Days, 15, 16, 17……..23rd – 25th April– At sea, crossing the equator and two deaths tonight

 Day 15, 23rd April

Woke to a hot sunny day today! So nice☀️👏😃. We decided it was a bit hot by the time we were up and ready after breakfast to walk on the walking track so we slathered ourselves and sunscreen, and went up and layout, on the lounges with a book and music – heaven :-) although there was a very loud Canadians beside us, who seem to speak in very loud voices, even though they are right next to each other!

Afterwards we went down and showered and read books – Graeme is actually on to his 3rd online book, and I am onto my 2nd. I still prefer to hold a book in my hand and it has been nice to have the time to do so. We went for a wander around the ship in the afternoon, and went to voyagers bar and tried a couple of cocktails – just because we could :-). Enjoyed having pina coladas that weren’t slushie’s and were the actual cocktail. I don’t drink strong drinks, but even I have thought the alcohol here has been very weak and have heard other say the same thing, think the slushy mixers are to blame as they are more like lolly water. They call normal cocktails “on the rocks” here.

Grabbed a slice of pizza and took it up to our room – gosh, we are going to miss that on our next cruise as they don’t have a Sorrento’s pizza. The ship takes about 3700 people I think in the next one is about 1000 people less. Will be interesting depending on how full it is as this one is about 1100 down on its normal total for passengers now that school holidays have finished. But I have just been reading that the Queen Mary two has had a breakdown and cancelled its South Hampton – New York – New York - Rome sailings so we may get some of those people coming onto our next cruise I’m thinking.

We enjoyed a couple of quiet hours in our room as we get the afternoon sun on our balcony which is lovely, then got dressed up as we had our specialty dining at the Jamie Oliver restaurant tonight. Just by chance, Vicki and Robyn, who we have met through cruise critic online, were down there having their meal as well so we got to sit with each other which was lovely to have a chat and catch up. The chat function on the Royal Caribbean app has been broken for a couple of days and that’s the only way you can talk to people on board, so was great we saw them tonight! 

Jamies -The food, oh my goodness – five courses and so much of it. The flavours were amazing – we had a charcuterie board, followed by the most amazing soft garlic bread and arocini balls, then the next starter was small pasta dishes which we shared. One was in a white sauce with truffles and mushrooms, and the other was a traditional penne with slightly chilli tomato base. The next main was salmon and chicken, which we shared with a side of posh fries! That sounded very Jamie! I could hear him saying it ha ha😃. Apparently the fries are hand cut and cooked, and all the pasta is freshly made. There was so much food. I am going to pay for it tonight I know! I have had a few of Graeme’s loser tablets as we arent used to eating so late and they are making a big difference, not waking up with reflux which says you’re flying out of bed like you’re going to be sick when you’re still asleep!

We had a lovely walk around out of the walking track afterwards.it’s funny with the wind at the bow, not good for woman with long hair, or floaty tops or dresses!!

Talking to family at home, sounds like everything is going well – Mum and Dad have got into a good routine with our two puppies and our place which is great and Danni has almost finished moving her apartment as their lease had finished. She is also into her flying with Qantas international and after an awful bout of food poisoning in Singapore, we are all hoping for good flying from here on in for her. Sam, Royden and the kids are all going well – Charlee has just finished a holiday hockey camp for two days which she really loved.

Day 16 -  24th April 

We have crossed the equator! First time we have been at sea crossing over and some lovely person stayed up until it got to “0” on the position, on the map! 😃👏

We went up onto the pool deck as they were having a – “Crossing the Line: the King Neptune, Equator Ceremony”. Apparently it is tradition and sailors, and the Navy always do it. It was really funny as I had to punish the officers who had been naughty first, especially the Head of the room attendance. She was punished and had to kiss a huge, raw flounder, because she had not taught all the room attendance how to fold, kangaroo towels!! 🦘.Then we all moved on from being ‘Pollywogs’ - those who haven’t crossed the equator – to ‘Trusty shellbacks’! Hear ye hear he…..👌🌊

A quiet day in our room and on the balcony, I think today – my hypotheses of paying for all the Italian food last night was correct, and didn’t get much sleep with a sore tummy – that will teach me!

Day 17–25th April…… Anzac Day

We got up at 5 am today so we could be out on the top deck for the ANZAC ceremony, which apparently has taken some negotiation with the cruise line to establish and to be outside. Approximately 1200 guests attended either the 5:45 am, ceremony or the 8 am ceremony in the theatre. We stood and watched the sun rise on one side of the ship, while it was still dark on the other – was quite surreal. It was great as they have handed out booklets as well and both New Zealand and Australian national anthems. Was impressed to see we also had the Māori verses, which we sang proud and only a little bit of the ‘hum hum’ in the middle where you don’t quite know the words or tempo😊. They had the last post  as the sun came up, which was beautiful, and the whole ceremony was quite poignant.

