Pago Pago, American Samoa to Auckland, New Zealand

The second of three days between Pago Pago and Auckland and this will be our last day at the tail end of world time, as at 02:00 tomorrow morning the ship’s clocks will zoom ahead 23 hours. The resultant puts us at Z+12, or the leading edge of world time. Today’s social calendar is well filled, with the guys having a TGIF (Thank goodness it’s Friday) meeting for Happy Hour, followed by cocktails at Fay & Vonnie’s cabin at 18:00 and finally another trip to the Steakhouse for dinner.

Temperature: High25C/77F, Low 23C/73F 

Wind/Weather: Wind veered to S’ly at 30 kts, freshening to 40 to 45kts. Moderate SE’ly swell of about 12’. Mostly cloudy and occasional rain. 

Sunrise/Sunset: 07:00/17:39 

Clox: Z-11 (no change) 

Navigation

Throughout the day, Sea Princess maintained a SSW’ly course at 19 kts through the Pacific Ocean towards Auckland. In the early evening we passed the island of Tonga, which was on the stbd side at a distance of about 14 miles.

Activities

Having attended the show after dinner last night, it was well after 23:00 before heading to bed, so I actually slept in this morning, not commencing my walk until a rather tardy 06:00. Conditions on the Promenade Deck could best be described as challenging, with the ship pitching considerably and also rolling. Prior to sunrise, the pitching wasn’t as obvious, as with no horizon, we had no reference point to readily observe the movement. However, once the sun approached the horizon, with the sky and water visible, the movement is much more apparent. Standing at the fwd end of the ship, it is quite impressive watching the stern moving up and down. Brings back great memories from my old deep sea days. It was also a tad chillier and as the bow ploughed into the waves, the resultant spray was blown onto the deck. We almost required a sou’wester to stay dry.

At breakfast this morning we sat with 3 other couples, enjoying some conversation on our various travels. When mentioning we are from Vancouver, it is amazing how many people aboard have completed Alaska cruises and trips through the Rockies. When the waiter brought the porridge this morning he was rather tentative, as he obviously knew the galley hadn’t reheated it. Sure enough, it was their usual lukewarm, so he took great delight in returning it to the galley. After breakfast we grabbed the laptops and headed down to the Wheelhouse. I headed to the Princess Theatre for today’s science lecture on Nuclear Fusion, which is the joining of atoms to produce power, as opposed to nuclear fission, which is the splitting of atoms. This is a new subject matter for me and I was surprised to learn it has existed in the experimental stage, in many countries, for over 50 years. The tentative schedule is producing power by 2025, although David did say this is overly optimistic.

On completion of the lecture, we met up outside the dining room for lunch, with today being the final pub lunch. Although today was the Cruise Critic lunch, due to attending the lecture, we were well after Noon before arriving, so joined the regular queue for a table on the other side of the dining room. Seated with 2 other couples, with Judi and I in the middle, conversation with all 6 was challenging, as the couple to my right were hard of hearing. They were very pleasant and were most apologetic at being unable to join the conversation. When the other couple departed for their afternoon activity, we stayed and had a pleasant chat with the hard of hearing couple. For lunch, Judi had the fish and chips and it was chicken curry for me. Unfortunately, yet again it was lukewarm, so back it went, returning steaming hot. Departing the dining room, the menu desk caught our eye, as tonight’s dinner menu was different. Turns out it is a scroll titled, “World Cruise Farewell Dinner”. A special menu that we haven’t seen on any ship before. Looked very interesting, with our first thought being why haven’t they promoted it in the Princess Patter. Our Head Waiter also comes by every evening for a chat, always mentioning changes to the clox, we would be more interested in hearing about this menu than clox.

We headed back to the cabin, where I re-oganised the entire file structure for the world cruise on the laptop, which then needed uploaded to my external drive and then to Lightroom. Shortly before 15:00, I got a call from Bob, requesting a rain check on today’s TGIF refreshments at happy hour. Not a problem, as I got the file structure re-org completed in 1 session. With over 200 Gig of photographs from the World Cruise, it took more than 3 hours to upload from the laptop to the external drive.

At 18:00 we headed up to Horizon, grabbed some nibbles and down to Fay and Vonnie’s cabin for pre-dinner drinks. Everyone was present and although formal night, nobody was heading to the dining room, so smart casual was rig of the day. We enjoyed a couple of drinks and conversation before heading to dinner. Bob & Christine booked the Steakhouse, so Judi and I offered to join them, but the others headed to Horizon Court. Being formal night, they had the regular menu plus lobster. Therefore, Bob and I had lobster for appy, which although small, were cooked to perfection. For main course, we all had a Filet Mignon, with all steaks again cooked perfectly, as ordered. Bob, Christine and I added some surf to the turf with the addition of lobster and prawns with the steak. A most enjoyable meal, with excellent  company.

Retiring for the evening, we put our watches back an hour, but with only a week before flying home we didn’t bother with changing dates. My watch tracks the day, date, month and year, so I would probably need the manual to make the changes. Off to bed on Friday evening we will not wake up until Sunday morning. With over 30 hours of sleep I can only hope we are well refreshed.

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