Live From the Decks of the Mercury The Final Two! 2/5/11 & 2/14/11

Starting this off a little early so I can send some links out before I leave home.

The weather has really tried to throw us a curve getting to the February 5th cruise. Hundred Year Blizzard's and temps in the double digits BELOW zero! Mercury really knows how to throw a party!

Even before the weather turned on us I had planned to go to Baltimore two days early. My usual plan is to drive to Jacksonville, spend the night and leave my car at the hotel for the three weeks and fly SW to BWI. Life intervened with a case of Bronchitis, an allergy to an antibiotic and bad knees/back. So here I am, missing my night in the hotel in Jax, driving to the airport this (Thursday) morning and hoping my plane to BWI leaves if not on time, on the right day!

I have a rental car for Baltimore and since I haven't driven in snow in years I'm spending a few minutes tonight praying to keep it between the ditches! If you pass a redhead by the side of the road please consider giving me a ride to the ship!:D

Keep your fingers crossed I make it to Baltimore early tomorrow afternoon and I will keep you updated on the pre-cruise partying!

Bye For Now!

Want to be the first to wish you a wonderful cruise....and will be reading all about it.

Judy

We are not expecting day time ice tomorrow, Friday. It thaws during the day and then that freezes on the roads at night. But we once again dumped plenty of salt out there that you'll see in the bay as you sail away. Temperature high for Friday is supposed to be about 40 with mild winds. Supposed to be... We're hoping it's even warmer on the 14th when we board.

Bye Gail and have a goodbye blast.

Say bye to Merc for us too!

All the best and smooth sailing,

Mark & Randi

Have a great trip Gail. :)

Hey Gail - I hope we are having a good laugh about this as we sail out of the harbor on the 5th. Good luck today, I'm leaving on Delta in the morning.

Hey Gail, Hope you made it to BWI okay and are settled in. Have a terrific BTB cruise. Want you to know we are sooo sorry :mad: we can't join you. Have one for us at the Elite Lounge and a hi to Cyl and Roger.

Fran and Tony:)

Hi, Gail. Wish I could do another 3-weeks on Mercury. My stomach is literally in knots reading this because it's so darn sad about X not being in Balt anymore & the crew having to spread all over the world.

Have fun.

Bonnie

Safe travels, I will be driving up to B'more tomorrow. Snow is not supposed to start till after midnight on Friday.. snowman on the deck sounds fun!!

See everyone soon.

K

OMG!! I forgot all about Mercury's final run. With all the bad weather we've been having, blizzards, ice storms, etc. I don't even know what day it is any more.

In any event - Gail have a wonderful time. I can't wait to read you live postings from Mercury, say good-bye for us and have a flirtini for me.

The first place I ever had a flirtini was on Mercury in the martini bar.

Anne Maria

Yeah, yeah, go ahead RUB IT IN. Like we care.....

(dont leave out ANY details, I want to hear EVERYTHING!!! And take LOTS of pictures too, please.)

I think I am going to cry now.... ;)

WHY oh WHY!!!!! My poor little Mercury....:(

Hi Gail - SO looking forward to spending time with you, my Mom, and Roger, on the first leg of this trip! I'll see you on Saturday afternoon! :D

Yeah!!!! Another "LIVE FROM.... Thanks, Gail.;)

Checking in.

I have some videos of my previous cruise with Tuggers

Tuggers should be in this one

Cruise Critic Connections video is here

And here is a Different take of the cruise

Cruising Bermuda Triangle

Enjoy.

So sad to see Mercury go, almost as sad to see Baltimore go too.

IMO.... Celebrity Mercury is a LUXURY cruise ship, hidden within a mass-market cruise line.

Gail have a great time and don't worry about us here at home.I'll take care of everybody.;)

Hi Gail !

I wanted to wish you safe travels. As always - looking forward to your updates. Have a wonderful time on Mercury. She will be greatly missed.

SIGH ~ it's so sad to know that Mercury is leaving the fleet. She provided some of our favorite cruising memories. I hate that ships of her size are becoming a thing of the past. She is one grand lady.

Gail ~ enjoy your time onboard and thank all of her crew for their wonderful dedication. Hope to see them on another Celebrity ship soon!

ENJOY EVERY MOMENT and thanks for posting!

Mercury was my first cruise ever. And that was back in 2004. My friends and I still say, "I miss Mercury!" Good bye, Mercury, you will be missed.

