Local Bus System

This Wednesday, I got to try out the local bus system for the first time. As I mentioned in a previous post, I made the huge mistake of running the battery down on my Yamaha TMAX motorbike. I had no idea how complicated it is to jump start the battery on the bike. It turned out they would have to take the bike's mirrors off, the windshield and the front face plate in order to get to the small battery. This is obviously not something they can easily do on the street. So, my bike was loaded on a truck and taken to the motorcycle dealership where they ended up replacing the dead battery.

Heyser Cycle was as prompt as they could be in fixing the problem with my bike. I say that because right now, they are swamped with work. It's hot; it's sunny; gas is still nearly $4 a gallon so everyone wants to ride their motorbike. Which means, Heyser is loaded with work right now as of course a number of the pesky bikes don't want to run right while the weather is great for riding a motorbike.

2 days after I dropped my bike off at the dealership, they called me and told me it was ready for pick up. Cool. 1 problem, how do I get over there to pick it up? My good friends the Baldons have moved to Bowie. I wasn't about to call them and ask them to drive out to Laurel to get me and then drive me to the dealership. The people I know at work are what I would call semi-friends. We have great times chatting at work and, I am willing to help them out some at work but, I don't have anything to do with them outside work. So, I wasn't about to ask one of them for a ride. I could walk it but, it is over 9 miles to the dealership. I could call a cab but, I haven't forgotten the last fiasco I had with that. So, I looked into the local bus system. It turned out there is a Central Maryland bus system that runs through Laurel and connects with Anne Arundel and Howard County buses. This makes it pretty handy if you don't have access to a car.

The fares on the bus were very reasonable. It cost $1.50 to get to Laurel Mall. From there, I was able to walk the remaining 3 or 4 blocks to Heyser. My only complaint with the system is they didn't have a schedule posted at the bus stop saying when the bus would show up and, you couldn't find out the pick up times on-line either. So, I went out to bus stop and had no idea when the bus would show up. Because of this, I ended up waiting over 25 minutes at the stop in the heat. I wasn't thrilled but, it beat taking a taxi or worse still walking.

That's all on my first experience with the local Laurel, Maryland bus system. It's a decent enough system. It is affordable and, you can get to a lot of places on it with the connecting bus services such as Greenbelt Metro Station, Columbia Mall and Baltimore Washington International Airport. I'm tempted to try to take it to the airport sometime. I figure it would cost me $5 or so to get there vice $35 to use an airport shuttle. We'll see on that. Cheers all!

Arundel Mills Dave & Buster's

Yesterday, I decided to treat myself to a visit at the Arundel Mills Dave & Buster's. It had been over 2 months since my last visit. I enjoy going to the place but finances kept me away. Yesterday, I decided to see if I could add to my ticket horde. I read on Facebook where some person had amassed 1,000,000 tickets. I'd like to do that too though I don't like to think what that would cost me. Dave & Buster's would get big rich of me doing that.

Anyway, I rode my motorbike out there which was fun. Thankfully, Arundel Mills has a special parking spot for motorbikes on that side of the mall. It isn't super big but, it can accomodate at least 10 bikes. I recharged me card with a $100 worth of coins and headed to my favorite game Spin & Win. I'm partial to that game because you have a lot of control over how much you win on it. You don't with a lot of their other arcade games. One catch with the Spin & Win game is that your timing must be spot on. You have a split of second to stop the light on 1 of the 3 1,000 ticket lights. A split of second early or late and you end up with 20 tickets. That's what happened with me a LOT. To my frustration, I would just barely miss it. Still, I managed to hit the thing 5 times and won approximately 10,000 tickets. That takes my ticket horde up to 365,224 tickets. I'm still a long way from accumulating 1,000,000 tickets but, if I keep slogging away, I'll hit eventually. It doesn't hurt that Arundel Mills Dave & Buster's only had one prize I wanted - a steak grilling machine. I'm tempted to buy the thing vice trying to win 1 with tickets. I'm certain it would be cheaper money wise.

Overall, it was a nice visit though I need to do a better job with my timing. Also, there were times when I embarrassingly jumped the gun. I hit the 40 ticket lights a number of times because of that. I look forward to going to the Arundel Mills Dave & Buster's again when they have half price games (I won't go any other time). Cheers all!

Bike Problem

Yesterday, I encountered an unexpected problem with my Yamaha TMAX. I decided to chat with an acquaintance who lives in my neighborhood. I was riding my TMAX at the time. I pulled up to where my acquaintance was working on one of their cars. I turned off the engine on my TMAX BUT, I left the bike's electronics ON. After chatting for about 10 minutes, I tried starting my TMAX only to find out to my dismay that I'd run the battery down so much it couldn't start the bike. The TMAX only has electronic ignition vice having also a kick starter like my previous Vino Classic had. This hadn't been a problem till now.

