Quote

"Rock and roll is just rock and roll"
--AC/AC, from the last track on the Back in Black album

Ugh

I don't think it's unintentional that the word blah and the word blog kind of rhyme.

Anyway, today is my fourth day aboard the Carnival Miracle. I spent the afternoon in St. Maarten. I think that's how the island is spelled because I saw it written that way, though there may be a better spelling. The island pretty similar to other Caribbean Islands I've visited, and fairly unremarkable on the surface... which is all I saw today. I will have four more chances to find something other than the regular tourist shops and an average beach.

There were three other cruise ships at our same dock today. Each one was as big as our ship or bigger. That means that probably over 10,000 people unloaded on to the St. Maarten today. That seems like a ton of people, but maybe it's not. An ski mountain at a busy Colorado resort holds over 10,000 skiers. I suppose that tourist towns are really dependent on dumps of tourists like that.

Our band has tonight off. The group is a full 10 piece orchestra and it's a lot of fun so far. The music here is more challenging in many ways than the music I've played on other ships. Our director has us playing a few original charts that he has written, and also some very challenging charts like "Some Skunk Funk" and others with little or no rehearsal. Still, the vibe is positive and non-competitive even when we mess some stuff up, so that's a good thing. Last night we backed up a Motown singer who was very Vegas-y but still put on a good show. The night before, we played a couple full big band sets, two production shows, and had a rehearsal for the Motown singer. That made for a long night, but it went okay. The day after tomorrow is a Beatles tribute show, and I'm looking forward to that one. I'll blah more later.

Second First Cruise

After a month back home in Colorado, I flew out to Fort Lauderdale last Monday to join the the orchestra of another cruise ship. I'm scheduled to work on the Carnival Miracle until the middle of January.

The Miracle was built in 2004 and is newer than the other two ships that I've been on. It's less cheesy and neon than the other ships I've seen. My room is a bigger and in better shape. Another plus is that my roommate is staying in his girlfriend's cabin, so I essentially have my own room.

The ship size is somewhere between that of the Triumph and the Imagination. It's 963 feet long, and relative thin at 106 feet wide. It can hold 2680 guests plus 950 crew members. It tonnage is 89, 452.

The itinerary of this ship could be a bit challenging since there's so much time at sea. Each eight day cruise includes four days at sea, and three ports besides the home port of in Florida. We have two different routes which alternate. This current round goes to St. Maarten, St. Lucia, and St. Kitts. Next week, I'll go to Panama, Costa Rica, and Belize.

I'll try to blog a lot. I'll have a lot of time on the ship, so hopefully I'll keep this up.