Two days at sea

Tuesday & Wednesday, January 29 & 30, 2019

Preface

One of the worst things that can happen aboard ship happened to me on Tuesday. Imagine, if you will, calling for and then entering an elevator, all by yourself. The elevator arrives and you step inside. Once inside, as the doors close, it becomes abundantly clear that somebody who just left your elevator left a nasty fart behind. So, there you are stuck in a tiny box with a prize-winning fart. What could be worse?

Well, halfway to the floor you’re trying to get to, the elevator stops, the doors open, and in walks another passenger. As the doors close they also detect the foul aroma, then snap their heads and look directly at you!

ARGH!

And Now the story

Well, the schedule calls for two days at sea as we travel from Fuerte Amador to Trujillo, Perú. Therefore, I don’t have any photos from shore excursions to show you. So, what can I show you? How about a day in my life at sea.

Fine, if you don’t like that topic, leave now and come back tomorrow.

When we have a day at sea, I do something that I’ll bet most of you want to do on any given day of the week: I sleep in until I awaken naturally. Sometimes that happens at 8am. Sometimes I get to sleep until after 10am. It’s pure bliss!

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Once I get out of bed I have to start dealing with my day. There is no coffee maker in my cabin and I always start my day with coffee. That means I’m into the shower, then shaved, dressed, and out the door of my Dolphin Desk (deck 1, aft) cabin almost as fast as I can move.

Although there’s no coffee in the cabin, good coffee can be found in the Lido Market Restaurant (deck 8, aft) and great coffee can be found in the Explorer’s Lounge (desk 4, midships). I never make it to the Explorer’s Lounge because the Lido Market has decent coffee and lots of choices for breakfast, as well. They have everything from fresh made breads to fruits and juices, to custom omelettes. There is always a broad choice of breakfast meats and I’ve found that the cooks will happily crisp up your bacon if you find it too soft (and I know you’d like that, Joe.)

After breakfast, I like to take a walk around the ship to get a little exercise. The Promenade Deck (deck 3) has a very nice wooden track that winds all the way around the ship. 3.5 laps around and I’ve completed one mile. The ship even has a scheduled event each morning to encourage people to get up and walk at 10am.

After all of the necessaries are out of the way, I usually refer to the Holland America “app” to see what kind of activities are planned for the day. The app is actually a website portal that runs on the ship. Listing the day’s planned activities is only one of the useful features on that portal.

On Wednesday, for example, the portal informed me that there was a presentation in the Wajang Theater from America’s Test Kitchen that looked very interesting.

I attended this event and found it to be quite enjoyable and very informative. This class was about making a classic dinner for two. One of the nice things about this presentation (like the TV show itself) is that they really focus on kitchen techniques, and not just the ingredients and how to prep them. At this event I learned about strong and weak spices, and how to make perfect rice in any amount. Recipe pages, printed on nice heavy, glossy stock, were available to everybody. Great show!

After morning activities, I’ll usually return to my cabin to work on posts like this one. It’s amazing to me just how long it takes to transfer photos, enhance photos, write, proof read, re-write, and publish. It’s a lot of work! So much work that I usually fall into an afternoon nap for an hour or so. Life can be so hard and demanding, don’t you agree?

Around 5pm I’ll head to the Ocean Bar (deck 5) and meet up with my team for a game of trivia. Fifteen questions, plus one “bonus” question. Our team has yet to win, but we’ve come pretty close. We’ll keep on trying.

If there’s no trivia game (it happens on some evenings) I’ll head up to the Crow’s Nest to watch the world go by and try out some exotic cocktail that I’ve never heard of.

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There’s a show in the big theater every night, but I haven’t attended many of them. The acts that are brought in might appeal to my father (if he were alive) but the music selection, the “night club” vibe, and the corny jokes just don’t appeal to me. What does appeal to me is Cigars under the Stars, held in the outdoor Sea View bar (deck 8, aft) every night at 9pm. I’ll take my iPad and a nice cigar out to the Sea View bar, order up a glass of Don Julio Añejo, and continue my re-watching of Game of Thrones in the warm night air. So nice!

After a cigar and a glass of tequila, I’m usually ready for bed, especially if there is a shore excursion the next day.

The next morning, I get up and start again. Wash, rinse, repeat.

Really, there are many fun things to do and the list changes every day. There are specialty restaurants with outstanding food. There are guest speakers on topics related to our cruise every day. Sometimes more than once a day. There is onboard shopping, but that only lasted me one day.

And sometimes, I just like to sit outside on a comfy lounge chair in the sun and read a good book. Or, I’ll use some time to continue to plan activities I want to do later in the cruise. For example, just today I booked my excursion to Petra, Jordan, that will happen in the spring.

What else?

Well, I do have hanging on my wall a scratch-off world travel map. As I visit each country I scratch off the coating on the map to reveal the country underneath in full color. The map also has the flags of each country beneath the map, so I scratch off and uncover the appropriate flag as well.

And, so where am I

Just to help you keep track of where I am in the world here’s my graphic progress report

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What is it?

So what was it yesterday? Some of you guessed the towel animal was an octopus. That’s what I though it was as well. But, we were wrong. The creator of this fine towel animal tells me it is a squid!

So, I’ve got a new one, and this one is going to be more difficult. Therefore, I feel that it’s only right to give you a little clue. OK?

Ready?

Here’s your clue: It is not a bear! Now, post your reply or just send me a message, as you prefer.

G’night!