We went back to our cabin after that – heard a alpha, alpha, alpha emergency call in the cafe afterwards for a little girl who had an epileptic seizure. It was quite severe, I think and there’s been rumours that she had another one later and passed away, but I am not sure that is correct – Chinese whispers are a dangerous thing.

We have been reading and reading on this trip, which is lovely. Probably because we have had so many at sea days, don’t know where the time has gone?! I’m so glad I keep this blog though – Affectionately called “The Blob” 😂, we wouldn’t be able to remember otherwise! 

When we get off the ship we will be flying from Honolulu to LA, then transfer for LA to New York, which is about 11 or so hours of flying. We will arrive in New York City at around 7 in the morning, so won’t be able to get into our hotel room, we are guessing for awhile. We decided that after having so much fun in LA with Graeme, Danni and I when went together in 2017 – that we would look for an event that might be on, on 29 April as that is the only day we have in New York unfortunately before getting on another 15 days cruise. 

Had a look online, and there is a ice hockey game at Madison Square Garden which would’ve been really close to us but the tickets were over $500 each?!😳 What the heck?. But we can get the subway over to Citi Fields arena, where there is a baseball game on. We really enjoyed the one we had when we were with Danni, so we are going to watch the New York Jets play the Atlanta Braves in the afternoon that we arrive. We will be a tad tired! as we won’t get much sleep on the two flights, but we want to make the most of the time we have. So I booked the tickets and we are good to go. 👌👏.

We did some walking up on the track – 7 times around, but were dismayed to find out that, even though it says 1 km from the starting point of the track to the end, it is in fact, 553m only! Feels like 1 km ha ha so that was only like 3 1/2 km that we walked – boo we have been over estimating our walks then. 

We are both feeling so over full and uncomfortable, even though we haven’t been eating huge amounts. It is just that there is so much available – there was a lady today in the windjammer cafe with 4 dinner plates stacked up full of food- one on top of the other, she was getting for herself .🤢 That’s the problem with cruise ships – they encourage gluttony with all the lovely offerings everywhere. 

So we have decided to cut back and go back to having two meals a day as you don’t feel good when you overeat all the time. We are glad we didn’t take the drinks package too, as it was about $100 per day per person, so was about $3000 for the cruise for a couple!! You have to drink between 6 to 8 cocktails a day which sounds lovely but 17 days in a row would be way too much. We have any spent a tiny amount compared to that.

For dinner, we went to the adults only Solarium, which is the mediterranean buffet. The food is very nice and the staff are lovely. A lot of the waiting staff in the higher end restaurants on board are Indian we notice and in the large restaurants mostly Indonesians. Gosh, they work hard hard hard, 7 days a week for 7 - 9 months and then 2 months off I think. No wonder they put the envelopes out for giving extra tips. All cruises from Australia already have the gratuities included which is good.

On our  next cruise we will be under the American rules, which are about $36 USD per day for gratuities and then everything you get the exact same drinks etc as on our current ship, you then pay another 18% on top. America is an expensive place with this sort of thing. 

We went to the show tonight – was quite freaky, with music and the massive harp that went right across the theatre above our heads, and a guy was playing it, while people were dancing and a lot of drumming. Was pretty full on and well choreographed. 

Went back to our room and Graeme fell asleep, but I kept hearing calls through the PA system outside in the hallway – it was an alpha alpha alpha emergency medical call again, then about 30 minutes later they started calling for a gentleman to return to his cabin on the 11th deck. Then they started sending PAs that were coming into the cabins, continuously calling for him on a regular interval. That went from about 10:30pm through to midnight. 

Then we felt massive juddering which woke Graeme. We had a look outside and the ship was turning around and - as we are are very near the bridge where there is also a spotlight, we could see they were shining it on the water and a small rescue boat was put down. It was very black and rough, and we are nowhere near any kind of land. They confined everyone to the cabins, as there was also another man missing, who was later found. 

After about two hours, they stopped their pattern searching – there was just no hope of seeing anyone in the water, but it has become apparent that a man who was linked to a woman who had just passed away in her cabin (which was the alpha call) had gone upstairs and jumped overboard.

It was a very late night and everyone was quiet and somber the next morning. News coming out of Australia gave more information than the captain, which is probably a bit of a pity as there are a lot of chinese whispers going around as people are so concerned of course. Know he has to respect privacy, but he just said someone went overboard rather than giving factual info and reassurance to passengers as everyone was feeling it.

Feel for everyone and also passengers on board who have no Internet and need to let their loved ones know they are safe after the news reports. I have offered, that if anyone needs internet and an iPad, I am happy to share mine so they can let loved ones  know at home that they are okay. Would hate for anyone to be distressed and not be able to contact family back home – I know we have had a lot of messages this morning from concerned friends and family which is lovely and apparently they are reporting this on the BBC as well, so it has gone across the globe.