Fancy A Cruise?
When, six months ago, I saw Jon Stevens advertising that he was playing on a cruise, and sent a silly text to my fellow music-loving friend Jude, saying “fancy a cruise?”, I never imagined it would actually come to fruition. Jude and I met when we were 18 and and were thick as thieves for years but Jude moved to Perth and we’ve only had sporadic contact over the past 20 years or so, always friends but the tyranny of distance playing a part in how often we got to hang out. So, when Jude responded to my message enquiring whether she fancied a cruise, with a tentative: “actually…” I realised she fancied one indeed.
Starting to seriously entertain the idea, we realised this wasn’t just any cruise. “Rock The Boat” was pitted to be a veritable smorgasbord of music talent; a floating music festival of sorts, chock-a-block full of Australian rock music icons (some admittedly a little longer in the tooth than others).
Jon Stevens, Jimmy Barnes & Daryl Braithwaite (to name a few) were on the bill and would actually be our fellow passengers in this sea-going foray into the South Pacific. Excitement started to take hold as we imagined ourselves chin-wagging with Barnsy over Coco Pops, challenging Jon to a game of Shuffleboard on deck or pulling up a poolside banana chair next to Daryl.
Being our maiden voyage, Jude and I had to swot up on the rules and regulations regarding not only what to pack but more importantly, how much we could pack. We all know the angst of having to zip and squeeze our belongings into a bag of the appropriate weight and size when flying, lest the plane be too sluggish to lift off, so when we read on the website there was a whopping 90kg limit, per person, on our ship, we thought we’d read it wrongly. 90kg! Yikes, the sky (or should I say the ocean) was the limit! If only we’d had bigger bags (although Ross didn’t concur with this sentiment as he unloaded our busting-at-the-seams luggage from the car).
After a mandatory pre-cruise snap, Ross farewelled us, waving us off at the port and delivering us into the hands of the very capable and abundant Royal Caribbean staff, who stood with ready smiles, just feet away from one another in a chain of human markers to follow through the process. It couldn’t have been easier. Not even the news that we’d missed Daryl checking-in by mere seconds, could slightly dampen our enthusiasm for climbing aboard this floating 13-storey apartment block.
After a quick safety chat and orientation, we were shown to our little room (little being the operative word) but we were so thankful we had opted at the last minute for a window room- a huge porthole giving us a perfect, unobscured view of the ocean.
Some of the passengers got into their cossies as fast as you could say “Welcome aboard!” and there were even a few keen beans working out in the gym before we’d even left the dock. We opted instead to enjoy the panoramas of beautiful Sydney Harbour from 12 stories up but were nearly propelled overboard by the blast of the foghorn signalling our departure, our hair is standing on end from the shock. That baby was LOUD!!
It was orientation onboard this afternoon with multiple groups sporting matching Hawaiian shirts or matching themed t-shirts (Cruisin’ and Bruisin’ wins for most popular) leaving us to feel quite inadequate in our non-matching get-up. People who had pre-purchased the alcoholic drink packages were making the most of their all-you-can-drink status and we even saw one bloke pedalling the exercise bike with a cocktail in hand.
We partook in a quick visit to the beauty salon for a free massage and a raffle we sadly didn’t win, soon realising it was just a good excuse for a hard-sell of their bevy of beauty treatments. Pointing out our wrinkles and suggesting we could really benefit from a visit to the onboard Botox Boutique, was a guy in the shiniest suit we’d ever seen - so mirror-like you could do your hair in it. Thanks but no thanks.
The passengers onboard the good ship Lance have been divided neatly into two - half with red cards and half with blue, dictating what times we go to all the shows. Our red card posse was down to see Mi-Sex tonight (obviously sans their late singer). and the usher met us at the door with an accented “Welcome to my sex”. Apart from some slight technical hitches and a girl collapsing in the front row, it sure was a great walk down Memory Lane. Comp-pu-pu-pu-pu-pu-pu-pu-pu…computer games!
Feeling decidedly buoyed by that first performance (pun intended) we took in a late show featuring Jason Singh from Taxi Ride in the Colony Cub, affectionately known as the Colonoscopy Room. He was awesome and even stayed back after the show for a chat.
We keep wandering the halls of this floating metropolis and saying we can’t believe we’re on a boat. It feels so solid - like a building - but then isn’t what they said about the Titanic? Sorry, we’ve made a pact not to refer to the Titanic again.
Time to get gently rocked to sleep.
