Jay’s Internet Log

During the night, Royal Princess continued her passage south following the coast of Vancouver Island.  The ship will continue to do so until around 7:30AM this morning when we will turn to port and enter the Strait of Juan De Fuca.  Vessels transiting the Strait are required to follow a vessel Traffic Separation Scheme (TSS) which separates inbound ships from those outbound.  Following the inbound lane of the scheme we will make our way east towards Victoria.  Rounding Race Rocks we shall then turn north and make our final approach into Victoria.  We expect to be alongside in Victoria around 2:00PM.

This morning, I woke up early and went to the gym again.  After breakfast, we started packing, something that isn’t nearly as exciting as unpacking was a few weeks back.  We only packed for an hour as I wanted to come and sit and wait for the final entertainment show of the cruise.  I sat and posted a single post before the Internet decided to give out on me, so I’m not sure if I’ll be able to post anything else until after getting home.  And now I’m home.  The final production show on the cruise was very good, and afterwards we had lunch, then finished packing.  Heather and I took our luggage up to the gym to weigh it, and it’s a good thing we did as one of our bags was 52 pounds, which would have cost $100 extra.  You’ve got to love the airlines (speaking of airlines, that’s a completely different story that won’t get written up here just now).  It was funny because we had our luggage all opened and were transferring clothes back and forth between bags in the middle of the gym.  At around 2:00PM, we arrived at Victoria, British Columbia, another port I’ve never been to before.  There’s an old Maritime law that states that a ship without 100% American crew can not start and end in US ports without visiting a foreign country, so that’s why we were here today.  Someone on the loudspeaker came on and said that there was a car show in town, so Mom and Dad took off for it, while Heather and I saw a lighthouse to walk to.  As we started walking to it, down a very long, narrow pathway that descended 30 feet to either side into the ocean sans handrails, the fog started to roll in, enough so we couldn’t see much in front of us.  I found it fun.  We saw some guys fishing and within 10 seconds of saying hello to them, the conversation turned to hockey.  Yes, we were in Canada!  We had a shore excursion this night.  We went to “The Enchanting Butchart Gardens”, a tour I signed up for because Mom loves flowers, and I’m glad that I did.  Victoria itself has a plethora of potted flowers all over the city, and it smells as such everywhere you go.  The Butchart Gardens is a 55 acre area that contains some of the most beautiful gardens I’ve ever seen.  The map has a route laid out for you to walk, and sometimes you’ll be walking down a path and all of a sudden there’s a huge garden below you.  It’s a place that I’d love to go back to given more time.  So, as I said earlier in this post, I am home now, and got home about 2:00AM local time last night.  The past 14-15 days have been some of the best cruising days I’ve ever had.  It may have been the itinerary, the ship, or the crew on the ship this time, but Princess Cruises has done it again, and I eagerly look forward to my next adventure with them.