Day 5- High Ho! Or is it Land-Ho!?

OK – this is it! This is the final posting about our cruise (maybe, unless I remember something else).

I just remembered something that I should have put on an earlier cruise post: I guide of Nassau told us that Columbus discovered Nassau – that was the first thing of the world he discovered. I think I remember it is not clear just what island he first landed on.

Now, on with the last day.

We were to vacate the room by 8:00am. We were to hang out someplace and wait for them to call our number after we had breakfast.

I woke up at 4:30am and went for a walk. I went for a walk every morning. The 7th level deck has an unobstructed walk all around it. It was about 1300 plus feet… I forgot exactly. A sign on the 7th deck that went completely around the boat said 3 and 1/3 laps equaled a mile. I walked around it a couple of times and went to the top deck and walked around it a couple of times. On both decks up front, or stern I think, was very windy… I could not wear my baseball cap.

On the aft side of the 7th floor I thought of hanging over the railing and spread my arms and say, “I’m Servant of the World”. But I didn’t.

Also when I passed a woman out for a morning stroll I thought it might be witty to say, about the strong wind, “Thar she blows!” but she might misunderstand what I was trying to say and throw me overboard.

We more or less had to only do our bathroom duties, change into some day clothes, throw our toiletries and sleep stuff into a small luggage and leave the room. We went to breakfast.

A man, woman, a boy about 10 or 11, and a younger girl were seated already. We sat beside them. By their body language and the way the adults addressed the children I don’t think they were the parents. But, I could be wrong. After they got off the ship they were going to some kind of kung fu match in Jacksonville.

The little girl was very sleepy. She rather be curled up and dozing than sitting up and eating.

Out of the blue her eyes opened and she said, “Bubba ate snails last night!” We coughed up our orange juice. – not really.

As soon as we finished eating we left wondering where we should go and there stood a man and woman with clipboards that looked like they should be on the staff.

I asked one of them, I forgot which, has Brown-One been called yet. I went on to say we were eating breakfast and we could hear them call out something, we just didn’t understand what. The woman looked on her clipboard and said we were next – we could wait right there…. Which we did.

I am glad she was really using that clipboard instead of just getting out of work. That was a standard joke at the post office, if you wanted to get out of work, just bring a clipboard to work and walk around with it… no body will ask you what you are doing with that clipboard – they are afraid to.

Sure enough, they called Brown-One. We proceeded in a line that lead out of the ship, into the terminal and through customs. I looked at my watched as we stepped on the ship and it was 8:39am.

The customs agent welcomed us to the United States and we got our luggage and the porter we enlisted knew exactly where to take it, to the Radisson Inn shuttle. We were back at the Radisson Inn in the parking lot looking for our car by 9:00.




Before we left the area I waned to check out Manatee Park. I like Manatees. We went to the park which was an opened air building overlooking the Red River (I think). We stood there a while and saw some fish jump up from the water and splashed back in. Anna saw a large thing come out of the water and back in – it may have been a dolphin.

We left and drove back towards Georgia.

In the same area as coming down, north of Orlando we got into another slow-poke traffic situation. We finally saw what the holdup was, the gawkers were looking at a tractor-trailer turned over in the southbound lane. The cab was burned to ashes. Up the road about 5 miles or so, and almost an identical type of wreck – an 18 wheeler with the cab burned to ashes. I think we were in the Orlando Triangle.

We only stopped, other than one time for gas, once. Near Cordele, Georgia, we stopped at a big store that sold quality name-brand clothes cheap. I bought a pair of Levis and a North Face rain jacket for a slightly more than fair price.

If you have read the journal of the Westmoreland family that I put in a few pages from time to time, Arthur and Gwen Westmoreland Hunter lived in Cordele and were mentioned often.

In the store Anna and I were walking around checking out what all they had and a little girl about 2 years old was in the shoe department whining. As we got closer we heard her whine, “I farted!” That was the 2nd time that day that little girls said the Darnnest Things.

The next time we stepped out of the car was in Marietta. We were surprised how cool it was… but nice and home-like!