Noon Reading:

• Position: S 10° 20.57′, W 152° 51.99′
• Speed: 17.5 knots
• Course: 170º

After a brisk walk on the deck, and a cold shower to try to stop the south-sea island perspiration, Cheryl declared that today was ‘Waffle Day’. So we were off to Mamsen’s for arguably the best waffles in existence.

But not until we had started a load of laundry.

Unfortunately the laundry was just finishing it’s dryer cycle as the 9:30 lecture was starting. So we watched “Friendly Wild Dolphins” on our stateroom TV while we sorted, folded, hung, stashed in drawers.

Then we decamped to the upstairs in the Explorer’s Lounge to relax and read and watch the world (and an occasional squall) pass by.

Eventually the football fans showed up to watch the Chiefs beat the Jaguars on the big screen TV up there…so we returned to our stateroom for a nap.

After lunch at 1:00 we masked up (a requirement) and assembled for the bridge tour.

The tour was conducted by the Second Officer, who is in charge of the vessel except when in or near port or in special circumstances, when the Captain assumes control. The ship is normally on auto-pilot (as it was today) so the bridge staff usually work to monitor systems and such. There are always at least 3 people on the bridge – a Second Officer, a Third Officer, and a lookout. The lookout keeps an eye out for hazards that don’t show up on radar – such as an odd shipping container that had fallen off a cargo ship.

Note that the “wheel” has a box covering it. If it gets bumped the auto-pilot will automatically be disengaged so the box keeps it from being accidentally touched.

The wing control centers (there’s one on each side) duplicate all the bridge controls and are used for docking.

At 3:00 we had the second rehearsal for the Cruise Choir. We sound pretty good.

4:30 was the Port talk for Papeete Tahiti. Following that Cheryl added an excursion. It was sold out but since I was already one of the participants they let her sign up.

6:00 was church. There are services both Saturday and Sunday this week. We chose the Saturday service since we’ll be busy tomorrow afternoon.

We skipped the 6:30 lecture and headed for dinner.

BBB was actually not as bad as we thought. We scored 12 out of 20 and finished kind of high-middle of the pack. The really tragic news we received when we arrived at the Explorer’s Lounge was that Denny and I have run the ship out of Buffalo Trace Bourbon. They won’t be able to restock until New Zealand. So tonight they served us Dickel. Tomorrow we’ll try Maker’s Mark. Worst case we arrive in Aukland a week from Wednesday. We might have to suffer until then.

Here are a couple of the questions from BBB tonight:

Norma Desmond was a character in a 1950’s movie that was later made into a musical. What was the name of the movie?

St. John, St. Croix, and St. Thomas are all islands in the U.S. Virgin Islands. Which is the largest?

Remember: No Research! And Don’t post your answer in the comments. If you like, send me your answers in a text or email.

That’s all the info so if you want you may stop reading.

However, I have received a request for more sunrise photos. The sun is up before we are these days but there are still some spectacular sun/cloud shots to be had:

And of course every good sunrise deserves an equally great sunset:

Now it’s time to set this aside and get ready for tomorrow. I’m snorkeling in the afternoon so I need to charge the Go-Pro and find my rash guard.

Nite all, R

* With apologies to John Denver, but he never saw this place.