Norwegian Joy

Norwegian Joy Cartagena, Colombia 2025

Wanting to be fresh for my 6 am flight for Guatamala City via Chicago and knowing I had to check in by 4.30 am and therefore be up at 3 am to drive to Albany airport. I went to bed at 9 pm. Just as I am about to get under the covers, my phone pings with an email, for some reason I look and see it is from Jennifer, the senior show and experience manager onboard the Norwegian Joy, which all being well I am joining tomorrow afternoon. Jennifer is very apologetic and tells me that she has just taken over this role and upon checking the upcoming show roster has discovered that my first night of shows will be tomorrow (the day I join the ship), two seatings 7.30 pm and 9.30 pm. Realizing that there was nothing I could do about the situation now, I put the phone down and went to sleep!

3 am my alarm goes off, I get up trying to be as quiet as possible and head to the shower. That done and teeth brushed, I head downstairs to make some coffee, I have already packed my cases and put them in the car, so all I need is to get into some clothes pour the coffee into a travel mug and away I go, obviously it's still dark when I leave the house, it's an uneventful drive to the airport and I park easily at the long term parking lot where a nice friendly woman takes me on the bus to the terminal. I arrive at 4.30 am and, without too much fuss, my cases are checked in. I head up to security, which always has a long line at this hour of the day, and eventually board my flight to Chicago. I read the rest of last night's email from Jennifer. It says that it is a three and a half hour journey from Guatemala City to the ship, which is now in Puerto Quetzal, and that I should arrive by 4.30 pm when we will immediately need to tech and set up the show in the theatre. Fortunately, they already have my cue sheet from my last contract with NCL. But do I have any images I want to use. I send her a couple of images I have on hand from my phone. I also inform her that I am on my way.

For once, neither of my flights are delayed, I even have time for breakfast in Chicago and in no time at all I have touched down in Guatemala City.

With surprising efficiency, both my cases appear, and I head for the exit to meet my driver, who is appropriately named Jose. We head out the door of the terminal and over the street to the parking lot, I am intrigued to see street vendors right outside the airport, one of whom is offering haircuts. Jose has limited English and I have limited Spanish, we manage to say hello, and he tells me it will be a long journey and hopefully the traffic won't be too bad and we are off.

I had never been to Guatemala before, it's hot, humid and tropical (which I expected). It is also quite poor, certainly a bit poorer than Costa Rica. The traffic is really bad, Jose takes a shortcut through a quiet neighbourhood and then rejoins the main road. He tells me we will be lucky to get to the ship on time. We stop, and he buys me a can of soda, which was nice. After an hour or so, we make it out of the city and get on the highway. The scenery is tropical vegetation covering small to medium-sized mountains which are obviously volcanic in nature. As we drive along, I become more adventurous with my Spanish and I find out Jose is married with two children and lives in Guatemala City, which he has to drive back to after he drops me off. He also tells me that we have picked up some time, and we should get to the ship on time. I text Jennifer the good news, and she tells me she will be waiting for me at the gangway.

We arrive at the port and I have to do a weird customs meeting in an office that is slowly disappearing under jungle like plants. The official checks my name off, stamps my passport, and I get back into Jose's car. I can see the ship now, and once again I text Jennifer. Jose and I park as close as possible and the two of us haul my luggage towards the ship. Jose wants a picture of himself next to the ship, which I take and also give him a tip, we shake hands and he leaves.

Josh, Jennifer's right-hand man, is waiting on the gangway, he is a friendly Filipino man. He helps me with the cases which have to be scanned by security as we board, as usual my juggling knives are thoroughly examined, and I give a short demonstration for the security man, having satisfied security, time to see the ship's safety officer who is a man of about my age called Paul, he is pleased to have another Englishman onboard. I am informed of my muster station and please "No open toed shoes, in the crew areas." For some reason, I also have to pay a $40 embarkation fee, in cash to the finance office, I am informed that I will get reimbursed for this, which seems to be a piece of Kafkaesque bureaucracy, as it has to be paid in cash, I have to use the ships ATM to make a withdrawal from my account.

It is now 5 pm, Josh and I empty my clothes that were in my hand luggage into my cabin (which actually looks quite nice and spacious), I need that little case for a prop in the show, and we head into the theatre where I meet Jennifer, Rowell and Sergio the sound guy. I hand Sergio my music, which I have downloaded onto an SD card, and he disappears up to the control room.

Jennifer seems very nice, and she is very, very apologetic for the inconvenience I am being exposed to. I start to set up my unicycle, while we discuss lighting and the size of the table I need. For once, everything is already there and Rowell even goes out of his way to find me a plastic wine glass for the Cigar box balance, Rowell too is (like the majority of the crew) Filipino. Happy that my tire is inflated and nice and firm, I set my props on the table and in the suitcase stage left, it's all looking good. We start the tech run. House lights 30 percent, I like to see their faces, stage lights are a wash, there are no nasty lights in my eyes, well nothing I cannot cope with. My lead in music is playing, so far all is good. We rush through the set and are all done by 6.50 pm, with the stage set for the show. I rush back to my cabin and jump into the shower, dry myself down, put on my costume. I'm backstage and ready to go at 7.20 pm. Rowell is pleased to see me, he hands me a bottle of water and puts on my microphone and body pack transmitter (experience has taught me to bring my own headset with a number of different brand connectors), Jennifer's voice comes over the backstage tannoy "Five minutes." I peer out between the curtains, it's almost a full house. Jennifer's voice again, "Positions please." The prerecorded introduction starts up and then my lead on music begins, Rowell holds back the curtain for me and I walk on stage!

