A day at sea was most welcomed once again. As the voyage continues from here on, there will be fewer days in between ports to relax and recover. One of the positive aspects of traveling north now, is the fact it will cool off. The humidity and temperature should be a lot more comfortable too.
We're not sure we mentioned this, but many of us on our deck have requested the USA Times or Canadian paper to be delivered to our rooms early every morning. A long time ago, this was automatic where everyone got a small newspaper. So it has worked well up to Singapore, where our delivery stopped. After a couple of days passed without the paper, we asked the front desk folks to please send it again. They said they never stopped it. So checking with our room stewards, they were sure they never missed a day of their delivery. The only answer to that was someone was stealing it. Can you believe that? Little do they know our names are on it, and our room guys are going to look for that. Better yet, they will leave it in our room after they service it in the morning. Sounds like a good plan to us. However, we would love to put a note on or mail slot saying that "You are on candid camera!"
The day started off with temperatures in the 80's with the humidity at 77%. The winds of 12.3 mph did little to clear the sea or sun haze that seems to shroud the coastline and scattered islands to the point we can hardly see it. At breakfast, we shared stories of our exploits from yesterday's port of Phuoc An, and caught up with an overland trip some friends did to Angkor Wat in Cambodia.
The morning was used for a deck walk and computer work, trying to catch up on reports and pictures. We are still a day behind but are doing our best.
We had some more quality time with our Aussie buddy, who paid us a visit at the Seaview Pool. Hope he is not "toasted" because the sun was more intense than we expected. We all stayed until Captain Frank's talk was complete. The sound was not the best from the speakers but the best we heard was we had another 247 miles to reach Da Nang tomorrow.
It was time for our two-week delivery of sodas. But this time we asked for flowers for one of us since the cokes are piling up. The sodas came to our room, but they were expired by over a week. This is the second time this cruise that happened. They promised to pick them up and come back tomorrow with the order of 20 Coke Zeros.
We just realized there has been no photo contest on the cruise so far. Perhaps that activity had been dropped. However, the photographers seem to be in the dining room every night, which is OK, but we do not like it while dining in the Pinnacle Grill. We shall have to pay Florin a visit and inquire about that. That department is not owned by HAL and is contracted out we think. So they might have their own rules we do not know about.
There was an exclusive High Tea Experience held in the dining room at 3pm. We are not certain what is different about it, but we did see the gigantic Art of Tea pot being brought through the Pinnacle Grill. We are not tea drinkers, so we will never know what this is about.
We shared a sandwich with French fries from room service. A 4pm matinee performance by the magician Sunny Chen took place in the World Stage. That's the first we have seen during that time of the day.
Dinner was "dressy" and most guests did just that. The menu was on the formal side with a brie and cranberry appetizer, Caesar salad, and mains of surf & turf. The surf was lobster, which only one of us had, and the turf was tenderloin with a gravy. Sliced watermelon and a small serving of apple streusel was just right and very tasty. We noticed there was something happening in the Kings Room. It turned out to be a private birthday party which can be booked and paid for ahead of time.
When we got back to our room, there was a knock on the door. It was the florist onboard with a beautiful bouquet of flowers. It was artistically arranged too.
Vocalist Emer Barry (no relation) took the stage this evening with Irish, British and Italian songs. In addition to this show, there was a Night of Music with all of the ship's bands playing in different venues from 4pm to 11:15pm. So much for another day at sea.
Bill & Mary Ann
PS We researched what one bottle of Macallan's 007 cost. The price was $2200. Whew….. It was the bottle we saw in Raffles window while in Singapore.
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