Tales of a Shoebox Princess

 Back in early 2020, Jim and I had planned a nice week-long fall drive in new England to cross off some states that we hadn't been to. The pandemic scuppered those plans, but we kept trying to find time to reschedule. Finally last fall, we settled on late May of 2025 and Jim set to work planning our route, looking up places to stay, etc. We discussed what we wanted to see while on our drive. I had one week between the cruise and the road trip, which was just enough time to do laundry and repack my suitcase.  We left Thursday after work and drove 3-ish hours to Wisconsin and I took no photos because we were just in the car and then in the hotel. Who needs to site-see in WI when you live in MN, although someday I would like to go to Door County. WI is delightfully wooded, but the drawback with woodsy areas is you get a lot of deer roadkill on the highways. The next day we drove all day to just south of Columbus Ohio. It was a nerve-wracking drive because of the traffic through C...

When we went for breakfast this last full day at sea, one of the ship's personnel walked around the buffet encouraging attendance at a cooking demo in the theater later on that day. We thought why not? Who doesn't like food?  We saw lots of towel animals randomly placed around the ship!  By the time we got to the theater to attend the cooking demo, the seats were nearly full. We had to sit separately. The demo was being given by the head chef and the head maitre'd. A few minutes in, it was apparent this was for laffs.  Maitre'D must have had stage experience because he knew how to play to the crowd. Every time someone came in late, he would stop what he was doing and politely greet the latecomer, thank them for coming and ask for their cabin #. He would assign someone to send them chocolate covered strawberries. I wish I'd been late. Chef would giggle at MaitreD's antics (over filling a pot with pasta, picking up pasta from the floor and putting it back in the p...

 Today was an at sea day, but we were going into Glacier Bay to see....glaciers! Wilderness as far as the eye can see, until it sees cloud cover. Tiny white dots are goats I didn't know glaciers could be so gray. This is the glacier we had come to see. I love the shapes of the ice chunks See that rift to the right? It's a bit wider than other crevasses. That chunk sheared off while I was taking pictures It was cool to watch! The girls were up on the open air deck and could hear it crack like thunder. I was at one of the windows inside and watched it from a bit of a warmer vantage point, but that meant I didn't hear it. Oh well. I enjoyed watching it fall. After glacier observation, we played games in the Palm dining room and laughed. Bananagrams first Then Speed (with mushroom playing cards) Then we went to a national park conservation program. After the speaker was finished, I followed her so I could ask where I could get my national park passport stamped. She told me wher...