Day 3 at Sea

Day 3 at Sea

We have developed a routine of sorts. It mostly revolves around mealtimes and BINGO. Marcia was interested in the captain’s talk about navigation, but later in the day she realized that all of the talks are videotaped and replayed on the stateroom tv later, so there is not much need to show up on time.

I have been contemplating the objection raised by some that a week at sea would get boring. I’m thinking that it depends on the individual. There are many things going on all the time. We see people with their watercolors in the lift-there is a daily class. The bridge players are busy busy. Techno geeks are often challenged by the satellite being down or the competition for online connection. (As you can see by our postings yesterday, we got a space on the satellite. ) This is not to mention the rates for connection that start at $0.46 per minute. Nevertheless, the internet lounge is always full and there is wi-fi all over the ship. There is a movie theater, and movies on demand and free movies on the stateroom tv. The casino beckons to some. There is family BINGO early afternoon and Snowball jackpot BINGO late afternoon. There are edutainment talks like the one on navigation. We have Nigel West aboard ship and he does some spy talk daily. Ditto for an expert on early Native Americans whose topics veer into the sensational and advertisements for Western Caribbean cruises. “Is 2012 something to really worry about?” There is a basketball court, table tennis, gym, walk/jog track, several pools-one in the solarium and two outside in the elements-fairly windy these past two days. Next to the pools are little hot tubs, probably about 10 of them. There are cooking classes-the perfect crepe and wine tastings, and it just goes on and on. Croquet on the lawn anyone?

We are not so interested in many of these things. We leisure our way through the days and nights enjoying the pampering of good food, good coffee, great big bottles of evian, and an occasional fruit smoothie. I am very impressed with the food. Very light and healthy choices-very tasty. We are eating light and moving. I got a nice walk around the upper deck yesterday and will soon be checking on the bicycle. We might even get in the pool in the solarium today. We blog and we read and we watch movies.

The sea got a bit choppy yesterday. Some swells of 5 ft, and perhaps even more last night. I love sleeping with a big chop, but walking is a bit challenging. It takes many extra steps to zig zag one’s way down a hallway when the ship is rocking, and there is something slightly undignified about it-though everyone is doing it.

The wind is blowing at 44mph and the temp is 67F, so the sunbathers are all dressed AND wrapped up in beach towels. Has little appeal to me, but whatever. The chop is down to about 3 ft (I’m guessing-Marcia has a different guess but I’ll let her blog about it), so we are rolling along. We have learned to be sure the balcony door is closed before opening the cabin door lest the contents of the cabin fly. At least they would fly into the hallway, not out to sea. I was glad I brought in my laundry this morning as they hosed down our balcony.

The ship itself is something of a marvel. We keep finding little lounges with lovely views-views of the ocean and more ocean. I find this relaxing and calming. I have plenty of books on my Blackberry, so I am good. Just as well as it would cost plenty to download them here.

We are off to the lounge on deck 12 fore. I overheard an explanation of the ship layout in the elevator. Eating is aft, entertainment is fore, and sex is in between. Or, as they guy who was explaining added, “In my case, sleep is in between.” Whatever.

Oh, BTW, I won at BINGO yesterday. I won the last game and would have collected about $100+ but the woman sitting next to me had BINGO as well and so we split. Once again, I paid for my BINGO and had enough left over for a glass of wine. Maybe today will be a really big jackpot.

Addendum: We have taken to playing, and I use the term loosely, electronic BINGO. One sits and watches a little handheld BINGO screen with many cards as the numbers shade when they are called. There are no mistakes on electronic BINGO, but they check the machine anyway. I won $105.01 today. The game was four corners and I got BINGO in 5 calls. Since the little machines cost $45 each, once again we recovered out outlay and made a glass of wine. When one buys the big cards or machine, one gets a little lottery like ticket to peel off. Three in a row of different symbols makes for a win from $5-$1500. Marcia won $5 yesterday and we each won $5 today. Winning is fun and reinforces our BINGO habit.

KG