Sea Day #10

Saturday – May 5

No excuse today but we were both slow in getting up. In fact, I didn’t think Bob was ever going to wake up. It was 8:15 before he finally opened his eyes. The banging noise in our ceiling was back during the night. It doesn’t seem to happen during the day…only when we are trying to sleep which is annoying. According to guest services, they had someone come into our cabin while we were docked in San Francisco and check into the problem and found nothing. But then…it would be hard to trouble-shoot when the ship is docked and the banging ceases.

Today’s coffee chat was with Taylor, the cruise director, and Andy, the assistant. During the Q & A time, I thoroughly embarrassed myself AND Taylor. On a previous day during trivia, Taylor had introduced one of the dancers as his wife. What I didn’t realize was that he was joking. So, when he announced that he would be leaving the Zaandam the next day in Vancouver and switching to the Noordam I asked whether his wife would get assigned to the same ship. Taylor stammered and stuttered and Andy totally ridiculed him. I felt silly and I think Taylor felt equally embarrassed!

Cruise director, Taylor.

Assistant Cruise Director, Andy. (Andy had been the Cruise Director on our Nieuw Amsterdam cruise back in November.)

During the time I was in the Crow’s Nest, Bob was walking on the promenade deck and was excited to report that he saw a whale breach!

The two of us met up in the theater for the backstage tour and Q & A session with the singers and dancers. It was surprising to see how tiny the dressing room was…not sure how they function when they are rushed to change between scenes. The production staff was all new on this cruise. One of the dancers got injured and had to leave at the beginning and another had been sick so a couple of the production shows were done with just one male dancer.

Backstage tour.

The dressing room was very cramped.

The view of the theater from the stage.

I joined Bob as he walked a few more laps of the ship and we saw dolphins and black chunks of “something” floating in the water next to the ship. I questioned the cruise director later and he had no idea what it was, but it almost looked like something that was coming from the ship.

Before lunch, we ducked into the theater to hear the lecture on geography covering Holland America’s cruise ship itineraries. The talk was pretty dry and list oriented…more like a school lecture than something interesting and entertaining. I left a few minutes before Bob and went back to the cabin to try and tame my hair after our walk outdoors. He stayed longer, but even he couldn’t stay interested enough to make it through to the end.

After 3 weeks of cruising, we had fallen into certain routines on sea days and one was meeting up with Danny and Stan at 11:45 to beat the crowd at the buffet for lunch…especially the line for the Asian station. Today the choices were Malaysian. I also added a bowl of parsnip/carrot soup and a piece of peach cheesecake for dessert. As we were leaving the restaurant, we looked out the window and saw a pod of dolphins jumping and swimming alongside the ship.

At the 1:00 trivia game, we played with a couple from Oregon and also one of the Australian couples. The bonus question was worth 7 points which we did get correct, but we missed the question “What is the highest mountain in Nepal?” The correct answer was Everest, but Bob questioned that answer since he said the mountain was actually on the border of China and Nepal. He thought perhaps it was a trick question and his overthinking lead us to the wrong answer. On a good note, we did see another whale from the windows of the Crow’s Nest!

Afterwards we spent a long time visiting again with both of the Aussie couples. It was so fun to get to know them and hear about their life and culture compared to living in the U.S. We exchanged email addresses and hopefully we will be able to stay in touch. It would be great to meet up and cruise with them again sometime!

After the fiasco trying to buy a Coke at the Crow’s Nest bar, I went down to the Mix Bar and ordered a Diet Coke. Once again, they scanned my beverage card repeatedly and it just didn’t work…so…I got it for free again! It is hard to use up the funds on the beverage card when they keep giving me drinks for nothing!

Since tomorrow would be a long day in port at Vancouver, I knew I HAD to begin the packing process. Bob left to go walk…it is impossible for two people to try and pack at the same time in the tight space. I got as much done as I could and the rest would have to be done at the last-minute tomorrow night. After the frustrating job of packing, I needed to get out and move a little so joined Bob and Danny in a lap around the ship.

Our always smiling room steward, Ilham.

Dinner was potato and leek soup for both Bob and I. Bob also had a spring roll and the two of us shared the main entrée shrimp salad. For the main course we both ordered Korean short ribs. Sadly, we had to say good bye to Yazzir and Lala. Danny and Stan were disembarking the next day in Vancouver and we had a full day planned so would eat in the buffet instead of the dining room. We lingered for some time as we visited with Yazzir about his life in Indonesia.

Yazzir getting our dinner orders.

Fadila (Lala), the assistant waiter.

In fact, we were so late leaving the dining room that all of the seats in the upper level of the theater were taken and our only option was to sit on the lower level close to the stage. The talented violinist and singer, Lizzie Ball, was the headliner on the Main Stage. Cruising gives us an opportunity to experience such a wide range of entertainment!

The sun had just set when we walked back to our cabin and we spent some time walking on the promenade deck enjoying the beautiful pink sky. The ship was sailing through a passage with mountains very close on both sides. I was sad to think our cruise would be ending very soon and truly wished we could have added on the 14-day Alaska itinerary that the Zaandam would be doing following our cruise. We have done two Alaskan cruises, but I don’t think I would ever tire of the beautiful snow-capped mountains, blue glaciers, majestic waterfalls, whales, eagles, sea otters,…well…you get the idea.  😉