Catching Up.....

March 8th, They’ve had Satellite problems and there was no internet connection at all, so I hope it is fixed today.   Part of the problem is the weather, we’ve been thru some small storms, but if it’s working today I’ll try to bring you all up to date.  

March 5th, our first full day at sea was wonderful, .....got up and went to the “king’s room” for breakfast and the food was great....  

When we returned from breakfast we found a gift in the mailbox from the kids - a bon voyage package of a bottle of champagne and some balloons.... wow!   If that wasn’t enough, there was a notice of some onboard credit!   Thank you so much, I already miss you all.....They taped the balloons to the door and our steward made a little sign to hang from the ribbons....”50th wedding anniversary”...  A lot of people have their doors decorated with various things, stickers from previous cruise’s, happy birthday’s, etc... We are going to wait until tomorrow night to break open the champagne as it’s the first formal night...

I can’t say enough about the staff, they have been so nice.  The largest percentage of them are Indonesian, and I understand now why Joe and Teri fell in love with the people of that country when they lived there....  They have been more than helpful with any questions and they work very hard to do what they can to please....  After introducing himself we have not seen our room steward, but every time we leave and return to the room he has been in to straighten it up and made it perfect again...   there is always fresh ice waiting on us and any trays are picked up and removed.  At night he leaves a little towel animal on our bed and if I can ever figure out how to do pictures I will show them to you....

We went to the first meet and greet on the morning on March 6th of the group that has been working together to gather donations for Fanning Island.   We met some more very nice folks..  found some things in common with several we visited with...  It was agreed to have a work day today and we will meet again at 11:00 to sort thru and bag up what we have....

We spent a little time (and money) in the casino in the afternoon....and in the evening we went to the speciality restaurant (the Pinnacle Grill) and had a wonderful dinner....  Jim had a rib eye and I had a filet...as we were leaving our room the steward walked by and ask if we would like him to take our picture in front of the balloons... we let him, but I still haven’t figured out how to post pictures on the blog yet as it’s doing weird things when I click on “download image”. Hopefully in a day or two I am going to see about signing up for one the internet classes to try and understand what I’m doing wrong...  I want to figure it out soon so I can post some of our shore excursion pictures in Hawaii and on down in Tahiti..and especially on Fanning Island....  Until then just bear with me......

March 6th!   We slept a little later and had room service breakfast, the captain came on with the morning announcements and said it was partly cloudy, 64 deg. with a north wind, the boat rocked and rolled pretty good almost all day....  Every morning they bring a menu for that evening dinner in the main dining room so you have a chance to study it and decide ahead of time what you might want to have.   Around 10:00 we went out explored the ship, there is so much beautiful art work to see and we didn’t make it around to all of it.

Back to the room around 2 this afternoon there was another gift from the kids waiting on us....this was a tray of canape’s and a small bouquet of flowers that decorated the plate.  Needless to say we’re getting very spoiled......

Last night was the first formal night and there was a card waiting on us that said a table for two had been reserved for us and two corsages were laying on the bed.....  It was a really special day.   We dressed in our finery and went down to dinner about 7, how fun to see everyone dressed up in their tux’s and evening gowns.....  I chose a pineapple boat for the appetizer...chunks of pineapple sprinkled with bits of coconut and a fine dusting of something else.....  Jim had a shrimp cocktail....next they brought a cold split pea and mint soup that was to die for... then we both ordered the  entree of lobster thermidor & a tiny slice of beef fillet, garlic mashed potatoes and a vegetable medley of bok choy, broccoli and carrots.

Thanks to the matre d’, we will be able to keep our table for two for the entire cruise and they are holding our wine package for us....  After dinner by suggestion of one of our waiters we went to the photo gallery to have our pictures taken while we were all dressed up.....  After that torture was over, we went to the casino again, and my luck was a little better but still nothing to brag about....  we got back to our room around 11:00

March 7th.....  Another rocky day at sea, it was explained that because of the way we are steering with the wind, our satellite connection was blocked somehow by the way the ship was headed...  It looks like today we may be clear so I’ll give this another try before we lose it again.

Yesterday was busy again.....  we met our donation group in a room set aside by the ship officers.....  There were at least 50 of us who begin sorting thru everything that everyone had brought....  It was a big job as there were tons of supplies.   It took us about 3 hours to separate everything and fill the bags that some had brought.   Each bag held 4 notebooks, 4 pencils, 4 colored pencils, 2 pens, a ruler, an eraser, and a pencil sharpener....   some of the bags were then filled with extra items of construction papers, coloring books, scissors, tape and glue for craft projects.   Others filled bags of sewing supplies, materials, needles & threads, and other bags were filled with hygiene items like tooth brushes, soaps, & personal wipes.   We still had our two old suitcases which the group used to fill with general items some had brought that did not fit into any of the other categories....   We kept all of our medical supplies separate until final arrangements are made with the island’s nurse for transfer to her.....  When we reach Hilo the director will try again to reach them by short wave radio to make sure she will be at the pier....

After that was over we went up by the pool and watched some swim for awhile, then came back to the room to get ready for dinner.....  I had a really good chicken & pasta dish last night but the star of the show was dessert of pineapple cheesecake.

We were beat after a big day so hit the sack early.......   Hopefully the internet will stay up and I can write more later.......