Gail, concerned we haven't heard back from you. Hopefully, your flight was on time and you are just too busy pre cruise partying. Enjoy your b2b on Mercury........wish we were could be there, too! I still remember the Zenith b2b, when we met you and 600 other b2bers! What great cruises we have had! I'll keep checking in for your "live from" reports. Stay well and best wishes for a wonderful cruise.

Kay

Have a great cruise, Gail!

I hope Mercury's final sailing is as good as Zenith's final sailing; that was special!

The Port of Baltimore shall mourn the departure of Celebrity Mercury. To Stewart Turnbull and all the other great people who crewed her we say thank you and smooth sailing in the future.

To Dan Hanrahan - please consider home-porting another vessel in Baltimore. It is a great and convenient port for many.

GREETINGS FROM BALTIMORE!

Started out for Jacksonville at 7 AM Thursday morning. Clear and no rain. Yea! This is going to be a breeze!

15 minutes later - The sky just opened up and proceeded to throw all the water in heaven on my car! So started the trip...

I fought wind, rain, fog, rain, traffic, morons in cars, did I say rain??? Getting into Jax after over two hours for a trip that normally takes an hour and 45 minutes I heard the radio DJ say 'if you are coming into Jax from the north on 95 you are in the clear, if you are coming in on any other road, well, you are in a world of trouble!'.

Got to the off-site parking and my luck holds. The price had gone up $2 per day! Got on the shuttle and proceeded to the SW terminal. Saw not one airplane. Asked the shuttle driver if planes were actually flying today. She 'thought' so. I'm encouraged!:rolleyes:

Made it through the new machine that sends your naked pictures to the Internet. (you can buy copies of mine on the site Idontcarewhoseesmenaked.com) Will be glad to autograph your copies onboard.

Got to the gate. Maybe 30 people waiting. They loaded us, took off 5 minutes early and made great time to BWI. In 10 minutes early.

Took the shuttle to the car rental area and headed for Alamo. Not one customer there. Four guys working the counter. Obviously I was the only person they had seen because three of them checked me in and one carried my luggage to the car. Apparently a lot of people canceled. Got a full size, Chevy Impala with 42 miles on it for 17.95 a day. My luck is changing. :p

Found the Holiday Inn Express Stadium. Turned out to be a very nice place with gated parking ($10 per night). Mike was very nice and got me a snack along with a bottle of water.

The King room has upgraded bedding, free Internet in room, breakfast and inside corridor rooms. It is clean, the TV works and there is an easy chair plus a desk.

I collapsed. This was about 2:30 and I slept until 5:30. Had good directions and it was an easy trip to G & M.

Carla was there when I arrived and we had a drink and crab cakes. Before we finished eating, Jay called to say his meeting was over and he was able to come and meet with us. We all 'kind of' ate together, talked, ate and talked some more. I really enjoy them and hope we can get together for another cruise soon. I wish they were going with us on Saturday! If you have a chance to share a dining table with them on a cruise, go for it! We had a ball on our last cruise together!

I went back to the hotel and was still pretty tired. Turned the TV on but didn't make it to the end of The Mentalist. Last I remember Jane was driving away from a cop who wanted to give him a ticket!

A couple more things about the hotel. They do not have an airport shuttle but they have a shuttle to the Inner Harbor that runs every night from 7 to 10. They are 3 miles from the port and have a shuttle every 30 minutes starting at 10 AM. Not a lot around here but I never felt unsafe. The staff is very pleasant and tries hard to fulfill any request. The breakfast is good and is served until 10 AM. I would have no problem staying here again for a cruise.

Bye For Now!

Glad to hear you that you got there safe and sound. We're driving in a caravan from SC next week and have heard that it was suppose to snow in Baltimore next Friday. Let's hope the roads are clear on Saturday. None of us are used to driving in the snow. We wish Celebrity would leave from Charleston again.

Was so glad to see on cruise critic that you were doing a live from the ship. Will be checking in often to see what's going on.

If you get a chance will you try to find out if our waiters from the Panama trip last April are still on the Mercury. I don't know if these names are spelled right and can't even remember but one's whole name. We couldn't pronounce the other one's name and just nick-named him slick. Anyway the head waiter was Marjan Koceb and his assistant was Niroslav (Slick). Don't waste a lot of time on it. We can check when we get on if you don't have time. Hope your B2B is great. :)

I'm sure I'll have time to check on the waiters for you. I imagine the first couple of days will be cold so we will be all about the eating!!!:D

The roads here are very clear. They salt at night so it's pretty good.