~ the Equinox Adventures ~
3/7/2010
Good morning! It is a lovely day here in the Atlantic - actually, we might be in the Saragasso Sea - but I am not sure. Its 65F out (boo!) with winds from the north on the starboard beam (meaning it is not too windy on my balcony!) at 19 mph. We are tooling along at 16 knots with pretty relaxed seas - rolling 5 footers with the occassional whitecap. The ship is bobbing a bit - so many people are calling it rough because it is relative to the rest of the trip, but it really is pretty calm. But it is sunny out, and the weather is holding out fine, just as my father said it would (he keeps checking Stormpulse.com to see if we are going to hit a hurricane). Here is the morning view. Yesterday was wonderful! I really needed the sea day. I don't mean to sound like I was complaining, but after 5 days of being bounced around like dice in a yatzee game, and swimming with the fishes, and grinding a racing yacht, you need a break. And yesterday was great. Now, if we could just convince them to turn around and do it again..... I know, they will turn around and do it again, in another day - but without me, which is my issue with the whole thing! Yeah, I know, I am not quite ready for this to be done, but it has been a great trip.
Last night was a good time! We met Mike & Debbie at the Tuscan Grille, and got some pictures taken - this is Mike & Deb
And we had a waitress take a picture of us all together. Then we went in and sat at the back of the restaurant, which is a full wall of glass at the stern - so great view as the sun went down. We had the same waiter as the other day (we asked for him), Sasco, and we flustered the heck out of him. I think he remembered me, but then he figured that we had all been there before, which of course was not the case for Deb & Mike. So, we had to explain that to him, which let him do his "usual speech" as he calls it. The meal itself was great, and we had a good time talking about the trip, previous trips we had been on, people we had met, kids, family, all that sort of stuff. It was a lovely evening. We were there so long that we actually managed to miss the first show of the evening, so we had a bit of time to kill before the second show. Mike & Deb went down to the casino to play a little blackjack, Carol & I went up to the room to get changed, then I decided to crash for half an hour (gotta get those shots of sleep in when you can) and Carol decided to go play a little more slots (since she has a system for beating the house). When I got up after my watch went off, I went down to the theater to find them all, and they were talking to Joe! Apparently my mother was still in the casino! Well, Carol had lost $10, Mike was up $68 at blackjack, and when my came in, she had lost all the money they had put in there, but had made 2 nice recoveries from $0.01 (yeah, high stakes penny slot machines!). Then we watched the show together, which was basically a stylized musical review - and they get alot of mileage out of their male dancers. Last night they had them doing aerial tricks (rope gymnastics suspended 25 feet over the stage, in a rolling ship). It was a really good show, and they earned the standing ovation that they got. Then it was bedtime! Today is our final full day on the ship, and it looks like it will be a reaxed on once again. Sea days are good for that! Maybe we'll go back to Bistro on 5 for crepes. We definitely had to pack later, fillout the questionaires and the customs declaration form. But that is for later. So much to do! So, I will write more later when I know what the heck we did with the day! Hope it is sunny where you are!
1555 - At Sea Somewhere in the Bahamas
Well, it is definitely not getting any warmer as we move closer to Ft Lauderdale. Right now it is only 66F, but that is not stopping people from going up on the pool deck and getting any sun they still can! Meanwhile, the ship is starting to develop split personality. On the one hand, they proclaim "its not over yet" and on the other, they do things like what we found in our stateroom when we came back today. How cruel! Those are our bags laid out on the bed!
But today has been fun. We went down, and had "breakfast" (it was sort of breakfast for Carol, more lunch for me) at Bistro on 5, the crepery. Sasco, the waiter from the Tuscan Grille works there in the mornings, so we figured we'd have one last hurrah with him. It was really tasty. This is what one of the dessert crepes looks like.
Then we went down to the theater where they were doing the ship's version of Iron Chef. They have two of the chefs come down and cook 3 dishes with two guests (who also pick the ingredients that they will have to use). It is all overseen by the Executive Chef for the ship, who we were lucky enough to chat with on our first trip to the Tuscan Grille, and this morning after the show.
Here is one of the team's cooking.
They had video cameras running around shooting the action, and showing it on the big screens on the sides of the stage. In the end, they had 3 guests come up and taste, then score the dishes on presentation, taste, and waste (they make a big deal out of using everything and wasting as little as possible. During the cooking, they had audience questions for the Chef. Turns out they use an obscene number of eggs (I want to say some 1800 dozen per trip), and their food bill runs about $500,000 per trip - wholesale. Obviously, its a big deal. The really interesting part was that they basically load out completely for the entire excursion in Florida. This trip, the only thing they bought on the islands was bananas in Barbados. My mother and Joe took the galley tour (2 floors worth of galley) and they said it was amazing. And that was just the galley for the main diningroom - they have individual kitchens for each of the different restaurants (there are 8, other than the main diningroom). It is quite an operation. Then we relaxed a bit (I took a nap), and packed! Never a good time! But now after dinner, we will be ready to go. My mother already went up to the place where you book your next cruise onboard to check out the deals (turns out the deals aren't that great onboard - we have had other trips where the deals were quite good, if you knew when you wanted to go). I guess that means she had a good time. Overall, this has been a pretty good cruise, and let's face facts - its tough to have a bad one. So, I am going to sign off for the moment, maybe get another entry done in the morning as we pull in, and let you know how this evening goes then. Hope all is well, and the forecast back home does not include snow! Keep Smiling!!!
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