Sunday, October 29, 2017; At Sea, Skirting Typhoon Saola

Sunday, October 29, 2017; At Sea-skirting Typhoon Saola

We were up with the sun again, and watched a bit of the news on TV, which put us back to sleep until breakfast time.  We stopped by the pool deck where the Movies under the Stars screen was showing Radio Taiso, a Japanese morning exercise show reminiscent of the morning aerobics shows, but without Richard Simmons’ mania.  

We had breakfast in the buffet.  Ben was surprised that the congee in the buffet was terrible.  Just water with a few bits of rice at the bottom.  That must have been from Battan recipe book.  We will be sailing just off the northern tip of the Philippine Islands today as we continue to skirt around the tail end of Typhoon Saola.  

Ben did spot the first sea bird he had seen since we left Tokyo this morning.  It was a solitary gull.  While watching it, Ben also spotted flying fish leaping out of the water ahead of the bow wake.  It is surprising how far those flying fish can travel.  A few went several hundred feet before landing back in the water.  Watching for flying fish is a bit like watching for falling stars.  It takes a bit of luck to see them, but when you do spot one, it’s pretty cool.

We met our trivia partners for morning trivia, and didn’t perform so well.  The winning team got 20/20, but they apparently are on their second consecutive cruise on this ship, and had seen all the questions on their last segment.  Their prize was the foam finger, so we laughed that one off. 

There was a cultural enrichment lecture entitled Women of the Samurai era, but it turned out to be pretty dreadful with just a list of who’s who (so and so was the mother of so and so, who was the half daughter of so and so, and so on), with no pictures, or insights into the role that these women played in society.  Ben left after 5 minutes to log in some steps on the promenade deck.  The bow was open so you could walk all the way around the ship.  It was in the 80’s outside and humid, but the breeze from the ship’s movement made it reasonably pleasant.  

We met up with our trivia partners for “Brunchtime” Trivia, and found some stiff competition from our Aussie friends, who beat us by 2 points.  They got a round of Princess string bags, although one of the Aussies asked to swap the bag for a foam finger.  

We met a couple from Reno and a couple from Orange County at lunch in the dining room. Both couples were well traveled.  The couple from Reno had done the South America circumnavigation, although their itinerary started in Fort Lauderdale and ended in Los Angeles, so they didn’t traverse the Panama Canal.  They had done the overland Machu Picchu excursion and highly recommended it.  That made us feel pretty good about going ahead with that excursion.  The OC couple had cruised up the Amazon with Oceana, and recommended that itinerary as well.  They felt the experience on Oceana was superior to Princess, mostly because it was a much smaller ship (800 passengers) with more personalized experiences, like a picnic on the beach.  However, she said the people of the Amazon were the most desperately poor people they had ever seen, and they’d been all over the world.  She said the Oceana people actually suggested that if you had any old items like dirty clothes or worn out shoes, to leave them with the Amazonians, who could really use such items.  They did discourage leaving the ship’s towels and robes though.  

We met our trivia partners for a 70’s music quiz and picked up a new partner, Daniel from Vancouver, for our 6th team member.  Boy was he good at the 70’s music.  He and Rick carried the team to a victory, so we ended up with foam fingers.  We had found out from the game hosts that Princess had run out of the carabiners, water bottles and other items we had seen before.  The only prizes they had for this trip were string bags and foam fingers, so we’re pretty much just playing for fun and pride of ownership.  

We then got fitted in Japanese Yukatas, which are lightweight informal kimonos for pictures.  Janet and Ben were the last two to get fitted.  There were so many people who had wanted to do it that volunteer Japanese passengers, who were familiar with how to fit and tie these garments, were helping the cruise ship staff get as many people as possible into and out of the costumes.  

We skipped formal tea because the Yukata fittings took too long, but did manage to get a spot ‘O tea and scone in the buffet before getting back together with our trivia group for the afternoon trivia, which was a conventional trivia quiz.  We came in second by 1 point again.  

We had dinner in the dining room and noticed that a new couple was seated next to us, where a pair of Japanese women had been previously.  The new couple were Canadians from Edmonton.  They were both in real estate and the husband was quite garrulous.  By the end of dinner, Janet was wishing we had our Japanese women back for neighbors, but the Canadians were pleasant enough, and hopefully will get less garrulous as the cruise progresses.  

We actually skipped out on a Name that song trivia to attend the early Princess Theatre show which featured a guest soprano singer, who was very good, backed by the Diamond Princess band.  She was a Filipino opera singer who looked like she was in her mid to late 20’s.  She sang some notable opera songs, as well as some songs from Broadway and operatic versions of some pop songs.  She did an operatic version of Elton John’s “Your Song”, and “Memories” from Cats, the musical.  

We did meet up with our trivia friends for a game show called “Guess the Commercial”.  This was hilarious, featuring clips from wacky commercials, and you had to guess what product was being advertised.  Some were from past Super Bowl commercials, but others were from other countries.  We ended up with only 6 out of 12 answers correct, but were second place to the top score of only 7 out of 12.  It was great entertainment just to watch the commercials and be surprised by what was actually being sold.

Janet and Ben stayed to watch some Karaoke afterwards. It was interesting how many older Japanese men and women participated.  They pretty much owned the floor, and really take their Karaoke quite seriously.  Most had excellent intonation and rhythm, and most had at least some associated hand motions and dancing to go with their songs.  Definitely a step up from what we had seen on our last cruise on Norwegian Cruise Lines to Alaska.  

We did manage to finish watching “The Ghost in the Machine” with Scarlett Johanson on our in-room TV during the course of our spare moments during the day- mostly while the “Name that Tune” trivia was going on.  

Tomorrow we push our clocks back another hour to Jakarta’s time zone.  The Captain advised that we would be encountering some heavier weather tomorrow, but will sail within 4 miles of the Philippine Islands.  Many of the crew are looking forward to being able to use their cell phones to speak with loved ones in the Philippines as we sail within cell phone coverage range of the Islands.