Three captains will have commanded our ship as, in the Latin terminology of old Rome, “Magister Navis” or Master of the Sea, before our voyage ends. And we have had the privilege to dine at least once with each, and establish a casual acquaintance. With Oceania, their work contracts are a rotation of about two…
Continue reading →I love sea days. I love the (mostly) gentle sway of the ship, the melting of blue from sky to sea, the feeling of being at home on the ocean, the mystery of its depth, the water slapping against the hull, the misting spray, birds roosting on the jackstaff, dolphins arching in the ship’s wake….
Continue reading →To me, one of the great experiences of cruising is living on the ship. It is a luxuriously contained world and everyone is pretty much there for the same reasons, mostly to ensure a good time. An advantage to a very long cruise is that you establish very good friends with which to have a…
Continue reading →Cruise ships suffer no lack of activities to keep their passengers busy whether it is with enrichment lectures, cooking demonstrations, wine and spirit tastings, art and dance classes, games, tea time, spa treatments, fitness exercises, bridge lessons, and on and on. The staff will do almost anything to keep us entertained. So to occupy us…
Continue reading →At about halfway through the trip, after all the long pre-departure angst of guessing, shopping, packing, and planning for everything it takes to live on a ship and sightsee in a variety of distant foreign lands for 109 days, I find that all the preparation has actually paid off pretty well. I’ve worn almost all…
Continue reading →We stood before King Neptune once again to seek permission to cross the equator as we sailed northward this time. At 1100 hours on June 10, 2015, having missed the first Crossing Ceremony, Dean, still a Polliwog, performed his dutiful initiation, kissed the fish, and was anointed with the green slime….thus elevating his status from…
Continue reading →If you’ve been checking our itinerary you know that I am woefully behind on my blog, since in real time we are now in French Polynesia and my recent posts show us still in Southeast Asia. I am about to recount a momentous event, however, that occurred over a month ago, and will actually happen…
Continue reading →The International Date Line is an imaginary line on the surface of the Earth from the north to the south pole and demarcates the change of one calendar day to the next. It runs roughly along the 180th longitude in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, occasionally zig-zagging to avoid splitting apart countries into two…
Continue reading →Real time, May 15, 11:00 a.m. We are are on the northern edge of the Tasman Sea, arriving in Sydney, Australia tomorrow morning. Rough mounting seas, 14 to 16 foot waves with heavy gales to 47 knots. The view from our veranda on deck 6, overlooking the bow.
Continue reading →For those who know Dean and me, it would be no surprise to learn that we have befriended the charming onboard head sommelier. He is Oleksandr from Ukraine, but better known as Sasha to all. Among the many onboard activities offered to amuse us, for varying fees we can partake in occasional wine tastings that…
Continue reading →