The Art Post

 As I said, I was quite busy art-wise on this trip. Not only did I have my own sketching, but there were art classes on all the 'sea' days and some of the port days due to our mid-afternoon arrival times and overnights.

I also had my travel sketch 'booklets' and my 2024 sketchbook displayed in the Odyssey Art at Sea show on the last day before we arrived in Fort Lauderdale.

We did lots of watercolour in the classes, using different techniques:

A New York skyline scene using wet-in-wet paint after
copying the outline using carbon paper

A landscape scene using a couple of different
techniques

Leaves in the wet-in-wet technique to mimic
natural colour changes

More wet-in-damp technique for the trees and
the water

We had fun with these underwater scenes - watercolour
background with fish cut out from thin paper and
glued on. Matthew is getting this one for his bathroom!

We also took a little time for some beading. In one
session we made bracelets.

The Art Display at the end of the cruise

My display at the end of the art show table. Just to show what you can do after being inspired to paint by joining the Odyssey at Sea art classes!

I also made and gifted two sketches - one to Jim Brochu and the other to our friend Kathy who we met originally on the 2020 World Cruise.

This is a scene from the Pond in Central
Park that I gave to Jim

Kathy gave me a couple of photos she
had taken of birds outside her window
at home in the winter. I painted
one of them for her.

And, finally, my little sketchbooklet and the sketches in my 2024 Travel Sketchbook:

From the 2024 Sketchbook:

The book isn't finished yet. I will update this post as the sketches are completed.

Fort Lauderdale Weekend

 We left the ship in Ft. Lauderdale on Saturday morning, expecting to wait to disembark and go through US Immigration at the port. We walked off the ship at 8:30, had no wait at all at Immigration, got a taxi within minutes and were picking our rental car up at the airport a little after 9:00. Now what were we going to do with at least 5 hours before we could go to the hotel?

We had planned to drive out to Sawgrass Mills Mall on Sunday anyway to do a little shopping for our next trip, so we rescheduled that and were at the mall shortly after it opened at 10. We made a beeline for Columbia Sportswear, which was the only place I wanted to go, and had made our purchases by 11:00. We wandered around for another hour and then decided to head back toward the hotel and have lunch at Duffy's Sports Bar before doing a little shopping at the local Publix. We didn't need to go out for breakfast, or dinner for that matter, every night we were there. A little bit of cheese, crackers and paté would do the trick.

Fortunately our room was ready when we arrived at the hotel, and we spent the afternoon sitting on our terrace overlooking the beach. We were still out there when the ships, all 6 of them, left Port Everglades on their next cruises. Lago Mar, our hotel resort, is not very far from the port entrance - we could walk down the beach to the breakwater in about 15 minutes - so the ships are quite close as they sail out. Serenity left just after 6 p.m. We watched her disappear, now looking forward to next year when we will be cruising on her in September and again in November.

On Sunday evening we went to Truluck's for dinner. This is a favourite restaurant that you will note we have also been visiting in downtown Miami on our recent cruises that left from that port. The Fort Lauderdale location moved since we were last there. Now it is on the A1A, also known as Ft. Lauderdale Beach Blvd, a little closer to our hotel than it was previously. It is a much larger space, and even busier than we remember. We had made an online reservation in the morning and were glad we did - we wouldn't have gotten a table otherwise. We had a lovely meal of all of our favourite dishes, especially the Florida Stone Crab Claws.

Tomato Salad

Wedge Salad

Stone Crab Claws -

- times two!

This is the 'small' key lime pie. We shared one
for dessert.

We spent a lot of time just sitting outside. The resort was quite busy and our little terrace was nice and quiet. 

I did a couple of watercolours of the beach 'en plein air', which is a new concept for me. Usually I'm lucky to get a good photo to sketch from later on. They came out so nice that Matthew has asked to put them up in his condo. They are now matted and framed for him.

It was a nice relaxing end to the trip, and now we're home again starting preparations for Christmas and our next trip in January. But there is still one more post to this blog - the Art Post. I attended most of the art classes where we did a lot of work with watercolour paint, and I also did some of my travel sketches so there's lots to show.

Entertainment - From Broadway to Pop and a Little More

 The entertainment calendar on this cruise was always full, especially the first half of the trip. The first segment from New York to Quebec City was listed as a Broadway themed cruise, featuring our friend Jim Brochu as well as a couple of stars of the Broadway stage, Rachel York and Laura Osnes. In fact, we weren't originally on this cruise, but after hearing from Jim that he would be lecturing, we changed our plans to include it.

Rachel and Laura had been on the previous cruise and done their bigger shows at that time, but we were still treated to one performance by Rachel, and another pre-dinner show in the Crystal Plaza from Laura, who was travelling with her husband, also a musical theatre performer.

