tennisbeforewine

Thursday, January 12, 2023 At Sea en route to Nuka Hiva Yesterday was my favorite type of sea day. I did a couple of French lessons, finished a book from the new library, and took a nap. Not only that, but we had breakfast in the Pinnacle, a perk of either being in President’s Club (not quite yet) or staying in a Neptune Suite. Because last evening was our first Chef and Sommelier Dinner, we decided to have a late breakfast, skip lunch, and then be in The Pinnacle Restaurant at 6:00 hungry. We do enjoy specialty dinners. Since our ship doesn’t have Tamarind or Sel de Mer restaurants, there is a “pop up” from those places once each segment. In addition, there are always Cellar Master dinners, usually twice each segment, one with a lovely gourmet menu and another with an Italian theme. The prices vary, but we believe that it’s well worth it, especially for the wine pairings of the Cellar Master dinners. Last night’s dinner lived up to our expectations. The Cellar Master, Jacques Louw, a longtime friend, and the Executive Chef Neil Ashworth worked together to provide us with a really delicious six-course dinner, each course paired with a matching wine. We began with a really nice French sparkling wine (not from the Champagne region, so it can’t be called that) paired with pan-fried foie gras. I know it’s not to everyone’s taste, but we really enjoyed it. The foie gras was atop a toasted brioche with mushroom duxelles and with orange jelly on the plate. As I write this, I realize that it really doesn’t sound very good, but everyone at our table loved it and cleaned their plates. I wondered at the orange jelly, but it was just perfect. Next we were served a coffee cup of pumpkin-sage cappuccino with a hint of cinnamon. The pumpkin was the dominant flavor, and even though I really dislike Starbucks’ pumpkin spice anything, I loved this one. It was a bit like pumpkin pie in a mug. The wine served with it was my favorite of the night, Cloudy Bay Sauvignon Blanc from New Zealand. The wines from Cloudy Bay are Jacques’ favorites, and although I don’t like their chardonnay, I did enjoy this one. The fish course was really delicious. It was three pieces of butter-poached lobster alongside a small crab cake. The sauce underneath was made from fava beans, and it made for a pretty plate, but the sauce was not my favorite. Since the accompanying wine was Grgich Hills Chardonnay from Napa Valley, I skipped that one and had more of the Sauvignon Blanc. I’m an ABC wine drinker: anything but chardonnay. After all of that, it was finally time for the main course: a roasted veal chop which looked like a mini-tomahawk steak. The wine sauce added wonderful flavor and I ate what I could of it, but I realized I was hitting “full” on my capacity. The wine with this one was a Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon from Silverado. This was a perfect main course, even though I couldn’t quite finish all of it. Finally it was dessert time. Oh my, was it delicious. We had a small tart made of chocolate fudge with sea salt, ginger, and vanilla gelato. Even though I couldn’t finish the veal chop, I had no problem with this one. The wine for the last two courses was Italian, Frescobaldi Pomino Viin Santo, a very pretty and very sweet pink wine served in small glasses. Were we finished? Of course not. Now it was time for the cheese plate. Even though we shared a plate, we didn’t even finish. The cheeses, an aged cheddar and a blue, were accompanied by dried fruit, nuts, and a beautifully curved sweet cracker. What a perfect finish. The best thing about these dinners is that the courses, although many, are quite small. We try to do our best to eat most of it, but I certainly wasn’t hungry this morning. We’ve book three more specialty dinners on this segment, so if we get off the ship weighing 300 pounds, I shouldn’t be surprised.

