April 12th

At Sea

How could it be day 6 already? Things are going by way too fast. When people ask what on earth do we do on a ship for 23 days, there are so many things to tell them. There is simply so much going on, there really isn’t any time to get bored.

With the World Club party at 11:15, I decided to go to the craft group at 10:00 dressed for the party. Not a good choice. The project for today way an elephant painting on canvas.

Painting the background involved mixing brown, yellow and orange paints to try to achieve a sunset effect. Somehow the paints ended up on me as well as the canvas. I was told that I needed to blot the background, and that lead to more paint going everywhere. I guess I am just not suited to being an artist as more paint ended up on me and the table than ended up on the canvas. Still I had fun. We traced a silhouette of the elephants and then painted them black. It is good that my cocktail dress had a large proportion of black fabric, so you really couldn’t see the spills. This reminded me why we used to wear smocks over our uniforms during art classes at high school. Sometimes things just don’t change.

I retreated to our stateroom to wash up before the party, and noticed the yellow paint in my hair. I debated leaving it there, but ended up washing it out. It did look quite interesting however.

We finally  got to see Captain Hall in person. He looks so young. Surely this is a sign that we are getting old! Holding the mike, he looked like he was going to burst into song at any minute.

He gave an interesting speech, including talking about how Queen Mary 2 will be going to Rotterdam for some much-needed paint work (good job, our balcony looks like it would disintegrate if there was any more rust) and new carpets. I do hope they replace the carpeting in the corridors – it looked faded and worn from the day it was installed.

Yoyo and Chris gave an update on how many thousands and thousands of miles we had all sailed-on Cunard, and introduced the top sailors on board. One of the top sailors has been sailing on Cunard since the late 50s, which certainly beats my first voyage on Queen Elizabeth in 1962. Still I am very proud that I have been a loyal customer since then.

The party was fun, and not at all too crowded. I wonder if they will have a senior officers party on this voyage.

Seeing as we are all dressed up we usually go to the Veranda restaurant for lunch after the daytime parties, but everyone seemed anxious to change back in to normal clothes, so we went to the Britannia dining room instead, and had a great meal, chatting too much with our friends again, as we were about the last to leave the dining room.

It looked sunny and not so windy. After all we are 13 degrees south – getting closer to the equator by the minute. Time to enjoy the great outdoors. We headed to the aft pool on deck 8 and spent a wonderful afternoon napping and swimming. It wasn’t too crowded at, and luckily no one was swimming laps and interfering with my doggy paddle as I floated around the pool.

We had received a $40 voucher for the spa, and I decided to go to the spa

And treat myself to a pedicure. I do wish that you could get your pedicure looking out to sea instead of looking at the used towels on the counter top. Still a pedicure is a pedicure, and Colet is wonderful. I emerged with shiny red toenails again. Usually the whole calm experience is destroyed by the nail technician trying to make you buy some overpriced lotions and potions that you absolutely don’t need, but they shame you for saying no. She didn’t even try to sell me anything, or make comments about dry skin and other failings that I have. I gave her an extra tip. It really was a wonderful experience, and I am happy to wear sandals again.

We had dinner with Kathy and Mark, the Distinctive Voyages hosts. We have always had late dining and had been reluctant to try the newly instituted anytime dining. Also I much prefer deck 2 of the dining room to deck 3. Kathy and Mark have chosen anytime dining, and we met up with them at 7:30. They had reserved a table for 4 in a nice position on deck 3, and it turned out that we had a really great time. We may think about anytime dining for our next trip. It certainly makes things easier for dining with friends.

After dinner we sat in G32 listening to the trio Habit To until the early hours. I couldn’t get Brian to get up and dance with me, but we still had a great evening chatting and listening to the music. G32 is certainly growing on me, especially as a late late-night venue.