02.27.2017 update from the Ruby Princess

We had a easy travel day Friday and embarkation was a snap on Saturday.  The hotel we stayed in Friday night was a bit sketchy.  There was noise from above us until 6am.  It was either construction, not likely at that time of night, or a child running across the floor.  It had a rhythm that reminded John of the way Super Mario runs.  Or possibly a roofing gun, thump, thump, thump, pause, thump. John slept through it, Colleen, not.  In Los Angeles, we made good use of Uber and had all positive experiences.  We asked some policemen loitering in a parking lot near our hotel to recommend a good place to eat.  They recommended Rock and Brews in El Segundo and it was good.  Big servings.  We could have shared one appetizer and been full.  The other party at our large table took the rest of our Bruchetta and enjoyed it.

The cruise we are on is the Princess Cruises Entertainer of the Year Cruise.   They have invited back the four most popular entertainers from 2016 Princess Cruises. They will perform for us this week and then the passengers will vote their favorites.  We have done this before and it is a lot of fun and great entertainment.

We have seen three of the four finalists for Princess Cruises Entertainer of the year.  We've seen a piano player/comedian, a comedian and a singer who does a great tribute to Whitney Houston.  The pianist is John Bressler, the comedian is Robbie Printz and the singer is named Cheaza Figeroa.  Co will probably vote for the singer who did a wonderful tribute to Whitney Houston.  John is going to vote for the one we haven't seen yet this trip.  We did see him on an earlier cruise.  His name is Steve Larkins and he does a great tribute to Freddy Mercury of Queen.  We'll see him tonight then we'll have an opportunity to see all four one more time before we vote.

On the last cruise and this one, we have been ordering dining room dinners to be delivered to our cabin.  It's necessary due to the crowded conditions in the dining room.  Sunday night our meal was delivered by a really delightful woman from Serbia, Sonja.  Bright and bouncy, quite a change from the usual, polite but quiet, room servers.  So we asked her to try to deliver our meals each evening.  She is the first to come with a table cloth to cover our small two foot round table, kinda tight.

Monday was sunny and warm after some morning fog.  From our deck we watched dolphins and turtles and several whales breaching.  There were many dolphins and one of the whales  put on a great show, breaching time and again.  The turtles are many and there is a "grandpa" two balconies down who acts like a town crier when a turtle is near.  "TURTLE"  he shouts every few minutes.  He and his family seem to have several cabins in a row.  The grandkids have tried to get him to the gym to work out, but he prefers to be on turtle duty it seems.

We are a bit off course today due to a medical evacuation this afternoon.  The passenger was taken off the ship via a boat that came alongside us just off the coast of Cabo San Lucas.  We'll be back for the day on Thursday.  Hopefully the passenger will be well enough to reboard our ship.

Tomorrow we will be in our first port, Puerto Vallarta.

Colleen and John