Tuesday, January 10, 2023 At Sea en route to Nuka Hiva, Marquesa Today is the first of eight sea days, during which we will travel across the Pacific to French Polynesia. If you’ve read my posts before, you know how much I love sea days. There is basically nothing to do and all the time in the world to do it. No cooking, no housekeeping - what could be better? The only drawback is that the “internet footprint,” or the places where internet is easily available, is poor in the South Pacific, so if I miss a couple of days of posting, that will no doubt be the reason. Yesterday our port was Fuerte Amador, the port for Panama City. The last few times we’ve called here it was a tender port, when we had to take the ship’s tenders (lifeboats) into shore. Now they have built a large two-sided pier, but the port is still very much under construction. In fact, the construction is such that passengers are not allowed anywhere except on the dock to take shuttles into one of two places: either the nearby restaurant area or the mall. We simply chose the next shuttle, since it was hot and the lines were long. Since it was headed to the mall, that’s where we went. The mall here is amazing. As basically a non-shopper, I don’t spend much time in stores, but boy, do I recognize names: Gucci, Fendi, Dolce and Gabbana, Jimmy Choo, Cartier, Tiffany - you get the picture. Even if I were a shopper, I don’t think the limits on my credit cards would take me far in those places. One of the nicest surprises was the huge grocery store in the mall. The prices were a bit steep, but I can imagine that they pay a great deal in rent. We went there for tropical juices (to go with John’s Captain Morgan), and ended up with Pringles for our cabin stewards and Goldfish for our pre-dinner cocktail group. We used to get Goldfish in the Crow’s Nest, but apparently that’s not something they stock anymore. The weather report called for thunderstorms in the afternoon, and since we were back at the ship by 1:00, it was still blue and sunny. Then came the afternoon. I was sitting at the desk in front of our window doing Duolingo French lessons when the lightning and thunder started. I could see the lightning and then hear the thunder about five seconds later, so I knew it wasn’t too near. Then came the BIG one. It was so loud that I jumped up from my seat. About five minutes later, I had a text from John saying, “Lightning scared us off the court. We’re on Deck 9.” Then came an announcement from the captain saying that lightning had struct the ship and destroyed an antenna (which was one of several, so it was redundant). When I joined John, Rich, and Greg on the aft deck, they told me that they were happily playing pickle ball when that bolt hit the ship, and it scared the heck out of them, especially when the smoke rose from the destroyed antenna. Of course that begs the question: why would anyone in their right mind play pickle ball on the top deck during a thunderstorm? Even John called himself a “dumb ass” for that decision. As we were talking about their experience, the captain came by and I commented to him that his announcement was a bit late, because these two, pointing at John and Rich, had been playing pickle ball when the lightning struck. He laughed and said he was sorry to hear that and, to make everyone feel better, he was buying all four of us a round of drinks. Did I ever say that Captain Friso was a great guy? This morning signaled the grand opening of the new ship’s library in what was formerly the Screening Room on Deck 3. I was pleasantly surprised to find that it contains well-selected books which are divided into sections: fiction, biography, science fiction, etc. Passengers may take two books (no check-out necessary) and return them when finished. I think this is a great idea for long cruises, but I do have some concerns about whether unfinished books will be returned at the end of seven-day cruises. My two choices were The Secret Lives of Church Ladies from the “new releases” section and Mrs Queen Takes the Train from the same area. Can’t wait to start them. Today is our first Sommelier Suites wine tasting at 12:00, just in time to be call pre-luncheon drinking. We don’t usually do that, but our friend Jacques, the cellar master, can’t get another time slot, so 12:00 it is. It gives us an opportunity to sample any of the wines on the three wine packages so as to decide what we want to order next at dinner. I’m getting anxious to start on my new books, so I’ll sign off. Life is good at sea, especially on sea days.

Not only were the Panama rolls delicious (as usual), but we just saw a crocodile lying in the brown sand at the water's edge. So cool!

