I have to admit that during my entire career I always enjoyed what was known for years as Cruise Season, as the fabrics and colors were fun.  Everyone that flew down for the wedding and most were also for the honeymoon, had to be down in the lobby of the hotel, bright and early to be shuttled over to the port to get on the ship, sounds easy.  There was a marathon race that morning and everything was totally a mess.  My Bride and I had our luggage on the first bus, and as I have remarked my Bride is a firm believer of “hurry up and wait.”  I am happy to say that the courteous Detroit style driving is totally apparent in Miami, by which I mean that if there was signage that stated an exit was in a mile, all the drivers waited until one car length before the mile exit, to merge and they expected everyone to realize that they were more important than the ones who had started merging when the signs appear, especially since they didn’t even bother using turning signals, which have been standard issue on most vehicles for over a hundred years.  Most of the exits were closed courtesy of the marathon, our bus driver was good, I understand that at least one of the shuttle drivers was creating his own route and people were concerned that they might not only miss the wedding, but the cruise as well.  As it was all the guests looked like the last rose of Texas, as we were all dressed from at least seven in the morning, went through cattle car lanes and enjoyed the Miami humidity and yes, I can say professionally that silk and linen clothes while ideal for high heat, are guaranteed to wrinkle or you may get your money refunded.

We arrived at the port, but there was no communication as to what to do with all of these early arrivals, as we were sent here and there, though there were plenty of photo opportunities to have pretend boarding photos for a price.  We all had to go through another “Checkpoint Charlie” and present our papers, I guess they hadn’t heard that identification papers weren’t necessary to vote, but imperative to just to get on a ship.  Eventually our luggage had to go through another Xray (I am glad that the hand steamer was not packed) and would get to our rooms sometime during the week, I kept my laptop bag with me, as my wife had prepared a video depicting the happy couple through the years, and a special video of a wedding gift from grandmother of the bride who made sure that there were would be a special Christmas tree ornament for their wedding, even though the grandmother had passed away.  My Bride is the unofficial photographer/videographer of every event for her family, and nothing keeps her from her daily duties.  There was even a smirking usher who zeroed in on my Bride announcing that no one, was to take photos or videos, but the anointed photographer. I took umbrage to think that they would think that my Bride would disturb the ceremony.  I thought no way was that going to happen, in fact the second day that we were back, my Bride had already created a wedding album of the nuptials, though she was nice, and insisted that the smirker still was part of the event and she had to take his photo as well. 

It was rather chaotic at least to this layman’s eye, but the wedding proceeded, and all the photographers took their chosen photos.  There were a couple of bridal dances and more photo ops.  I hope that the couple had a wonderful time, as they were in a maelstrom of emotions and events thrust upon them.  The cruise officials seemed more concerned about escorting those that were not going on the honeymoon off the ship, than the wedding proper.  I am not sure where the “official” photographer came from, but they almost forgot to take the “Sisters” photograph, but it did occur.  Another fun thing was watching all the people that were walking on the perimeter of the ship as they were intent on looking through the windows to observe the wedding.   I eventually did find that they were offering finger-food appetizers and drinks, but I guess the employees were not enlightened, or if they were, they were trying to save the cruise ship money.  I was disappointed that the cruise line would not have better accommodations, but they didn’t seem too concerned.  I took some photos of the wines that were offered, and I was hoping that we would have a chance to eat before the official reception later that evening.