Day five at sea was much cooler and far less humid as we sailed towards San Diego. Most of the early morning we had some blue skies and clouds that dropped rain showers on the horizon. The temperature was recorded at 70 degrees, but we doubt it was that with 68% humidity and 5.1 mph winds. There is still some rocking and rolling even though we are doing a speed of 18 knots.
During his pm talk, the Captain said we had traveled 2115 nautical miles since leaving Nuku Hiva and have 709 nautical miles to go to reach San Diego. The seas were calmer today, but it would not last. He expected the winds to pick up to 20 knots with increasing waves and lower temperatures in the high 60's. At least we picked the best time to do most of the packing, and we only have a little left to do. We have already received two notices concerning disembarkation options for Wednesday the 19th . We will not have to collect luggage tags from the rack at the front desk. As part of our benefits for President's Club members, we will have our tags delivered to us the day before, which will be tomorrow. We have independent plans (a taxi ride to the airport) and will be able to disembark from 8am to 9:15am. It should be a piece of cake, so to speak. There were also two Delft tiles waiting for us on the bed after breakfast. That's a total of eight for the four voyages we did.
We turned in the last of our laundry at 8am, and it was returned by 2pm…..still warm to the touch. We never did get a notice that the laundry service would stop sooner. There was a nice note with our basket saying: We will miss doing your laundry and we hope to do your laundry again soon. Safe journey and see you again. Have a good day. It was signed, but the signature was not legible. Anyway, we thought it was a nice touch.
One of us worked on the computer since yesterday's report was not finished last night. Sometimes you just have to give it up and get more sleep. There have been some late nights trying to keep up with each and every day. But that's the beauty of sea days……more time to do stuff. The other one of us took a nice walk on the promenade deck along with the group of On Deck for a Cause folks. This is the third one we think of this particular cruise. It seems to work better when there is a smaller bunch of people walking at one time. It was during his walk, that he spotted a bird….what appeared to be a brown booby all by itself. It happened to swoop down and grab a flying fish before that fish disappeared into a wave. We have not seen that for ages it seems. Hoping to see more, he grabbed his good camera and both of us headed for deck six forward. The booby had begun to fly back and forth across the bow of the ship as they often do. That's when we saw some movement on the bow deck and were surprised to see a white masked booby either resting or injured standing in a spot near the wall of the bow. That's when we figured that the other bird was probably a juvenile masked booby keeping watch on possibly the mother bird. Who knows for sure, but we had obviously disturbed them by coming out here, so we left after getting some pictures. Back in our room, we suddenly saw the white booby fly by our veranda. All alone, but not injured. Within minutes, they were both gone.
Today was the Zaandam Crew Show at 3pm in the World Stage. We figured we would order a room service lunch at 2pm, then attend the show. Up until today, it has worked out fine. But soon it was 2:30, then 2:45pm and no lunch. One of us decided to go to the show while the other waited for the delivery. Calling them, they obviously had lost our order, but promised to delivery it immediately. Well that turned out to be 3:30pm. At least half of the show was seen by one of us. Maybe they will rerun it on the TV for everyone to see it. As always, the theater was filled to the max.
There was still some shipboard credit left, so some more shopping was needed. This time the purchase were three shades of lip gloss made by Effy. Who knew they were into make-up? If you spent a certain amount, you got a set of face brushes in a zippered case for free. Now we are done and will not have to worry about retrieving the cashable amount as it was spent here. Maybe that is their plan in the first place?
There was a nice sunset, but much earlier like after 5:30pm. Dinner was dressy tonight with the Zaandam's Legendary Farewell Ball with the officers and crew beginning at 8pm in the World Stage. The dinner menu was gala and the most expected entrée was the filet mignon with broiled lobster. Neither of us ordered the surf and turf, but we did try the lamb cutlet, not knowing for sure what that meant. Our waiter Regie did not know since none of his early diners ordered it. Well, it turned out to be the winner because it was a dead-ringer for rack of lamb, only more savory and tender as could be. Now we know. Appetizers were Caesar salads, a single cod slider, and the now-famous chicken noodle soup. All good. Dessert was the same for both of us – a chocolate sundae with lots of chopped nuts. And as they tend to do on gala nights, there was a chocolate surprise at 9:30pm on all of deck five.
And for those who preferred a quieter evening, there was a movie, The Fantastic Four: First Steps in the Wajang Theater. So much to do, and so little time left.
Bill & Mary Ann
