Friday Sept 30

Normally we have breakfast in the Lido restaurant, it's really just a cafeteria, with waiters who bring you coffee and bus the tables. The dining room for breakfast is overly grand, in the sense of an old hotel dining room in which you must dress appropriately, and order from the menu, and then wait for the food to come. In the Lido, you ask for (or order) your desired meal at various stations. Eggs from the egg station, pancakes and waffles from that station, toast from the bread station and so on.

There is always a video chart that is available to see on the room TV. This morning's chart shows we are half way between Seattle and Hawaii, approximately 1500 miles made good and 1500 to go. I noted we were also about 1500 miles from San Francisco, so plotting these three points, makes an equalateral triangle. It also shows that we are way the hell and gone out in the Pacific, in fact about as far from land as we could be, with 18,000 feet of water under us. And now the temperatures are generally warmer and it's quite comfortable to be outside in short sleeves and short pants.

The sea has calmed down but there are always rain storms on the horizon (this is a Panorama shot which makes the horizon looks a little wavey—it's not—that's my wavey hand).

The Captain had reported the sea swells were running 6 feet (of course we are over 700 feet long, so that's not too hard to deal with here in the cabin. But by mid day even that had let up and the Pacific seemed to be living up to it's name.

Looking aft from our balcony. Overcast at mid day, but sunny and warm after lunch, and 1500 miles from land—18,000 feet deep right here!

This morning Sandra and I attended a flower arranging demonstration. The ship's florist is an Indonesian fellow from Jakarta named Agus who has worked on the Holland American ships for 5 years. He did own up to the fact that he has worked for 5 years, but he had been a room steward, a bar tender and a dining room waiter, so his time as a florist may not have been all that long, but the room was filled with dowagers who approved of his skills and asked questions that he seemed able to answer. He did say that he liked his job, but it was his job, not an avocation. He said he does not arrange flowers when he is on vacation, except that once he reluctantly did the flowers for his sister's wedding.

Agus in the middle of a tall floral arrangement, being pestered by a passenger.

We've been trying to walk around the ship on the Lower Promanade Deck each day and so off we went to take 4 laps. I must say, the weather is fine, and walking around the deck seems like a good thing to do, and maybe a way not to gain too much weight, since there is food everywhere and it's hard to only select the foods that are good for you. Yesterday we were interrupted by a fire drill, but today everything went smoothly and we got our 4 laps in before the next food show. On past cruises we have seen these foodie events, but we rarely attended. But this group of cooking tips and recipes and other presentations have been interesting and fun to attend. In fact, following our track event, we went to see what was billed as a hamburger cook off which was a lot like Chopped.

There were 3 judges, and two chefs making their specialties. One was a 20 year chef from the Pinnacle Restaurant, and his competitor a member of the event management team—but spoiler alert, she used to own 3 restaurants and apparently did catering prior to selling out and joining the cruise line business. Lots of great smells as the burgers cooked, he made 4 different burgers, she made a couple of the same. Hers was pulled pork mixed and squeezed into hamburger meat, she also made a salad and desert—the judges liked her effort, but his efforts were really professional, and included a sushi burger; a tofu with portofino burger, a traditional burger and another fancy burger.

At the Hamburger Cook-off. From left: the two chefs, the host,

and the three judges (none of whom have ever missed a meal).

After the burger excitement, we spent the afternoon at the pool. Starting out with lunch (no burgers for us, thank you, we're into salads and iced tea) and then reclining in lounge chairs and reading until cocktail hour. I must say this decadent lifestyle is really quite pleasant, I can see how easy it would be to make this a regular way of life.

A look at the pool. The retractable roof is partly open for sun and breezes.

This is a nice place to spend an afternoon, don't you agree?

The Captain came over the cabin loud speaker as we were dressing for dinner. Apparently there was a passenger on board in critical condition and the ships doctor needed blood to save his life. The call came for O negative or A positive. Passengers who could were asked to come to the medical offices immediately with their blood donor ID card. Well I am A pos, but have no donor card. Even so Sandra and I went to the Dr's office. The really good news is there were about 15 people ahead of me, and most of them had donor cards, so I was released, as they wanted proof of blood type.

Dinner tonight at the Pinnacle and I assure you it did not include burgers, I had lobster bisque and lamb chops, Sandra enjoyed the signature Dungeness Crab Cakes and planked Halibut.

Sandra enjoys the planked Halibut and shrimp at the Pinnacle Restaurant

Dane gets ready to attack the lollipop lamb chops—Yum

After dinner the show was a Las Vegas based magician who was really very talented, specializing in slight of hand and rope tricks. I'd like him to come to one of our boating safety classes and teach knot tying. I'm pretty sure the students would all have vacant looks after seeing these fancy rope tricks.