Alaska Cruise Days 1 & 2: Embarkation and At Sea

 Saturday morning, we got up, packed up our stuff and headed to the Princess Sapphire! It'd been a long time coming (cruise was booked in February of 2023!). We met up with David and Sandy at their hotel and were walked over to Canada Place for check in and security. It was handy to go with a Princess person because she knew right where to go. It didn't take us too long to get onto the boat. Megan and Me carried a big bag with the sodas in it. It was heavy! U got stopped in security because they thought he might have a knife in his bag. He didn't. However, Justin did but they didn't flag his bag....

Our boat, as seen from Suzi's hotel room.

View from our room on the boat. See the waterbus going by?

We enjoyed touring the boat. We kept running into family, which was fun. Bean was with us a lot of the time. She was super excited to see Megan and Matthew.

Megan, imagining fun times in the pool.

Matthew, Me and Megan up top.

Dancing at the Sail Away Party. It had to be moved inside because it started to rain. We really did have nice weather in Vancouver so can't complain too much.

Heading under Lions Gate Bridge.

More dancing!

Me, Megan, Matthew and U

U entertaining David and Sebastian during dinner. There were magical crayons and pens.

After dinner, we went to see the juggler. His tricks were cool but we didn't appreciate a lot of his humor.

U and Me walking the promenade deck Sunday morning when we woke up.

We enjoyed breakfast at the buffet with Sandy and David. We went to the Alaska land and sea presentations by the naturalist, which were really interesting. We bought a book that tells about where we are sailing and has a large map that shows where we might see wildlife.

It was somewhat rough seas for most of the day and a lot of people were feeling it. They said the waves were between 10-12 feet. The higher floors and the front and back of the boats definitely felt it more. Proof that the motion is not completely in my head: when trying to weigh the peanut for Matthew's dose, the scale went from -0.20g to +0.20g with nothing on it--it was jumping all around within that range. So my body is just sensing the same movement as the scale. 

Matthew's turtle buddy

Me's turtle buddy.

Megan enjoyed doing some crafts.

We saw a whale off of the ship right before lunch! We ate lunch in the International Dining Room. Matthew had ordered his meal the night before (he can do that with allergies--super nice!).

Me's fancy lunch

U's Monte Cristo sandwich

Megan and Matthew both got mac and cheese

A bunch of us went for afternoon tea. The scones with clotted cream and jam were delicious.
Clockwise from lower left: Me, Rowan, Accalia, Wren, Tanis, Sebastian, Suzi, Sandy

Bean and Matthew visit in the "window seat" while Megan rests.

Matthew, Bean and Megan at the formal dinner.

Yummy fish!

Fancy dessert

Matthew, Bean and Megan waiting for the start of the Bravo production show. We quite enjoyed it.

Me and U waiting for the show to start.

Our room. It was small but we had places to put everything and it worked out quite nicely.

U played games with a lot of his family most nights.