What color exactly is the deep blue sea?
As the Valiant Lady sails eastward towards its summer port home of Barcelona, ferrying me across the Atlantic Ocean for another stint in Europe, that is what I have sat here and pondered.
It’s obviously blue, and in hazy sunlight we have right now, it’s brilliant. At least to me it is, but I recognize that brilliant means different things to different people.
I paused on azure, and while I think it’s a close fit, apparently most people use that color to describe the sky. The sky has never looked like this color to me, so I move on. Cerulean earns some consideration, but that’s too bright. This is deeper, richer.
It’s like a bright navy.
But that’s ridiculous isn’t it? Because navy isn’t bright. It’s dark.
Go to Google. Search for admiral blue. Tap on the images tab. The swatch on the Wikipedia entry for admiral blue that you see there? That’s it. That’s the color that’s floating beside us as we make a trek that once was relatively commonplace and now feels quite exclusive.
I don’t mean that in any bragging way. Yes, it’s a nice ship, but when I say exclusive, I’m referring to the experience of sailing across the ocean.
I wish it wasn’t so exclusive. I wish more people could experience this.
Feel what it’s like to be so isolated, with the only signs of life in view being the brown dots of sea grasses drifting by as we cruise along at 19 knots.
It forces you to contemplate. What it makes you contemplate is up to you. It may even be nothing, but contemplating nothing is something.
I’ve been on cruises before. Three of them to be exact. All the same itinerary from Port Canaveral to Nassau and back. Whether it’s the visibility of other ships or the lights from land, those journeys always felt remote, but not isolated.
This is isolation.
And it is glorious.
You think of things as being an ocean away and feel as if it’s somewhere distant, and it is. But in that distance, there is also connection. Because we’ve mastered the art of traveling whether by air or by sea. When you think about it that way, an ocean away doesn’t seem so far.
It really does provide you with a deeper appreciation for how we are all just one human race on this planet. And nowhere is out of reach for us. And thus maybe we should listen to John Lennon’s Imagine one more time and think about what it really means.
And so maybe this isn’t isolation after all (that happened fast, huh?).
Maybe this is just a strand of connectivity. A line on a map that connects Miami to Barcelona. Then think about all of the other lines that radiate from Barcelona.
Everywhere.
Connected.
The world living as one. Maybe not in harmony, but that day will come. Lennon’s not the only one to tell us that. Joe Cocker does also in his tune Space Captain. Go listen to it. Especially the second verse. I smile so big whenever I hear it. What a hopeful message.
And that’s what I feel as we gently bob across the sea.
Hope.
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If this is how I’m feeling just hours into our first day of sea, what will it be like by the time we see land again at our next stop in Lisbon?
With that out of the way, congratulations if you made it here. I’ll now do a more practical trip summary of sorts. I just had to pen (type) those thoughts.
After picking up my rental car on Saturday, it was a glorious drive once again from Bradenton to Miami, and the Everglades were looking particularly lovely on this late spring/early summer day.
I guess because of the extended nature of the voyage, embarkation times were pushed back, and I wasn’t able to board until 4:45.
I’m not sure if other folks ignored that or if there’s just not many people on this transatlantic trip, but I walked basically straight on. There were no lines at the check-in area, no lines at security. It was a much different experience than when embarking on a Disney cruise, I can tell you that.
As soon as I found the hallway my Sea View Cabin with Terrace is in, the ship’s general alarm sounded for the muster drill, and so I had to just throw my bags into the room and find assembly station D with no time for exploring any of the rest of the ship. Turns out, I wasn’t actually in any hurry since in this post-Covid era they weren’t doing a ship-wide muster drill but rather having people come in groups as they can. That part wasn’t explained until I was well on my way down the stairs towards my meeting place.
Having had the long-ish drive and the unnecessary hurry to the muster station, I retreated back to my stateroom to relax for a bit before dinner.
Now y’all, look. I like to eat. The Disney cruises — save for an incredible sea bass which is the single-greatest animal I’ve ever eaten — left a lot to be desired compared to the idea in my head of what cruise ship food should be like.
The Valiant Lady is trying to be like the Tampa Bay Rays, hitting home runs on consecutive nights so far to start the journey.
Virgin Voyages does dining different. There are no main dinning halls, instead opting for specialty restaurants all over the ship. So far, this appears to be an incredible move on their part.
The first night I was booked for Pink Agave, the elevated Mexican joint on board. I started off with an opener of grilled corn that is second to the casino in Vicksburg, Mississippi, for the best corn I’ve ever tasted (that’s high praise… that casino corn was DIVINE). Much to the disbelief of my waiter — “are you a vegetarian?” he asked, prompting a slight chuckle from myself followed by a gaze at my not-so-svelte figure — I ordered a stuffed pepper for my main.
Y’all.
It was incredible. It was stuffed with potatoes and cheese and maybe more corn, served in a sauce of some type that had — you guessed it — more corn. I will have it again, and I might order two of them.
Last night, my reservation wasn’t until later so I had some Ship Eats delivered to my room in the early evening to have a pre-meal appetizer of the best meatballs I’ve ever had, topped with a perfectly smokey mozzarella. So, so, so, so good.
And so I made another server look at me in bewilderment when all I ordered was a pasta dish at Razzle Dazzle, the signature restaurant on board. The bowtie noodles looked like zebras which was interesting, and it had some type of braised pork and Swiss chard in it. And yes, it, too, was amazingly delicious.
I’m going back there tonight, and after gawking at both the table to my left and to my right — though refraining from asking for a bit as my father might do — I will be torn between their impossible burger and some type of butter chicken. What I can guarantee you I will get are these cheese tots that looked like heaven itself delivered them.
So yeah, this is what cruise food should be like.
I didn’t get off the ship yesterday in the Bahamas. I’ve been to the Bahamas four times now, and I decided it would be more fun to enjoy the ship with fewer folks on it and explore a little bit.
I did less exploring and more adult beveraging at the lovely bar that’s in the back of the ship. The concoctions were great, the view spectacular. I feel like I’ll probably end up spending a lot of time there.
In fact, there’s where I’m headed to next.
I’ll check in every couple days or so. Or more often if I have more wisdom come to me like the beginning of this post.
Before I go though, can anyone tell me if icebergs make it this far south? (I wrote this while on the ship, but the WiFi wasn’t strong enough to post. In the next entry, I’ll talk about how there were no icebergs, but there were waterspouts!)
Rails to Ride 