After breakfast this morning, we had another mandatory visit to make on our residential decks to hand off the Ghana arrival and departure cards, The Gambia visa application, and endure a temperature check. Previously, we had received a form where we had a choice of purchasing The Gambia visa for $155 each, or opt out, and stay onboard the ship that day. We are so glad we have been given the chance to opt out, because we have been to The Gambia in 2018, toured it, and did not feel the need to return. All of our friends did the same thing, and remarked about the price they were asking. Way too high they said. The Ghana visas will cost us $85 each, whether we get off of the ship or not. Guess we will be getting off there, even if it will be a drive to a craft market. The temperature check revealed that we were both 36.5 degrees C. Suppose that is acceptable.
Last night's Daily Program had been delivered, then taken away abruptly. A new one was added after dinner. Normal activities had been resumed with permission from Seattle headquarters. Comparing the programs for the last few days, we really did not notice many differences.
We worked on photo captioning for a while this morning. It was warm once again with temps in the mid 80's outside. The skies were overcast and muggy and we could see rain on the horizon. We went for our morning walk and ran into two fellows who joined the ship recently in Cape Town. We did not know them, but we had a mutual friend, Konnie H, who had sent a hello to us from Facebook we guess. Konnie – we wish you were here!
Captain Frank gave his noon talk and confirmed that the seas are rather calm with a swell of 1 ½ meters, causing the ship to roll a bit. Then Ian followed as he always does, and mentioned that the port on Sunday will have most everything closed. When these itineraries are created, why would they schedule a stop at a place where all of the attractions are all closed? This will occur again when we go to Cadiz, Spain on Easter Sunday. That is a huge holiday there, and we expect nothing will be opened. But we could be wrong. The speakers are still bad on the outside deck, because we could have sworn that Ian said Ghana was closed down, but that is on Saturday. Time will tell.
Watching the videos on Ian's port talk for Takoradi, Ghana and Abidjan, Ivory Coast are not very enticing to say the least. Much of the area seems to be under construction, or the sites are far from town. Of course this promotes shore excursion sales for sure. There will be no one allowed to walk in the dock area, so shuttles will be provided to the port gate, or to a nearby hotel. But this is pretty much what we expected, especially after following the blogs from the Grand Africa voyage last fall.
We shared an avocado-bacon burger and a plate of Bolognese spaghetti for lunch. During the afternoon, the outside temps seemed to drop and we knew we might be headed into some squalls. By 5pm, we went for our usual walk, and the rain began in earnest. One time around the deck, it was flooded, so we gave up and went back home.
This is a good time to address a "mystery" noise that has been occurring this week. Mostly in the evening, we have heard loud noises that sound like a plane landing down the hallway. It starts slow, then builds to a loud windy noise, then subsides. It may be coming from the ceiling vents we suspect. While sitting here writing, the noise began at 9:50pm, and has continued off and on. Ellen and Aart are two cabins from us and have also reported this strange occurrence from the beginning. We are thinking it is a problem with a relief valve letting off excess air, but it only a guess. So far, there has been no concrete answer.
Anyway, back to dinner where all of us were present except Heo, who is still not feeling great. Greg looked perfectly fine after his ordeal with the bug and we welcomed him back. Ginny, a friend to all, joined us since her husband is either sick or got injured according to Barb. Ellen joined us as well, as Aart is still recovering from the bug. Nice to have a full table as the conversation flows much better. Most all of us ordered the tomato/basil crostini, and remarked we were glad they skipped the hot oil they have been adding to too many dishes. We agreed we do not need the hot sauce, and if they insist on adding it to unsuspecting dishes, we need to know before ordering them. For more times than we care to count, some of the appetizers have been ruined with sauces that burn our lips off.
Mains were meat tortellini with red sauce, and red snapper fish with the same red sauce. It was puttanesca, which has olives which one of us does not like. The good thing is that Nik remembered to put the sauces on the side, which worked well. The same went for the turkey entrée with gobs of gravy….all on the side. Once again, the dining room was less than half full, and despite the fact that the regular dining service was back, we think the bug is still around. We are not passing anything around the table yet, and not encouraging the use of sharing cell phone photos at the mealtime. It stands to reason that those phones are the most contaminated items we can use these days.
We have a new pianist onboard by the name of Christof Van Der Berg who will perform at 9:30pm. He was listed as a piano bar entertainer who will play tunes from Gershwin, Porter, and Sinatra. Ellen and Greg were eager to attend, so we called it a night before 9:30pm. We were about the last of the guests to exit the upper dining room. Appeared they were preparing for another spraying.
One more sea day crossing the Equator and we will be in Ghana, a new stop for us.
Mary Ann & Bill
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