Rachel York

Laura Osnes

Laura's husband joined her for a number as well

Jim did a few of his famous talks about stars of stage and screen whom he had known, and this time also included a talk about his own life and career, which spans more than 50 years. It was a fascinating lecture; it's too bad that he waited until he was ready to retire to present it. Yes, this cruise was Jim's final lecture series on the high seas. A bittersweet moment when it finally arrived. He did his final talk on Lucille Ball, whom he got to know very well in the last year of her life. In fact, an autographed photo that she gave him the last time they saw each other was the last time she ever signed her name. He brought us all to tears when he finished the talk with, 'I really mean it when I say 'I love Lucy'.'

One of Jim's other talents, among many, is his sketching. He specializes in pencil drawings with a hint of colour added. He did one sketch of Crystal Serenity which is featured in the Captain's Reception Room where he holds cocktail parties. I grabbed a photo of it when we were there.

Jim sitting at the podium, ready to start his talk about his own
 life, entitiled 'Jim Who??'

Jim also knew Zero Mostel, and wrote a one man show, which he also starred in, about Mostel which he called 'Zero Hour'. We were honoured to have seen it once on Crystal when he debuted it in 2012 on Symphony, and again when he brought the show to Toronto. Mostel was an artist as well as an actor, and in the show Zero is painting in his studio as he speaks to the audience about his life. Jim actually created a painting at each performance, and his partner Steve had kept them all - about 800 in total! Some were of Zero and others were abstract faces. Jim offered to sign paintings for anyone who wanted one.....he had a lineup in the Lounge after his talk.

Jim signed one of his abstracts for us

Jim, ready to do his final talk, on his favourite star,
Lucy

And that evening, Jim and his partner Steve, who is a composer and great pianist himself, entertained us all a bit in the Avenue Saloon.

On another evening, Jim sang 'For Good' from 'Wicked'
with Avenue Saloon pianist Mark Farris. One of Jim's good
friends is 'Wicked' composer Steven Schwartz

The Crystal Ensemble of singers and dancers and the Showband did a fantastic job as usual. The welcome show is one of our favourites with the Irish dancing segment. The violinist, Nadia, is featured as well. She's great. And one of the other regular shows is a tribute to Billy Joel, starring James Fox, who was in Movin' Out, the Billy Joel musical.

 

A HUGE feature entertainer on our second segment was music legend Gloria Gaynor. Cruise Director Raphael Derkson was vibrating with excitement whenever he talked about the show. As we found out later, it was a scaled-down version of the show she had just been doing in Rio de Janeiro, where she performed for something like 50,000 people over a couple of days, but she did it for an intimate gathering of about 400 - that was 250 guests plus every crew member that could get an hour off to see the show! Gloria is now 81 and walks a little slowly, but that certainly didn't take away from her voice!

Gloria brought her own band and backup singers along.
She actually stayed on board all the way to Ft. Lauderdale.

She had everyone on their feet for a couple of
songs, especially 'I Will Survive'

The next day, Gloria did a sit-down with Raphael and talked about her life and career. She wrote 'I Will Survive' after she had had an accident to her back that left her in hospital for 3 months and then 3 more in a back brace. She lost a recording contract and then got it back during this time as well. Her favourite story was that 'I Will Survive' was only recorded as a demo - her record company didn't like it. But then individual DJs got their hands on it and gave it radio airtime. When people started asking for copies, she had to record it, but even then the record company only released it as the 'B' side with another single - one that nobody can remember the name of now.

We did Gloria around the ship here and there, but she kept mostly to herself and spent the time resting up and enjoying the fantastic Crystal service.

We also attended the 'Supper Club' one evening. On formal optional nights, the Stardust Lounge is converted into a 1940s style supper club, with a dinner selected from the Waterside menu for the evening, and performances by the showband, dance duo, violinist and singers Karin Kovachova and Bruce Hammond.

The dance duo is very good  - they even give lessons 
if you're interested

Karin did some numbers from the Great American Songbook

Nadia entertained on a real violin - she normally
played an electric one during her sets in
the Crystal Cove

On our night in New York on the second segment, those of us who stayed on board had a real treat that had only been put together the day before. Concert pianist Julian Gargiulo had just moved back to New York after living in Europe for a number of years, and agreed to come on board for an hour or so. It was a great little classical concert. You can check him out on YouTube - just search 'The Pianist with the Hair' and you'll find him. He will be back on board Crystal Serenity in January at the beginning of the 2025 World Cruise.

And even yours truly sang a couple of songs with Mark in the Avenue Saloon, namely Anne Murray's 'Could I Have this Dance', 'Someone Like You' from 'Jekyll and Hyde' and a version of 'My Favourite Things' with new Crystal-centric lyrics written by another longtime Crystal cruiser who was also there but couldn't sing it herself. And don't tell Jim Brochu - we sang 'For Good' on the last night of the cruise. Mark suggested that we should do weddings when we weren't sailing (😉😲).