ETA Bluegrass Cruise - Tuesday - St. Maarten

As we’re finishing breakfast in the Rembrandt dining room we looked out the window to see jagged mountains rising above white sand beaches interspersed with rocky shore where the mountains rise directly out of the sea. We’ve arrived at St. Maarten, the Dutch end of two island nations, one of Dutch origin, the other French. The islands of the Caribbean curve south from the Bahamas to a series of small islands just off the coast of Venezuela. For want of a certain explanation, I suspect some of these islands were created by volcanic action while others grew on a base of coral over the ages. Thus a variety of shapes and sizes of islands is found. Sail and motor boats flit back and forth. Three large sailboats are tacking back and forth out of the harbor, each loaded with passengers. It doesn’t take us long to figure out these are excursions from the other cruise boat we see standing at the pier.

As we approach the pier Irene notices there are no tug boats about. The wind is blowing hard, but the Captain turns the ship around and carefully backs this 1111 foot long behemoth into its space along the pier. There isn’t even the slightest bump as we come to rest, the two huge screws rotated to pull the ship alongside. Across the pier, Disney Magic is moored. By nine o’clock, the gangway fills as a large portion of the passengers head toward the busses that will take them to Waikiki Beach for a day of fun in the sun and music. We have decided not to go on the excursion because of the price and the amount of sun I’d be exposed to. Later, we will discover that perhaps we made a mistake, but we have decided to take it easy, and I want to get Monday’s experience posted.

We eat lunch in the Windjammer and Jade Café where, despite how few people remain on board the ship provides a sumptuous lunch with a range of offerings from hamburgers, hot dogs, and pizza to Asian specialties, salads and stews. As always there’s a selection of pastries in small enough portions to allow those who wish to have three or four desserts. After lunch we disembark to visit St. Maarten’s capitol city, Phillipsburg. St. Maarten/St. Martin is the smallest land mass in the world shared by two sovereign nations at 37 total square miles. It is 9.3 square miles long and 8 miles wide at its widest point. The highest point is 1392 feet. The mountain sides are studded with homes, some quite stunning from a distance and certainly more so close up. Closer to town and the beaches resort hotels and condominiums can be seen. While French, Dutch, and English predominate, over 100 different languages are spoken on the island.


We walk down the long pier to the water taxis which transport us ($6.00 all day fare) to downtown Phillipsburg. Since tourism is the basis of the entire economy of the island, there is little wonder that the down is dominated by small shops. The Welcome Center, located at the head of the pier, distributes free of charge a glossy and thick magazine detailing the stores and brands available. Generally speaking the emphasis of the small shops along Phillipsburg’s narrow streets is on jewelry, loose precious stones, cameras, and liquor. There is a small market in the middle of town selling colorful clothing in island prints. A few blocks away from the crowded beach the shops are more focused on meeting the needs of local people. There’s a market, clothing stores, Penny’s Department Store (not to be confused with J.C.), and smaller shops. The streets are very narrow and there’s a bustling atmosphere. A number of branch offices of international banks are available as well as a couple of large law offices, suggesting the possibility of offshore business opportunities providing tax advantages to American businesses and individuals not wishing to have American tax officials getting too close a look at their books. At mid-day the sun is brutal and we try to stay in the shade of buildings. Since we’re not in the market for anything, we window shop but don’t enter many of the stores. I go into a camera shop to buy a little gizmo and price the camera and lens I’ve been lusting after. I find that if I bought it here, I’d save about $400 under the price at home. The new lens a camera body will have to wait for another day. We head back to the ship for a nap and some quiet time.

Irene wakes me at around 4:30 to go on deck to watch the passengers return. From four stories above we see lots of sunburn, some people staggering from the free rum punches provided at the beach, and lots of happy, tired people. We watch from the deck as the last few stragglers stroll up while the gangplanks are being taken in. One might think they’d be in a hurry since the ship waits for no one, but stroll they do. We head for dinner and are joined by Josh Goforth and Todd Meade from Lorraine Jordan’s band. These two young and talented musicians are delightful dinner companions, and we’re glad to have them at table. Our wait staff, Ronel from South Africa and Selvino from India, is good humored, efficient, and friendly all at once. The dining room is perhaps half full of people tired from their day ashore. Lorraine has bought tropical print shirts for her band members while many other passengers have bought them, too. This makes for a most colorful view as we look out. Susanna Jordan Langdon and Molly Kate Cherryholmes sport trick glasses and are relaxed and coltish as they mug toward other guests.