Sunday, January 8, 2023 Transiting the Panama Canal No matter how many times we sail through the Panama Canal, we are always amazed at the engineering that created it and sad to read that approximately 25,000 people died building it. Finished in 1914, we sailed through it during its centennial year in 2014, and two years later Panama added a second canal alongside the first, resulting in a doubling of traffic, since it now accommodates wider and heavier ships. Since the locks are 110 feet wide, the number of ships, primarily cargo vessels, was limited. Our ship is 105.8 feet wide, allowing for two feet on each side. Was it designed for the canal? Of course. If you wonder why a cruise through the canal seems expensive, it’s because it costs the company over a hundred thousand dollars for the privilege. The original canal takes ships either from the Atlantic to the Pacific or vice versa, and does so by way of three sets of locks. The challenge is to take a ship from one side, up to the higher level of Gatun Lake and then lower it first to Miraflores Lake and then to the Pacific. One bit of trivia here: the transit is not east/west or west/east; it’s actually north/south or south/north. We’ve been sailing south all day. We began this morning by going through Gatun Locks, which raises ships traveling toward the Pacific to the level of Gatun Lake. There are three sets of chambers which raise the ship about 100 feet and take about two hours to traverse. One of my favorite parts of the locks is watching the ships on the other side which are going the other way. We often see people sitting on their balconies in bathrobes, having coffee and waving at us. It’s easy to tell that this is a tropical area. If the heat and humidity didn’t convince you, the bright green of the hills and trees would do it. If one watches carefully, it’s possible to see the occasional monkey in a tree or even a caiman, a close but smaller relative of the alligator. We’ve seen both in the past, but no such luck today. After the first set of locks, the next memorable site was the Culebra Cut, an artificial channel which stretches eight miles across the Continental Divide. Then, while we had lunch on deck, we transited Pedro Miguel Lock, which lowered us about 30 feet to enter Miraflores Lake. There’s a visitor center here, but since we’re all remaining on the ship, I guess we’ll have to skip it. As I write, it’s a little after 2:00, and we’re entering Miraflores Locks, our third set, and will spend a little over an hour descending 54 feet to the level of the Pacific Ocean. I can see out our window that the “mules, “ or little trains, are busy pulling our ship into position in the first lock. In the early days, actual mules were used to do this job, so when it was mechanized, the name stayed the same. We’ve really enjoyed going through the locks alongside the m/s Volendam, which sailed from Ft. Lauderdale with us, parked alongside us in Puerto Limon, and is headed for its two-month round South America cruise. We’ll also dock together in Fuerte Amador (for Panama City), and we hope to visit with a few friends - passengers, crew and officers - whom we know from previous cruises. If you ever get a chance to sail through the Panama Canal, take it! P. S. Loved the photos. During lunch we were able to look down on the aft deck of the Volendam (it's shorter than we are) and see all the activity.

January 7, 2023 Puerto Limón, Costa Rica Although we’ve visited this port a few times, we never get tired of it. The beauty of the countryside, the friendliness of the people, and the charm of the town always draws us back. A few years ago, we took an excursion to Tortuguero National Park and enjoyed a boat ride on the canals there. We watched for monkeys of all kinds, sloths (hanging around and living up to their name), beautiful tropical birds, crocodiles and caymans. It was a beautiful boat ride, and we did see many of those creatures. On this visit, we headed into town through the park. We wandered through local markets, poked our heads into a few stores, and talked to a few locals, with my broken Spanish and their broken English. Costa Rica is the most stable country in Central America, thanks to their Pura Vida (pure life) motto. They abolished their military years ago to concentrate on things like education and health. Tourism is very important and a major source of the country’s income. Last evening was our first “Dressy” night. HAL has decided that there will be a dressy night once a week, and then once a month a formal night. Last night’s turnout showed what most passengers thought of that! In the Ocean Bar, there was a sign saying “Tuxedo Junction” and virtually all the women were wearing gowns and the men tuxedos. Throughout the ship we saw far more formal wear than what would be considered “dressy.” I guess that most passengers, like me, keep a supply of formal wear for world cruises, and by golly, we’re going to wear them! We were supposed to be mask-free after Costa Rica, but when the results of our covid self-tests were sent to Seattle headquarters, it was decided that we would be masked in indoor spaces until after Panama City. We’re pretty used to them by now, and virtually everyone complies with the rule, even though we hear some complaining now and again. Tomorrow is the Panama Canal, a transit we’ve done several times and which always fascinates us. According to the captain’s recent announcement, we’ll meet our canal pilot at about 5:30, but actually go through the first lock at 7;00. I love watching the smooth mechanics of the locks and waving to the ships across from us, going the opposite direction. The weather is always hot, but tomorrow we will have the treat of thunder showers and intermittent rain. Fortunately our verandah is about half covered, so we should be able to remain dry. The day after the canal will be Fuerte Amador, the port for Panama City. It’s a fascinating city, looking like New York with its high-rises and not like the small town that it was on our first transit in 1967. It will be our last port for six days, until we arrive in Nuka Hiva, Marquesas, French Polynesia. It’s time to dress for dinner, but tomorrow I’ll give you a play-by-play of our transit of the Panama Canal.

