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Thar She Blows, Cap'n. This is taken from
the Gridley Joy Ride bus, while crossing the San
Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge. Our ship, the Ruby Princess,
awaits our boarding, alongside Pier 27 in San Francisco. The
pointy end is facing into the bay so she's ready for a rapid
escape. Our beautiful Golden Gate Bridge stands proudly in the
distance. We see the south tower, and the north tower is out of
sight to the right of the picture. If you have never thought
about it, that is a very long span to hold up for the last 88 years. It was the longest span of any bridge for decades.
Distance between the south and north towers is 4,200 feet or
4/5ths of a mile.
Almost there. This is the Aft (back) end of the Ruby Princess. She gets
pretty large the closer we get. There are some cruise ships out
there now that hold two and a half times the passengers Ruby
carries, so she is not at all in the big boat circle.
Terminal building is on the left, and we walk right from the
check-in counter to deck number four. Behind those metal gates
is a bevy of business, removing 4500 bags from the ship and
taking on another load as large. She is also taking on enough
food to fix some 100,000 meals before we return. Fueling can be
done while we are in foreign ports. Ruby can process bulk crude
oil for her engines, so she does not end up with bad fuel from a
foreign entity.
She came in this morning as the sun was rising, and she will
leave with us for our seven-day run before the sun sets.
Departure
We are under way. We are passing the well-known and never to be
missed feature that dominates the center of the San Francisco
Bay... Alcatraz Island.
One of the most notorious isolation spots
for hard-time felons, it could handle about 330 prisoners. It
fell into disrepair in the early sixties and they closed it due
to it being three times as expensive to maintain than other
prisons. Native Americans claimed it in the late sixties, but
all sorts of riff raff settled in and eventually torched many of
the buildings. It is open for public tours today.
Here are a couple of views of the north tower of the Golden Gate
Bridge. It is painted annually, with painters starting at one
end and working across to the other end. When finished, they
return to the other end and do it again. And again.
This image is our heading out 'the
gate', with a close-up view of the north tower of the Golden
Gate Bridge. That pile of dirt there is Marin County.
Those towers are hollow, with
ladders taking you to the top. Workmen only. Those two large cables
are made up of hundreds of strands of 1/2" cable, attached to the
foundation at one end, strung to the other foundation more than a
mile away, looped and sent back to this end, and returning,
again and again. The cables are spliced and make a single cable,
crossing the water hundreds of times, and then bound into a single
bundle to form the large 'cable' that we can see today.
Those towers reach 745 feet above the
water, and the clearance for ships passing under the bridge at
high tide is 200 feet. These two photos were taken from the private balcony I had next to
my cabin. About half of the cabins on the exterior of the Ruby
Princess have a balcony attached to them. There is a good number
of cabins that are 'interior' cabins, with no access to the
outside. I have never cruised with a cabin that did not have at
least a large window looking out to see what is going by.
Being able to stand and look at the horizon
if you feel a bit whoozie from the motion of the ship can be the
resolution of 'sea sickness' that some face. Even better is
standing at the helm, but Princess has not extended that option
to me. LOL.
This north tower rests on a poured footing
that goes clear to bedrock. The water is about 25 feet deep next
to the footing. The south tower, next to San Francisco, is about
100 feet away from the shoreline, and the footing stands about
80 feet above the bottom of the bay. Built in the thirties, they
had trouble digging the footing to bedrock, so they used
torpedoes that were dropped straight down, blasting open the
soil.
The water below the surface, as we serenely float
under the decking of the bridge, is about 275 feet deep, and the
current going out on low tide is enough to fight smaller boats
that want to come in.
Our First Port of Call
Taken a day later, this is a panorama image taken from my deck,
allowing us to see forward (to the left) and aft (to the right)
of the whole ship. The port is Long Beach. We spend the day in
port and sail at night, sometimes sailing in the day if we have
a good distance to travel to the next port. When sailing from San
Francisco to Hawai'i we sail open seas for five days straight.
 The first cruise Rosalee and I ever did was from
this port, on the Royal Caribbean 'VIKING SERENADE', for a
four-day cruise a lot like this one. That ship was half the size
as the Ruby.
The Gridley59 'Crew' at Dinner
Arnie and Dianna Stewart.
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Peggy (Haller) Neves and Don Segur
Howard and Florence Hamman
Joann and Larry Hamman,
Howard's younger brother.
