Monday 9^th February 2015 – Day at Sea

 

Clocks forward another hour – so it’s now GMT +7.

 

Didn’t fancy breakfast this morning so went to see Helen’s last lecture. (They’re getting off in Singapore) Mike is suffering from the Cunard cough unfortunately. After Helen’s lecture we went to “Sir Samuel’s” for proper coffee and decided that we were going to have a “farewell” lotus (Asian) meal with them tomorrow night. Nesta thought it was lovely to have a real expresso and said that we may even treat ourselves to another before the end of the cruise!

 

Then it was off to the “dress rehearsal” for the three of us with the choir. An hour’s work trying to get four songs correct and then we had to go onto the stage in the Queen’s Room in front of a packed audience. Surprisingly (and thankfully) it all seemed to go rather well!

 

In the evening we went to see “Saving Mr Banks” starring Emma Thompson and Tom Hanks. It was a good film and once again we forgot we were actually on board a ship!

 

We decided against eating in the restaurant so, after a quick snack, headed down to the pub to save seats (i.e. have a pint) for some of the smokers who wanted to do a music trivia quiz. We did quite well, scoring 13 out of 15 but the winners scored 14, so still no prizes!

 

Nesta decided to do some washing later on – but it will have to be carried over until tomorrow as the laundrette closes at 9-30pm and we discovered some toe-rag had taken our wet washing out of the drier before it was dry and used our drier for their clothes!

 

 

Tuesday 10^th February 2015 – Phuket, Thailand.

 

Our first tender port – and there are over 1400 people booked on shore excursions!

 

First things first though – Nesta was up at 7am to retrieve the washing and (as neither of us felt like breakfast) she went off to the Kings Court to make a couple of cheese salad rolls each to take on our trip. (Very British!)

 

There were plenty of tenders and the organisation is very good but it was still 10-40am before our coach finally set off. The tour was excellent and when we returned to the port managed to buy some cans of beer at a supermarket before joining the queue to get back on board. It was 5-30pm before we got on board – thank goodness for those rolls!

 

We decided we needed a cold drink (the temperature was only 34 degrees today) so straight up to deck 8 aft for the sail away party. After a quick 2 pints of Strongbow, Nesta was game to join the entertainment team and some other smokers in strutting her stuff to the music. It was all going well until the lead singer in “Vibz” sang a song where he instructed the dancers which move to make. He sang “jump into the pool” “jump into the pool” so about 12 people (including him) actually did – fully clothed…it was good fun and the other passengers gave them all a hearty round of applause when they emerged – dripping!

 

After a shower and putting on some dry clothes, Nesta thought she would brave the laundrette again. We had read on “trip advisor” that there are often queues, but had underestimated the friction and downright bad behaviour! Apparently two guests were asked to leave the ship in Dubai, because they had actually been fighting in the laundrette! Fortunately the only drama Nesta faced was a member of staff had locked the door 15 minutes early - so we had to phone the Purser’s Desk to get someone to open it - so we could retrieve another load of washing (and very popular we were too!)

 

The clocks go forward yet another hour tonight so when we land in Malaysia we will be GMT +8! Because of this, we decided to have an early night.