En Route To Cochin, India - Day 44

NOTE: We added some pictures from yesterday’s golf putting contest.

We also added picture from today’s lunch at the Lido Café. Included in the pictures is Alberto who is also a waiter in Silk Road (he is holding the beer blowup) and Alvin one of the Lido Deck Stewards who filling beer mugs with the draft beer.

We wanted to begin by touching base on two items.

A few of you have written to us who view the webcams on the Crystal Cruises Web Site that the look like a sheet of glass, which they do even from our vantage point. We have really had nice seas as we do this crossing.

The other item is that each day as we go outside on the promenade deck there are several security officers posted on the deck carefully keeping their eyes out for anything related to pirates. As we mentioned, the crew and Crystal Cruises are taking a number of pro-active precautions some of which we are aware of and others that we are not and all of this is very good from our perspective. A while back before we left on this journey some asked us if we had concerns sailing in this area of the world and as we said back then we always knew that Crystal would do whatever is/was required to keep all of us and the ship safe and out of harms way. Clearly safety and the comfort of the passengers are the number one priorities for Crystal.

We had another wonderful time on the ship last evening.

We had a very nice dinner at the Main Dining Room. After three nights dining at the Specialty Restaurants it was nice to be back in the Dining Room. We each enjoyed a nice salad and for our entrée we each selected the Grilled Halibut Fillet. Many times Halibut is one of the times available on one of the formal nights (last night was informal) and we do very much enjoy thie fish. As usual, we had berries for our dessert.

Afterwards we attended a party that we were invited to which was to celebrate the birthday of passenger George Nelson who turned ninety-three yesterday. George is a frequent passenger with Crystal who has been on the ship since sometime in November. A couple of weeks ago he was the passenger who we had mentioned who sang two songs at the Valentine’s daytime event that was held in the Crystal Plaza. He is a delightful man who has a very positive outlook on life and who is very kind. George sang one song for everyone and the lead Crystal vocalist sang Happy Birthday reminiscent of the way Marilyn Monroe sang the song one time for President John Kennedy. George said some words to everyone and Captain Glenn gave a very nice talk. Those attending represented a nice mix of passengers along with a variety of officers, other staff and a variety of others from the enrichment group and certain other personnel such as some from the salon/spa. It was a pleasure to attend this party and to celebrate his birthday and it was very touching.

We slept very well last evening as the seas were relatively calm and woke up at our normal times. It was nice not to have to forward the clocks again. J

Yes, Keith woke up early to begin his day with another nice workout in the Fitness Center. With each passing day his ankle is getting better and stronger and he now believes it will be a week or so until he is back to normal. When he arrived, one other passenger, Brian was already there and in time our friend John and the Executive Chef was there as well. By the end of Keith’s workout the Father Will was also working out. Keith enjoyed a wonderful workout in the Fitness Center. While still working out on the stationary bicycle he is hoping to get back to the Elliptical Machine very soon. He worked out for a long time and then stopped by the Lido Café for coffee where he chatted with Lido Deck Stewards Reymond, Earle, and Ross.

Anne Marie enjoyed a wonderful workout on the treadmill for one hour and then afterwards stopped by the Lido Café for coffee as well. She has been enjoying her two hours of day of walking broken down by one hour in the morning and one hour in the afternoon. She also finds that using the iPod function that is part of the iTouch has been very nice as she can listen to a variety of books that we loaded onto it prior to the start of this adventure.

We both enjoyed a very nice breakfast in the room as we watched the morning program starring Cruise Director Rick Spath and World Cruise Hostess Stacey Huston. During the show we learned a little more about why we will forward the clocks by another thirty minutes before arriving in India. There are just a few places around the world where this occurs, and India is evidently one of those places. In those places where this occurs the reason is Geography or Politics. In the case of India they straddle two different time points and rather than having one portion of the country on one time zone and another portion on another time zone they chose to go with the thirty minute time zone change.

During the program we viewed some videos that our fellow passengers are doing as part of a calls that is being offered on board this leg of the World Cruise for the very first time by the Travel Channel Academy. We know some of the passengers taking this course who have shared very positive comments with us.

On a related note, Keith and a couple of fellow passengers were talking with the person who runs the Photography Studio on the ships and were talking about how more and more people are becoming digital camera and video savvy and how overtime we think that people will be doing more and more with this technology. We also offered some suggestions for the photo studio to consider.

During Captain Glenn’s morning talk from the bridge he noted that were still heading in a due east direction and this evening would begin cruising in a northerly direction. Captain Glenn’s thought of the day was “We all live under the same sky but we don’t necessarily have the same horizon.”

At 9:05 AM Keith attended the Rap With The Rabbi and Anne Marie attended the Catholic Mass. Today’s discussion by the Rabbi focused on Purim which we will celebrate on the ship tomorrow since on the real day of Purim we will be at the port of Cochin, India.

At 1O:00 AM we attended an excellent presentation given by Dr. Jay Wolff who presented “Gandhi Mohandas K Gandhi. He was an ordinary man of extraordinary charisma who led his people from bondage to independence without shedding a drop of blood. He had the qualities of saint, but saints are often hard to live with. This worker for peace never won the Nobel Peace Prize.

At 11:00 AM Keith attended the lecture given by former Senator Phil Gramm who spoke about the recession and his views on going forward and he also took about fifteen minutes of questions from the audience.

We enjoyed another very nice lunch at the Lido Café. Today the menu also featured Bavarian Specialties along with complimentary Draft Beer. We had our regular salad entrees and Keith had a little beer.

In the afternoon, Anne Marie enjoyed a wonderful walk on the Promenade Deck and also sat out for a while. Keith did reading, writing and sat with a couple of our fellow passengers.

This evening is formal night on the ship. We will dine by ourselves at the Prego Italian Specialty Restaurant. Afterwards, we will attend the Crystal Society Reception.

Headline Vocalist Penny Mathisen will provide this evening’s entertainment. She has performed at sea and on land she has performed as Christin in The Phantom of the Opera and as Cosette in Les Miserables in the West End. She has also performed on television.

We will post more on this tomorrow.

TODAY’S THOUGHT FOR THE DAY….

“Sometimes forgetting is just as important as remembering.”

Keith and Anne Marie