Part II of Californy

So we climbed aboard the ferry at 6 PM and headed back to Long Beach and the Queen Mary, arriving there a little after seven. The tour members were now on their own until 11 AM Sunday. We took a break in the room and proceeded to the Chowder House on the Promenade Deck where we ate another sumptuous meal although the Wife was disappointed in her shrimp scampi. She said it should have been called shrimp scamper due to lack of shrimp. My dinner was fine.

We slept late Sunday Morn, getting up about 6:30 and headed for the free buffet breakfast again. (Included in the tour fee.) Some of the group took the self-guided tour of the ship, but we looked into a couple of shops and bought inexpensive souvenirs for the family and killed time until it was time to board the bus again. Instead of heading home we were transported to the inland waterways of Naples which actually make up a channel to the ocean and are small channels around the small islands. Included in out tour was a gondola ride through these waterways with expensive houses and boats lining the banks. The gondolas were rowed by two young men each and one on our gondola was from Italy. He serenaded us and related some of the transactions of the housing market as he rowed along. They were in the millions of dollars per house, even the small ones ran around three million simoleons. This little side trip took about two hours with the loading and unloading and we headed for an In-n-Out Burger place in the area and ate lunch or took lunch with us on the bus. The gondolas were fun and everyone seemed to enjoy the ride.

Heading out of town and home, we ran into the first pinch on the road. I-10 was shut down due to a fatal accident near Quartzite and the traffic was backed up to just west of Blythe, miles, in other words. The highway was re-opened about 6:30 or 7 and we were delayed about three hours, inching along the freeway. The bus made a stop at Chiriaco Summit before we ran into this mess, thank the Lord. We finally made it into Buckeye where the second pinch arose. All this traffic had to squeeze into one lane due to construction in the area and we arrived at the stop in Buckeye about 10 or 10:30 PM. Oh, yes, we didn't get to stop at the Naked Man Bookstore in Quartzite.

Other than that, a fine time was had by all, and we reached home about midnight, which was way beyond our bedtime.

Now that we're rested, we're ready for another tour.