Silvano

Ronel

Who's This?

Officers and Spouses - Lorraine Jordan Fan Club

After dinner we head down to the Conference Rooms on deck 2 with our instrument for an evening jam. One jam is filled with band members and (mostly) skilled passengers, so a pretty big group has joined them to watch. There are two other jams going on, one pretty skilled and a relatively slow jam for the less experienced. We join that one, picking and singing for a couple of wonderful hours. We feel welcome despite our relative inexperience and are encouraged to lead songs and take breaks along with the stronger musicians. It’s the kind of experience that helps novice musicians improve their skill levels. Keeping up with faster, better pickers and trying to take instrumental breaks in public encourages improvement. The more we participate in this sort of jam, the better we’ll get. Since, in many ways, jamming is what bluegrass is all about, it's really fun to be involved in this on the cruise. Things begin to wind down, and we hit our stateroom around 11:00 o’clock. Tomorrow we’ll be at sea and there’s another formal dinner. We fall quickly asleep to the gentle rocking of the ship.

Jammers

ETA Bluegrass Cruise - Monday - San Juan

el Morro Castle - San Juan, Puerto Rico

The ETA Bluegrass Cruise is an interesting combination of cruise and bluegrass festival. People wanting to maximize their bluegrass experience can attend the Ross Nickerson banjo workshop which also provides private instruction in other instruments. Conducted by Ross Nickerson of BanjoTeacher.com and assisted by the recently retired Alan Munde, this workshop provides beginner, intermediate and advanced instruction. A space on the ship has been set aside for people who want to jam or practice, and we’ve participated in one jam, which was fun but above my head as a picker. Each evening, ETA offers a concert featuring three bands, and there will be a big party at a beach in St. Martin. Cruisers wishing to attend regular shipboard events or participate in the broad range of other activities offered on a cruise ship have plenty of time to do so. When the Liberty of the Seas is in port, people can leave, people can leave the ship on their own to explore or engage in any of the varied activities scheduled by Royal Caribbean. These range from guided walking tours to deep sea fishing, SCUBA diving, and kayak paddling trips. The off-ship activities are relatively expensive, but they provide lots of alternatives. It would take a very jaded person or one with a quite limited range of interests to have time to get bored on a cruise ship.

Liberty of the Seas at Pier

Yesterday I had discovered I could get twenty-four hour coffee at a place called the Promenade Café. On Monday I learned that the food served there is also free. The only charges are for specialty coffees. In the morning you can get pastries and donuts. Later in the day there’re sandwiches just in case you didn’t get enough food in the dining room. A pizza place called Sorrento’s also supplies Panini and other kinds of snacks until 3:00 A.M. A person who stays away from specialty coffees and alcohols can eat almost 24 hours a day. For those wishing something special, there’re a steak house and an Italian restaurant on board where higher end foods can be purchased at a premium. Since the kitchen will supply nearly unlimited amounts of what’s on the menu plus additional foods for those who don’t find what they want on the dinner menu, there’s no need and little incentive to use the high end restaurants. Nevertheless, they appear to do a booming business.

Cobbled Street in San Juan

Residential/Commercial Street - San Juan

Our day began with a crisis as I left my power cord and transformer in a martini bar called Olive 0r Twist where I went to write my blog. I arrived back in our cabin to discover it wasn’t in my bag, blamed Irene for having left it, and ran up elevator and down stairs searching for it. We reported the loss to guest services on deck five, then came back to the bar only to find my equipment neatly wrapped on the bar. After reporting our find to guest services and heaving a great sigh of relief, we headed up to the Flow Rider on the sports deck at the top of the ship for our first planned activity of the day. Think of the Liberty of the Sea as a fourteen story luxury hotel with two elevator cores and a number of hallways providing fore and aft access. All the dining rooms are located towards the rear. The theaters and sport activities lie amidships or toward the prow. Our cabin is aft and passengers must learn to negotiate the system to get to the end of the ship providing access to their destination. Despite numerous ship models with very accurate maps of the elevator and stair systems, it still takes some doing to get where you want to go.

