Doug and Paula's Excellent Adventure - part one

Doug and I got up early on Saturday to begin the long, nine-hour drive to New Orleans. The day was overcast with occasional light showers. It was a scenic ride through the NC and TN mountains along the Ocoee River. We finally entered northern Alabama where the first things we saw were trailers as far as the eye could see – no houses, just trailers. At this point, I was beginning to think all those jokes Georgians tell about Alabama must be true! (Sorry, Mary Ann and John)! It looked much better, however, as we came near Fort Payne. I saw a sign on I-59 that said, “Alabama Museum and Fan Club.” I was wondering why a state would have a fan club when Doug said to me, “I think the group Alabama came from Fort Payne.” We stopped there and had lunch at a Cracker Barrel. We continued on through the state and into Mississippi, where we stopped at Meridian to spend the night. Southern Mississippi is even worse than south Georgia, if that is possible – nothing but flat land and scrawny pine trees that give way to swamp and more scrawny pine trees. Flat land just does not appeal to me.

The next morning we continued on to New Orleans. Doug has been there, but I never have. I was amazed at the long bridge over Lake Ponchatrain. As we came into the city on I-10, we were looking down on the districts hit by Katrina. Parts of it still looked bad, but there was a lot of new construction. To be honest, I imagine this area looked pretty bad before the hurricane.

We got off the interstate and drove down to the port where our ship, the Norwegian Spirit, was docked and ready for its new passengers. We paid $98 to leave our car in the parking deck for the week and got our suitcases out – three of them, plus a duffle bag and my makeup bag. I over-packed. We went down to the entrance and waited in line to go through security. Then we waited in line again to check in and leave our luggage with the porters. The whole process took about an hour. Finally, they took our picture for the first of many, many times, and we got on the ship, around 1:00 pm. The cabins were not ready yet, but there was lunch at the buffet. We went there to find about a thousand others there already. It was crowded and chaotic. We finally managed to get some food and find a place to sit so we could eat our lunch.

We should have taken the advice of the lady who first checked our passports at the beginning of the process. She said we could go into New Orleans and eat lunch, and come back a couple of hours later, and there would be no lines.

I had expected warmer weather in New Orleans. It was cold and windy. The sky was still overcast.

After eating, we explored the ship. Like the other two NCL ships we’ve been on, it was beautiful. This one had an Asian theme. (You would have liked it, Vivian). We then found our tiny little cabin. Although the cabins on these ships are small, they make an excellent use of space. There are nooks and crannies everywhere to stow your stuff. We lay on the bed and read our books until our luggage arrived at our door. Then we unpacked and put everything away. The ship was to set sail at 5:00, so we decided to take our books and go to the Galaxy of the Stars, a huge lounge at the front of the ship with wall-to-wall windows. There we found a seat in the very front and ordered virgin pina coladas, which I just love! I had been looking forward to them since our last cruise. We read and waited for the ship to turn around in the Mississippi River and start its voyage. It began to vibrate and move sideways until we were turned around and the voyage began. It was great seeing the skyline of New Orleans lit up as we sailed down the river. This was definitely the highlight of our day.

By then it was time for dinner. NCL is the only cruise line which has “freestyle dining.” That means you can choose to eat whenever and wherever you want. You can also sit at your own table or sit with anyone you please. In other words, you are free to do your own thing. Other cruise lines assign you a time and a table at which to eat. You sit with people you don’t know. The advantage of that is you meet and get to know people on the ship. You will get to know people on NCL as well, but usually on the shore excursions. Since there were only the two of us, we always got a table for two next to the window. We were surprised at how many people were there in groups, some of them quite large. I have to admit, I was a little envious at first, because they were laughing and talking and having so much fun at their tables, while we were having a much quieter dinner.

There are seven restaurants on the Spirit. Four of those are “specialty” restaurants which means you pay a cover charge to eat there. We ate dinner at Windows, the main dining room, since we had already paid for it when we paid for the cruise. For breakfast and lunch, we usually ate at Raffles, the buffet, or the Blue Lagoon, which was open 24 hours a day. The food was very good, of course, though I was not too impressed that first night. After our dinner, we went to the theater for the first nightly entertainment. It was an accordion player. He played well, but unfortunately, thought he could sing. We were, again, not impressed.

I fell asleep that night thinking that I really wanted to enjoy this cruise, and I hoped it would get better. It did.