Kenny Smith
Lynn and Jim Jackson
Mike and Groverlee Dahl
Ray and Lyndell Ivey-Din
Some odds and ends snapped
while wandering aboard the ship
Grove shared some random images of features
that were available to us.
These 'Premium Desserts' are normally above
and beyond a normal meal. We have many selections for goodies to
eat, literally 24/7. These are just about a mean in itself, and
while the meals are already paid as part of our fare, these are
for those who dare. I believe they were added to our trip free
of charge, as a gift from Princess or from our Cruise Agent,
SuzyCruizy.
I guess the goblins are also on board the
ships. Heavens. But I heard no trick-or-treaters knocking on my
cabin door.
Cruise ships usually find an excuse to
carve food or ice or something.
SMILE - You're On Candid Camera
%20Neves%20--%201024%20m.jpg)
Don Segur
and Peggy (Haller) Neves
Florence and Howard Hamman
Ray and Lyndell Ivy-Din
If you care to share any images that you have from the cruise,
please share them with us. There is a lot of room, right here.
An Evening At The Theatre
The first reunion cruise we did, someone
insisted we sit down in front, like row three, when we go into
the Princess Theater. Princess ships all have a theater in the
bow, and they are all called the Princess Theater. The seats
climb from deck five to deck seven. They can seat about half the
passengers at one time in there. There is usually a show every
evening in here. There is another venue at the aft of the ship,
and several places in between. You cannot be bored on the ship.
Even on long days at sea, such as crossing the ocean, they
schedule a lot of stuff that is quite entertaining, interesting,
or informative. Or all of above.
Anyway, after that first time sitting up
close, Rosalee and I continued to sit there on other cruises we
took after that one. And most of the group in our reunion
cruises have done it as well. It is up there where you can see the
expressions, and feel the sweat. LOL. No, not really. We did a
theatre tour once, and they had us up on stage and turned the lights
to be like they have them when someone is up there performing.
They cannot see past the second row. That is why the MC usually
comes out to 'warm up' the audience. By doing that, the
performers can hear how full the theater is. That helps them.
For all they know, the theater would be empty past row two. LOL.
Well, unless the Gridley59 bunch is in the house.
What One Does When One Has More Money Than One
Knows What To Do With It
While berthed in San Diego, we were shown
an example of that. I understand that our friend,
Mark Zuckerberg, of Facebook fame, owns several boats. This is one of them.
Named 'LAUNCHPAD', she is 387 feet long. That is an extra 29
yards added to a football field in length. With four engines
producing 23,300 horsepower, she is said to have cost him
$300,000,000 dollars. Did you notice the helipad on the top?
That 'little guy' berthed in front also
belongs to Mark. This is Mr. Mark's 'WINGMAN', which sails when
'LAUNCHPAD' sails. She is the 'support ship'. She carries surface
craft, can also hold a chopper, has a diving facility, including a
decompression chamber, is only 220 feet long, and cost a mere $thirty
mil.
Remember when those first 'home computers'
came out in the early 80s, promising to allow us to 'keep
recipes and balance our check books'? And we were telling our kids,
"You cannot make money in computers. They are just a passing
fad." LOL. Even we don't believe that now, when this
beautiful black and white 'fad' cruises past us.
In the image below we are berthed in the Ensenada port. The
image was taken from my balcony again, and the ship you see on
the right is
not ours. That is Royal Caribbean's 'NAVIGATOR OF THE SEAS'. We
were tied up in her spot on our last reunion cruise down this
way.
For those who are not familiar with that
certain law called the Jones Act of 1920, it declares that if any passenger ship
that is of foreign registry leaves a US port, it is required to visit a foreign port
during the cruise before it disembarks at a US
port. US registry ships do not have to follow that rule.
Princess ships are registered in Bermuda, so, if we board in SF,
we must visit a foreign port before we return to SF. Princess
ships leaving SF or Long Beach usually visit Ensenada, the
closest foreign port, unless
they go on down to the "Mexican Riviera" on ten-day cruises.
Or some may sail from Seattle, San Francisco or Long Beach and
pass through the Panama Canal, which I guess they consider that
a foreign port. That is a longer trip and they likely will stop
in a port somewhere along the way.