Skip Cherryholmes on Flow Rider

Skip Cherryholmes of the band Cherryholmes and Tami Butler, wife of Jerry Butler from Lorrain Jordan and Carolina Road had decided to venture onto the Flow Rider at 11:00 A.M, so Irene and I found good seats to watch this adventure. We sat in the sun and wind and watched kids and adults try their surfing skills on the Wave Rider. This apparatus provides a well padded surface over which masses of water are sent pouring uphill. The rider starts at the top and jumps onto a boogey board and a small surfboard. Experienced riders can eventually get to their feet and do a variety of surfing moves and the never-ending wave. Neither Skip nor Tami had ever ridden this equipment, although Skip spent part of his youth in California and had surfed. After waiting in line at watching others, their anxiety grew as they headed towards the top of the line. They each had very successful rides, cruise members who came had a good laugh, and the pictures tell the “rest of the story.”

Tami (Mrs. Jerry) Butler

Mission Accomplished

After lunch we went back to our cabin where I finished my blog and posted it before lying down for a nap. It’s worth noting that hand cleaning stations are placed at every eating location, in bathrooms, and at other appropriate locations around the ship. Passengers and crew are encouraged to wash their hands frequently and the ship’s crew is obviously eager to encourage people to do everything they can to avoid the spread of the various ailments that have plagued some ships in recent years. The entire ship is kept scrupulously clean.

Alan Bibey, Phil Leadbetter, and Steve Gulley with Bradley Walker

Irene wakes me around 3:00 PM to let me know we’re coming up on Puerto Rico and soon Moro Castle appears on the port (left) side. Moro Castle is a brooding old fortress dating back to the seventeenth century. San Juan is the second oldest European founded city in the western hemisphere, dating back to 1521. Only San Cristobal in what is now the Dominican Republic is older. Puerto Rico is 110 miles long and 35 miles in width at its widest point. The San Juan metropolitan area has a population of around two million, roughly half the population of the entire island. From our ship we could see the old city come into view and a wharf where three other cruise boats were already berthed. Liberty of the Sea effortlessly nosed into its berth. The propellers of this ship can rotate in a 360 degree arc, allowing the ship’s master to go sideways and obviating the need for tug boats. Watching the docking procedure is an interesting venture each time you reach of leave port. The island itself is mountainous and lovely. San Juan is an old city perched on the edge of a beautiful bay.

Nearly four thousand people eager to hit the shops and walk the streets create quite a crush at the gangways, so we went back to our cabin to wait until the rush to exit was over. We then strolled down the pier and into the city. San Juan features narrow, cobbled streets whose houses are painted lovely pastel colors. As we moved away from the vendors and past the standard tourist stores found around where tour boats unload into a more residential area, we were occasionally able to get a peek into a courtyard or apartment. These buildings present a closed face to the street and then open into spacious courtyards inside. Unfortunately, Monday must be trash collection day, because trash bags littered almost every corner and the odor was strong. We walked across the peninsula past small parks, along the wall of an old fort, and eventually emerged to see Morro Castle spread out below us. It was closed and we wanted to get back to the ship for dinner and the evening’s bluegrass event. I’d like to see something of Puerto Rico away from the immediate tourist area, which is always crowded; even more so because of the picturesque narrow streets of the old city.

Steve Wallach - Host and Emcee

Mark Newton

The evening’s program presented two great bands and an award winning singer. We lingered a little long before getting to the Sphinx Lounge for the evening program where Mark Newton was already on stage when we arrived. We had never heard the Mark Newton Band before. His personnel are all very solid with Beth Lawrence on bass providing a solid beat as well as a lovely singing voice, whether harmony or lead. Tony Wray on banjo is a fine player who has until recently played with the John Cowan Band. Newton played a set which offered bluegrass standards and more recent tunes. His sound is pleasant and provided a good start for the evening.

