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Now that I’m stuffed with turkey and pumpkin pie and feeling nostalgic about the pilgrims, it's hard to believe that just a week ago, Chrissi and I were in the Mayan ruin city of Tulum with fellow soap fans. The Mayan culture (dated back to the year 400 A.D.) beats the pants off of the good ol' USA's culture, I must say. We (Americans) are merely toddlers. But I digress. The First Annual Soap Cruise was an amazing experience for me, as a Soaps.com Editor -- as well as a lifelong soap fan.

Nearly 300 ardent soap fans set sail for four days with what have to be 10 of the soap world's most hilarious personalities. During the many scheduled events on board, the soap fans never failed to entertain. Even when they weren't necessarily supposed to! Before we even set sail, there was a meet & greet session in which fans got their photos taken with the actors. In addition to meeting and greeting and saying "cheese", Don Diamont (Brad Carlton on The Young and the Restless) was messing around with his life vest and trying to make his fellow actors nervous about the impending voyage. Later, we all played celebrity bingo and filling our cards became the secondary form of entertainment. One after another, the actors took the microphone and called out numbers, each trying to outdo each other in antics. Y&R's Christian LeBlanc (Michael Baldwin) was clearly the only true Bingo player in the bunch because he wanted the stretch the rules to include a game called "blackout". (Those of you who know what this means can consider yourself in Christian's league of bingo diehards.) Personally, I got the biggest kick out of what ensued when the Carnival Cruise line employee had no idea who Brandon Beemer was or that As the World Turns even existed. "Hey I practically live on a cruise ship," she explained. Brandon, however, took a verbal beating from his fellow actors.

Guess who else seemed to be the muse of the actors' biting tongues? The incredibly tall and blue-eyed Cameron Matheson (All My Children). He was genuinely happy to be onboard with all of the fans and so appreciative of everyone's support on Dancing with the Stars. The actors, however, seemed to have limitless fun by acting as if they, too, were ballroom dancers. They would samba across the stage or jive their way to the microphone every chance they got. Each time Cameron laughed. Hell, he even laughed when Don Diamont whispered (okay, when a guy whispers in a microphone it's not exactly whispering) "Marie Osmond kicked your ass." We all enjoyed that so much that he added, "The one who faints kicked your ass Cameron." Later, I introduced myself to Cameron's mother (his date for the weekend, everybody say, "awwww") and commented about how proud she must be of her son. Like any great mom, she told me, "I've always been proud of him."

I could go on all day with anecdotes from the trip -- and I will, as a matter of fact, in articles to follow. But I also wanted to comment on how nice this experience was for me as a member of the media. Getting to know Chrissi (our Soaps.com Editor-in-Chief) was really, really nice. I've been working with her for over a year now and, as with most people who work via the internet, we had never met! Now I smile when I see her name in my email "in" box because I know so much more about her. I won't say more - just know that she has far more discipline than I do when it comes to, well, just about everything. We shared dinner (and ultimately much more) with Amy from an ABC affiliate in Sarasota and her friend Tommy, cameraman extraordinaire. (On a side note, soap fans thought he was Sammy Hagar everywhere we went! He, by the way, didn't seem to mind.) Also at our lively table was Cindy, the publicist for Soap Cruise 2007. She was like the table's mother (even though I rival her in age) and so very pleased with how successfully everything was going. The man in the chair to my right, Devin, will likely turn out to be a lifelong friend. From the very first moment we met, we chatted like old friends until we finally had to part ways four days later. He writes for Soap Opera digest and is based in my former stomping ground, Los Angeles. We laughed, we ate, we hung out with some of the actors, we ate some more.

Which brings me back to my current status - I'm full. It's not just the turkey this year that fills me beyond measure. It's my good fortune: to have a family that supports my newfound career of "watching TV", as my son calls it; to have found work with the best online soap opera community there is, and to be able to report to the family that is Soaps.com on a daily basis. Oh yea, one more thing. I'm happy to report that Soap Cruise 2008 is already in the planning stages and Mike Gold, the event planner, promises that it will be even bigger and better than ever.

Much more to come. But I feel a nap coming on.

To see pictures from the cruise or keep up with what's underway for Soap
Cruise 2008, go to Soap Cruise 2007!


Julie Clark Robinson
GH Editor, Soaps.com