Friday, January 6, 2023 At Sea en route to Costa Rica If you have no other reason to go to Jamaica, go for the music. As we disembarked the ship, we could hear wonderful reggae music and singing, and even if you don’t like reggae, it just really fits the place. We arrived at Falmouth (home of Usain Bolt) at about 10:00 and as we got off, it started to rain. Oh no, we thought, not the South Pacific again. On our six-week Hawaii/South Pacific cruise in the fall, we had rain, and rain and rain. In fact, after one day when it just sheeted down, the captain came on and said that in many years onboard ships, he’d never seen rain like that. This rain just turned out to be a shower, and by the time I went back up to our cabin to get umbrellas, it had almost stopped. Suddenly it was warm and sunny and it was time to see some of Falmouth. There’s a gated area around the port where only passengers and registered local sales people are allowed and it was really crowded because there was a Princess ship docked next to us. We bought our requisite postcard and then were directed to the post office, about a half mile away. That took us out of the gated area and into the really interesting part of Falmouth. We enjoyed seeing local shops and having people tell us a bit about the history of the city. There’s a park which used to be a local “watering hole,” and of course now it’s called Water Park. When we found the post office, we were happy that the clerk would take American currency for the necessary stamps. We wrote the card, affixed the stamps (really pretty ones), and dropped it in the box outside. John’s plantar fasciitis, which he’s had since last spring, is limiting our walking, so after the post office it was time to head back to the ship where he could rest his feet. We had lunch in the lido (it was taco day!) and then, plantar fasciitis or not, John met up with Rich for an hour and a half of pickle ball. Oh well. One of our few disappointments about the Zuiderdam - after the Amsterdam - is that the Crow’s Nest is just not what it was. After dark, instead of having a The Station Band playing lively dance music and people jostling for seats, it’s quiet and one of our friends said he went up there and found only two people. I do realize this is a First World problem, but we had to find a new bar for cocktails before dinner. We’ve settled primarily on the Ocean Bar, but we occasionally frequent the Gallery Bar, a venue which is reminiscent of an English country house with walls filled with lovely paintings. It’s fairly hidden away behind the casino, so it’s a great place to go when we just want a quiet drink. The only excitement of the evening was that we changed dining tables. Our first choice of tables was on Deck 2 in an area which is raised from the rest of the room and only accessible by three stairs. Unfortunately, our friend Handler is in a walker now and has trouble with stairs, so our old friend and former waiter Tomo invited us to his station and that’s where we are now. We had, as usual, a wonderful time at dinner, enhanced by the addition of one of Ginni’s White Russian cakes. She had baked two of them at home, one for our table (and waiters) and one for the staff. It was delicious, and even though the alcohol bakes out, it was easy to taste the Kahlua in the cake. In answer to a question about our stateroom, we have been very, very fortunate on this cruise. When folks were required to disembark in Perth in 2020, one of the future perks was guaranteeing a one-level upgrade on the next world cruise. We booked a verandah, so we were upgraded to a Signature Suite, a large and very comfortable accommodation. Just two weeks before the cruise, however, the Upgrade Fairy struck, and we received a further upgrade to a Neptune Suite. It’s large and incredibly comfortable and we feel really lucky to have it. I did remind John, however, that unlike our first world cruise, this really WAS a once in a lifetime opportunity and not to get too comfortable. We’ve added the newly available four-drawer chest to one empty wall and had our room stewards put the (also) newly available bar to a space next to our front door. I’m not sure I like having our clothes handing right at our door, but it does solve a lot of problems. This morning was our required covid test, for which every passenger was given a self-test with instructions. We had a half-hour window to test ourselves and then show the results to our room stewards, who recorded either positive or negative. Fortunately, we’re both negative. I guess those masks really do help. So . . . we’re very lucky ducks and we really do appreciate our good fortune. Thanks for following along, and I’ll look forward to having you check in with comments or questions.