The Mark Newton Band

Cia Cherryholmes

Cherryholmes has been tearing up the bluegrass circuit for three of four years and has moved into a crossover range where they are playing more concerts on the arts circuit as well as Americana festivals. A venue such as this cruise provides more opportunity for interaction with performers than is even available at festivals. Irene and I had a chance to chat with Skip Cherryholmes at length during breakfast. He talked about the band’s move into newer venues and said he thought they were introducing new fans to bluegrass through the diversity and energy of their music. Also, Cherryholmes is working with the Portland Symphony Orchestra to create a work using the breadth and depth of a full orchestra in conjunction with their sound. Cherryholmes, founded after the tragic loss of a daughter when parents Jere and Sandy Leigh wanted find a family activity which would lead to healing from their loss, have been creating an more diverse sound than many bluegrass bands offer. They play straight ahead bluegrass, and have added jazz, swing, and rock-influenced elements to their music. I was floored on Monday night when fourteen year old Molly Kate, BJ, and Skip formed a trio with Molly Kate’s fiddling sounding much like Stephan Grapelli, the legendary jazz fiddler, while Skip’s lightning fast guitar work was reminiscent of Django Rhineheart, a gypsy great. BJ, when I asked him, said he supposed his mandolin playing on this piece was heavily influenced by David Grisman’s playing. Cherryholmes finished their set with an energetic six part harmony to “Oh, Mary Don’t You Weep,” which was a jazzy, black church oriented piece that swung. I was particularly struck during this set with the growth in Molly Kate’s fiddle playing, which showed virtuosity and maturity not so much in evidence a year ago. Both Skip and BJ, on guitar and fiddle, have also grown enormously as musicians. Their singing, too, is much improved.

Molly Kate Cherryholmes

Skip Cherryholmes

Bradley Walker backed by Cherryholmes

The last act of the evening presented IBMA Male Vocalist of the Year Bradley Walker backed by Cherryholmes. Walker is bound to a wheelchair, being a victim of muscular dystrophy. With his painfully distorted body, it seems a miracle that this very talented young man can even get to the stage. When he begins to sing, a new world opens up. I had written after the IBMA awards in October that I thought he was primarily a country singer rather than a bluegrass one. This performance put the lie to my earlier remarks. While a good deal of his work is flavored with country music sounds, Walker is at home with bluegrass music and presented a marvelous performance. Supported by Cia Cherryholmes’ harmonies, he sold his music with verve and skill. The wheelchair and body disappear into the music as his performance goes on.

Bradley Walker and Beth Lawrence (Mark Newton)

After the bluegrass show, there was enough time for us to attend one of the regular performance offered by the cruise line. Held in the Platinum Theater, the largest room on the ship, this piece of formless music, dance, and aerial performance combined elaborate, not to say outrageous, costumes with flying acrobats, land-based dancers, and singers. The less said about this bit of fluff, the better.

Jere Cherryholmes

Sandy Leigh Cherryholmes

We headed for bed around noon and slept soundly as The Liberty of the Seas headed for St. Maarten.

Bradley Walker

ETA Bluegrass Cruise - Saturday and Sunday

The Liberty of the Seas loomed over downtown Miami as we tried to reach the Port of Miami piers. We could see it, standing there against the sky, but the maze of roads leading to the ships lined up at the pier was confusing and there were people trying to get on board while all those arriving from last week’s cruises had not yet debarked. We followed the signs into the parking garage, took the ticket (maximum parking ticket for the garage = $165.00), missed the sign taking us upstairs in the garage and arrived at the checkout booth. The attendant motioned for us to make a U turn and head back against traffic. After some jockeying we found the up ramp and a space. It only took us two trips to move our gear across the street, some to a porter for delivery but our computer, camera, and (most important) instruments carried through customs, immigration, boarding security, check-in, waiting room, another check in, a delay, and with a relatively simple boarding procedure into the ship itself. The crew members told us to find something to do to entertain ourselves, as we wouldn’t be able to occupy our cabin for a couple of hours. We sat for while, found a buffet luncheon, and eventually got to our stateroom several hours before our luggage. All was well, and we were into our new home for the next week.

Our stateroom, down on the third deck, is comfortable with a pretty large window looking out on the sea. It has all the necessary comforts – queen size bed, TV, desk, comfortable though tight bathroom. We cruise the decks, trying to find our way and to do so without having to walk through clouds of cigarette smoke. Royal Caribbean says that “essentially” this ship is smoke free, while at the same time saying that smokers want to smoke. They’ve designated the port (left) side of the ship on the outside decks as smoke-free, but have also left ash trays there. They claim it’s a change of policy about which everyone isn’t quite aware. Furthermore, almost all the bars on the ship permit smoking as does the casino. Where smoking is permitted, the smoke permeates the atmosphere. There are few areas of the ship where the smell of smoke isn’t pretty pervasive. Fortunately, dining rooms and cabins are smoke free.

