A few weeks ago a number of us embarked on this year’s SQL Cruise, this time to the Caribbean. It was absolutely amazing. Jes Borland, another cruiser and instructor, just posted a great post on what she learned on the cruise, and I thought I’d do the same.

• Yes – Tim and Amy Ford put an incredible amount of work into the cruise, and it was wonderful watching it all come together. Just look at how happy they are when we all got together for the first time on board!

• You can, in fact, have a serious educational experience and extreme fun at the same time on a cruise ship, with learning at all hours of the day.
• Jes Borland presented two amazing sessions, presented SQL Server wait statistics in an incredibly new way that everyone understood, and got me even more excited about Extended Events than I already was! And bowling with her and the rest of the group was fun too!

• You can’t escape SQL Server or Windows challenges, even on a cruise ship. I think they should have contracted any one of us for help while we were there.

• Grant Fritchey presented sessions on the SQL Server 2016 Query Store and on getting ramped up with Azure SQL DB. Now I have homework!

• SQL Cruisers are getting younger every year.

• Jason Hall gave a great session on tempdb challenges and showed some new features within the SQL Sentry Plan Explorer!

• Boats can get really large. They turn into ships at some point.

• Argenis Fernandez gave an incredible talk about how to hack SQL Server, and then proceeded to scare the entire class for the rest of our professional lives.
• The “Office Hours” block each day brought out some of the most honest and personal discussions that I have ever heard at a tech event. Jes hit it perfectly when she said the “How do you do *it*” discussion was all about balance. Hearing each other’s stories, goals, and personal challenges helped us learn more about each other personally and professionally, and was probably the most heart-warming personal discussion I’ve had in years.
• The itineraries planned for 2017 will be amazing, and I intend to be a part of this life-changing event again. Stay tuned!

You really should be a part of this event. The training is world-class. The friendships last a lifetime. The experience is unparalleled. I’ll see you there next year!