Day 8

We have spent the last eight days at sea. At first it was pretty calm but the last two days have been pretty rough with swells of 10 feet and possibly more. We had a tour of the bridge and have been to talks on the land tours we will be taking. Each evening our room is made up with a chocolate on the bed and sometimes a "towel art" animal shows up as well.

I have more pictures but something has gone wrong with trying to upload of pictures so I will just have to leave it at this for now.

The Cruise Begins

I'm writing this on Monday, September 22, Day 4 of our 65 day trip. I'm including some pictures of our adventures so far. [Sorry, there seems to be no way in this program to put the pictures in order]

Before the ship even left the dock in Seattle we had a lifeboat drill. Everyone was required to put on a lifejacket and assemble on deck by their assigned lifeboat. They even took roll to see that no one skipped the drill. Our boat is B07. I hope it's a good one. I looks like it might be watertight.

I have a picture of us leaving Seattle with the Space Needle in the background and another one of us leaving civilization behind, literally, in our wake. The next picture is our stateroom, Number 6151.

We were eating our first dinner in the dining room as we left Seattle. You can see Alki Point in the background. On Sunday it was a "Formal Night" were we got dressed up for dinner. There are only five or six Formal Nights so we can be comfortable the rest of the time.

We were only one day out when someone had a medical emergency bad enough to require a helicopter rescue. It was very dramatic as a Canadian military helicopter came in and hovered over the bow of the ship. They let down two men and a stretcher then hovered nearby while the patient was strapped in. Then they came back, pulled the men and the patient in the stretcher up a wire to the helicopter and flew off. After that it was back to normal life on the ship, from extravaganza stage shows to tai chi sessions.

The Weather is cloudy, about 50 degrees and surprisingly calm seas. We have about five more days at sea before we reach Japan. (The stop in Russia has been cancelled.) 

I'll post some more when I find the time in our busy days.

PS: No pirates so far.