We’re on day 7 of 8 sea days and we’ve enjoyed it tremendously but I think most people would agree that land will be a welcome sight. The only thing we’ve seen for a week is a school of flying fish and a pod of dolphins. Otherwise its just water, water, water. It’s amazing how immense the Pacific Ocean is.
Our days are filled with exercise, lectures, food, reading, relaxing, sunning, etc. I’ve gone to a few craft classes and take an aerobics class almost daily. Ed and I try to get into the hot tub every day too. We have dinner at 5:45 every evening, which is kind of early for us but it does mean that there is less time for drinking before dinner (a good thing) and more time after dinner for other activities. We like our dinner companions but don’t socialize with them too much other than at dinner. We’ve met another couple, Dick and Debra, who we enjoy very much and are spending time with them more and more. In fact, tonight we’re having dinner with them at the Pinnacle Grill, which is the upscale restaurant onboard. Dick and Debra have befriended one of the comedians who has performed for us and he and his wife will be joining us this evening at the Grill.
Most evenings, though, are pretty low key. There’s a nice movie theater on board and we’ve been to 3 movies after dinner or we check a movie out of the library and watch it in our room. We’ve done a little gambling and are currently $7 in the black. They have 1 cent, 2 cent, and 5 cent slots which I love. It takes me a long time to spend a buck.
We’ve had lots of great entertainment while we’ve been captives on the ship. The best speaker is Eric Dunn who is an astronomer. He’s lectured on the constellations and the planets and the first night Ed and I went outside and we could see the Constellation Orion right away. Orion has been following us ever since. We are looking forward to seeing the Southern Cross when we get to the Polynesian Islands this weekend. We also got to see the first pictures of the planet Mercury that were sent to Earth on Tuesday. That was quite interesting as well.
For the last several days we’ve had talks by Barbara, who is the expert on the ports we’re going to visit and her speaking style and great enthusiasm is making us even more excited about reaching solid ground again. The first 4 places we’ll visit are Nuku Hiva, Papeete, Moorea and Bora Bora and are reputedly lush, unspoiled islands with lots to offer visitors. There will be much more forthcoming on these places after our stops.
On every world cruise Holland America chooses a charity and sponsors an event for the passengers to participate in. This cruise it happens to be the Susan G. Komen Foundation for Breast Cancer! Since my diagnosis and mastectomy was just 3 months ago, this charity is very close to my heart (no pun intended). We’ll definitely participate in the walk which will be this Sunday, the 20th.
I couldn’t write for the blog without mentioning the NFL Playoff games this weekend. We are keeping our fingers crossed that the ship can get the signal and we can watch the game. Ed has developed a reputation as the go-to guy for football statistics and updates.
I have a new name. All my cruise documents are under my legal name, Mary Suzanne McCarter, and they have misspelled Mary in the one of the computer programs onboard. So many of the things I receive in the mail are addressed to Maky McCarter. Our room steward calls me Miss Maky (sounds like Mackey) and now Ed has started calling me Maky too. The catchphrase seems to be “look out, old Maky’s back”. I think I like it.
I know this is long and wordy and if you’ve reached this point in the blog I thank you. If you gave up halfway through, who can blame you?
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