On November 1 we — Bill Bouchard, Colleen Wright, Barb and I — joined a Celebrity cruise on their latest ship (Edge) that took us from Rome to Florence\/Pisa to Provence (Toulono) to Palma de Mallorca to Tenerife (Canary Islands) followed by a week at sea crossing the ocean to land at Ft. Lauderdale on November 15. (See previous posts to read about the multi-country trips we four enjoyed prior to the cruise.)<\/p>\n
The Ship<\/strong><\/p>\n The ship was impressive, and not just because it featured a unique external elevator\/platform that could be raised out of the way when not needed or lowered to accommodate passenger ingress\/egress or festive underway gatherings. We all subscribed to a flexible plan that permitted reserving evening meals at any of the main restaurants. We could do breakfast and lunch at numerous restaurants or in a cavernous cafeteria that hosted an uncountable number of stations, each specializing in a different constellation of food types or international sub-genres. And there were numerous snack shops and coffee shops and dessert bars physically separate from the eateries I’ve already mentioned. We all gained a substantial amount of weight; I admit to adding about 15 pounds.<\/p>\n\n\t\t