Golf Day

 

My main activity today was playing golf with John.  John had an afternoon event so we played quite early.  I could have taken a lot more pictures, but this one shows you a typical Florida golf course.  We did see one alligator sunning, thankfully, on the other side of a pond.  

All in all, it was a beautiful day with good temperatures, lots of sun, and little wind.   And both John and I played good golf, both shooting a 93.  I was using borrowed clubs which was a bit of a challenge. 

After I got back from golf, we did some suitcase packing so we'll have less to do in the morning.  Once ready, we took one last beach walk.  Sure love the sound of those waves!

With the clear weather, it made for a great sunset picture. Mary got this great reflection shot tonight.

Tomorrow we drive back to Tampa and fly home.  We have a nice mid-afternoon flight so no need to get up early and rush around in the morning.

I hope you enjoyed following along on our short Florida trip!

Monday Boat Ride

Today my golfing buddy, John, invited us for a boat ride on the inter-coastal waterway.  He's a member of a boat club and had reserved this nice pontoon boat for our group. That's John in the orange, Irene (former DTE co-worker) in blue and Mary in white (the two in blue are dock workers).

We enjoyed a nice 4 hour boat ride,  John showed us a lot of the area that you can't see by car.  While we did not do this, at many places, boats were beached and the people got out to explore, hike, picnic, or fish.   Mary took this picture of a very noisy osprey who squawked a us as we passed by.    Eventually we docked at a restaurant on Manasota Key (where we are staying) for lunch before heading back to the marina.  

We got back to our condo in time to walk to the beach and see a very pretty sunset.  We will miss seeing sunsets like this once back in Michigan.  

Tomorrow I'm playing golf with John in the morning, and then Mary and I need to start packing for our trip back to Dearborn.  

A Quiet Sunday

We took our morning beach walk at low tide today.   On the left you can see the path that we take to get to the beach.  Once you get to that point, you can start to hear the waves. 

We walked south today and the beach is much flatter this way as you can see on the right.  The waves glide quite a ways up the sand.  We both ended up with wet socks as we failed to dodge a big wave!  It's good we did this at low tide since we could see that the waves at high tide reached across the sand to the rocks in several places. But it was a very nice 1 3/4 mile walk. 

Tonight we went to a Jim Curry concert in Punta Gorda.  As expected, it was a super good concert.  I like how Jim takes extra time to give the background  of some songs which adds a lot to the concert rather than just singing them.  In addition to the classic John Denver songs, they sang one un-recorded John Denver song called Wandering Soul.  We stayed around afterwards to talk and were among the last to leave.

Tomorrow we are doing a boat trip with golfing buddy John and a former DTE co-worker, Irene.

Note:  Thanks for the blog comments.  Mary and I read and enjoy all of them.  

Tiger Baseball

 

Today we drove to Lakeland to see the Tigers play the Yankees in their first spring training game.   Before the start of the game they announced the temperatures in Detroit (27), New York(43) and Lakeland (73), then thanked the crowd for their wise decision to be in Lakeland. 

If you look at the lineup card on the right you'll see that only 4 "name" Tigers started.  And once they got to the 6th inning, they substituted for every player.  

But was a great day with super good seats, right behind home plate.  It was sunny (and we were in he shade) and a comfortable temperature.  

The Yankees scored early and often and had multiple base running in every inning.  The Tigers had a few good innings, but ended up losing 22-10.   

But it was a nice outing, even if we did have to fight some heavy Florida traffic there and back.  

Tomorrow is a Jim Curry Music concert as we continue to enjoy our vacation.

Florida Day 2

 

We had a nice, peaceful day today.  Our plan was to take a beach walk in the morning, then drive somewhere in the afternoon.  Well we headed to the beach about 9:30 am, but saw the waves were high and our only option would be to walk on the soft sand, which makes for very tough walking.  So much for our plan...

So we decided to drive to Port Charlotte to see what we could see.  It was a nice drive but not too much to see.   We did take the beach walk in the afternoon.  The waves were still quite high and this photo does not do them justice.  They left little packed sand to walk on but we did our half mile out and back. 

Later we had a nice dinner at Ken and Barb's, a local restaurant we knew about, then came back to the condo and streamed a few episodes of This is Us and that ended our exciting day.   Who says we don't live it up on vacation!  

Tomorrow we head to Lakeland to see a Detroit Tiger spring training game, their first one of the year.

First Day in Florida

This year we are staying on Manasota Key in the same condo we rented in 2022.  It's a nice, well furnished condo and has just a short walk to the beach.   Having been here before, we are somewhat familiar with the area which helps a lot.  

This morning we visited the Englewood Farmers Market.  It's rather large  (about 2 blocks) and has sprouted up a few nearby markets.   Lots of produce, jewelry, handicrafts, and food.   It was neat walking through all the crowds and seeing the many booths.  We did our share of buying.  I'd been looking for a new wallet and found one here.  We also bought a spanakopita (spinach pie) and baklava along with some snack foods.  Our morning ended with a pleasant beach stroll. 