Wednesday, January 4, 2023 At Sea en route to Falmouth, Jamaica Ahhhh! That’s the sound of a passenger who finally folded her last tee shirt and hung up her last “dressing for dinner” outfit. Why oh why do we always bring too much? We enjoyed our second day in Ft. Lauderdale, both because of running into cruise friends and seeing the members of our cruise agency staff, including Tom Bauman, whom we’ve know for several years. Monday night was our agency’s Bon Voyage dinner at a wonderful venue which isn’t a restaurant but only does catering and special events - which we certainly were. It was really special to each of us. One of the highlights of the evening was spending time with our favorite captain, Jonathan Mercer, along with his wife Karen. We’d spent time together on previous world cruises, so it was wonderful to see them again. After we returned to the hotel, we talked with Rich and Ginni and decided that since we all hate 50-passenger busses (anyone else?) that we’d call for an Uber. The cruise agency bus was to leave the hotel at 10:30, so we arranged the Uber for 10:00 to avoid crowds in the lobby. We were lucky enough to be in check-in group A at 11:00, so when we arrived at 10:15 we were surprised to receive a warm welcome and join a very short line. That morning, John had spent about an hour and a half and a great deal of frustration completing our VeriFly on-line information, since we’d been told by previous cruisers that it would make check-in much smoother. Not only did the officials there not want to see our online app, but some of them had never even heard of VeriFly. Oh well, our paperwork was in good order as were our vaccination and booster certificates, so we sailed right through. We know of at least one person who forgot his yellow fever certificate (required for West Africa), so it took him quite a bit longer to get through the line, having had to telephone the medical office where he’d been inoculated and have them fax the proper information. Arriving at our cabin felt wonderful, since we knew we were now really ready for this 128-day adventure. The only thing missing was our luggage, the six bags that had been picked up by Luggage Forward on December 14 and send to the ship awaiting our arrival. The first three delivered were all John’s, so in the late afternoon, just before the sailaway party, John was completely unpacked and “tucked away” when my first bag arrived. I had about half of that one complete when it was time to go to sailaway, and the other two arrived just before dinner. We were so tired that unpacking after dinner was not on the agenda, and I finished this morning. Our cabin now looks like two quite civilized people live here, even though the closets are stuffed to the gills. One nice addition this year was the possibility of asking for a four-drawer portable chest of drawers as well as a five-foot hang-up bar which is attached to the ceiling by incredibly strong magnets. Those two items made our unpacking possible. It’s wonderful to have a sea day today, and tomorrow we’ll be in Falmouth, Jamaica, followed by yet another sea day (my favorite kind). I’ll try to make sure my posts are more frequent than this one, now that we’re on our way.

