Dear Cruise Diary — Day 7, April 27, 2013

Dear Cruise Diary

Day 7 – At Sea in the Atlantic Ocean

April 27, 2013

 

This is the problem with not keeping up with the journal every day. Today is really Day 10 and I am trying to remember what I did on Day 7. I jotted down some notes at the time, but they aren’t helping a lot as the sea days are beginning to merge in my memory. That could be because they really are about the same. So don’t expect these journal entries to be very long.

Back to Day 7: I slept till after 8 am. The ship’s clock may change every day, but my body clock doesn’t seem to. I obviously missed the 7 am stretch, so headed up to the Windjammer for breakfast (the usual bagel and lox with fruit) and read some of the old Wall Street Journals I downloaded a few days ago in Nassau.

I sat down in the shade on the pool deck to work on an article for a financial client, but it was just too windy. It also was getting cooler, in the low 70s or high 60s. I didn’t really pack for cooler weather. I had a windbreaker and a cardigan – which worn together would be fine any time it was really cool on the trip. But they would get tiring if I wore them daily, and they would probably have been overkill around the ship. It would be nice had I packed one or two long-sleeved shirts for daytime, but I knew that once we were in Egypt and beyond I wouldn’t need them.

The writing took a good deal of what was left of the morning, but I did take a break to go to a ship’s lecture on “Great Saves – Rescues at Sea.” Of course, it had nothing to do with ship disasters – no need to worry the passengers. Instead the lecturer, who had served in the Coast Guard, focused on airplane crashes (straight into the sea; typically no survivors) and ditches (landing “on” the sea – think of US Air on the Hudson River).

I had another salad in the Windjammer for lunch (after we jumped ahead again on the clock); I am starting to get tired of having the same thing every day, so thought I better switch off tomorrow.

There is a big screen on the pool deck and they were showing Les Miserables during the afternoon. Quite a few people wrapped up in beach towels to watch. I headed for the café to write blogs from the previous day or two. By 4:30 pm I was ready to move, so headed up to the jogging track to walk a few miles. I was glad I brought a clip to attach my ball cap to my shirt because it was pretty windy. After two miles, my hip (the one I had replaced three years ago) was starting to ache, so I called it quits then. By the end of the day, though, I had put in 30 flights up on the stairs – a new high.

Dinner was the second of three formal nights on this segment of 15 days. I didn’t bring much in the way of formal wear, but in nice black slacks and a dressy top I fit right in with most of the people on the ship. There were four of us at dinner; one a woman I had eaten with before who again spent much of the meal complaining, so I would later ask the maitre d’ to not seat me with her again. The couple that joined us was delightful. They met on a cruise a few years ago. I think it was the first couple I met who actually did meet on a ship and marry. She was from Wisconsin and he was from Australia, where they live now.

After dinner I just wandered through the promenade listening to music for a while and then headed to the cabin, where I went to bed after watching a bit of television.

Tomorrow: Day 7 – At Sea in the Atlantic Ocean