Day three at sea found us sailing north at a slow rate of speed - 11 knots. At 8am, the temperature was 73 degrees with 55% humidity and 15.2 mph winds. The good news is that there is no sign of Hurricane Simon anywhere near here, although some significant rain fell in Ensenada we were told by the Captain.
This morning before breakfast, we had an envelope waiting for us regarding tomorrow's procedures with customs and border checks. It will be a zero-clearance day just like we had in Vancouver. By 9:15am, we will need to take our passports and ship's old key card with us to exit the gangway. We were given transit stickers to put on our shirts to identify us as non-disembarking guests. New keycards were issued; however, they were not the President's Club ones. That was an easy fix at the front desk where our rep Margaret came to the rescue to make sure it was done correctly. Otherwise we might have problems re-boarding. Lastly, we might have to e-register our credit card as their system does not save the numbers and codes. We plan to spend the day in town once again.
If you recall from September, when we boarded we assumed all six voyages were linked. By adding a last minute credit to all six cruises, the 35-day Legendary Voyage was dropped from the linking. So we discovered our room keys had us leaving tomorrow October 15th, when in fact, we will be here until November 19th. It will be like starting over again with having to buy an internet package for the remainder of the trip. The new shipboard credits will be added (hopefully) and we will be back in business again. Other good news is that we do not need to attend the easy muster scanning of our cards. We suspect another full muster drill will be coming up within a week or so.
We spent the morning working with the blog and enjoying the pleasant weather. We definitely felt a change in the air, which has cooled off quite a bit. Both of us kept watch for the dozens of birds flying across the bow, leaving a complete mess there. Later in the afternoon, a team of deck workers had to scrub and hose the bow. It will need to be perfectly clean for tomorrow's scenic sailing out of the harbor. Anytime we arrive to a US port, everything has to be shipshape. Most of these birds were boobies, some of them masked ones.
Captain Thomas came on with his noon talk and said we were 35 nautical miles off the coast of Baja. We have sailed 797 nautical miles from Pichilingue and have another 198 nautical miles to go to reach San Diego. He expects to arrive to the bay at 5:30am and be docked at the north terminal by 7am. Sunset tonight will be 6:14pm and sunrise will be 6:55am. He ended with a fond farewell to all guests departing tomorrow, wishing everyone safe travels wherever they live in the world. This week literally flew by.
We took a break to do more shopping, which brought us closer to using the credit. Then we had a nice room service lunch with Cobb salads and a bowl of tortilla chips. It seems they have run out of potato chips; heaven forbid. Tomorrow there will be another day of heavy loading.
Using binoculars to search for dolphins, we spotted some different activity in the water far out from the ship. Getting some lucky photos, we learned these were pilot whales that often frequent these waters. First time ever for us to see these. There was a small pod of them with a few young ones. It wasn't long afterwards that the sun began going down on a totally cloudless horizon. Now that would be frosting on the cake if we saw a green flash tonight. Watching intently, we did see some green-tinged sky above the setting sun and also flashing on the horizon as it sunk and disappeared. The camera will tell the story if we captured the phenomenon or not.
Right before dinner, we checked our shipboard account on the TV to make sure all of the charges had been applied. That's when we remembered to look for a refunded port charge for missing Mazatlan. There was no entry for that, so we called and asked about it. We learned that both HAL and Princess Cruise Lines no longer refund port charges for missed ports no matter the reason. Usually the refund is small, but if you are on a longer voyage, it can add up. And it was always treated as a cashable refund made to your bank account when you return home. Well, you learn something new every day.
Dinner was a farewell to most with the parade of chefs, kitchen staff, and the waiters as they sang two different songs with gusto. The guests clapped and cheered but did not do the napkin-waving. Our waiter Sandi said the second song they sang was one they all learned in kindergarten in Indonesian. They really had fun with it, then it was back to work.
Both of us ordered the wedge salads, which were Pinnacle size. We shared a small anti pasta plate and another sweet potato salad we had asked our head waiter about. Without hesitation, Betty flew down the stairs and came back with one sweet potato appetizer to share. Our mains were beef Wellington and pork tenderloin. We shared one banana pudding in a jar.
The final show for this 7-day cruise was comedy with Doug Funk and with a name like that, he would have to be fun.
And so ends the "taco" portion of our adventure. Tomorrow starts the "tiki" part. Looking forward to it.
Bill & Mary Ann
