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First Day at Home - April 5, 2020

First day home. Last night I reset the time on my alarm clock. Daylight Savings time started while we were gone. I must have hit the alarm and it went off at 6:00. I just kept hitting buttons until it stopped. Not the best way to start the day. I went back to sleep and Rob got up at some point. We had been gone long enough he had forgotten the steps for his new coffee maker. Before we got home Douglas and Michelle did grocery shopping for us. We have milk, eggs, cottage cheese, lettuce and bread. Douglas also dumped the ice in our ice maker so that I had fresh and stocked our fridge with Coke Zero. OK, get up, there is a lot to do. We have four weeks of laundry to take care of and suitcases to unpack. I did a couple of interviews and answered part of my email. We start on the pile of mail. Amazing how much of it can be dumped without looking at it. I get a nice hot cup on chai and then eat my cottage cheese standing on the screened porch. It is about 50 degrees out but I do not care...
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Anderson South America Misadventure Day 31 – FLL to ATL to CVG “Homeward Bound” April 4, 2020

I wake up for some unknown reason and cannot get back to sleep. I am fretting again. I know that there is nothing that I can do about what is happening but I still cannot get back to sleep. I try all of my tricks and finally doze off. My cell phone rings at 5:35 am, it is a call from Berlin. Yeah, no, I am not talking to a reporter at this time and I still have my bite guard in. I hear Rob get up and go “Oh no.” This is not the way that anyone wants to start the day. I used to wake up to this and it usually meant that he had either lost a contact or had it off centered. Since his cataract surgery no more contacts and this is not the way that I get awakened. Our travel information has arrived. Victoria is correct about the bus and the flight to Atlanta. We do not have the 3:45 flight to Cincinnati, we have the 7:35 flight. Oh dear, how is Douglas going to get a car to us when we are going to land just before 9:00 pm? I look out the window. I can see the Rotterdam and two Coast Guard b...
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Anderson South America Misadventure Day 30 - Off the Coast of Florida "I Can See America" April 3, 2020

I woke up this morning and moved the curtains, I could see the sun rising. Wait, rising? We have been on the west side of the ship why am I seeing the sun rise? The captain had said last night that we would be heading for Ft Lauderdale but had been asked to stay outside of the territorial waters. We put the map on TV. Sure enough, we are making a big oval in the ocean. I can see other cruise ships circling with us. We are told that the Volendam has joined the "parade" to act as support. There is a meeting that will be held at 10:00 am where they will be "crossing t's and dotting i's." Breakfast comes, what a nice surprise we have a cheese omelet. Yes, I also have what I hope will be my last cup of tap water chai. When I put the drink order out I see a packet waiting for us. Yes, the end really is in sight. We have luggage tags and a health form to fill out. Uh oh, it is the same one that kept us from going to the Rotterdam. Do we tell the truth and risk an...
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Anderson South America Misadventure Day 29 – Between Cuba and Florida “Is the End in Sight?” April 1, 2020

I woke up this morning and I knew that the ship was holding still. We have been on the ship long enough that I know how it feels. I looked out of the window, yeah, the water was still. I told Rob that we were holding still. He asked if I was sure. I crawled up into the window to look down at the water. Yup, we are holding still. Rob turned on the TV to the cruise map channel. They list the speed of the ship, the wind, temperature and humidity. We were sitting still right off the Northwest coast of Cuba. Hmm, I wonder why. I called Victoria since she finds things out before we do. No, she did not know anything. Then I remembered, the captain had said the night before that we would be stopping briefly to transfer medical supplies from the Rotterdam to the Zaandam. Breakfast came and it was scrambled eggs again. OK, not that bad, ugh, they are cold, I mean, chilled cold. We split the plate and then we checked the other plate. There were two banana nut pancakes, Rob was excited and two s...
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Anderson South America Misadventure Day 28 – Off the Coast of Cuba “Paper Airplane Day” April 1, 2020

This is Day 10 of confinement and we are both still alive, even if we did not get our Coke Zero delivery. I woke up at 3:47 am with a killer headache. I realized that I was dehydrated. I have been trying very hard to keep drinking water but I like really cold water. This room temp stuff is, well, it is wet. I got up to pour some water for myself. Our last water delivery was a 6 liter jug. This thing is not light. I do not know how they expected some of the little old ladies on this cruise to heft this jug. Of course I am doing all of this in the dark. I did not want to wake up Rob. I put my water bottle on our little table and grab the jug. Umph this thing is heavy. I get the cap off and make sure to put it down where I could find it. Now start to pour water, in the dark and not spill. I did it by sound and get the water bottle close to filled but did not spill any water. Put the lid back on the jug and put the jug somewhere that will not be tripped on. It takes me a while to get back...
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Anderson South America Misadventure Day 27 - In the Caribbean "Plague Ship of the Caribbean" March 30, 2020

We spent a good portion of the night in our transit of the Panama Canal. They had really bright lights shining which I could see under our curtains. I would move the curtains because I wanted to see what was going on. The bright lights would hit Rob in the face, wake him up and he would yell at me. I could hear machinery going and people yelling and there were lights. So I would move the curtain again and Rob would yell again. It was a long night. Then I could feel the ship moving and I knew that we had cleared the canal. That was a big relief. When we hit the open water and the ship started to rock something started to make a knocking sound. Rob got up to figure it out. One of the bottles of wine that we got over a week ago was in the cabinet. Since Rob made me get rid of my water bottle raft supplies the wine bottle was banging around. See, he should have let me keep them. We had the alarm set to wake us up early so that we could do a live spot on Good Morning America. We got dresse...
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Media Blitz March 30, 2020

OK, my media blitz continues. Good Morning America and CNN have run videos. Today I did an interview with Channel 12 in Milwaukee, Inside Edition and Fox 19 in Cincinnati. Please tune in and if you can contact anyone to make sure that we will be allowed to disembark in Florida that would be wonderful.
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