After lunch, we headed back to the beach to enjoy the sunshine.  So relaxing, with the warm sunshine and the soothing sound of the waves.

After supper we headed out to catch the sunset.  It was a bit chilly (for Florida).  A few clouds got in the way, but this shot with colorful sky was one of the prettiest we took. 

Nothing planned for tomorrow so we'll see what develops. 

Heading to Florida

 

Today we flew to Tampa for our winter break.  Unfortunately it was 60 in Michigan today and only reached 69 here.  But it will be in the 70s for the next week here and Michigan will be cooling off a bit. 

We had a 2 hour drive to our condo and fortunately had very light traffic.  This part of Florida is notorious for long backups and we saw a few on the northbound side of the freeway.   The condo is nice and has a beautiful private screen-covered patio with a pool.  Before dinner and grocery shopping we did take a short walk to the beach.   The waves on the gulf were rather high today.   It was nice to be near  a large body of water again and hear that relaxing sound.

Tomorrow we plan to visit a farmers market and sight-see a bit.   

Last Sea Day - Heading Home Tomorrow

 

Well, our cruise is nearly over.  This one has had its challenges, but all's well that ends well. Here's a picture of the map from our TV as we head back to San Francisco. 

We had a quiet morning and late breakfast. Mary visited the "Princess Garage Sale" where they sell off outdated merchandise at a discount, but she did not find anything of interest.  After that, we enjoyed lunch in the International Cafe.   The afternoon was reserved for packing suitcases and making sure we cleaned out the aafe and all the drawers and shelves. 

Dinner tonight was a surprise!  Surf and Turf, and it was excellent.  They also had a coconut mouse for dessert which capped off a last dinner quite well. 

Tomorrow we take a Princess shuttle to the airport for our flight home, with a layover in Denver.  Hopefully the flights are all one time, but we are prepared to stay over in Denver if things go wrong.   

Not much else to say and, hopefully, this is my final post of this trip.  

Ensenada

After 5 sea days, we pulled into Ensenada, Mexico this morning.  Mary and I did not get off the ship, but greatly enjoyed the sounds of a pack of sea lions right below our balcony. Quite a crowd swam over to the rocks by our ship and kept up barking most of the day. 

We had a surprise visitor on our balcony this morning as you can see on the picture on the right.  There were two of them there, but one flew away before I could take the picture. 

After lunch we watched the Lion's game.  Mary took the picture on the big screen  before we went to our room to watch he game. It was a nice 31-23 victory so now they are off to play San Francisco next weekend.  After that game we watched the KC vs Bills game so the final 4 teams are now set.  San Francisco vs Detroit and Baltimore vs Kansas City with the winners playing in the Super Bowl. 

As many of you may have seen on Facebook, Katie's sister-in-law, Amy, passed away today from Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome.   After the game we spoke with Katie to express our sympathies to her and were able to visit using FaceTime. 

That's about it for today.   Last sea day is tomorrow with the major activity being packing so we are ready to leave the ship Tuesday morning. 

Sea Day #9

We had a very nice day with a number of nice events.  I participated in a golf putting challenge before Sudoku.  That was followed by a "Coffee with the Captain" event which was very good.  The cruise director asked him a few prepared questions before taking some from the audience.   The captain answered all with humor and some good stories.   

We had lunch in the buffet after the noon time change (we are now on Pacific Time) before the golf tournament finale.  I have to admit there isn't a vanilla sauce dessert that I don't like!  This one was a chocolate- walnut brownie with 3 scoops of vanilla sauce.  YUM!

At golf I did not do good today and fell our of the top 5.  But I enjoyed competing.   

We then watched the NFL playoff game in our room before getting ready for dinner. 

Dinner was the last formal night of the cruise and featured lobster!  It was excellent!  And Mary was doubly thrilled when Floating Islands showed up on the dessert menu.  

When we returned to our room we were very surprised to find a towel animal on our bed. What a cute elephant!  

Tomorrow is Ensenada, Mexico and we may not get off the ship unless there are some interesting stores right at the port.  

We will be rooting for the Lions as they go for their second playoff victory this season. Hopefully the weather permits us to watch it on the big screen.

Sea Day #8

 Our reasonably calm seas continued today.  Nothing unusual, except for three different golf related events.  Today's Sudoku puzzle was so hard that no one finished it within the allotted 20 minutes, so no prize was awarded. 

An Officers vs Passengers golf event was held at 11 am.  An officer and passenger took turns trying to score points for their side.  You could either score 10, 5 or -1 points.  Due to the number of passengers, the officers ended up taking many attempts and won by a wide margin.  But it was nice to see them play.
A second event was 4 hole miniature golf challenge.  The winners had 10 strokes while I had 12. 
Lastly was a chipping challenge in the ongoing tournament.  I did OK and am tied for 3rd place, with the finale tomorrow afternoon.

Mary and I watched another movie in the afternoon then headed to dinner.   She had scallops and I had a pork entree.  Here's a picture of my Peanut Butter bar dessert.   

