7:00am Waiting for our breakfast delivery. I did the form last night instead of Virginia, so the question is – will we get another breakfast tower or not?
It’s gorgeous outside – it’s a shame it’s so damn early. The Behind the Scenes tour is 90 minutes away.

Just checked the WiFi because photos aren’t uploading. Except for a couple of hiccups like this, the WiFi has been solid all over the ship – and it hasn’t disconnected at random times. The only issue is that you can’t force a device offline from another device (which Norwegian lets you do.) So, if you leave your iPad online in the cabin, there’s no way to get your phone online until you go back to the cabin, get the iPad and logout.
You also can’t charge devices while you’re away, because the room requires a room key to turn on the power. I haven’t tried using my hotel key which was an old trick on Norwegian until they started enforcing “no bodies, no power” in the rooms.
7:30am Breakfast has arrived and a much shorter tower than yesterday. I am now in charge of ordering breakfast.

Just remembered I have homework due this week. What day is this?
8:00am Slamming down breakfast. Meeting point for the excursion is the theater, so that’s one place we’ve been before. However, it’s four decks down and that means the dreaded elevators. As slowly as Christmas came when you were a child, as slowly as five o’clock comes when you’re an adult, as slowly as Virginia gets ready in the morning, nothing is as slow as the elevators on this ship. Add in the staggering number of people who do not know “down” from “up”, and you are almost guaranteed to be late for everything.
8:20am Signed in. Waived. I don’t remember signing waivers before. Tagged. First question will be “Can you show me where coffee is made and can I have a large sample?” Second question will be “Why is the casino closed when were in the middle of the ocean?”

Seeing a lot of open-toed shoes down here. Waiting to see if there’s a shoe check. (Norwegian sent a woman back to her cabin to change shoes once.)
11:30am Tour wrapping up. With a glass of wine and snacks. It was a very comprehensive tour – I’ll add notes later.
Visited on the tour:

• The stage, dressing rooms and sound control booth in the theater
• The Yacht Club (marketing genius!)
• The crew bar
• The red and white wine cellars
• The drink cellar
• The galley storeroom
• The laundry
• The crew & passengers laundry
• The print shop
• The main galleys
• Wine and snacks to end

We were each given a backpack at the end of the tour.
We’ve been on other Behind the Scenes tours, and this felt more detailed than others. It also cost less. We’ve never been allowed in the “private” crew area before. We’ve never heard the print shop mentioned although other ships must have one – that’s where the Daily Planner is created.
It’s interesting that there are two laundries, basically one for linens (towels, sheets, tablecloths, napkins) and one for clothes – staff and officers uniforms and guest laundry items. We saw the infamous machine that puts the semi-permanent tags on your clothes when you send them out. The crew can do their own laundry or some just pay other crew members to do it for them.
Only an Italian (or perhaps French) cruise ship would have separate wine cellars to keep red and white wines at serving temperature.
The genius portion of the tour was visiting the Yacht Club. I now wonder why Norwegian doesn’t think to show the Haven. “Here’s the private bar. Here’s the private pool. Here’s the restaurant – there’s no set times, just eat when you want. Here’s the concierge who solves all your problems.” Seriously? Look at all the room up here. Look at all the services. Why am I in the cheap seats? Brilliant marketing.
MSC crew doesn’t call the main corridor “I-95” like on other cruise lines. It’s the “corridor.”
12:15pm Lunch at the Seashore restaurant. This is our first non-buffet lunch. Another relatively small menu.
12:30pm Captain’s announcement – the first I’ve heard. Well, didn’t hear because it’s noisy in the restaurant and nobody else seems to care what the Captain has to say. The beginning was navigation information which very few of us care about so it generally gets drowned out.
1:00pm Photo Gallery. What exactly is in the package Virginia purchased?
2:00pm Cappuccino at the Seashore Bar. First drink at a bar all week that wasn’t comp’ed – and there’s no booze in it. (Virginia tells me before every cruise that she wants to spend some evenings at a bar listening to music and it never, ever happens. We will watch inane game shows. We will see shows. We will go to the buffet. We will have snacks at the 24-hour restaurant. We will never listen to music.)
2::45pm Naps and homework. I’m not napping.