Tales on the High Seas: A journey aboard Norwegian Prima
November 2, 2022
I left off last installment on the evening of November 2nd. On this night I attended Donna Summer, the musical in the Prima Theater at 8:30 pm. It starred Kimberly Locke who gained fame in 2003, from coming in third on American Idol. I was familiar with her because back then I actually watched that show. I no longer do. She was the best thing about that show. I love musical theater and attend shows in NYC on a regular basis. I would guess I’ve seen over 100 shows at this point. Kimberly’s voice was the best part of the show. The show was basically a review of Donna Summer’s life interspersed with her music. I really enjoy the music of Donna Summer. But that book of the musical was forgettable. I really don’t remember most of it weeks later. Did I enjoy myself? Yes, I did. Kimberly’s performance was good and I’m glad I got to hear her sing. But thank goodness the show was complimentary because I would not be pleased if I had paid over $100 for a ticket to that show. When all was said and done, Dee Gee and I left the show and enjoyed a few drinks at the Metropolitan Bar. I had some sort of sustainable cocktail and soon after called it a night.
November 3, 2022 – Making Norwegian regret giving me a beverage package
I wanted to test out room service and ordered a bento box breakfast for one. I filled out a door hanger the night before and someone came around and collected the order before 4 am. It was yummy, but it just didn’t fill me up. I was given assorted pastries and a little container of fruit. I added some orange juice and some tea. Since I was still hungry, I continued breakfast up on Seaside Café with a made to order omelet with ham and cheese and a banana.
But was that really enough? I think we need a second breakfast. Just ask the hobbits. I made a trek up to Seaside Café to have a made to order omelet with ham and cheese and onions. Plus, I needed to make myself feel like I am sort of healthy so I added a banana.
Since I could not do the dry slides yesterday, I did them today. The Drop is a slide that removes what you stand on out from under you and initiates your fall through the slide. Everything was going well, until I got to this clear portion that juts out away from the side of the ship. It was there that I got stuck. I had to shimmy my way through the slide and soon I continued on. I don’t know what sounds I made or what I said, but you land outside of the Local. There were a number of diners out there and they all laughed as I made my exit. The Drop is the world’s first 10 story free-fall dry slide. It was fun. The other slide was The Rush, which features dueling dry slides where guests can race each other. Me and this other passenger raced each other. I don’t know who won because it took me a bit to get out of the slide. It was meh. It didn’t go all that fast. I enjoyed myself but it really wasn’t anything to write home about. I also took this time to go exploring and got more of the butterflies in my stomach when I went out on the glass walkway out on Deck 8’s Ocean Boulevard. Only one side was open. The other was closed off because a previous sailing had caused some damage. It is a nice feature, if you can get over the ”willies”.
Today was going to involve a lot of drinking. I was going to put a serious s dent into that drink package of mine. I had scheduled pub crawls on two successive days from 11:30 am to 5 pm. The first pub crawl was today! I looked at a previous sailing’s daily newsletter to discover the operating hours of the bars/lounges on ship and made decisions on the itinerary based on that information. The pub crawl had rules. Rule #1: The goal is to have fun, rule #2 think of how you will feel at dinner or the next morning, rule #3 lunch can be enjoyed either at the Local or Indulge Food Hall. We can split our visit to the bar at either the Local or at Luna. We have an hour stay at this stop.
An attempt was made so participants could eat something for lunch in addition to imbibing a beverage at either the Local or at the Luna bar. Since both bars were relatively near each other we could divide our group between the two bars and hopefully get quicker service. The Penrose bar was not included since we met there for the slot pulls. The Soleil bar was not included because we had the opportunity to experience that bar at the Sailaway party.
Everyone was asked to wear headgear to make the event more fun. I got to re-sue my Halloween hat. We started at one of my favorite bars, the Belvedere bar. I enjoyed it so much because the staff at this bar was stellar.
Most stops were 40 minutes in duration, so you had time to be served and not feel rushed. Our itinerary was as follows:
Belvedere bar, Metropolitan bar, Whiskey bar, Local/Luna bar, Observation Lounge, Waves Pool Bar, Speedway bar.
Participants could come and go as they please. No one was tethered to the group. 114 people had signed up to participate. Therefore, I split everyone up into two groups. When all was said and done, I would guess 15 people showed up for pub crawl #1. Was I upset? Heck, no! Now I didn’t have to worry about folx struggling to get served. I think we all had a wonderful time exploring the ship’s watering holes. More than one person came to me to thank me for incorporating a lunch stop into the mix. I absolutely loved my time at the Whiskey bar. Who knew? The spiked whiskey was my favorite drink. It was 1792 small batch bourbon, grapefruit juice, fresh lemon juice, rosemary syrup and water. The Metropolitan Bar was always good for a good time, and I had been visiting Metropolitan Bar at the very end of my evenings. I was recently there after my visit to the Noise Boys and Donna Summer, the musical. They specialize in different sustainable cocktails. That is where you can find Clarence, the chocolate cowboy these days.
Surprisingly, I managed to emerge from all of these bars/lounges without feeling like a messy drunk. I pulled it all together. Thankfully, I didn’t suffer any ill effects and never had a hangover this entire trip. Part of it was that I did have water in between alcoholic beverages on occasion and I’m sure that helped. The other part is I was a bit sensible and monitored my body well because I didn’t want to ruin my vacation with alcohol poisoning. Yuck!
If you want dessert and not a cocktail, try letting the Waves pool bar use their blender to concoct a mudslide for you. Absolutely delicious.
You drizzle chocolate syrup inside of the glass and add a few ice cubes to the blender. Combine Bailey’s Irish Cream, Kahlua, vodka, milk, and ice in the blender. What does a mudslide taste like? A mudslide tastes pretty similar to a chocolate milkshake, especially if you include the optional ice cream. Some people even like to put extra cocoa powder in the milk to give it an additional chocolate kick. I don’t think they did that here.
But now I got into trouble. I used one of my specialty dining credits at Onda by Scarpetta and was seated outside on Ocean Boulevard. It was a perfect evening to enjoy my time out there. I think where I made an error was to start with the bread service. I’m a sucker for bread and since I was on vacation, I really indulged. My starter was the braised octopus accompanied by a San Remo cocktail (Bulleit bourbon, compare, carpano antiqua vermouth, elderflower liqueur, orange, lemon, and lime juices). The octopus was everything I wanted it to be. My pasta was mezzelune with ricotta, spinach, preserved truffle, butter, and sage. I would have ordered two servings if my stomach would allow me. For secondi I had the veal chop Milanese (herb bread crumbs, arugula, tomato, red onion). By this point I was getting quite full. I don’t recall ordering contorini. I think I skipped right to dessert. What a treat was my salted caramel budino with chocolate chip cookies and chocolate gelato! There is a restaurant in my hometown that makes wonderful budino so the bar was set high. Yet, this did not disappoint. What a fantastic meal! If you are on a Norwegian ship that has Onda, I encourage you to give it a go.
I had a reservation to see some stand-up comedy that evening. But since I was so stuffed from Onda, I could not join Dee Gee. I would not have enjoyed myself. I felt like I was a stuffed sausage that was squeezed with filling until it was about to burst. She later reported back that I really didn’t miss anything. She didn’t enjoy the comedian that evening.
NEXT: A roller coaster ride in a jeep in Aruba