Day 33 Melbourne/ Diamond Princess

Today we made the connection with our new cruise ship the Diamond Princess. I must say I have become a cruise snob. We were spoiled by the Odyssey where everything was taken care of and the number of passengers was much less. The one thing we did hear our new Captain say was that he was sorry it was such a rough night last night and tonight would be better. So somebody else had a bad day at sea, hmmm. It is mildly surprising only because this is such a large ship so to create a bad trip would have required some pretty bad seas.
We enjoyed our last day in Melbourne by visiting the Queen Victoria Market which is a huge indoor/outdoor market. They sell everything from t-shirts to pigs feet. It is very colorful and a great place to wander for a few hours. We hope our old trivia team finished well.
We are now unpacked in our new room and since we felt we were living out of a Barbie Doll chest of drawers on our last ship we now feel like a second cousin who is only allowed less space than Barbie. Given that people were dining in jeans our wardrobe will be reduced significantly. This is a beautiful ship but clearly they put all the money into the public areas. Anyway we are happy and on the next leg of our multinational tour.
Tomorrow A sea day.

Chris - "Back in the saddle again" - We certainly enjoyed Melbourne and I liked getting caught up on the Olympics. The market that Paul described was a cross between Traders World and Findley market for all you Cincinnatians. It was fun to see all the different options available that we don't have at home...particularly the fish.
This will be our second time on the Diamond Princess as we took it to Alaska with my family a few years back. Gee I don't remember it being that big then. :) I enjoy starting a new routine and this ship will have it's own advantages. For one there will be trivia two to three times a day, that should be fun. For the Odyessey Oddities, the trivia sheet today was identifying 30 phobias, we needed you Maggie! There are soooo many things to do in terms of activities and shows that I'm sure we won't be bored. I have scouted out my area that I will spend my daytime hours in and it will be walking on 7 and a pool on the aft part of 12. A lot higher up from the water but I bet it will work just fine.