Another day at sea brought with it slightly warmer temperatures and what felt like higher humidity. At times, there was little wind and it almost felt like we were "swimming" instead of walking the promenade deck. Even as early as 9am, the heat had risen for the day. If there was breeze at all, it was a following one. We had to laugh, remembering how chilly it was while sailing in Alaska, which really was just weeks ago.
We had another lazy day relaxing at the Seaview Pool for an hour or so. After high noon, the Captain always comes on with his daily updates, and has been ending his log with some interesting questions given to him in a box by the front desk. Some of the queries are legitimate while some are actually funny. One simple question was the average age of the guests onboard this cruise. The answer was 70 years old, but that's due to the fact we have two very young children belonging to the hotel manager. Dropped the average for sure. Another question was why is the tissue box in the bathroom located so close to the toilet? Hmm, never gave that a second thought truthfully. The Captain's answer was, "I have no idea…it is above my pay grade", drawing chuckles from the crowd around us. Today the Captain had a Q&A session in the World Stage and took on many questions, so by the time he came to his noon talk, he admitted he was questioned- out. We have been used to Captain Mercer (now retired) giving his idioms on the Grand World Voyage, so hearing current questions is a nice twist.
It was so warm today that there were few people even in the Lido Pool area. Ordering some lunch in the Dive-In took less than 5 minutes. We have given up ordering the naked fries there since they always come in a greasy clump. Maybe they are doing us a favor.
Going out on deck six forward was a good spot to watch the sun go down. We finally had a breeze up there, as well as a few other folks that discovered this spot. Today there were fewer clouds and the sky was mostly blue. And because of that, the sunset was not spectacular. We all agreed that the best ones have been in Hawaii. But we do have some time going forward to capture many more sunsets. An added bonus was seeing two little birds flying around the bow of the ship. About the size of swallows, they do not appear to be seabirds. But that would mean they jumped onboard around Fanning Island. It would not be the first time we have seen such stowaways. One time a pair of pigeons stayed with us from Europe to Florida. Hope they liked living in the USA.
This evening was different as far as dinner was concerned. We had been given an invitation to an exclusive party for President's Club members with Pinnacle and Neptune suite guests as well. We felt the time of 8:15pm was a bit odd, so we decided to have Caesar chicken salads for dinner (excellent combination), leave the dining room early, and hoped the food served there would be in the dessert department. Well, we were wrong. The gathering was held in the Atrium on deck three outside the offices of the head managers. We were greeted with trays of champagne and wine, which we really do not drink often, and more trays of nice hors d'oeuvres, but no desserts. Oh well, we ordered after dinner drinks of Kalua and crème de cacao, which came half wrong. The Kalua was a Bailey's Irish crème, which I would have taken but the waiter disappeared. On the other hand, we did get to talk to nice officers such as Russel, the beverage manager, and the new food and beverage manager who boarded in Hawaii. We also questioned the internet manager, who we met last week, about tomorrow's message in the newsletter concerning the connectivity of the internet. This note explained that the speed may be slower and the connection lost due to our geological location. Strangely enough, he knew nothing about this message and was surprised because we have the new Starlink system running now. Well, time will tell on this story too. Captain Paul joined us and we chatted for some time, mostly about people we all know. We also touched base with Arnold, the Mariner rep onboard. We had a question regarding the President's Club Mariner benefits that may have changed recently. Again, he knew nothing about any changes, but wants to see our emailed flyer on the computer tomorrow. We shall be happy to show him what we received. We were about to call it a night when we spotted friends Bill and Leta, who we figured did not make it to the party. We visited for 20 minutes, then it got so warm in the atrium area, we said goodnight to all. And an added bonus was one hour back on the clocks tonight. We always like that.
One more sea day will have us in Pago Pago, American Samoa.
Bill & Mary Ann