I let the bike sit overnight hoping the battery would get enough of a charge back that I'd be able to start it in the morning. No such luck. I figured I could get someone from Heyser Cycles to come jumpstart the bike. I found out you don't jumpstart a TMAX and, it isn't easy to charge the battery. For starters, it's a major job to get to the bike's battery. You have to remove the 2 mirrors, the windshield and the front faceplate just so you can get to the battery. Crap!

The solution ended up being getting the bike picked up and taken to Heyser so their mechanics can work on it. To prevent such a major hassle in the future, I found out you can get an electrical connection connected to the battery which leads to a plug that you can connect an extension cord to. What you would do is plug one end of the extension cord into an electrical socket and the other end into electrical lead which goes to the bike's battery. You would let the dead battery charge overnight and presumably the battery would have enough power to start the bike the next morning. Another plus to this electrical plug is that it's not super expensive (at least for the TMAX anyway). So, while Heyser is getting my battery recharged or replaced, I'll had one of these electrical leads installed to so I won't have to go through this again. Lastly, I won't leave the bike's electronics on when I'm not riding it. That way, I won't end up with a dead battery again (hopefully).

Back-to-Back Cruises

I first heard of doing back-to-back cruises during my recent Alaska cruise with Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines. With the Alaska cruise, I thought it was kind of redundant. You'd do the same cruise only in reverse order ending back in Vancouver. However, with other cruises, Royal Caribbean Cruises alternates itineraries between cruises which can make it worthwhiled doing back-to-back cruises. In my case, both of my cruises leave out of San Juan, Puerto Rico (a fantastic place to sail out of, really pretty at night.). I'll be cruising to St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands; Basseterre, St. Kitts; Oranjestad, Aruba and Willemstad, Curacao. Normally, I wouldn't care to go back to places I've already visited once cruising BUT, in this case, I won't mind going back to Aruba and Curacao as I didn't see much of either of them during my first visit. I did scuba diving trips on those 2 islands and, the trips took up virtually all the time I had on those islands. I couldn't tell you anything about what those islands have to offer barring some very good scuba diving. So, I'm looking forward to seeing them again. Also, 8 months after I visited Aruba, they opened a Hard Rock Cafe there. Any readers out there know I collect the t-shirts and, I'll be delighted to add the Aruba t-shirt to my collection.

The second cruise stops in Bridgetown, Barbados; Castries, St. Lucia; St. John's, Antigua; Philipsburg, St. Maarten and St. Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands. This cruise will be neat in that there is just 1 day at sea then, the cruise island hops its way back to San Juan, Puerto Rico. Also, I've never been to Barbados, St. Lucia, Antigua or St. Croix. On St. Maarten, like Aruba and Curacao, I haven't seen much of it though in this case it was because of a stinker of a deep sea fishing trip I went on which I still haven't forgotten. The captain of the boat was supposed to drop us off at the cruise ship pier and, he didn't. My friend Harvey and I ended up walking nearly 2 miles to get back to the cruise ship pier. We were not happy campers when we made it back.

Another aspect that'll be interesting about doing back-to-back cruises is that there are special procedures for such travellers and, Royal Caribbean has a special department that handles such things as I found out. Apparently, Royal Caribbean's website doesn't like back-to-back cruises. It wouldn't show both of the cruises on My Cruises webpage. I called Royal Caribbean's tech support who referred me to the Back-to-Back cruises department. They got the problem solved eventually. I learned from the man I spoke with that at the end of the first cruise, I'll go to a special waiting area that is just for people doing back-to-back cruises. All people must clear customs when the ship returns to San Juan since they're leaving the ship. However, I won't have to since I won't be leaving. Once everyone has disembarked from the ship, I'll be allowed back on. In regards to my luggage, my suitcase won't ever leave the ship. Instead, it'll be transferred from my first cabin to my second cabin. Due to price differences, I couldn't afford to have a balcony cabin for both cruises. Interestingly, I'll have the same SeaPass for both cruises. Some how, Royal Caribbean will program it to open my first cabin during the first cruise and open the second cabin on the second cruise.

Overall, it should be a really fun adventure barring paying for it. Right now, I owe over $2,700 for the 2 cruises. I'll get them paid off in time though I wish Royal Caribbean didn't demand full payment by 70 days out from your cruise. I suspect that's so they can still sell the cabin if the person backs out. I bet it's still pretty hard to sell cabins for a cruise at the last minute. I know I couldn't take advantage of that. I have to plan my trips at least 6 months in advance. The only reason I was able to break that rule in this case was because I was only adding another week and, it wasn't going to break the bank to add the second cruise. Royal Caribbean was offering a decent price for an Ocean View cabin. We'll see how much I like being enclosed like that. I do like having a balcony cabin. It's awesome to walk out in the morning and watch as your ship sails into port. It was particularly spectacular during the Alaska cruise with the stunning scenery. Stay tuned for more travel adventures all!