We're planning to watch another movie tonight before our 5th consecutive sea day before arriving at Ensenada  on Sunday morning. 

Sea Day #7

 Only two more sea days before we reach Ensenada, Mexico.  Fortunately we've had fairly calm seas so far on the return from Hawaii.  The captain has reported that there is a storm system north of us so we are glad to be staying on it's southern edge. 

As usual, Sudoku and an enrichment lecture for me in the morning while Mary enjoyed catching some rays, and reading.  After lunch, I competed in another round of the golf tournament, using only 6 putts to sink 4 balls.  I'm not sure of my actual standings, but I know I'm near the top. 

In the afternoon we watched a documentary about the Notre Dame fire which was quite interesting, showing how where the fire started, the fire department response and the heroic effort to save the north bell tower. 

We both enjoyed our dinning in the dining room.  Here are our desserts: a souffle for Mary and a triple trio for me.  The one on the right of my plate was billed as an ice cream sandwich.

After dinner we listened to an acoustic guitar singer for a while, then retreated to our cabin. 

Sea Day #6

Overall we had a quiet and relaxing day today. The most unusual thing was that we changed our clocks by 1 hour at noon!  The captain reported that they did this on an earlier cruise and it worked out OK so they are trying it again.  So we jumped from 11:59 am to 1:00 pm.  But the people that print the daily Princess Patter (that lists the events of the day) apparently did not get the word since several events started at noon.  8-)

After winning another first place win at Sudoku, I played round 2 of the golf tournament today and remained in 4th place.  The challenge was to put your ball into 1 of 5 cups that were 30' away with the ship encountering moderate seas. I got 1 in the cup out of 3 tries which was better than most golfers did today.

After golf we watched the the latest Greek Wedding movie.  It was entertaining, but not as good as the earlier ones. 

The dining room featured scallops (right) tonight (a favorite Mary's) so we ate there tonight.   I was surprised to see pulled pork (left) on the menu. It was delicious. We both ended our dinner with a drambuie souffle.

No show tonight so we'll probably watch another movie in our room.  Another sea day tomorrow, with a similar schedule. 6 1/2 days to go!

Sea Day #5

While information has been very hard to come by, it appears like last night's incident was triggered by an unruly passenger who Princess deemed to be "a threat to follow passengers".  Apparently since the incident happened while within 3 miles of the island of Hawaii, Princess has to involve the local authorities.  The captain did finally include a comment about this in his daily noon address. 

This morning's events included the daily Sudoku challenge and a Navigation at Sea presentation.  I came in 4th out of 10 at Sudoku.  

The presentation was quite interesting. A ship's officer spent quite a bit of time talking about what it takes to work on the bridge. The picture on the left shows the minimum years to reach each level and what license is required. On the right is a picture of the bridge controls. If you make it larger the small wheel on the blue box in the center is what they used to manually steer the ship.  He also spoke extensively about how, while they use several GPS systems,  they do manually check positions using charts, especially as they approach a port. 

The afternoon was the start of a new golf tournament.  We did the first of 6 contests with the scores being cumulative.  We will continue to play this week.

Being formal night, we had very good entrees at dinner this evening.  Lobster tail and some excellent desserts!  YUM! You gotta love Lobster night!

Princess has added a new option where you can have lobster or a steak any night, but for an extra $19, so we skip that option.  

Tonight's production show was Sweet Soul Music which featured a lot of Motown hits. We're pretty sure we'd seen this show before, but it was still very enjoyable and the cast did a great job of putting it on. 

Love those Princess production shows!!

Sea day #5 coming up tomorrow, with more on board activities. 

Kona, Hawaii

 We had a relaxing day today.  Originally we had a marine wildlife excursion scheduled, but the more we thought about it, sending 3 hours in a the hot sun on a Zodiac was not worth a few possible whale sightings.  So we took the tender into town on our own for some shopping. 

As we approached the town we were surprised to see a Cariloha (bamboo products) store!  I had been needing some new socks and they were out of stock online.  The store we found in Waikiki only had 2 pair, but this store had 4, so I bought them out!  I wear these daily so getting 6 new pair was a blessing.  As we wandered down the main street so Mary could visit some shops, I stopped in for a local brew.  Mary took a photo from the street, and I did a selfie with my view of the shore, with the ship in the background. 

On our way back to the ship we were able to get more photos of the Crown Princess. Based on how it was docked at the other three ports, this was our best opportunity to get pictures of the whole ship. 

So now we are on our way to Ensenada, Mexico. At least we were on our way, but when I checked the navigation screen, I noticed we had reversed course and are headed back to Kona.  All passenger services will say is "an incident happened and the Captain will be making an announcement".   Further info to follow, when we find out!

Well, its now an hour later and we are now at anchor back at Kona. We've let down one tender that made a trip to shore, and it just returned. No announcement from the Captain and it's getting late so I assume we will know more in the morning.  A ship's officer told me that this will not affect our arrival in Ensenada.