Embarkation day at last! After sailing on the Emerald Princess last year we were anxious to sail on her again. That morning we drove down to Port Everglades and boarded the ship around Noon.

Once again we were on the Lido deck, this time in L308, a couple of doors up from where we stayed last year. And waiting for us in our stateroom was a shrimp cocktail from my father. Its become something of a tradition to put a gift in each other's cabin whenever we go on a cruise. It makes for a very nice start! There were also certificates for a very good bottle of Riesling wine and for a 500 ml bottle of white rum (gotta have my rum and cokes!). On top of that I had ordered a special occasions package for David that included a bottle of good champagne; this was in celebration of the release of his new album.

After we dropped off our luggage and enjoyed shrimp and champagne, we headed off to the buffet for lunch. Afterwards we went to the back pool and ran into a few other bears that we sailed with last year. We then went topside for launching.

Since we sailed on Halloween, we had a bear costume party that night. It was a bit scaled down from last year, mostly due to airlines charging a fortune for luggage these days. I went as Smokey the Bear and David went as Jack Skellington from Disney's Nightmare Before Christmas.