October 17, 2024 Sea Day #6

    Today was Sea Day #6 starting the voyage back to Vancouver.  The clocks were advanced forward one hour overnight. There will be two more times, spaced every second day.

   The sky was mainly sunny except for a few small scattered clouds, a light breeze and temperature of 21C. The ship’s course this morning was heading Northeast 41.84° at 19 knots.

   We got back into our sea day routine, starting with breakfast in the dining room just before 8 a.m. Then a few laps around the Promenade Deck before activities. In the afternoon we altered the plan from an average sea day.

    There was a 9 a.m. lecture in the World Stage. Dr. Robert Hilt presented The Astronomical Zodiac, about where the zodiac signs are in the star map and Coffee with Alex, the cruise and travel director, with an interview with the Hotel General Manager. His staff of 820 is divided into 21 departments, which have a manager and seven assistant managers each. The total crew members on the ship is about 1,050 which includes the navigation team and engineers. 

    At 10 a.m. at the Lido pool deck, about 35 people joined Declan for another line dance class. Then we met Jo and Mike on deck 2 at the empty Rolling Stone Lounge for an impromptu dance tutorial, reviewing some dance steps with them.

   The captain gave the ship’s position at noon which was about 24° north and 150° west. We have journeyed 393 since Hilo and have 1,864 nautical miles to each Vancouver in four and a half days. The sea swells are around one to two meters high.

   We had a light lunch at the Grand Dutch Café. While there, we chatted with Liz from Idaho, who told us that she liked watching us dance.  We had a nice chat about Craters of the Moon National Historic Monument in Idaho, Boise (where she lives), San Fransisco (where she grew up) and gardens since she was a career horticulturalist.

  The early afternoon lecture - Hawaii Up Close: Extreme Paradise was about the volcano origin and continuing active volcanos of the islands. We gave up the chance to go to the Ice Cream Social in the Lido Market at the same time as the lecture.

   There was a future cruises presentation about the 2025-2026 itineraries at 2 p.m. in the World Stage. The audience was informed that if a cruise was booked on board the ship, the deposit amount is reduced and there would be at least an onboard cruise credit applied to the booked cruise starting at $100 US. We were intrigued by a couple of cruises, one that is round trip from Montreal which goes to the French islands in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, St. Pierre-et-Miquelon. The other cruise was going into the Mexican Sea of Cortez with stops on the east coast of the Baja peninsula.

   Since we are are skipping the dining room for dinner this evening as both other couples at our table are going to speciality restaurants this evening, we went to the 3 p.m. Dutch Afternoon Tea in the Deck 2 dining room. We sat with Carol and Bill from Edmonton and Linda from Victoria whom we met at breakfast last week. There were two three-tier servers contained finger sandwiches on the bottom, tiny buns & cakes in the middle and petits fours on the top tier. A nice tea was served.

    The 5 p.m. Ballroom Dance Hour was back on the daily agenda. We could stay for the whole time. Jo and Mike came for the first 30 minutes before they had to go to their speciality restaurant. Most of the music was danceable.

   We attended the early show on the World Stage tonight at 6 p.m. rather than 8 p.m. The entertainer tonight was Tyler Bryce, a singer who had an impressive catalogue of impressions of other singers, both male and female. His final song was God Bless America, which got a luke warm response from the 90% Canadian audience.

    After the show we climbed the stairs to Deck 9 for dinner in the Lido Market, where they featured many of the same menu items as the dining room. Today’s Port to Plate special was Fresh Blue Marlin Caponata which Larry quite enjoyed.  We stopped at the Grand Dutch Café on the way back to our stateroom for a cappuccino and Americano, both decaffeinated. Since it was just after 7:30 p.m. we peaked into the World Stage to see how full the theatre was before the 8 p.m. show - there were very few seats that were empty. The 6 p.m. show had people who had arrived ten minutes early, having to stand.

    Yesterday we received an invitation to the Mariners (loyalty members) Lunch at Noon tomorrow in the main dining room.. Today we received an invitation to the Mariners Wine Tasting at 2 p.m. tomorrow in the Orange Club private dining room.

     This evening, the ship’s course was heading Northeast 39.9° at 20 knots.

Steps 13,880