Anchored outside the Port of Dunedin

In the Fog

Happy St Patrick’s Day!

Well, despite my efforts I was unable to get an update on the baseball cap incident yesterday. We may never know what really triggered the alarm. The man whose cap was involved in the incident now has his cap back, courtesy of the New Zealand coast guard. Brian on the other hand is still missing his QM2 cap, and he is extraordinarily miserable about this. I don’t see the problem. We just need to do another trip on QM2, and he can purchase another cap. Coincidentally the 2019 World Cruise itineraries are available for pre booking today.

We participated in the quiz last night with our tablemates. It was the one on advertising slogans, and although it was very UK centric, we did win another bottle of Contessa Sparkling wine, so yet again, we are the champions! Contessa is quite nasty when drunk neat, but it does not have the drain cleaner after taste that Pol Acker is known for, and it makes a darn good mimosa.

When I looked out the window this morning there was nothing to see. Literally. The fog was so thick; when I looked over the balcony I could not see the front of the ship. The Commodore announced that due to the fog the port was closed, so we would have to wait and see what happens. Apparently they NEVER get fog here, so it is difficult to predict when it would clear. He was hopeful that the fog would be gone by noon, and then we will be able to get in to the port. The future of our daylong train trip, which I had been so excited about, was not looking good.

Neil Kelly, the Entertainment Manager, wasted no time organizing a morning schedule to keep us busy while waiting for a weather update – water colour classes, craft session, a morning quiz, baggo tournament, bridge, line dancing, and a talk on Captain Cook all of a sudden appeared on a revised Daily Programme. We opted to wait things out in the Commodore Club, where you get the best sound from the foghorn.

Three hours later the sound of the foghorn every 2 minutes was getting quite annoying. The fog was as thick as ever, and the prospects of a wonderful train journey through the New Zealand countryside were waning. The revised Daily Programme still had us scheduled for a 6:30 departure.

We never got to Dunedin. At 2:00 PM the Commodore announced that even if the fog lifted now, there would not be enough time for us to dock in Dunedin, and it really didn’t look like the fog was going to lift anyway. So we off loaded our pilot and a few people who needed to go ashore, and so with a blow of the ship’s whistle and our foghorn blasting every 2 minutes, we headed off into the thick fog with absolutely no visibility at all.

We were in very thick fog until it suddenly lifted at about 5:00, and the sun shone through, revealing a very pretty, mountainous shoreline on our port side. It turned out to be a very beautiful evening with hardly a cloud in the sky, and our walk around the deck was great.

It is St Patrick’s Day. We are not Irish, but I love to dress up, so tonight I had a green shawl, and Brian wore a green striped tie. Some passengers were totally over the top, with flashing green bow ties, green sequined jackets, green top hats, and one man had a green hat with a ginger beard attached, so when he raised his hat, he raised his beard too. It was not an attractive look, but they were all having fun. The St Patrick’s Day ball was quite well attended, and it was standing room only in the pub for the Irish sing along.

We decided to miss both of these and went to the show. Berni Flynt, a winner on Opportunity Knocks decades ago, was the performer. He played his guitar and told jokes, and was quite funny so it was an enjoyable way to end the evening.

We have booked a nature cruise in Akaroa tomorrow. We received a letter this evening informing us that our tour will leave at 11:00 tomorrow morning rather than 9:00 due to expected bad weather. Hopefully this doesn’t mean I won’t get to see the penguins tomorrow. Missing a train ride was bad, missing penguins would not be right at all.