Monday, January 2, 2022 Ft. Lauderdale, Florida Negative 1 day to World Cruise After two bumpy rides, we arrived safe and sound in Ft. Lauderdale, picked up our luggage and took a taxi to the Renaissance Hotel which our cruise agent, Cruise and Travel Experts, have provided in FLL. They’ve had us here before, and we love not only the hotel but the area in which it’s located. We’re in easy walking distance to The Boat Yard (our favorite FLL restaurant), Panera, Ross, TJ Max and, most importantly, Lab Doctor, where we now are the proud owners of two negative covid tests. While other cruise lines are skipping the tests, and Holland America doesn’t require them on any other cruises, we have to be negative to board the world cruise. We also are required to “mask up” for the first three days of the cruise in any public areas. We really don’t mind these restrictions, because there’s nothing as annoying on a cruise as being quarantined. As we walked into the hotel last night, we met our friends Martha and Bob going out, headed to The Boat House, where we joined them about a half hour later. The weather is so nice that we sat outside and enjoyed 78 degrees alongside the waterway. Later, we stayed in the lobby to welcome our friends Leslie and Handler, who had just flown in from Austin. Today’s arrivals will be our other table mates, Rich and Ginni, who will arrive momentarily. We’ve picked up our “goodie bag” from our travel agent’s table and are all ready for the pre-cruise celebratory dinner tonight. Every time we walk through the lobby we run into world cruise friends. Actually, one of the top three benefits of a WC is getting together again with friends with whom we’ve cruised for years. They’re from our state (California), other states, and even other countries, and we just love spending four months in such good company. You may wonder what the other two of the top three benefits are. From my personal point of view, the two are no cleaning or cooking for four months and, more importantly, seeing parts of the world that we had, as kids and young adults, only dreamed of seeing. Who would have thought that we’d ride on an elephant in India or a camel next to the pyramids in Egypt? Speaking of Egypt, I never expected to see the sunrise over the Great Pyramid and then walking inside it to the topmost chamber. There are such wonderful sights in our world and on this cruise we hope to add more. One of the areas that we haven’t explored much is western Africa, and that will be a new experience to which we’re really looking forward. We’ll call at several new countries: Angola, Ghana, Cote d’Ivoire, The Gambia, and Senegal. We have a couple of independent tours set up, but we still need to do more research to decide exactly what we want to see. As always, we’re excited that tomorrow is sail away day, and I’ll be keeping you up to date on where we are, what we see, and the best of our experiences. Stay tuned!

Well folks, it's been three long years of Covid and no world cruises, but we're finally back and ready to join in 2023. We're on our way to the ship, after a trying time at home. Just in time for departure, our roof sprung a leak and started dripping water into the dining room. Although we're in the middle of a mega-drought, and we need rain badly, why does it have to come in buckets? Our lovely house sitter Alicia managed to climb up into the attic, find the source of the leak (which we've been seeking for three years), call our friend Steve, and arrange to have it fixed tomorrow. What a relief. There was also some concern about just getting to Florida. Our routing is San Luis Obispo to San Francisco (for an overnight) and then SFO to Ft. Lauderdale. There are only two flights from San Luis to SFO, and a couple of days ago John suggested we change our afternoon flight to the morning flight. What a good idea! Yesterday, the morning flight left 3-1/2 hours late and the afternoon flight was simply cancelled - all because of weather problems in San Francisco. This morning, our only problem was a 20-minute delay and we were off and away. Were our problems over? Of course not. We've seldom had such a rough flight. I guess it's ironic that we love it when the ship encounters rough seas, but when the plane begins to bounce, we both grab for the armrest. Finally we arrived at SFO, and with reservations at the Grand Hyatt built into the airport, we didn't even have to go outside to access our room. They were nice enough to find us a room at 10:30 this morning, so we were able to get what we needed out of our one bag and go for a sandwich in the bar. Then it was time for a blissful 2-hour nap. You may ask why we only had one bag each. One of the joys of a world cruise is that most passengers (depending on cabin), have luggage pickup service. Therefore, on December 14, a nice UPS driver came and picked up our six pieces of luggage, which we won't see until we walk into our cabin on the ship. This afternoon was college football on TV for John and Duolingo French lessons for me. Now I know what it's like to be at the bottom on the class! We thought we'd go back to the bar for dinner, but Quail and Crane, the excellent pan-asian restaurant, had a cancellation and we were able to enjoy a wonderful dinner. Because it's New Year's Eve, we were served a glass of excellent California sparkling wine before digging in to our pork dumplings and a bowl of fried rice that we couldn't begin to finish. Now our only worry is to go to bed right after the ball drops in New York at 9::00 so we can be up at 5:00 to check in at 6:00 for our 8:00 non-stop flight to Ft. Lauderdale. We're returning to returning to the Zuiderdam, since we were aboard for the Hawaii/South Pacific Cruise in the fall and we're looking forward to seeing the wonderful crew and officers that we've known from many previous cruises. We're also curious to see the changes made in dry dock as well as the upgrades that are always evident on world cruises. Most of all, we're looking forward to reconnecting with world cruise friends we've made over the years.