Day 229: Ahoy!

This morning, after a good breakfast at our hotel, we checked out from our rooms first and went around to check out the shopping scene in Copenhagen. Which basically meant walking over the closest mall and checking out the price tags because things were priced at far higher than their actual worth and I didn't end up buying anything. So while the shopping itself was quite uneventful, what was eventful was the fact that we got caught in the Danish rain. But since am a preparation genius, we were ready to tackle the rains too - with umbrellas for the adults and an effective rain cover for the little one's stroller. Am so proud of having added these items into the packing list because we have never carried even an umbrella on a trip before! 

Post that rainy stroll, we collected our luggage from the hotel and took a cab to the port terminal to board Royal Caribbean's 'Vision of the Seas', our first European cruise experience! This time too our cabbie was a Pakistani who struck a conversation in Hindi and seemed mighty please to have bumped into fellow Hindi speakers.

At the port, we completed the immigration and security formalities during which I realized that the little one has lost one of her shoes. It struck me that we had just taken a picture two minutes ago and if we check it we would know whether the shoe was present when we got down at the port or whether it was lost even before that. A quick look at the picture confirmed that the shoe was indeed present when we arrived at the port. Needless to say I felt like Sherlock Holmes. 

I traced back our steps from the security point to the taxi drop off point where the picture was taken, in search of the missing shoe. Unfortunately I couldn't find it. Now, you may wonder why I am writing the details of such an insignificant event down. Sure, it might not be significant, but I thought I should chronicle the possible events that could take place when travelling with an infant - in this case, the mystery of the missing shoe. Plus the fact that I felt like Holmes. 

Back to the cruise…. so yes, we completed the immigration and security formalities and boarded the Vision of the seas and checked into our ocean view room! Needless to say, we were pretty excited about the whole thing. 

[I cannot believe I didn't mention the below event in the blog before publishing it the first time! This was definitely THE highlight of the day!]

As we walked in search of our cabin, reading the numbers on each of the doors to figure out which one is ours, the hubby who was leading the way, stopped in his tracks and exclaimed "Oh my God, how did you manage this?!" His excitement was at seeing the birthday decor that was hanging on the door to our cabin, courtesy his lovely wife, of course. He had not expected that in the least, and his surprise was awesome to watch! 

You see, Royal Caribbean has the option of ordering gifts to the cabins and I managed to get some done discreetly. I was certain the hubby would not have expected this, and his excitment and wide grin were the exact reactions I was hoping for! I clicked a couple of pictures then and there. 

We stepped into the cabin and there were more streamers, chandelier shaped and flower shaped decor waiting for us. The hubby was thrilled, especially as these were accompanied by a small gift card with a customized birthday message for him, once again courtesy the lovely wife, i.e. me, of course. 

I should also probably mention that there were a few "gifts" for the little one - diapers and bottles baby food. For some weird reason, these also come under "gifts" at Royal Caribbean, so when I ordered them I even had to write customized messages because yes, the diapers and baby food also came with gift cards. Ours read "For your pee & poo purposes!" for the former and "Be a good girl and eat well on the ship!" for the latter. Really, what else can one say under such circumstances?!

After this exciting start to the trip, we spent the rest of the day relaxing on board, taking a ton of photos around the ship, enjoying the sea breeze, eating and drinking a lot and last but not the least, enjoying the beautiful landscape that we passed by as the ship sailed out of Denmark towards the Gulf of Finland. For a long time, we sailed by the land by our side and we saw beautiful islands with quaint cottages and charming churches, green pastures, and thickly vegetated landscapes. Over the sunset, the whole scenery and the atmosphere was just gorgeous.   

Dinner was in grand style with seated and served dining as opposed to the buffet style that am familiar with on the cruises I have been on before. When I asked the waiter for "anything mashed for the baby", the restaurant manager turned up and gave me the list of vegetables he could mash up for me. He then followed up by actually bringing me a bowl of the vegetables to check on before he actually mashed them up! Brilliant service indeed! I must say every member of the restaurant crew so far seem to have been trained to make the guests feel like royalty. I really enjoyed the dinner experience! 

After that satisfying dinner experience, we called it a day, looking forward to tomorrow which would be spent wholly at sea.