20240513 Monday, May 13, 2024: Skirting a Storm System at Sea
The ship rocked us to sleep last night, and we had another time zone change forward. We are now in GMT or UTC+0. The ship had had to change course from northeast to due north to try to skirt around a low pressure system where the winds at the center are over 45mph. We are currently experiencing winds in the 30’s, which would be very typical for our winters at home, but the ship is rolling and pitching enough that people are visibly wobbling in the hallways even at 8AM.
Breaking a cruise-long trend, we managed to win this morning’s wake up or warm up trivia. We had tied with another team with 19/20, but managed to pull off the tie breaker which was how many stars are on the Brazilian flag. Did you know the stars reflect a star map of the constellations on the night of the declaration of the Brazilian Republic over Rio de Janeiro? The southern cross and other constellations are recognizable. There are 26 Brazilian states and one Federal district for a total of 27 stars.
With the ship pitching and rolling as much as it has been, handrail usage is a must in stair ways, and running on a treadmill is hazardous, so Ben ended up riding a stationary bike instead to get his activity rings closed. We grabbed pizza from the pool deck venue, which because of the weather and sea conditions, was pretty much empty.
The last Progressive quiz going towards the Cruise Long score happened today. What country has the most islands in the world? Hint, it isn’t the Philippines, or any country on the Pacific for that matter. Also, who was the father of the computer? Clue: It wasn’t Allan Turing. We didn’t have a good day, but probably finished within 5 points of the highest score today, so we don’t think we blew our lead. We’ll find out tomorrow when they release the final rankings. The riddles continue to elude us. I can be cracked, made, told and played. What am I? If we had a few more minutes we would have figures this one out, but time ran out for us.
As Elite members, we get to participate in a wine tasting, so that ultimately made navigating the hallways even more challenging. They usually have a sparkling wine or champagne (Domaine Ste Michelle Brut from WA) , a white wine (Meiomi Chardonnay from CA), Two reds (Kim Crawford Pinot Noir, New Zealand and Los Vasvos Cabernet Sauvignon, Chile) and a dessert wine (Errazuriz Late Harvest Sauvignon Blanc, Chile), narrated and guided by a team of sommeliers and a small plate of fruit, cheeses and crackers. It is a more refined experience than the cheese and wine tasting in the Açores. The Domaine Ste Michelle Brut would be a good choice for our daughter’s upcoming wedding for toasting with.
Despite being a bit tipsy from the wine tasting, we managed to tie another team for highest score on the afternoon trivia, but lost on the tie breaker, which as to guess how many minutes long the original Godfather movie was. We were surprised it was nearly 3 hours long (178 min).
Another Elite benefit is an exclusive lounge which opens in the afternoon where they serve appetizers and cocktail specials. Since we didn’t buy the drink package for this particular cruise (didn’t need the additional calories, and not cruising with our kids or a bunch of Australians) we just sampled some of the appetizers which are not generally available in the buffet.
Dinner service was a bit of a challenge for our waiters because the sea conditions have become the worse of the cruise. The Atlantic crossing had been remarkably smooth until yesterday. The ship has done a good job of providing a broad selection of menu items with new items each day. On other cruises longer than a week, it’s not uncommon to see the menu repeat in a cycle, but so far that hasn’t happened. At some point it probably will.
There are many people on board who will continue on this same ship beyond Southampton to cruise into the Baltic and then back to Southampton. We hadn’t thought of that when we booked this leg of the trip because we were focused on just getting across the Atlantic to meet with our kids in France, so we booked a self drive tour of the UK and rail tour of France. It would have been less expensive and easier to have simply stayed on the ship another 2 weeks. Oh well. But driving through the countryside in the UK and touring outside Paris will be new experiences for us.
The Princess Theater Showtime featured instrumentalist Inna Tolstova, who is a talented and energetic violinist who plays arrangements of updated classical and popular music, up to and including Nirvana’s Smells Like Teen Spirit. She was dancing and jumping all over the stage while playing her violin, and was very much a virtuoso.
Ben and Mike did an 80’s music trivia, getting beat by one point on a song and artist who was an Australian and UK phenomenon, but not nearly so much in the US (John Farnham, You're the Voice). It does help that Mike is a bit of a popular and rock music savant.
Tomorrow is our last sea day. Hopefully we will be able to make it into Cobh (Cork) on schedule despite having to veer off course to skirt this storm system. The good news is there was no unscheduled overhead announcement by the Captain today. We should have one more day of trivia and then several port days in succession before disembarking in Southampton.
