Jan 07 2008
A Stately Pleasure Dome: Cruising on the Zuiderdam
For her birthday, Chandra wanted to go on a cruise. This is not my normal way of travelling. I’m much more of the swing from branch to branch and hop into an idling sampan or jetboat school. In fact, coming from the Cape, lounging when it is warm is anathema. Summer is for work, not play. Make hay while the sun shines and all that. But it was not my birthday, and I had gotten to choose the year before. So it was cool.
Not having gone on a cruise before, I did a little research. Well, a lot. And I found the Norwegian Cruise Line’s Norwegian Spirit heading out of New York to the Florida and the Bahamas for 6 days. I was on hold with American Express Travel when a call from Walter 
Brooks came in, and he related a tale of woe about a Norwegian Cruise from none other than Don Howell. While trying to get in touch with Don directly, I did a little more research and found that bedbugs were becoming a problem on board New York cruise ships, which I then related to Don.
He subsequently went on to blog about it, and I promptly gave up on that trip, much to Chandra’s consternation. My idea of a vacation might be different from yours, but I’m sure neither involves being trapped far offshore in a large tin can filled with parasites. And I’ve been a paralegal.
What helpful news the Blogfather did relate was a ringing endorsement of Holland America from New York — which gave the benefit avoiding an airport by simply driving to the dock. When I investigated further, I found that nothing they were offering from there worked for our schedule. So instead, we booked one from Ft. Lauderdale aboard the Zuiderdam (pronounced “Zy-der-dam“), having to take into account the extra cost of the flights. As it worked out, it was cheaper to fly one way on Air Tran there and one-way back on JetBlue, than either airline roundtrip.
Fast forward a few months to the day of departure. Well, really, the day before. Chandra and I arrive at Logan and they promptly pull her aside for extra, extra patting down. Then another. Then into the side room for another check. White, late middle-aged female TSA agent just would not let this go. Another check. It was obviously the stud in Chandra’s tonque setting the metal detector off. And another check. Unfortunately, as a young black woman in Boston, she’s all-too familiar with this sort of extra attention. 
Arriving at the airport in Ft. Lauderdale, we were met by my oldest friend, Jake Smith, who lives in Coral Gables. Before crashing at his place, he took us out to, Les Halles, a brasserie nearby that not only made the best macaroni and cheese (gruyère, of course) we’ve ever had, but also a Salade d’Auvergne (arugula, apple, bleu cheese and walnut salad) that I craved repeatedly through the whole cruise.
Aside: Before the web, there was The Newsletter, most recently described as a proto-blog or paper blog. I put it out once a month, roughly, to keep friends informed of goings on and otherwise impress girls with how whitty I could be. Word spread and after a while, I was getting requests from people I didn’t know for copies. And it was Jake’s then future ex-wife, A. Manette Ansay, who wondered when there would be an email version. I had featured the cover of her book, Vinegar Hill, in The NL — and only 4 years later, Oprah picked it for her book club… coincidence?
Saturday, Jake was heading to back to the Ft. Lauderdale airport himself, and was able to drop us first at the cruise ship terminal. We were running early, and figured we could stop into a CVS/Walgreens/what-have-you to pick up forgotten toiletries. Except that the area around the airport and Port Everglades (the proper name of the place where you get on the boat) is nothing but industrial land. Miles of it. So that was out.
We got there about 11:25 AM and were third in line. Check-in took place at 12… or so.
First our bags. Then security. Then eventually letting us get on board the Zuiderdam and head to the Lido deck to hang out while they got our bags to our room and did mysterious other nasty things to the rooms probably involving bleach, DDT and asbestos suits (I hoped). I was able to grab a table by the window and we were finally able to decompress. Now all we had to do was wait for the room to be ready.