The ship is brilliantly designed to force passengers to walk through the major commercial portions of the ship several times a day. The merchandising is powerful with many trinkets to be bought, extra side-trips in port to be purchased, seminars and activities invite people to spend more money. We have already paid a significant premium to add the bluegrass component to our cruise, so perhaps we object more to the rest of the sales pitch than we otherwise might. Neither of us can understand why people are buying ice cream (even if it is Ben & Jerry’s) pizza, hamburgers at a premium restaurant, and so on. A dedicated eater could eat breakfast at 7:00 and return for a mid-morning snack before the dining room closed. Same for lunch. Why people would purchase snacks with so much food available they’ve already paid for mystifies us. Perhaps the most expensive “extra” is the cost of Internet access. There are several plans, but the least costly one still sets a person back $.37 a minute for 150 minutes. Nevertheless, much of what I’ve commented on is truly standard operating procedure for cruising, and if I don’t like it, I suppose I shouldn’t cruise.

At 5:00 PM the ETA Bluegrass Cruise group meets in the Sphinx Theater for our welcoming cocktail party and get together. Steve Wallach, tour director, and Tami Newton, his assistant greet us and prime us for the rest of the cruise. There’ve been some changes that are reflected in our packet. The only problem is that our packets haven’t been delivered. They eventually show up mid-afternoon on Sunday. We get our complimentary T-shirts and some hors d’oeuvres as well as drinks. Since this is a bluegrass group, most of the crowd drinks cokes. We greet our friends from Grasstowne as well as Lorraine Jordan and Carolina Road, the two bands we’ve come on this cruise to spend some time with.

After the cocktail party, we head for the dining room for our first regular meal on board. We’re assigned to a table right by a big window with four other folks from the bluegrass group. They’ll be fine as table companions for the week. Getting assigned to table where you have nothing in common with the other people can lead to long and uncomfortable meals. This won’t happen here. The food, as with other cruises we’ve been on, is fairly interesting, pretty tasty, beautifully presented, and better than many cruisers have ever eaten. Service is attentive and pleasant. It astounds me how the kitchens can put out the volume of food they do for two dinner sittings a night while maintaining quality as high as they do. For sure this never happens at hotel banquets or weddings, to which these nightly feasts might be compared.

An hour or so after dinner we head for the Conference Rooms, which have been set aside for jamming. I bring my banjo and join a man with a guitar who I quickly realize is much better than I. After a few minutes another guitar, a banjo, a Dobro, and a bass appear and we have a band. I’m easily the least able picker in the bunch, so I refuse breaks and don’t call songs, but have a good time vamping while the others carry the heavy lifting. I stay for perhaps an hour. The music is good, too fast for me, and fun. I’m sure I’ll get in some more and Irene might even bring out her mandolin. We head for bed shortly after ten after a busy first day.

Sunday began for us as it usually does, around 4:30 AM. Fortunately, there’s a 24 hour coffee pot two decks above us, so coffee and morning reading got us through until breakfast in the Windjammer café on deck eleven. There’re lots of choices from bagels to eggs, waffles, pastries, breakfast meat, as well as cooked to order eggs and omelets. We enjoyed a leisurely breakfast while we watched a low set of islands, maybe the Bahamas slide past about four or five miles west of us.

