Vacation Day #4 (Sunday 3/19/06)

We were instructed to change our clocks ahead from 1 AM to 2 AM as we moved, during the night, from the Eastern Time Zone into the Atlantic one. We were awoken by a knock at the door at 7:40 AM - our pre-ordered continental breakfast was ready. The order was all wrong, unfortunately, and the coffee was cold. My husband called room service and a fresh (hot!) pot was brought the room immediately as well as the items missing from our request. We showered and went up the aft elevators to get the kids something to eat at the Horizon Buffet around 9:45 AM. They were eager to check out the Kids' Camp so we took them there at 10 AM before heading back to the Buffet to eat ourselves. We relaxed on the Sun Deck until noon - it was nice to spend some time together. We just marvelled at how amazing everything was - the ship, the beautiful (and expansive!) ocean... We knew already that we'd be doing this again. Every now and then, one of us would ask the other "Did you feel that?" but the motions, when we did feel them, were slight and never jarring or un-nerving.

When we retrieved our kids, we had pizza and hamburgers for lunch by the pools on the Lido deck. They were eager to go swimming but, since the Calypso and Neptune pools were completely packed, we took them to the Splash Pool by Morgan's Bar. The temperature was perfect - partly cloudy, 75-80 degrees and the seas were slight (1.4-4 feet). They swam for a while and we enjoyed afternoon ice-cream at Scoops before returning to the cabin.

At 5:15 PM, after we showered and dressed (our first formal night!), we headed up to Crooner's Lounge for the Captain's Welcome Cocktail Party. Dinner was at 6 PM in the Coral Dining Room. Olsen from the Philippines was our waiter and we had a lovely dinner. A ship that T had seen earlier in the day behind us passed us during dinner - turned out to be a Disney ship! We spent time on the Promenade deck (deck 7) after dinner and it quickly became my favorite place to watch the sunset. We went inside to look at and purchase our embarkation picture from the day before and headed to our cabin. To our surprise, the beds had not been taken down yet. We found Mr. Kem (as our children referred to him) and he apologized and said he'd get right to it. Because of the kids, we turn in rather early - there was no way for him to know this having just met us. Every other night of this cruise, our room was perfectly ready for bed by the time we returned from dinner. Kem was truly a gem. Anyway - while he worked in the room, we took the kids up to the M.U.T.S. to see what was playing. Already in progress was Family Stone (with Sarah Jessica Parker). We found chairs easily, grabbed blankets and enjoyed the movie and popcorn for about an hour. The kids started dozing off in our arms so we headed back to the cabin and were all sound asleep after our first full day at sea by 9 PM.