4AM Ship Tour

On our fifth day of the cruise, I finally got up at 4:30am to go on my own tour of the ship. I figured with it being so early, no one else would be up and out. This would leave me free reign to film without bothering too many people, although it was dark. The only people I saw were some of the crew cleaning and some fellow passengers in the workout area.

I started from Deck 5 and walked my way up one deck at a time. Even with walking through all of the entertainment/non-stateroom decks, I couldn’t find The Tune Up, the manicure and pedicure salon on deck 15. This is where I wish the Virgin Voyages app included an interactive map of the ship not just on the website.

My cameras nearly died just when I got to the last deck, so I went back to the room to charge them (and to go back to sleep).

Morning Re-Start

When I woke up again, Mom and I went walking on the track for some exercise. Nothing like (re) starting the morning with the ocean view and breeze.

We got breakfast in the Galley again and I decided to get eggs Benedict from Let’s Taco About It. They had a traditional one with and English muffin but they also had one on a corn tortilla with pico de gallo and it was so good! Let’s Taco About It also had a breakfast burrito but I didn’t see that until I was leaving to go back to the room. It looked mouth-wateringly good (I know that’s not a word but it gets the point across). I did, however, grab a fruit and yogurt bento box on the way out for a snack later.

We saw our stateroom attendant, Rezzy, after breakfast who gave Mom a bottle of wine for her birthday! She was a day early but it was sweet!

Games in the Dock House

Mom and I took our showers and then headed to Deck 7 to play games that we brought from home. We played in the Dock House, the Mediterranean style bar and lounge area, until The Dock, the outside bar and lounge, opened for lunch. I got the Orange juice, not to be confused actual orange juice, from Juicsea while played it was very good. It had orange, carrot, and sweet potato.

Once The Dock was opened, I got one of everything on the short menu since it was finger food. They had chicken, steak, shrimp, octopus, and polenta skewers as wells as falafel. However, each order came with two skewers each, and Mom wasn’t eating anything since most of it was seafood or had sauce she didn’t recognize. While everything was really good (I especially liked the octopus skewers to my surprise), I couldn’t finish it all right there. We ended up taking some back to the room.

On our way back, we got cookies from the Grounds Club coffee shop (again, better than the 10pm cookies the night before) and saw “Keith” from the Miss Behave Show.

I didn’t want to bother the performer because it looked like they were working on something but Mom being a mom asked for a picture.

The performer was telling us that this was her last week working on the ship. She told us she preferred performing on land to have a bit more freedom in where she traveled. She also said the next Miss Behave show on this sailing had a new cast with different jokes. We already had plans the day it was showing so we’d miss it.

Wandering Afternoon

Back in the room, we watched The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes. Afterwards, Mom went to a salsa dance class and I walk around to get a frozen drink.

I sang in the karaoke room briefly since it was opened and then witnessed the seahorse race. People painted seahorses early in the week and then were “racing” them with rolling dice to determine how many spaces they’d move. This was the last race and the winner got over two thousand dollars; the first prize I witnessed that wasn’t a free drink. It was fun to watch before having to get ready for Scarlet Night.

Scarlet Night

Scarlet Night is the night everyone wears some form of red and the ship has a red theme of colors and performances through out.

We saw the show of night, Dual Reality, before dinner this night.

We were supposed to see it last night but it was canceled due to what I’m assuming was an injured performer.

The Show Cancellation Debacle

So during the day Virgin sent a notification via the app that they rebooked our canceled show. While I’m glad they rebooked us automatically without having to fight with other contenders for the new show time, they booked it for Thursday which would’ve been in the middle of Mom’s birthday dinner.

I tried rearranging the dinner but The Wake had no wiggle room since it was later in the cruise. We ended getting a later dinner at Gunbae tonight so we could see tonight’s Dual Reality instead.

Dual Reality

The show reminded me of Cirque du Soleil a little. They were re-telling the story of Romeo & Juliet and separated the audience of blue against red. We were on the red side. The divided the audience seats down the middle, like how seating is for a high school basketball game and the stage was the “court”.

Tip: Have everyone seeing the show with you arrive together or else you might be on opposite sides.

The show was good but and not what I expected but surprisingly not my favorite either. I almost wished I’d kept my original dinner reservation.

Gunbae!

For dinner we went to Gunbae, the Korean BBQ restaurant. This was one of the reasons I was extremely excited about going on a Virgin Voyages cruise because I love Korean BBQ.

We had to wait a few minutes even after we arrived on time for our reservation because they were trying to put groups of a certain number together.

Tip: If you have less than 5 or 6 people in your party, you’ll be seated with others. No private tables at this restaurant.

We were seated with two couples. This restaurant is more communal as they’re grilling meats in the center of the table.

We were all cordial but there were a lot awkward silences. I was the youngest person at the table by some years so I couldn’t keep a conversation going about what everyone was talking about. I mostly listened.

The food was good to me, but because of Mom’s allergies and her being a picky eater, she didn’t eat much. We tried ordering her the Korean fried chicken, something she really likes but because the fry it the same oil as the seafood pancake she couldn’t eat it. She didn’t want any of the medium plate dishes so all she ate was the Kalbi (marinated beef short rib).

I got the nori rice crisps, japchae, and kalbi. I was supposed to get a seafood pancake, but never received it. I think the other person at the table who ordered one as well thought he got two.

Neither Mom or I wanted the dessert they had which was matcha or mango soft serve, so we left to catch other Scarlet Night events.

More Scarlet Night

We were able to catch the brief story of the origins of Scarlet Night both from the hostess who was also “the octopus goddess” that night in the Red Room and a crew member, The Foodie, in the Roundabout.

The big pool party was next. We went up for a few minutes but both of us were exhausted so we didn’t stay. Sorry, I’m no fun when I’m sleepy.

That was our Scarlet night: a little stressful, awkward, and fun. The next day is my mom’s birthday and our first excursion for the cruise!