They are a friendly bunch and are immediately laughing (Phew). I start with the crystal balls, I have been doing this short routine for at least 20 years, it is almost a warm-up for myself most of the tricks are pretty easy with the exception of the head roll and I have been doing that for so long it's just muscle memory now, although I hear my neck cracking louder each time I do it. It is also a trick that the audience realize takes a bit of skill, so as long as I nail it I am on a winner. Fortunately, I do nail it.

The first person I ever saw doing the head roll was the iconic Swiss juggler Kris Kremo on the Paul Daniels magic show, back in 1988 or 1989. I loved his routines and as soon as I saw him I started to try and learn some of the tricks he was doing, my cigar box routine is heavily influenced by him. As far as the head roll goes, it took me a month just to learn to catch the ball on my forehead and another three months before I could reliably roll the ball from one side to another, it genuinely is the hardest trick I do. I had the pleasure of working with Kris at Liseberg Park in Gothenburg, Sweden in 1993. On the final night of his contract he even pretended to be me, I really felt honoured by that. He was great fun and on one memorable night he hosted a party (bought all the drinks and food) in our apartment (we were four mostly young men), so his didn't get dirty. The grand finale of Kris's show is a triple pirouette with the cigar boxes, and I have never even got close to two turns. The man is a legend.

Kris Kremo

I could write about Kris's tricks for much longer, but let us get back to my show on the NCL Joy. Crystal balls done, I move on to my cigar box routine, it's a nice combination of skill and comedy. I have a magnet taped onto one of the boxes and another hidden on my jacket which means I can make the box appear to magically float, that gag is always a winner. I finish this segment by balancing a wine glass on top of a stack of ten boxes, balancing the whole lot on my nose, and then catching the glass. So far, it's all going great.

I perform the bell routine with three adults, which I actually think works a little better than with children and as there are a grand total of six children on the entire ship, that is probably just as well. There are a large number of Europeans on board and I have a German woman, a Norwegian man and a woman from the USA. The routine is made a little better when the German lady tries to be funny and I, good-humouredly, point out that Germans are not normally known for their comedy (a cheap but effective line, I know).

Considering my epic journey to get to the ship, this is all going very well so far. But the rope walking routine is next and that takes ten volunteers who between them have to have the strength to lift me up. Bearing in mind, the average age of the passengers is about 70. It takes a little while to find them, and I bring them onstage and perform the trick. A couple of days later I was stopped by some of the passengers, who confessed they had been a little worried about their friend who had been one of the ten, as it turns out he had just had heart surgery.

I finish the show on the unicycle, jump off and take the applause, which for once I think I really do deserve. I'm tired and I still have the second performance to go. We wait for the audience to leave the theatre and I reset my props. By this time it's 8.45 pm. I'm tired, it is only adrenaline that is keeping me going, I return breifly to my cabin but I don't lie down, that would be a mistake, I do change my shirt. I am back in the theatre by 9.15 pm. Once again Rowell mic's me up.

The Norweigen Joy has approximately 3800 passengers, this is a big ship, but the theatre only has seats for around 950. This is good, it means I can see the whole lot of them from the stage and it also means that the shows always feel pretty full, and the second show is indeed pretty full. I am nice and warmed up and also the first show was great, so except for the underlying tiredness of the journey, which I am ignoring, I am in a good place. The show is at least as good as the first one and I take the applause, bow and get off. I sit down in the dressing room and pretty much just collapse, the exhaustion hits me like a wave and I just sit there, I can feel my muscles relaxing like ballons full of water that have sprung a leak.

Two bright and cheery faces appear Jennifer and another woman whon I have not yet met. They are both effusive and shower me with compliments, telling me just how good the performance was. The new lady introduces herself and it turns out she is the fleet entertainment director. "Do I drink wine"? Well yes I do! She tells me that she really does appreicate what I have just done and would very much like to show me some grattitude by buying me a very nice bottle of red. I am absolutely worn out from my eventful day, but I am also high on the adrenaline rush of the shows and the day, so as soon as I have packed up my props and changed I hit the crew bar to buy a couple of bottles of beer, which I take back to my cabin, by this time it's past 11.30 pm and I have had a very long day.

The next morning I wake up and when I look out of my porthole we are entering the first lock of the Panama canal. Wow! In my in my lifetime I have travelled far and wide, but up until now I had never been through the Panama canal. The ship only just fits into the massive lock.

Panama Canal Lock

The canal really is a marvel of engineering and once you get to the lake you are quite litterally floating through the jungle. It took us 8 hours to traverse the length of the canal and I spent most of that day in awe of the experience.

On one of my trips back to my cabin I am touched to discover a bottle of red wine and a card from the fleet director thanking me for yesterdays performances. It was indeed a very nice bottle. Somedays life can be very good.

The day after the Panama canal we spent the day in Cartagena, Columbia which is a fascinating city where I enjoyed a very nice cup of coffee indeed. The street art was also very interesting. I would like to spend a little longer in Cartagena but unfortunately we have to leave before the party starts.

Cartagena street art

We have some sea days ahead of us and my second show night is in two nights time. The sea days are pretty uneventful and I spend my time relaxing, reading and with frequent trips to the gym. I also find the time to do a little bit of practise for the second show, this is very necessary as I don't often do it.

The evening of the second show arrives soon enough, I am a little nervous about my soliiquay from Macbeth "Is this a dagger which I see before me"? where I juggle the knives whilst reciting the text, but as my first show was a hit I know I have a bit of wiggle room because I have already won them over. To be honest the first show was alright but I thought could have been better. The second show however was great and I left the theatre on a high.

The rest of the journey was very uneventful but after my long tour I really needed the rest.

As soon as I get home to Vermont I vowed to nothing for a couple of weeks and when I finally did get home I did just that!