Cruise of a Lifetime: Day 1 At Sea – Dining on the Ship - Book Giveaway!

The first day of the 12 day cruise was a day at sea. This was helpful as it gave us time to familiarize ourselves with the boat. We had a stateroom with a balcony on the 9^th floor. Luckily, there were maps of the boat at each elevator bank. There were two banks of elevators on each floor both forward and aft so 4 banks of 4 elevators on each floor. There were also stairs for when we wanted exercise or to avoid waiting for an elevator. There were about 2,000 passengers and 1,000 crew members on this cruise.

Of course, on a cruise, the food is plentiful and varied and always available. So we immediately made ourselves acquainted with all the dining areas.

There was the Oceanview Café for buffet style around-the-clock food and then the main dining room for two seatings at dinner unless, like us, we had select dining which meant we could eat whenever we wanted during their open hours. The dining room was open for lunch and breakfast at specific hours depending if we were in port or not and that was general seating.

The wait staff was excellent and we had the same crew (4 in all) in the dining room which meant they anticipated what we wanted and gave us extra food to try when they thought we would enjoy it.

There were also the specialty restaurants that required reservations and an additional fee. There were 4 in all and we only tried 2 as we really enjoyed our dining room crew. We tried both the Tuscan Grill and Murano’s, the French Restaurant. We thoroughly enjoyed our meals though having 6 people wait on us at Murano’s was a lot for us. However, we did enjoy the table side cooking of our lobster there :-)

We did take a tour of one of the galleys in the dining room on that first day.

Our guide was the Executive Sous Chef who, though he had worked for Celebrity Cruise Line for a long time, had boarded the ship the day we did. He was from Jamaica so we felt right at home :-)  My husband even helped out answering a question from one of the guests when the Chef didn’t have the answer. My husband is a certified auxiliary chef for the Coast Guard :-}

Luckily, my awesome husband bought the recipe book of all the meals that this boat prepared, so I can have this food whenever I want! Well, more like whenever I want to go off my diet. He also had the book signed by the Executive Chef, other sous chefs, the Captain of the boat, and everyone who waited on us be it Shore Excursions, dining, or bar staff. 

We got to bed relatively early that night as we had to be up by 5:00am to be ready to visit Rome!

Since it is Sunday here on Happily Ever After Thoughts, I think it only fair that I should give away a copy of my latest book Cruise into Eden to one lucky commenter. So leave a comment for a chance to win!

Always, Lexi

www.lexipostbooks.com

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Next: Day 2 – Michelangelo in The Vatican