Alan Bibey at Workshop

Lorraine Jordan teaching at Workshop
Fiddle Workshop

At 10:00 o’clock the bluegrass portion of the cruise really began. A series of one hour instrument specific workshops were scheduled with band members in the conference room area. Teaching and providing workshops requires very different skills from performing, and some musicians are better at it than others. Nevertheless, for people interested in particular instruments, the individual workshops were quite satisfying. Steve Gulley of Grasstowne, Dave Denman of the Mark Newton Band, and Skip Cherryholmes presented a guitar workshop. Steve, who is also an accomplished songwriter, sang one of his songs, as did Dave. There was excellent attendance. Because Irene plays mandolin, we were both particularly interested in that one, presided over by Alan Bibey (Grasstowne), Lorraine Jordan (Lorraine Jordan and Carolina Road) and Sandy Leigh Cherryholmes. Lorraine showed strong teaching skills as she answered questions, demonstrated skills, and provided some practice for workshoppers. There was plenty of teaching. Lorraine was particularly impressive as a teacher when she summarized the content of the workshop at the end. The banjo workshop contrasted strongly with the mandolin group, but was equally as interesting. Four banjo players from four different bands played the same tune in their own quite different styles. Ben Greene (Carolina Road), Jason Davis (Grasstowne), Cia Cherryholmes (The Cherryholmes) and Tony Wray (Mark Newton Band) differ in age and approach to picking the banjo. This approach helped illuminate the great range and subtlety of this sublime instrument. In the Dobro workshop Phil Leadbetter (Grasstowne), well know as one of the very top players of this interesting and fairly recently invented instrument, and Tim Graves (Tim Graves and Cherokee) the nephew of fabled Dobro player Josh Graves answered questions about the instrument and demonstrated thoughtfully the differences between their styles., The bass workshop included Todd Meade (Carolina Road), Jayme Booher (Grasstowne) and Beth Lawrence (Mark Newton Band) talking about playing this important instrument, which in bluegrass substitutes for drums in other bands by playing the solid rhythm line needed to provide structure and form to the music. Finally, at the fiddle workshop, Josh Goforth (Carolina Road), Molly Kate Cherryholmes, and B.J. Cherryholmes (both of The Cherryholmes) jammed on fiddle tunes. It was impossible to attend all six workshops, but together they constituted a master class in bluegrass music.

Cia Cherryholmes waiting for Workshop

Tim Graves and Phil Leadbetter teach Workshop

Meanwhile, the ship kept plunging through increasingly rocky seas toward its first stop in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Moving forward at 22 knots (a knot is a nautical mile or 1.15 statute miles) into a breeze sometimes reaching 25 miles per hour. The effective wind on deck approached 50 miles per hour, which seemed to dampen no one’s enthusiasm for sunning and playing on deck. I’ll write more about these activities with pictures on Wednesday.

Jere Cherryholmes at Captain's Gala

Sunday dinner featured the Captain’s gala, one of the three formal dinners of the cruise. According to the written material provided by Royal Caribbean, “formal” means tuxedo for men and cocktail dresses for women. This practice hearkens back to the glory days of transatlantic passenger ships when the folks who could afford such luxuries commonly wore such dress to dinner. These days the demographic of cruising people has changed as have the times, making the word “formal” a somewhat daunting challenge to many cruisers. In the end, some people appeared in full formal attire, while everyone choosing to attend the gala dressed above and beyond the normal for cruise attire. Most men wore ties; all had jackets and most ties while women looked attractive and showy. The food for the dinner was a cut above its usual high quality.

Steve Wallach: Host and Emcee

The bluegrass crowd reassembled in the Sphinx Lounge for the first bluegrass show of the week. There are about 270 people on the bluegrass cruise most had time to change back into more comfortable clothing in keeping with the usually informal dress of a bluegrass festival, which after all, this looks very much like, even if it’s taking place at sea. Promoter Steve Wallach served as emcee, combining his usual combination of corny stories, long experience running this cruise, and familiarity with many of the people who have taken this cruise a number of times kept the proceedings moving forward in good humor. Tonight three bands performed. Tim Graves and Cherokee opened, followed by Lorraine Jordan and Carolina Road with Grasstowne closing the evening as midnight approached. The response, even from this rather stuffed and tired crowd, was enthusiastic, too say the least. The performers, struggling with a sound system not designed for the demands of the acoustic instruments of a bluegrass band, acquitted themselves very well, and the music was of a very high quality, even though it was sometimes difficult for the musicians to keep their feet as the ship’s rolling increased into the evening. Many of the people on the cruise chose to come because they are friends or fans of particular band. One large component of the cruise is quite loyal to Lorraine Jordan and shows it. I’ll have much more to say about the individual bands as the week goes on. Suffice it to say that despite a few minor problems, the cruise is off to a roaring start and will certainly end much too soon.

Steve Gulley (Grasstowne)

Phil Leadbetter (Grasstowne)

Lorraine Jordan and Carolina Road

Lorraine Jordan, Benny Greene, Jerry Butler (Carolina Road)

Lorraine's Daugher Susanna