Monarch of the Seas Baja Mexico Cruise 2006

Monarch of the Seas Baja Mexico

Our cruise began as many do, at the port of Los Angeles at San Pedro. Royal Caribbean's Monarch of the Seas was parked on this fine sunny day at berth 93, her usual haunt. The cruise is one of two that Monarch sails every week, going from Los Angeles to Ensenada and back. The boarding process went very smoothly from the helpful luggage handler to the presentation of our Sea Pass cards. We had done the online registration and the check in only took a moment. I wanted to take a couple of photos of the ship from the gangway, but they don't like you taking photography of the boarding area. So one shot of Monarch's Bum was all I could sneak from the berth.

The first order of business is playing the game we have all come to know and love, Find the Cabin. Our cabin was on Six Deck which is the Tween Deck on Monarch of the Seas. It is a strange deck that only crosses half the ship, which makes it difficult to access from many stairways. Really, the Centrum (the central lobby of the ship) and the nearby stairway are the only two ways to get to it. The Centrum is a vertical area with sweeping stairways that lead to the two formal restaurants onboard Vincent's and Claude's. You enter the ship just forward of this area. There are shops and often someone playing music at the bottom of the grand staircase.

Once we glanced around at the as yet closed stores, we tried to find our room. It wasn't easy. Our room was an interior room, and the way they are organized on six decks is in rows with hallways that cross the center of the ship. Once we found the room we were at first startled by the miniature size of it. Perhaps six by twenty it was very narrow and deep. The bathroom was tiny and there really wasn't enough storage space for two people and their luggage. When our luggage appeared soon after, we spent a few minutes unpacking it so that our formal wear didn't become too wrinkled and we stowed our suitcases under the bed. Then our Stateroom Attendant appeared. A quiet-spoken Filipino man, he introduced himself and let us know about the ingenious Do Not Disturb/Make Up The Room signs that fit into your key slot on the door. Whenever you want him to make up the room you put it out....etc. He was very nice and always made sure we had ice in the room. He turned out to be just as wonderful as any of the stewards we had on Cunard, which I really appreciated seeing as we were in teh cheapest cabins and we could have been ignored. The most dreaded event of any cruise has to be the Emergency Drill. You all have to go through it. The drill on Monarch was much longer than on QE2 or QM2 mostly I believe because they were not quite as well organized.

Once they found the "missing" passengers we could then set sail. Jason and I returned our life vests to the cabin and then ran out on deck to watch the ship leave.

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