Cruise Number Two

Hi everyone!

I trust you are all keeping well wherever you may be!

I am currently in the Scottish sea, having left Oban last night and we are now en route to Invergordan. What a week this has been! We finished opening all of our seven shows on the first cruise and sailed into St. Malo for lunch with CC and Suzy. It was gorgeous in St. Malo, but I guess technically we had lunch in St. Servan, another gorgeous place where French is spoken all around. We sailed into Southampton on the last day for what we call “disembark/embark day” in which most of the passengers get off as the cruise is over and a new lot get on in one day and we sail away that night! Talk about a suite change over. Housekeeping works double time!

I was lucky enough to have my mum and granny come over from the Isle of Wight, where Granny lives, (just a 1 hour car ferry away) and they came aboard the ship! I gave them the grand tour of the beautiful 9 deck ship including insider detail to my cabin, the theatre and of course as my mother is a sommelier, our fabulous 6 star wine flight restaurant, La Champagne.

I have started a postcard collection from every port that I visit, which will be fun to look at when I am done. The unfortunate thing is, that I have terrible penmanship, so I’m going to just keep the postcards, and not send them out. That way you wont have to decipher what I am saying. We are in the middle of our second cruise, and this crowd is a bit tougher then the first; yet, I think they are cracking and are just lovely. I’ve already been invited to dinner by Mary a wonderful woman from England, cruising with us, and it was a wonderful dinner.

We visited Falmouth, and it was an adorable English seaside town, with the most delicious clotted-cream & black-current ice cream. (Lara – you need to try this ice-cream, it will change your life) We also ran into some Pirates, well, three young  strapping men, dressed as Pirates who were on their way to Penzance to be part of the new Guinness World record for most Pirates assembled in one place.

 After Falmouth came Cork, and we ported in Cobh, which had Titanic memorably everywhere as it was the last port of the great ship before it fell in that fateful night. Cork was stunning as well, the cathedral was beautiful and The famous English Market was amazing. I am still nibbling on some delicious local cheese.

 I have to say Dublin was a favorite so far. The hustle and bustle of the street reminded me of Manhattan and how much I miss its business. The Irish pubs in Temple Bar were amazing, and St. Stephen’s Green was as beautiful as Central Park, if not more-so.

Oban, where we left last night, was  a hit. The Oban distillery was a sight to see, and the Oban Fish & Chips had some of the best fried Cod I’ve ever had. However, it was the Muscles that was the winning dish here, and I had ½ a kilo for only £5.60! (and a ginger beer of course!)

We have our second night of Studio 54 tonight, a show where I get to sing Beatles, Rolling Stones, and Elton John’s, Don’t let the Sung Go Down on Me. (which might be my favorite Park & Bark number) ~Park & Bark is a term in musical theatre where you do nothing but sing and stand, no elaborate choreography, no dance breaks, just standing in one place (parking) and singing your heart out (barking) ~

Tomorrow I am going to do my first Shore excursion by Silversea. It has something to do, with having tea in a Scottish Castle, so I am looking forward to it. It should be quite fun. I am trying to get on the excursions as they seem to be a great guided way to see some amazing things in the ports that you might not be able to do if walking on foot or exploring on your own.

I am still trying to get pictures uploaded on here, as I am blogging on my computer and my photos are on my iphone, and they are having trouble blue-toothing. Since I don’t want to send them via email, to expensive to be on for that long, what should I do. ROB?  Perhaps I’ll work it out for next week.

Lots of love,

Rhett

Onboard The Ship!!

Hello everyone!

Let me start off by saying I’m terribly sorry I have had no chance to update my blog. Life has been extremely busy these past few weeks. But here is a quick recap of what has happened:

We finished rehearsing in the studio, completing the 5 shows and preparing for a possible Broadway show and an Italian show, which we had no idea would turn into full scale shows, once we arrived onboard, taking our show total up to seven different shows a cruise! We pack them in here on the Silver Cloud! On our last day off in Florida, we went to Disney World! It was a wonderful day off, we got there just as the Parks opened, and Carina (the Wind’s female singer  -also a dinseyland lover-) and I park hopped all around the four parks (Magic Kingdom, Epcot, Animal Kingdom, and Hollywood Studios) the whole day getting VIP seating at all three of the shows we saw: Finding Nemo, Illuminations - Reflections of Earth, and Fantasmic! We also got front seating on every single ride we did in each and every Disneyworld Park.  It was a wonderful late birthday present, and a great way to spend our last bit of free time before we boarded the planes. That’s right planes…. We had a bit of drama getting to the ship, as our first and supposedly only flight was delayed twelve hours. So we had to get a different flight on a different airline into Madrid and change to yet another airline where we had to pay for our bags again. We luckily made it to Barcelona, just in the nick of time however, just before the ship left port.

Our first night onboard was crammed with safety meetings and tours of the ship, while we all nearly fell asleep. It was lovely to meet our on ship Stager Claire, who is lovingly called CC. She is wonderful and it is a pleasure to have her shape our shows (many of which she was the original choreographer for) onboard the Cloud. The next day more rehearsal more safety and more getting acquainted with the ship. Of course I can’t forget about the wonderful Suzy, who is fitting my costumes, day and night. She is a gem, and even offered me a croissant when I didn’t gat any breakfast because I was feeling ill.

To date, we have opened our First show “Dance on the Waves” [Waves] to great success and big praise. We then opened the Italian show, which is the brainchild of our awesome Hotel Director, in which he pulls in the talents of the cast to help him tell the story of his “restaurant” which only serves Italian food. After that, Vicki and I went down to the Real Restaurant onboard and escorted some guests to their seats, and were seated at a table to enjoy an amazing dinner with them, the highlight being the Assiette of Duck. It was amazing!! We opened our third show “Fiesta Latina Nights” last night, and although I am quite a bit under the weather and have been hoped up on antibiotics, it went very well. Let me just say, our ballroom team Anton and Olga are amazing. We have been to Palma de Mallorca, Ibiza, Cadiz, and Lisbon so far and are currently sitting in Leixoes/Oporto. Because we have been rehearsing non stop I have only been able to get out in Cadiz. But it was wonderful. We visited the Cathedral and had a delicious ice-cream gelato thingy in a yummy cone.

We open “Broadway to the West End” tonight in the Panorama Lounge on deck 8. It should be amazing. Tomorrow we open “Studio 54”, which is our outdoor barbeque show. The day after tomorrow we open “The lands” our big finale show, and then the next night, we open our informal “Jazz a la carte”. Then having done all seven shows, the next day is disembark / embark day and we start all over again.

IT IS REALLY IMPORTANT THAT I SAY HOW BLESSED I AM TO BE WORKING WITH NINA, OLIVIA, KELLY, VICKI, ANTON AND OLGA. THEY ARE ALL A……MAZING! AND I LOVE THEM ALL SO MUCH.

The last day of this cruise is in Southampton, so I am looking forward to seeing my mum and granny and I will hopefully be able to give them a tour of the ol’ girl.

You probably wont hear from me for a week or so, as we are very busy until then, but I will do my best to get the schedule of our ship up. For now, if you want to know where I am, go to the silversea website (silversea.com) and look up The Silver Cloud.

Again, sorry it’s been so busy, and I will do my best to keep you more updated with photos and such; but, it’s very difficult  to log on to the internet here so, who knows when my next chance will be to update really.

Lots and lots of love and I hope you are all well and good.

XOR