• Noon Position: S 03° 27.50′, W 153° 52.90′
• Heading: 172
• Speed: 17.0 knots

OK, not that much comfort. Actually the sea feels pretty much the same today as it did yesterday.

The morning was spent in a couple of meetings – via zoom. Daughter Kim and I tested the Zoom link a couple of days ago and determined: Video Zoom is unworkable. Phoning into one of the Zoom phone numbers is very workable. So that was the plan. Apparently that solution is more workable in the northern hemisphere. Down south the call dropped every 2-10 minutes. By my count I dialed back 50 times into the meeting after the link was dropped. Frustrating at best, more likely painful.

We wrapped up about noon and Cheryl and I stopped by the pool bar for hamburgers and onion rings. Just needed a chocolate shake to make it a full-on grease orgy. I did finish with ice cream though.

The next event was a game of Farkle (aka Shut Up Orville) with our BBB trivia team. One of the members (Beth) arrived with the word that she had overheard a conversation about am unpublished ‘behind the scenes’ tour this afternoon. So after Ralph won the dice game we trooped down to guest services (where the tour was supposed to meet) to check it out. It turns out that a couple of navy vets had asked if they could speak with the Chief Engineer along with about 6 friends. There were closer to 25 of us. But he was gracious.

Then he took us down to the control room where we looked at the screens and he answered another half-hour of questions. (He asked that no photos be taken in the control room.) It was a great tour and we learned quite a bit about how the ship operates.

At 4:00 we attended the Port Talk for Moorea (where we’ll be on Monday).

Then it was back to our stateroom to finish yesterday’s blog and watch the replay of two lectures we missed this morning:

Arriving at dinner we were taken by a somewhat spooky sunset.

Then it was BBB time. We actually did fairly well tonight – scoring 12 out of 19 – tied for second place.

Here are a couple of sample questions:

In December of 2013 this port hosted 15 cruise ships in one day. The previous record was 10 ships. Name the port.

What musical instrument has small metal disks called “zills”?

Remember, no fair looking up the answer, and don’t post your answer in the comments below. email or text to me.

So that’s today. We’ve got one more sea day before 3 port days in French Polynesia. We can hardly wait!

till tomorrow, TTFN, R