January 20th, 2024

Our third day at sea heading due south from Honolulu to Tahiti. We arrive in Bora Bora on Tuesday the 23rd. Definitely getting warmer and muggier. Today is cloudy with rain showers on and off. The balcony is soaked with salt spray and rain so won’t be spending much time out there. I did meet with the 2 people I went diving with, Roger and Marilyn and got a few of there pictures to share from the diving in Honolulu.

I took these stills from the video that Marilyn shot of the manta so you can get an idea of the size of it.

This picture was also taken by Marilyn and it is the wreck dive and the turtle swimming by Roger who is also video taping it.

We are set up to dive in Bora Bora, Moore and Tahiti and hoping the water will be smoother since most of the diving is in bays.

The sea day routines have not changed much. Kathy is in the gym while I am waiting to go play Mah Jongg. After Mah Jongg we go up to the buffet and meet Kathy & Micheal, Jeff & Judy and Linda & Micheal for lunch. Micheal and Jeff usually get a big table in the front of the restaurant and we all straggle in. The buffet always has the same thing that is in the restaurant you just have to get it yourself. Also it is close to the pool grill that has burgers, hot dogs, chicken wings and chicken and fish sandwiches plus fries and onion rings. We all graze and catch up with the day before all heading our separate ways. Some folks go to the lectures on board and some to the crafting classes and some off to read and nap. Kathy, Kathy and Judy are all doing the felting class where they are learning to felt and working on a gnome. I will post a picture when they finish with their gnomes. They also offer art classes at 10am and 2pm with a variety of different activities to do.

We did not have many at Mah Jongg this am because we are crossing the equator today and they always do a ceremony at the pool for the crossing. They did the ceremony at 10:30 but we don’t actually cross the equator until 6pm. Neither Kathy or I went up for the ceremony as we have crossed the equator a few times but the other Kathy did and sent me some pictures she took. After the crossing she came back to Mah Jongg. I will post some pictures of where we play Mah Jongg tomorrow when we have more tables.

The ceremony was well attended and most of the officers got thrown in the pool.

This was the apple pie in the buffet today. You can see the chef in the background so you can get an idea of how big it is. Not sure if they had a bunch of apples go bad at once or what but it was huge.

We have also figured out the best time to do laundry. We sort of knew from last cruise but we have tweaked it a little. The best time is at 9pm when the evening show is. If we go during a guest performer and not the regular crew performers the laundry is almost empty. We did it a couple of nights ago when a guest singer was on and we got 3 out of the 4 washing machines. We realize that as it gets warmer we may need to do it more frequently but for right now 2 weeks worked well. Today we have been on the boat 1 month.

2 more days at sea until Bora Bora.