A Greek Isles cruise would be delightful, if it didn't involve a ship

I know now that I'll never get that cruise of the Greek Isles. I can daydream about it all I want, but it'll never happen.

The reason I'm so positive is that we finally took the ocean plunge. The seasickness my husband suffered on short boat trips had us convinced that travel on any body of water larger than Rimrock Lake would be a bad idea. Then along came a set of circumstances that made us change our minds.

1. We decided we weren't getting any younger, and if we wanted to do anything exciting, we'd better do it while we still had enough working brain cells to remember the experience afterward.

2. People we talked to said that patch-behind-the-ear thing took care of seasickness ... for real, not just empty promises.

3. One of my "Oh, if only I could" travel Web sites offered a cruise starting in Philadelphia, traveling down the Delaware River to the Atlantic, and then up to the maritime provinces of Canada, with excursions to Maine, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island. I've wanted to see Prince Edward Island since my mother first talked me into reading a book she'd loved as a child, "Anne of Green Gables." I was convinced I couldn't like anything so old that Mom had read it, but I was wrong. I loved it. In the book, Anne lived on Prince Edward Island.

4. The cruise was ridiculously cheap. Plus, the same day I read about it, the Internet offered one of those fantastic airline deals -- the kind where you travel for about one-fifth the regular cost.

Oh, boy. Was fate trying to tell us something, or what? We booked the cruise and plane tickets, our doctor prescribed the ear patches, and we were ready to roll. We even arranged for an extra day in Philadelphia after the cruise, to see historic sites.

We arrived at the harbor on a muggy late-autumn day, after an exciting (as in death-defying) taxi ride, pulling our suitcases behind us. Inside the cavernous terminal we showed e-documents, passports, credit cards, etc. and then experienced a new twist on travel: the swine flu questionnaire. We filled out a form about whether we had been coughing or sick, or exposed to swine flu. By this time, I'm sure that a person who had such a severe case that his tail was curly and he spoke in oinks would have lied just to get out of the melee and aboard the ship. At last we climbed the gangplank, had our hands sprayed with disinfectant, and collapsed in our cabin.

The ear patch worked. Russ was able to eat exotic food, watch excellent shows, and even lounge on deck and watch the waves without a twitch of nausea. We met two Yakima couples and had dinner with them a couple of evenings, for a nice touch of home. We enjoyed the excursions, especially Prince Edward Island, the "Anne of Green Gables" shrine. It was the trip highlight for me, and Russ seemed to enjoy my synopsis of the five "Anne" books, although I did catch him yawning discreetly a few times.

The cruise was a great adventure, made even better by the fact that a good many of the passengers were so geriatric that we didn't seem like old fogies. Evidently, we weren't the only ones who wanted to cruise while we could still remember the trip.

On our return to Philadelphia, it was too early to check into our hotel, so we left our luggage there and had a bus tour of the city, noting the places we wanted to explore further the next day.

Unfortunately, that was all Russ got to see of Philadelphia. Next morning he was as sick as he would have been during a typhoon at sea. Surely he couldn't have contacted an illness during the cruise, with the automatic hand-washing dispenser outside every food source, and having our hands disinfected after each excursion.

He got out the patch instructions, and we read the fine print of possible side effects. One was withdrawal from the drug, which few people suffer. It begins 24 hours after removing the patch, and consists of dizziness, nausea and vomiting.

I felt guilty leaving him in his hour of need, but it seemed that at least one of us should see the historic sites. So I did. With my tendency to get lost, it was amazing that I found my way to the hotel afterwards.

When I got back, he thought he might be able to eat ice cream, so I ordered some, and for me, a Philly cheese-steak sandwich. After all, Philly is famous for them. Russ ate three bites of ice cream, looked at my sandwich, and lurched into the bathroom to throw up. Ginger ale, usually a stomach soother, had the same effect.

Next morning, he woke up fine and dandy. Too bad we had to fly home that day.

Remembering that old pleasure/pain cause and effect principle we learned many years ago in Psychology 101, that was our first and last cruise.

Goodbye, Greek Isles.

* Donna Scofield is a freelance writer whose articles, columns and short fiction stories have appeared in numerous national and regional magazines. The longtime Yakima resident is retired after working as a secretary and office manager in Yakima School District elementary schools. She has raised two sons and two daughters.

• Jobs
  www.yakjobs.com
• Homes
  www.yakhomes.com
• 
• 
  
• Autos
  www.yakwheels.com

• All Special Pubs Yakima Magazine Channels YakJobs.com YakWheels.com YakHomes.com Playdate Yakima Bride Yakima Wheels (Print) Home Buyer's Guide Baby Brag Book Graduates 2009 Summer in the Valley Prep Football 2009 Women in Business Holiday Gift Guide
• Advertisement