Today is our last of the six sea days before we reach Ponta Delgada in the Azores. It was a little windier today, and cooler, so we were not able to do a lot outside without bundling up. But first, from the beginning of the day….
We got up a little earlier today, trying to acclimate to the time change before we hit our first port tomorrow morning when we will not have much of a choice.
We went for breakfast in the buffet for a change of pace, having gotten a little tired of just having the breakfast sandwiches in the room. Of course, we, well really I, ate too much for breakfast, but it was mostly good things like grits and yogurt, it was just more food than I needed. Stephane was good and had cereal and some fruit. She had really wanted the usual breakfast sandwich, which they also sometimes have in the buffet, but not today, so she was a little disappointed.
After breakfast, we went down to deck 7 to sit in Stephanie’s favorite high backed chairs, we will have to post a picture of them later. I worked on the blog, trying to catch up with the posts and adding pictures into the posts that have been done so far. We should be entirely up to date with writing the posts, and with also adding a little visual effect by inserting the small in-post pictures.
We hope to have some free Wi-Fi tomorrow while we are in Ponta Delgada, so we will add the rest of the photos to the Sea Days 1 2 3 Photo Album.
After digesting our breakfast, we decided to walk laps out on deck for the first time on the trip, so we went back to the room and put on our exercise shoes, and some warmer weather clothing so we could walk on the upper deck running/walking path. It was a little winder up on the walking path than we had anticipated. The temperature today was not bad, it was supposed to be about 66 degrees, but the wind was coming from the front of the ship, and when added to the ship’s forward speed, was probably blowing about 25 mph or better across the decks.
We made about ten laps around the track before we were just too cold to continue, mostly from the wind. One half of the track was in the sun, but the other half was in the shade, and it was just too cold. After exercising, and feeling we had done something good, of course we had to go to the Outrigger Bar and have a morning beverage, a Bloody Caesar for me, and of course, the usual Bellini for Stephanie. We visited with Arturo, the Bartender there, who we really like talking to, he is so polite, and just fun to be around.
We left Outrigger’s and went down to Deck 7 to walk around in some of the stores to see if they had put out any new items for sale, which they periodically do, especially when the weather turns a little colder.
After window shopping, we headed up to the buffet for lunch, and then outside to the Seaview Bar to watch their “flair” show at 2:00 PM. We had to wait a bit for the show to start, so I had a couple of glasses of wine at the Mermaid Bar, one of the bars we rarely frequent, but is located in a part of the ship that is more protected from the wind. It was actually really nice outside when the wind was not blowing.
Flair show At The Seaview Bar
The flair show started about 2:15 PM, and it was interesting to see a completely different set of Bartenders do the show from the ones we had seen on our other cruises, both on this ship, and on the Royal Princess. They actually brought in one of the cooks, and another bartender from Crooners to help do the show. They do not have enough flair bartenders on the ship to completely staff the show solely from the Seaview Bar personnel like we had seen before. They were good, but only one of the bartenders was really good, Miguel from Peru, who was a permanent Seaview Bartender. His show was different than the other’s we had seen, his technique was different, but really good.
Miguel From Peru
We then headed to Vines to relax inside the ship where it was warmer, and to listen to some of the music that was being played there. We did not stay a long time, deciding to head back to the room to watch a little TV and rest. I think we both slept a little as we watched an on demand taped version of the port lecture show for Ponta Delgada, recorded live from earlier today. The lady hosting the show was so much better than the person we had on our last cruise, who seemed to always be out of date with the information on the ports.
We were specifically interested in information about taking taxis to some of the sights, which we were thinking of doing tomorrow after first attending Mass, but only if the weather was good.
Mongolian Bar-B-Que
We went ahead and got cleaned up and dressed for dinner at the buffet, they were having one of our favorite meals, Mongolian Bar-B-Que. it did not disappoint.
After dinner, we headed down to the Wheelhouse Bar to listen to Simon Wilcox, our favorite musician on the ship. We ran into our friends from Indianapolis, Sam and Glenda. They had just gotten out of the 7:00 PM comedy show in the Princess Theater, and told us how great the show was. We told them how good the Mongolian Bar-B-Que dinner had been, and we sort of swapped venues, they went to the dinner, and we went to the second showing of the comedian at 9:00 PM.
We sat in the back of the theater, just in case we need to make an early exit. The show was great, we will look up the entertainer and add that to the post soon. He was one of the funniest comedians we had seen on a ship. The only problem was that a couple came in about half way through the show and the gentleman sat down beside Stephanie, and unfortunately, he stunk, just an old dirty clothes smell, and fried food added in for good measure. She could not take it any longer and we got up and just stood in the entrance for the last fifteen minutes of the show. It was great.
We actually ran into Sam and Glenda on the way back to the Wheelhouse Bar, and we all went to the bar for a nightcap. They had liked the Mongolian food as much as we had liked the comedian.
We knew we were getting up early tomorrow, at 6:45 AM, which is the earliest we have gotten up on the entire trip since the day we went to mass in Port St. Lucie a week ago, so we did not stay out past the one drink, arriving back in the room by about 10:45 PM.
We packed our backpacks for tomorrow’s adventure, getting out all of my camera gear and other items we were planning on taking with us. Afterward, we watched a little TV before retiring for the night, certainly not as early as we planned.