Princess ships leaving Seattle visit Vancouver, Canada before
returning. Ships sailing north to Alaska from Seattle, SF, or
Long Beach will stop at Vancouver either on the way up or on the
way back.
That is why we are in Ensenada.
Bienvenidos
a Baja (Welcome to Baja)
This is a little better view of
Ensenada. I have always thought that Ensenada was a tiny Mexican
town. I don't think so, Tim. It goes way back into them thar hills.
Sailing, Sailing, O'er the Bounding
Main
For Many a Stormy Wind Shall Blow, ere
Jack Comes Home Again
Our compass is set on something
close to Northbound, and our speed is about 19 knots. We are headed
home, to San Francisco Bay. We are not running close to the shore,
due to the fact that we are taking a direct route from Ensenada that
will slip past San Diego and Long Beach. Shore is on our starboard
side... the right side, but just far enough to not be noticeable.
Perhaps 10 to 15 miles. Standing on this deck, if we turn and look directly to the right,
we could likely see the shoreline.
You can see a protrusion up
ahead, jutting out from the ship. That is called the starboard
bridge wing (one on each side of the ship) and is part of the
bridge, from where the ship is controlled at all times. It sticks
out so the crew can stand out there and see the edge of the ship at
the waterline, crucial for docking. It is the widest part of the
ship... except for the fin stabilizers, which are retractable
"wings" that usually can be changed to offset a ship's rolling to
the side. It is for comfort mostly, and for reducing sea sickness on
cruise liners. They stick out only when needed in open waters, to
counteract force from waves or wind that tend to pitch the ship side
to side. A rolling action.
In 2000 our family joined us on a trip from
Alaska to Vancouver on the Dawn Princess, and we actually talked
an officer into allowing a dozen of us to walk onto the bridge
and speak with the captain. That opportunity was eliminated after
9/11/2001, sadly.
Below me you can see another
row of private balconies, and a third row below that. Notice those
balconies push out further than mine does. That is due to some
balconies being deeper. Or, the cabin is wider and pushes out more.
Notice that avove me is the underside of some balconies that cover
my deck completely. My balcony is a little more 'private' than the
deck below me.
Notice that on the lower deck,
about four balconies forward, the door between the two balconies is
open. They are normally closed and opened only in port when the crew
is washing the windows. However, if friends or family are in the
cabin next to you, you can request the door be locked open, so you
can enjoy each other on your balconies, or run next door to check on
the kids... if they don't lock the sliding glass door. LOL.
Zoom in on the bottom of the
image and you can see the door details, and hinges on the door for the
lower deck. Notice the balcony just below me does not have a door
and hinge? That tells me that their balcony is deeper than mine. The
door is more under my balcony.
"San Francisco. Open Your Golden Gate
You'll Let Nobody Wait
Outside Your Door
San Francisco, Here Is Your Wanderin' One
Sayin' I'll Wander No More "
It is 0-dark-thirty as they
say... we have passed the Golden Gate bridge and are eastbound,
entering the bay, admiring San Francisco. I have always felt the best feature about
any city is the view of it, all lit up, from a distance. The red
spire, then the blue top, then the bold, white Coit Tower, at the
top of the hill. Always good to be 'home'.
We will need to be out of
our cabin by 0800 this morning, so they can clean up our messes and
be ready to welcome the next 2,000 anxious cruisers by noon. Ruby
will be headed out before the sun sets this evening, headed to Alaska, California
north coast, Hawai'i, California south coast, or Mexico, depending
upon the season. No rest for the weary.Those ships usually serve
about 25 hard years and are sold off to serve other duties.
The crew members often will
have a 'day ashore' should they choose to go ashore, but only a
small few at a time. Their work goes on while passengers play, tour,
or sleep. I have visited
with crew members who were on a break, and were on an excursion with
us. Interestingly, crew staff have different employment agreements
with ship's owners, depending upon their home country. Most will be
assigned to a ship for anywhere from four months to possibly 8
months, then have a month or two at home. They may or may not return
to the same ship next time. We have recognized some crew staff on a
second cruise on the same ship several years apart. And they
recognized us as well. It is a whole new world in the world of
cruising.
We had a beautiful bus and
great driver, both coming down and heading back. If anyone has an
image of our bus, I will post it if you share it with me.
It was a wonderful cruise, as
they all have been. And... no one got sick on this one, so far as I know.
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