July 8th, 2024

The ocean reminds very calm and we have not felt the boat move at all. I made it downstairs for 9am Mah Jongg but there was some confusion as to where it was being held. Plus since it was already the 2nd sea day some people already had their group of 4. I finally found 2 more people and we played for awhile and agreed to meet on the next sea day at 10am. We will see what happens.

The afternoon was spent reading by the pool in the shade and of course napping.

We decided to go to the dining room for dinner which meant dressing up a little bit. They did call a medical emergency to one of the dining rooms around 6:30pm. While Kathy and I were eating the Captain came on to say that we needed to off load the medical emergency and we were going to turn around and head back to the city of Sydney, Nova Scotia instead of proceeding ahead to Corner Brook, Newfoundland. I guess Nova Scotia is a bigger town with better medical care. The Captain said if the boat could arrange it a helicopter might meet us halfway so that we would not have to go all the way to Sydney.

The atrium on the ship

When we finished dinner and tried to go back to our room we were met by our room steward who said that due to the arrival of the helicopter we could not go into our room. We have been on boats with lots of medical emergencies and seen a few helicopter rescues but never have we been told we could not go into our room. We hung out in the buffet until 10pm when the Captain came back on to say that the helicopter was delayed and we could go back to our room but would ahve to vacate again at 10:45pm. Only people on the port side and only decks 11 & 12. When we went back to our room all the balcony furniture was off the balcony and in the room. We grabbed our books and went back up to the buffet. About 11pm we heard the helicopter and we assumed it picked the patient up and when we saw it leave we all tried to go back to our rooms but they did not allow us in. No explanation and we all just hung out by the stairwell waiting.

Waiting to get back in our room.

We heard a noise about 11:45pm which also sounded like a helicopter so I went down to deck 7 to see.

The helicopter hovering over the boat and then leaving with the passenger.

We have no idea why they came out to the boat 2 times. Someone said they came out to drop off medical personnel and see what else was needed and then went back and got needed supplies and then came back out to get the patient. The Captain finally announced that we could go back to our rooms at 12:15am. He also said that because of the delay we would be getting into our next port of call at 11am instead of 7am.

Next stop Corner Crook, Newfoundland.