Day #44…Sunday, March15, 2015

Sea Day #1…Heading to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico

San Juan Del Sur, Nicaragua

We had an eventful morning on the ship, as our last bag of laundry did not return to our cabin.  When we asked the cabin steward, he said he had delivered it all to us and did not have his copy of the receipt.  We had questioned why passengers do not get a copy when laundry is sent to be completed and were told that only the laundry and the cabin steward need copies.  From memory, we had to make another list of what had been sent, and he went looking for our garments.

Several hours later, he found them and seemed very upset that he had to spend time in the laundry looking.  We wanted to remind him that if he had not discarded our receipt, then the job would not have been so difficult.  Let us say that we have had better cabin steward service on other cruises.

Our next stop was to take care of an art gallery problem.  We had requested to change a frame pattern and color on one of the pieces of artwork that we purchased.  We had stopped four times to talk to the sales person that was to take care of us and felt he was avoiding us.  Last night we briefly ran in to him and he said he would see us between 10 and 12 Noon today.  We arrived at 10:10 AM and the receptionist said he was busy and was not available.  Pleasing words were not in the vocabulary after that response.

We were told to come back later and the final outcome rests in our hands.  They will not take care of changing the frame before it ships from Florida.  We were given the email address and phone number to take care of the changes ourselves.  In the future, we will be reluctant to use the company again.

We started to pack our luggage and see if our souvenir items would fit into our suitcases that we brought with us.  It is going to be a tight fit so we may be looking for another piece in Puerto Vallarta.

Dinner in the evening was an Italian theme and our waiter, Luciana, was pleased that our tablemate treated us all to an after dinner drink promotion Princess Cruises was offering.  She told us if she sold ten (10) between her first and second seating guests, she would get to have a day off in Puerto Vallarta.  Dennis signed another voucher and told her we would buy whatever she needed to make her goal, if the second seating people did not buy enough.  She was so pleased!  She has been such a wonderful waiter and we also told her that if there are any bottles of wine left on our wine package we bought, we are gifting them to her.  She is Brazilian and loves wine.

In the Princess Theater, mentalist and illusionist, Wayne Hoffman, entertained us.  His show was intriguing and we do not understand if he really has special powers or his show is just an act.  A singer from Mexico entertained in the Explorer’s Lounge during the next hour.

 

Revis, Nicaragua

When we arrived back in our cabin, we checked our email and had some very sad news.  Our daughter-in-law, Ellie, had flown to LA on Thursday to see her father and run in the LA Marathon today.  This was her first marathon and we were anxious to see if she was able to complete the run.

On her sister’s Facebook page, we read the terrible news that her father had had a massive heart attack this morning and died instantly.  He was 68 years old and too young to die.  Jeff had also emailed us and asked us to call him ASAP.

Ellie had started her race and had run for about an hour when she got a cell phone call from the police telling her about her father.  Ellie means to the world to us and we immediately called from the ship’s phone, to reach Jeff and get more information.  We had never called from the ship’s phone and Dennis’s cell had no signal.  We are at sea for two more days and have emailed our Princess agent about flying home early.

Ellie’s mother died when she was a teenager and her family members now only include her sister and a nephew.  Her father was an only child and she has such a short support system to lean on.  We want to be able to help if we are needed.

We have two (2) more sea days and then we will arrive in Puerto Vallarta.  Dennis has checked about available flights home.   We plan to call Ellie today in LA from the ship and form a plan.