Day 19 - January 21, 2025 - Sea Day

We have one more sea day before our next port of Rarotonga in the Cook Islands.  When I woke up this morning Kay had already left for the gym.  I made the 30 second trek up one deck to the coffee station.  Afterwards it was up one more deck for about 2 miles on the sun deck track.  Although the sun had already risen, it was an absolutely beautiful day.  The winds were mild, the sea calm and the temperature about 82 degrees.   Sorry guys back in Georgia where I know you have been in the low teens.

At dinner last night, Carl had ordered short ribs which came with a side of cheese grits.  We joked that we should all have order the ribs since we have been missing our grits for breakfast (well, all except Janet).  Grits are not on the main dining room's breakfast menu and we had not seen them in the World Cafe.  Anyway, we were joking with our main waiter Aquil, who is from India and did not know what grits were.  At this point the restaurant manager, Antonio (from southern Italy) came over to see if everything was alright.  When we explained what we were joking about, he explained that they actually served grits in the World Cafe, but only every other day.  We were happy to get this information.  Afterward another attendant, Shelter (yes, that is her name) from Zambia came by and we asked her about grits.  She was very familiar with grits and said they were widely eaten in her country.  We enjoyed the waiter survey regarding grits.

The funny thing was, when we came to breakfast this morning we were greeted by the restaurant assistant manager (sorry, can't remember his name), who said that grits were on their way from the 7th deck for our breakfast.  Then, later the  manager, Antonio, came by to see if we enjoyed the grits.  When we assured him we did, he offered to have them available every day for us.  Well, you can't argue with service like that!

We attended another lecture by Patrick Goodness this morning about the people of Polynesia, Micronesia and Melanesia. It was excellent as always.

Patrick gave an excellent presentation explaining the migration patterns, languages and cultural differences of the various South Pacific nations.

Our second session of our education was by Captain Tom Anderson titled "The Southern Sky".  This program explained the differences in appearance of the Southern sky compared to the Northern Sky.  Many constellations were pointed out as well as some technical explanations.

This slide was interesting.  It is a population map like I have  never seen before.  It shows the concentration of population based on latitude.  I would never have guessed that 90% of the world's population lives north of the equator!  His point was that most of the world's population never has an opportunity to see the Southern Sky.

After lunch in the Main Dining Room, Kay and I had a relaxing afternoon.  We joined Janet and Carl in the Exploders Lounge for a drink before dinner.  We had reservations at the Chef's table tonight.  The Chef's Table is a specialty restaurant which serves a fixed meal with matching wine parings.  The menu  changes every 3 days.  Tonight it was a Japanese menu with a guest chef.  Unfortunately, Janet was not feeling well and decided to retire before the meal began.  The menu was interesting for us, and we were reserved in our expectations.  fortunately we we all enjoyed the meal and the wine.  Since we had the Silver beverage package, we received the premium wines.  Three wines and a sherry were really too much, especially since if finished one of Kay's wines and her sherry!

After dinner we attended the night's live entertainment.  Kevin Flynn, a comedian with quite a resume gave a very entertaining 45 minute show on "life as we know it".   Everyone seemed to have  a good time.

Tomorrow we reach Rarotonga, Cook Islands.  We have two excursions planned, each for 3 hours with only 45 minutes between.  The first is a trip to Muri Beach Village, were we will visit a museum and then have some time on the beach.  The second is a 4x4 excursion exploring Rarotonga.  

If we get back in time, I will make a blog post.