Thursday 5th February 2015 – Day at Sea.
Happy birthday Don.
We had another relaxing day
at sea. Went to hear Helen give a lecture on the defence of India in Napoleonic
times, had brunch and then went to the cinema on board to watch “The Best
Exotic Marigold Hotel” starring Judy Dench, Maggie Smith and Bill Nighy. It’s
set in India and is a really good film.
It was yet another formal
night so we ate in the restaurant. We have found a Chilean un-oaked Chardonnay
which was very nice and at $34-50 quite cheap!
There was a “Night of the Raj
Ball” in the evening. We had a look in and there were a surprising number of
passengers strutting their stuff in fancy dress. We didn’t join in!
Friday 6th February 2015 – Colombo, Sri
Lanka.
Our “Ceylon Tea Experience”
was certainly that! It involved a two hour drive each way in traffic just as
chaotic as in Cochin…a large junction with three (official) lanes of traffic
converging from five different directions all at once on to one policeman, with
a whistle, standing in the middle of the road, was our favourite!
We did notice that no matter
how “free” the driving is, we never saw a single vehicle with a dent or even
scrapes.
We did about six miles on a
toll motorway – with hardly any traffic! – And the last few miles was actually an
“off-road” experience where we bumped along over dried mud!
Because of the civil war in
Sri Lanka (Tamil Tigers, and all that) only finished in 2009 we were warned
that tour guides were inexperienced and may not have much grasp of the English
language - but they would make up for it with their enthusiasm… Our guide was
in his 70’s, couldn’t speak conversational English and had obviously missed out
when the enthusiasm was being handed out. It eventually became quite an art
deciphering what he was in fact saying (that is when he bothered to speak at
all!)
The sights and aromas of the
tea factory were fascinating and the cup of fresh tea served on the lawn
outside the plantation bungalow (massive house!) was picturesque and thirst
quenching.
At the “sail away” party we
stood chatting with Dr Rami Seth (one of the lecturers) and then decided to
dine in the restaurant. Our sommelier told us that several of the red wines
(including our favourite) were out of stock… We are sure it is purely
coincidence that it is all the wines priced at less than $40 dollars that have
run out. We said we would leave it for now but, not to be outdone, he returned
shortly having “found” a South African Pinotage at only $35-80.
Saturday 7th February 2015 – Day at Sea.
Our three lovely “Solace”
security men left us at 2-30am by small boat off the coast of Sri Lanka as we
are apparently no longer in the piracy danger zone. Nesta was chatting to one
of them yesterday and he has four days off and then flies out to accompany a
Super Yacht through the Suez Canal, Red Sea and Gulf of Aden. Not a bad life…
(As long as there’s no pirates!)
After listening to a Jackie
Stewart Q&A session we went for brunch and found there was a “Ploughman’s
Station” – all that you can imagine that could be served as a “ploughman’s” –
brilliant!
Choir practice was at 2pm –
to learn our 4th song…We still aren’t very good and the performance
is only two days away… Heigh-ho
We went to Helen’s next
lecture about the lifetime experiences of a Battle of Britain pilot who not
only survived, but won a DSO and bar and a DFC. The fact that he was also
Helen’s father merely added to the interest.
We then managed to skype
Dave, Rebecca and Martin… although the Wi-Fi is expensive it’s worth it! (Ellie
and Fi – we’ll try you tomorrow).
On Voyages of Discovery
whenever you were invited to dine at the Captain’s table the commemorative
photograph was delivered to your cabin. As we hadn’t received ours we enquired,
to be told that the group photo of this ship’s dinner would cost us $25.
Strangely we didn’t buy one!
In the evening, we tidied our
stateroom and Jerry (our steward) found us an extra chair because we had
invited Helen and Mike up to our balcony to sample the wine which we bought in
Italy. We then headed for the “Chef’s Galley” for some fresh pasta – delicious.
Here they bought a bottle of Malbec which was much nicer (and probably more expensive)
than the one we had at the beginning of the trip. All in all it was a lovely
evening and another brilliant day.
Sunday 8th February – Day at Sea.
We attended Rami’s final
lecture – he made us laugh again - and then it was on to the church service
with the Deputy Captain.
Another relaxing sea day and
as the Captain said on his noon update “We are skirting the bottom end of the
Bay of Bengal in the North Eastern part of the Indian Ocean and are totally
surrounded by – absolutely nothing…except beautiful sea”!
In the afternoon, Ian went to
see the film “12 years a slave” whilst Nesta went to the latest choir
rehearsal.
The bad news is we seem to be
missing out on free wine!! (Yes, difficult to believe isn’t it?). Tonight is a
formal night and we should have received invitations for a cocktail party but
they were not forthcoming. Several people complained (not Nesta!) and were told
several different reasons/excuses for the non-appearance of the invites. The
final one was “it is your cabin steward’s fault for not delivering them”.
Strange coincidence that lots of different cabin stewards forgot to deliver the
invites at the same time! Why can’t people just say “sorry, we got it wrong”?
After dinner in the
restaurant we went to the show – more acrobats doing a similar show as
previously – and then at 11-30pm our time skyped Eloise and Fiona – meaning we
had seen and talked to all the children this weekend.
We also received presents from
the World Voyage Club…a hat for Ian and a rather nice beach bag for Nesta. Very
nice – but doesn’t make up for missing the free wine!!
Well – another sea day
tomorrow followed by four different ports in four days! You need stamina to be
on a world cruise…
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