My views do not necessarily reflect the views of my employer.
November 10 to December 7 2024
I flew from Melbourne Australia to San Francisco. My cousins Cameron and Selina picked me up from the airport, which was great – could get all of the gossip from the last six months on the two hour drive to Clarksburg. I arrived home on the 10th of November to a house of new babies.
Three weeks before I came home, Adrienne’s daughter Hayley was born.
Easton took about 5 minutes of making sure it was really me after not seeing me in person for 6 months, before he took me around Papa and Bobby’s house to give me the updates on all the tractors.
In June, Easton’s little sister Ella was born.
I got home on a Sunday for the remainder of a long weekend with my favorite people in the Sacramento area. Then on Friday I was invited to a group call with Princess where they announced that they had great exciting news! They would be eliminating the positions in the Entertainment Department as we knew them, but we could apply for the new exciting positions! I was so glad I was home on vacation. My friends on ships got this call and then had to go back to work. Within the hour I had a letter saying that I would not be offered another contract with Princess but I was invited to apply for the new positions. The options for the new positions were 1) I could apply to do what I had been contracted to do for the last six years, but share a cabin or 2) I could do the extra stuff I had been volunteering to do for the last couple of years, get an extra stripe and a nicer cabin than I had been allocated before.
I sent a message to my friend Niki who had messaged me about a position as a US Ambassador for MSC about a year and a half before. They had been looking for Americans who had traveled in Europe and worked on cruise ships to come cruise in Europe as a guest and help other American guests on their vacation to Europe. I would throw a cocktail party once a week, sit in a lounge for a couple of hours so the guests would be able to find me, attend the activities on the ship and go on Shore Excursions when possible. When Niki had first messaged me I was scheduled to join the Enchanted Princess in the Mediterranean, so it didn’t make sense to quit the job I was already enjoying to go where I wanted to go, but now I was in a different situation.
During my contract on the Diamond, it had shown up on the crew website that my next ship would be on the Grand Princess which would go to Mexico and Hawaii. I really did not want to do that. Hawaii is beautiful but there are too many sea days and time changes to get there and back. Going to Hawaii from Sydney had nearly killed me. So when a friend on the Majestic Princess said he would speak to the Entertainment Director and request me, I had low expectations of that actually happening. Then, a couple of weeks before my contract finished, it changed! My next assignment would be on the Majestic Princess starting February 4 – I would be home not only for Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Years, but also for my birthday! I love not working on my birthday! And the Majestic was going to the Mediterranean one month into my contract. I was still skeptical. Princess had promised me the Med so many times, and it hadn’t worked out yet. As soon as the assignment came through, there was a part of me that didn’t think it would actually happen. So of course! Of course, when I have a contract going to the Med, they would restructure the Entertainment Department and send me a letter saying I would not be offered another contract. I decided to look into my options.
After a couple of days of Niki giving me more details about the job, she said they could get me on a ship by the end of the week. Whoa! This was going fast. I had been home for nine days. I had been looking forward to being home for the holidays, but if they wanted me to travel around Europe and pay me more than Princess had been paying me (almost double), I decided to go for it. I would still apply for the two-stripe position at Princess, but I would check out this MSC job while they figured things out. They said they were trying to find a ship for me. I would either be going to Northern Europe or Saudi Arabia. I obviously couldn’t start packing until they figured that out.
I was able to be home for Thanksgiving.
MSC confirmed that they had a place for me in Northern Europe and wanted to know when I could start. After Thanksgiving I had planned to fly back to Washington with my mom and Ron Voyage and then the three of us would go visit my buddy David, the Checkerboard guy, a guest entertainer who my mom and I had met in Japan. He had a brewery and an Air BnB just across the water from my mom in Canada. MSC asked if I could join on the 1st, the 8th or the 15th of December. Even if I waited until the last day it wouldn’t work to be able to go see David with my mom. So I told MSC I would fly to Germany and join on the 8th. We would have to go see David’s place when the weather was nicer. Everyone was disappointed (including me) but understood my predicament.
So I ran around town trying to figure out what I needed for this new job – a navy suit for the day time, and a white outfit for White Night (this cruise line had different theme nights than I was used to) and all the toiletries and winter things I would need for three months.
When I first saw the itinerary I was surprised. Who goes to Northern Europe in the winter? I guess I was about to find out. We would go to the same ports every week – for the first time in six years I might know what day of the week it was! I was used to the itinerary changing every cruise, so it seemed weird that these ports were so repetitive, but then I thought, if someone asked if I’d like to spend 12 days in Hamburg, 12 days in Rotterdam, 12 days in Zeebrugge, 12 days in Le Havre and 12 days in Southampton, I’d say yes without hesitation. I’m just going to go once a week! I’m going to try to do different things every week instead of going to the same places over and over which I’d found myself doing lately. Plus if I need a day to rest, that port will come around again. I’ll let you know how it goes!