April 30, 2018 – Home

We’re home now in Florida. Our disembarkation from Crystal Symphony went very smoothly in Fort Lauderdale. We woke up early and ate our final shipboard breakfast at 7:00am in the Market­place (Lido Deck). We were surprised that the ship wasn’t docked yet; but, once that happened, everything (including downloading of luggage) moved quickly. We efficiently left the ship at 8:15am, found our luggage in the terminal (with the help of an excellent porter), breezed through customs, transferred our four large suitcases to the Luggage Concierge staff waiting for us outside of the terminal, and called the Shell Point person (who was waiting in the “cell phone lot”) to pick us up for the drive home. From the time we left the ship, we were on our way in less than an hour. All went very smoothly, with no problems or delays – we were home by 11:30! The next day, Luggage Concierge (via UPS) delivered the four suitcases to our front door.

It’s great to be home again, but we have big jobs facing us to unpack the suitcases and sort for laundry and dry cleaning, as well as look at the mail that accumulated while we were gone. We have wonderful neighbors, Darryl and Barbara, who collected the mail for us while we were gone. The two 1-foot-tall stacks of mail didn’t even include all the shopping catalogs that we received; Ginny told Barbara to keep the ones she wanted and throw out all the rest.

The last several days on the ship were a whirlwind of activity. We attended a few enrichment lectures, when we had time ─ Futurist Tom Faranda and destination lecturer Bob Aalberts are two of our favorites. The entertainment team finished the world cruise with a big bang over the last few days ─ featured Broadway entertainer Josh Young was great; Naki Ataman with his 45-minute, nonstop “Around the World” piano show is always a favorite with Crystal cruisers; The “Edge Effect” acapella group from Orlando was a big hit; the remarkably talented (and lively) Canadian recording star Lovena Fox was fantastic; and, comedian John Joseph was lots of fun in his cabaret act.

We attended two spectacular entertainment shows the last nights on board, both of which were designed, produced and directed by Jonathan Hawkins, Crystal Symphony’s World Cruise Special Events Coordinator. Saturday evening (Apr 28) was “The Symphony, a Concord of Sound” special event – a high energy spectacle of entertainment starring Jonathan, Sarah Hayes, Heather Lundstedt O”Neill (a vibrant and talented young soprano singer, with whom Jonathan has performed in concerts all across the U.S. He brought her on board Symphony just for this event.), as well as the two lead Crystal Symphony singers – Carina Kärcher and Karl Grunewald – and the Crystal Showband.

The next night was a “Farewell Variety Show” with Lovena Fox, John Joseph, The Edge Effect, Jonathan Hawkins, Heather Lundstedt O”Neill and, of course, the Crystal Showband.

The last port-of-call for Symphony’s 2018 World Cruise was in Key West, Florida on Sunday, Apr 29, the day before our cruise ended in Fort Lauderdale. We’ve been to Key West several times, so we stayed on the ship all day and packed our suitcases. We finished packing just before dinner time and left all the big ones out in the hall for the crew to pick up and organize in the cargo hold for delivery to the terminal the next morning.

After dinner, we went to the Crystal Cove/Plaza for a World Cruise farewell party, with bands and dancing, climaxed by an exciting balloon drop at the end. Everyone went crazy popping the balloons -- lots of fun!

Crystal Cruise’s 2018 World Cruise 4, “South Pacific Reflections,” was a great experience, and we have wonderful memories. We’ll send out one more blog posting, within the next few days, to summarize this incredible journey from our perspective.

Jim & Ginny