Pitcairn Island to Tahiti, French Polynesia

While the storm force winds of yesterday have abated, the swell certainly hasn’t, resulting in a rather uncomfortable ride throughout a rainy and overcast day in the South Pacific. The Cruise Director has finally produced a unique daily schedule, with some new and interesting activities, rather than the usual dross. Therefore, I had a busy day with at least 4 activities of interest, and bonus, they were all at different times. Unfortunately, the weather resulted in Judi’s sea legs being misplaced, so she wasn’t able to attend some of the activities.

Temperature: High 25C/77F, Low 22C/70F

Wind/Weather: Light Airs, short/steep SW’ly swell. Overcast and rain, then cloudy and clear by late afternoon.

Sunrise/Sunset: 07:20/19:00

Clox: Z-8 (no change)

Navigation

Throughout the day, Sea Princess maintained a WNW’ly course through the South Pacific Ocean at a speed of 17 knots.

Activities

As usual, I hit the Promenade Deck about 05:30 completing 1 hr 45 mins before returning to the cabin, finding Judi awake. So after a quick shower, we headed to the dining room when it opened for breakfast. We sat at a table with 3 other couples, but one couple didn’t participate in the conversation. One of the ladies was a fellow early morning walker, who I meet on deck most mornings. Our waitress was the excellent Katheryna, who remembered our normal breakfast, so no need for menus. A fine breakfast and some excellent conversation.

After breakfast we returned to the cabin, where the ship’s motion hit Judi, so she had to lie down, while she changed her motion sickness patch and took some gravol. The daily schedule was actually interesting today, with some new activities, rather than the usual stuff. At 09:45, I attended a marzipan demo, where the cooks made an assortment of shapes and figures out of marzipan. On completion, they invited everyone down to inspect and sample their creations. Bad idea, as it resembled a swarm of locusts, with them 3 or 4 deep pushing, shoving and trying to grab over others shoulders. I like marzipan on Christmas cake, but have no desire to eat it in pieces. I stood back, as all I wanted was a couple of close-up photographs, but by the time the crowd cleared the trays were almost empty. I did get a good laugh after climbing the stairs back to our deck, when a couple came out the lift with handfuls of marzipan creations, complaining it was rather sweet. OMG!! what do you expect, it’s marzipan.

Next on the agenda was the Ukulele Orchestra led by the excellent entertainer Trevor Knight. I sat with Danny, a chap we met on the evening of the pre-cruise dinner, so had a good chat before the concert started. During his just over 1 week aboard Sea Princess, Trevor has held a Ukulele class on each sea day, with this performance being their final class. The Vista Lounge was full, when Trevor kicked of the concert, while playing his guitar. With lots of audience participation it was an excellent hour of entertainment. After an hour break, it was off to Princess Theatre for another lecture on horses from the multi-talented Trevor Knight.

At 15:30, with Judi feeling a bit better, we headed down to Vista for afternoon tea with music and dancing. She lasted for a couple of cups of tea and scones, as after the ship dug into a couple of swells, it was back to the cabin, where she stayed for the remainder of the day. About 18:30, I ran up to Horizon Court for a quick dinner, which as usual was cold, so I reverted to salads, which fortunately were also cold.

I made good use of the cabin time, completing all yesterday’s photographs and writing the first of 2 blog posts on Pitcairn Island.

As another day closes, we bid you farewell, till tomorrow and hope for fair skies and following seas.