Thursday, March 22, 2018

Thursday – March 22, 2018

Ah, another glorious sea day. We have been asked many times how we avoid boredom. Here I will try to convey how a typical sea day goes for us.

We got up at 6:45 and prepared for the day. We attended Mass at 8:00 followed by breakfast in the dining room. After a brief stop in our cabin we attended the Coffee Chat at 9:30. Today’s guest was Hotel Director, Henk. He has been with HAL for 24 years, and has been hotel manager on the World Voyage for many of those. He talked about his personal life before getting into the aspects of his work. He is married to the Guest Services Manager, Krystal. They work on the same ship for their contracts. He explained some of the intricacies of managing this large floating hotel. This includes overseeing accommodations, dining, activities and entertainment. Provisioning also comes under his perview.

At 10:00 we went to the Queen’s Lounge (theater) for Barbara’s presentation on what to see and do in Seychelles. A presentation in America’s Test Kitchen on Mediterranean Cooking followed. Another brief stop in our cabin preceded lunch.

At lunch David, our steward brought me some green sambal from the crew’s dining room. He had told me earlier that it was hotter and excellent on rice. My luncheon choice of curried vegetables came with steamed rice so I got to try the green sambal. It was hotter than the red sambal, but it was also excellent. I really enjoyed it. David was surprised.

After lunch we spent some time in the cabin reading and planning the rest of our day. Shortly before 2:00 Alice went off to the crafts class, and I headed to a lecture on the Indian Ocean. This was the first in a series of lectures. It dealt with the evolution of the spice trade in the region, and the changes in control that accompanied that. It was very interesting. This is a part of the world that I do not know a lot about. The speaker has motivated me to learn more.

Next was a stop at the future cruises desk. Two days ago we received a flyer describing some new itineraries for the Maasdam. It has been targeted to offer intensive visits to specific regions of the world. In January, 2019 it will start a series of cruises in Indonesia and Southeast Asia. These will feature Bali, Java, Vietnam, Thailand, Sri Lanka and Malaysia in addition to Singapore, Hong Kong and Western Australia as well as Cairns and Brisbane. Alice and I talked about how much we have enjoyed our brief visits here, and how much we would enjoy seeing more of this part of the world. These new itineraries would keep us busy from January 6 to March 28, 2019. They would start in Fremantle and end in Brisbane, so we would have to endure some very long flights. We decided that I should get some more information.

My visit with Larry was fruitful. The cruises that interest us are actually four 20-day cruises. They have been combined into two Collectors Voyages of 40 days each. This affords some savings in bookings. Larry was able to provide detailed daily itineraries and prices. We could cruise for 81 days at a cost several thousand dollars less than this year’s 76 days. We are seriously thinking about this. Maasdam is a lovely ship we have not been on since 2008. It is small enough to visit ports that other ships cannot, thus the intriguing itineraries. They have also created programs that are immersive in such things as art and culture, food and wine and history. We shall see.

After working on this bog for an hour and a half we went to dinner at 5:00. This is early for us, but tonight we have a cocktail party at 7:00 sponsored by The Signature Group. This is the travel consultant organization with which Cruises International is affiliated. We enjoyed visiting with the beverage manager at the party as we consumed cocktails of our choice until 8:00. Then it was off to the Queen’s Lounge to be entertained by Jukebox Rogues. These four young men are excellent vocalists from around the world. This was their second show, and it was better than the first.

We returned to our cabin, set the cocks back 1 hour and went to bed. What an excellent day!