This season of Below Deck Sailing Yacht has been off to a hit-or-miss start. On one hand, the first charter of the season was relatively easy. Other than Gabriela Barragan having to rein in a drunkenly inappropriate charter guest, of course. On the other, the new crew members aren’t quite gelling yet, whether it’s Ashley Marti and Tom Pearson arguing over who’s more immature or the two stews getting off on a competitive foot. But little does the crew know they should’ve been counting their blessings during charter number one because things can get much harder at work. And they’re about to, thanks to some unforgettable returning charter guests…
The day after the first night out is, blessedly, a turnaround day. So the crew has a full twenty-four hours to clean up the mess they made on board after a night of drinking, partying and arguing. As the stale beer bottles get emptied, Captain Glenn Shephard calls Gary King, Daisy Kelliher and Marcos Spaziani together for a preference sheet meeting. And surprise! The co-primaries for charter number two are Erica Rose and Cindi Rose! Daisy in particular, is filled with dread at the prospect of the return of the Roses, especially considering how unabashedly difficult the mother-daughter duo were last season. But hey, at least as a viewer you know it’ll be memorable! Just dear go, please no “tatas for Trump” this time, OK?
There’s also lingering tension among the junior crew that needs to be dealt with before guests come on board. After getting advice from Gary, Tom decides to apologize to Ashley for their spat the night before. At least just for the sake of clearing the slate and keeping things copacetic and professional. Though deckhand Kelsie Goglia still thinks that the two need to, in her words, “bang it out” rather than simply hug it out — even if Ashley insists she would never date someone her own age.
Yet as one door of drama closes, another opens, this time over the hierarchy in the interior. Ashley‘s made it no secret that she was rather unhappy about being made third stew. And if her attitude is any indication, she doesn’t intend to take any orders for Gabriela during the charter season. So when she opts to suck up to Daisy by helping plan the Roses’ party decor instead of cleaning up the bar like the second stew asked, it becomes a problem. Gabriela’s upset at being blown off, and calls Ashley out in the crew mess in front of nearly the entire crew. But rather than intervene, Daisy focuses on her own duties. The two stews can figure things out between them without the need for her to referee.
Gabriela quickly regrets the confrontation, but her attempt at apologizing doesn’t really go over that well either. Ashley tells her point blank that she basically sees the hierarchy between second and third stew to be completely arbitrary. And in a way, she does have a point. Both stews only have about a year of work in yachting under their belts. But while the air technically gets cleared, something tells me this battle of the stews is only going to get worse as the season progresses. And Daisy won’t be able to avoid stepping in for long.
The next morning, Captain Glenn greets Daisy with a deliciously scandalous piece of news. The guests’ arrival for the charter — which is scheduled for that afternoon – has been upset on account of Erica, her husband and her mother being ejected from their flight at Heathrow Airport. While details are a bit muddy on what exactly went down, it looks like Cindi won’t be arriving until later in the day. Because she’s been detained. I swear, only the Roses…
Following a panicked scramble to properly clean the transom, the rest of the guests arrive sans the Married to Medicine Houston alum, with Erica in the lead. And before they’ve even made it down the dock, her husband, Chuck, is threatening under his breath that every time he’s inconvenienced, the crew’s losing part of their tip. So this is going to be fun! As the crew gets to work unpacking Erica alum’s mountain of luggage, the one-time Bachelor contestant regales Daisy with the story of her mom’s detainment. Apparently, it involves Cindi stealing Chuck’s omelette from first class because she didn’t like the yogurt being served in economy plus? I can only imagine the four police officers chasing Cindi around the plane with her eggs, but the real question is: why wasn’t she in first class too?
After anchoring in Cala Presili, Tom makes his second major mistake of the season by forgetting to remove the pins in the door before opening the swim platform. The deckhand’s flub not only scratches the paint on the boat, it also earns him a talking to from Colin Macrae about doing his job correctly. Meanwhile, Ashley is a captive audience for Chuck as she’s forced to unpack his and Erica’s bags as he drones on and on about stone crabs, alcohol and how rich he is. Suddenly I’m having flashbacks to when Cindi cornered Alli Dore last season to do nearly the exact same thing. They’re not technically blood related since Chuck is her son-in-law, but maybe the habit runs in the family?
While Gary heads off in the tender to finally pick up an unfashionably late Cindi, Daisy serves as intermediary between the guests and Chef Marcos over the dinner menu. Chuck immediately turns his nose up at the idea of a watermelon gazpacho. He may not know what it is, but the word sounds disgusting, OK? So that idea’s out the window. Ten minutes later, Erica invades the galley with a friend to shoot down Marcos’ plan to make a broccoli mousse. Can’t they just have a plain, basic salad instead? Right about then, it dawns on the chef that he’s cooking for guests with the culinary sensibilities of a kindergarten class. I warned you this would be fun, didn’t I?
Despite the downgraded menu, Marcos manages to pull off a delicious meal for the first dinner of the charter. Not that that stops Erica and company from complaining about the food. First, she sends her steak back because she wants it well done. She expressly told the chef she didn’t want any pink in her steak, but he managed to forget. Then, Chuck criticizes the steak after his first bite, but quickly retracts the statement because he just cut off a piece of fat. By the end of the meal, though, everyone seems satisfied, with even Erica’s finicky husband calling the dinner “one of the top five” he’s had in his entire life. Hint: you would do well to remember that statement.
Before going to bed, Daisy runs the next day’s itinerary past Erica, who settles on forgoing breakfast for a boozy brunch on the beach at 11 o’clock. However, her family members seem to have missed that memo. Because Chuck wakes up cranky and demanding food with Cindi meekly following suit. Their last-minute breakfast orders — an omelette for him, poached eggs for her — create more work for Chef Marcos, who has to pause his brunch prep. But he whips the food out in no time. No problem, right? Wrong.
First, Chuck gets angry that his omelette has tomatoes in it, and demands a second, tomato-free one from the galley. Like a petulant five-year-old. But it’s while he’s waiting for his replacement omelette that he really gets going, bashing Marcos‘ food while Cindi chimes in to claim what the chef has presented since they arrived is no better than the local Chili’s. Oof, low blow, dude. Chuck gets so wound up that by the time the new omelette is delivered to the table, he pushes it away too, calling Marcos’ cooking “disgusting” and refusing to eat. And on second thought, he takes back what he said after dinner, too. He hated the steak. As he stomps around the boat whining that he’s had “better food at the ball park,” Daisy‘s left to run interference before the crew loses their entire tip altogether.
TELL US – WERE YOU SURPRISED TO SEE ERIKA AND CINDI BACK AS CHARTER GUESTS? IS ASHLEY DISRESPECTING THE HIERARCHY OF THE STEWS? HAVE YOU EVER SEEN SOMEONE GET KICKED OFF A FLIGHT FOR STEALING AN OMELETTE?
[Photo Credit: Bravo]
