. It was a wonderful meal made very enjoyable by having Rick Spath with us and by being taken care of by the wonderful Crystal Dining Room team. Maitre d’ Leo Assmair stopped by and Augusto came by several times to check on us.
After dinner we stopped by our room to freshen up and when we opened the door we were treated to a very nice surprise by our Butler Rao, Stewardess, Sneha, Trainee Stewardess Cindy and Stewardess Viktoria. Streamers where hung from the ceiling, two dozen long stem roses in two vases (one dozen yellow and one dozen red) were on the coffee table, rose petals were neatly arranged on our bed along with some animals made from towels, along with a banner on the wall.
A few minutes later Rao, Sneha, Cindy and Viktoria came by our room and we thanked them all so very much for their thoughtful gift for us. They are truly remarkable.
A short while later we met up with Cruise Rick Spath and as time went along several fellow guests joined us including friends Bob and Glo.
It was also great to have wifi access at the cruise ship terminal. The biggest surprise was the speed of the wifi connections, which was better than most locations on land such as Hotels. We were able to use the FaceTime application (very similar to Skype) so that we could speak with and see our son, Eric, our daughter in-law Kara, and we saw their two dogs, Tobey (Australian Shepherd) and Kylie (almost five month old Golden Retriever).
Headwaiter Augusto with Cruise Director Rick Spath. Knowing how much that Rick Spath enjoys pasta, Augusto had given our Senior Waiter a small plate of the pasta to take over to Rick Spath to see his reaction. Fortunately, he also sent over a regular size portion for Rick to enjoy.
The Cake tasted as great as it looked. It was truly a work of art.
Surprises from Rao, Sneha, Cindy and Viktoria.
Anne Marie with Rao, Sneha, Cindy and Viktoria.
Keith and Anne Marie with Sneha, Cindy and Viktoria.
We posted today's blog from the cruise ship terminal and hopefully we will be able to post from the ship tomorrow once we are out of the water of Japan.
Just a few minutes ago we were able to utilize FaceTime to speak with our daughter, Jennifer, with our son-in-law Gui also there and we also could see Jennifer giving a bottle to our Grand Baby Andre. It was so wonderful to be able to catch up with Jennifer today and with Eric yesterday. We are so very fortunate to live at a time where technology can help people keep up with family and friend no matter how far they travel from home.
Lots of people want to ride with you in the limo, but what you want is someone who will take the bus with you when the limo breaks down." -Oprah Winfrey
Keith and Anne Marie
The cake is beautiful. What sort of pastry is the cake? White, chocolate or other type of cake or something else. We will be celebrating Andy's birthday on board in Sept. Maybe I will order one of these for him.
ReplyDeleteWonderful you could use face time. It really shrinks the world doesn't it? We are planning on joining the WC in 2015! It looks great.
Enjoy the last leg,
Ilene and Andy
Keith and Anne Marie,
ReplyDeleteLarry and I send you a belated happy 35th anniversary and how wonderful to celebrate at sea. The St. Honore cake is so lovely and glad you ordered it as I've ordered it twice for Larry on his birthdays.
hugs to both of you and enjoy the last segment.
Nancy