"Treasures of Cruising the World" with Bill & Mary Ann: Report #48 Crossing the Equator November 10, 2016 Thursday Sunny & 88 degrees 28 Pictures

Although the Amsterdam did not literally cross the Equator until later in the evening, it was celebrated with the King Neptune Ceremony at 10am. With a long blast of the ship's horn, most everyone was present to "all hail King Neptune". It was held in the Lido Pool area, deck eight, with Gene, the cruise director as the MC.

Several crew members from different departments were the "pollywogs", or first time crossers taken prisoners. The all-important big, ugly fish was on display, which had to be kissed by the prisoners. If they hesitated, or more so, if they were girls, they were pushed into the smelly salmon.

Next step was the "sliming" of each person with buckets of tinted whipped egg whites. The crew members seem to love doing this, getting the sticky mixture into their clothes and hair.

Then they are led in front of a panel of judges, which included the Captain and four of his top officers. The offenses were described, and the judges gave thumbs up or down. Thumbs up, they are saved from pool dunking. Thumbs down, they are immediately thrown into the pool. Now in our way of thinking, wearing that egg mess drying in your hair is worse than the dunking. So thumbs down is much better. At the end, everyone that gets slimed ends up in the pool. And at the end, the pollywogs were now "shellbacks", and the crossing was sanctioned by King Neptune for a safe trip.

Silly, but fun, and the passengers love it. We squeezed in between onlookers on deck nine to take a few photos, then ducked out before it was over. We knew that when the ceremony was done, the middle pool would be closed for cleaning. That meant we had to get to the aft pool before we lost our usual spot. By the way, we both received the certificates of the official Crossing the Equator later in the day.

It was more crowded than we expected, but not bad. There was a strong breeze blowing across the deck, still depositing the soot from the stacks. Don't know if there is going to be a solution or a fix for this. It sure has caused a lot of extra work for the deck crew, and more than likely ruined some clothing.

The lecture of the day was delivered by Sadie Urbanowicz. It dealt with writers of the Pacific, fiction and non-fiction. Kainoa did two talks….one on Under the Jarvis Moon, a documentary, and the other on the next port of call, San Diego.

An Indonesian tea was held in the dining room at 3pm. They served exotic teas of Indonesia and sweets, which our tablemates admitted were great.

When we got back to our room, we ordered lunch, then hunkered down to work on photos while watching news or a good movie, Quigley Down Under, on TV. The only problem was our TV had quit working. Nothing with the 220 plugs were working, so we knew the breaker had tripped somewhere in the hall cabinet. Calling the front desk to report it, we were told it may take up to 4 hours before it would be fixed. Four hours? What's with that?

We gave it an hour, then made a trip to housekeeping to report it there. Within 5 minutes, a room steward arrived, and checked the connections, but could not fix the problem. We had to wait for the electrician. He finally showed up after 5:30pm, and said he just received the call 5 minutes before coming to our room. And as we deducted, the breaker had tripped, and he had it repaired in minutes. Now we are curious as to how many electricians are onboard, and have their numbers been cut back?

Dinner with our tablemates was pleasant as always. We discussed what we all did in Nuku HIva, and then asked if the four of them had seen the sharks. Unfortunately, they did not. They would have been impressed for sure. As it was pretty warm on the island, they did not explore it too deeply.

Tonight we both ordered alternate dinners of steak and chicken. The meals were fine, as were the appetizers of tortellini soup, shrimp cocktail, and a pasta with diced veggies. Desserts got mixed up between John and Bill, but each enjoyed the other's chocolate pudding and pear upside down cake. Oh well, the waiters don't always get things right, but we roll with it.

The show as a good one delivered by Bettine Clemen, a flutist we have seen many times over the years. She gets better every time we see her.

Six more days at sea, and we will be in San Diego. But who's counting?

Bill & Mary Ann

PS Vacationing Charlene: We found on this particular trip that we did not need to exchange for local money. However, if you wanted to buy something in small shops in Fiji, for instance, they did not take US dollars. Credit cards were accepted everywhere….mostly Visa and Mastercard. In our travels, we find that you can either exchange money on the ship, or take the time to do it in a port. Some folks even order the money at their bank before they leave home. It may save you a few dollars in the exchange rate.

Kiss the fish…..yuck