Mark was awake at 6:30 and moved out onto the balcony to read and write. Pam was awake by 7:15 and also relaxed and read. We had breakfast in the kings court buffet and then returned to our cabin to relax as the ship’s company were exercising - not star jumps and the like but drill simulations - there were lots of announcements starting with “for exercise, for exercise….” which always brings to mind the bad cruise joke of why should you use the stairs and not the lifts on cruise ships? For exercise, for exercise. Taking of which Mark, did manage to get in 3 laps of the promenade deck, after breakfast, before the crew started their drills.
Pam is aching and her knees are playing up so we decided to spend some time in the Terrace pool at the rear of Deck 8. Bob Geldolf is having a discussion in the theatre with the cruise director, which is also being shown in cabins and Illumations, so we thought we would have the pool to ourselves. Quite a few had the same idea. We both swam in the pool even though it was a bit choppy. Then got out and relaxed on the loungers until we dried off. The sun is deceptively hot today and there is a strong breeze.new later discovered a bit of sunburn from that combination.
We went back to our room and showered and then took lunch in the Carinthia Lounge with its light snacks. Pam had Mac and cheese with mushrooms and a pistachio eclair. Mark had a fish tapas platter and a mousse. We then joined our regular quiz partners, Andrew and Diane, for the music trivia quiz which was very, very bad - only 17 out of 40. They were very hard songs this time and everyone struggled a bit but we struggled a lot.
After the quiz, Andrew and Diane went off to bingo, in the Golden Lion pub, so we said we would join them. We very occasionally play bingo, but mainly when we are with our eldest daughter Katherine. We hadn’t played on here yet so thought we would give it a go. $40 gave us a set of cards each and therefore 5 games of bingo. We have our own green, red and blue dabbers from previous cruises so we used them. The first two games went by and then Mark changed from a green dabber to a blue one. This is important to know because that is Katherine’s favourite colour and she is quite lucky at bingo. Anyway, instant success as Mark won $110 with two lines. Knowing lightning hardly strikes twice he convinced Pam to swap dabbers with him and lo and behold Pam got a full house and won $250. We were so shocked to win once let alone twice!
We relaxed back in the cabin before dinner and watched TV - still in a state of disbelief. We didn’t fancy the main restaurant menu tonight so went up to the buffet instead as there was more choice to our liking. Next to the buffet is the Carinthia Lounge so we went in there afterwards to play cards and listen to a pianist and saxophonist play. It was different but also good.
A couple of nights ago a new act joined the ship. They are called the Queens of Rhythm and played a Soul and Motown set in the theatre. It was a port day so we were tired and skipped that show but tonight they were playing in the Queen’s room so we joined them. They had the whole room rocking and it was a fantastic show with them right in amongst the passengers who were dancing like crazy.
While we are in here we will make this venue our next ship tour segment. It is the room behind the restaurant and we have featured a few pics in here in earlier sea days due to events that we have attended. The venue is used mainly for dancing (ballroom in the evening and classes during the day) and special events like cocktail parties and afternoon tea. Here are a few pics we have gathered so far.
We ended the night back in the Carinthia Lounge for the general knowledge quiz, with our usual quiz partners plus Raju (Mark‘s shuffleboard partner from a week or so ago) . We won with 19 out of 20 and gave the bottle to Raju. A very successful day indeed.
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