Tuesday's choices

Wednesday 15^th May

Dinner last night was a mixed affair. One of the couples we sat with was older and both man and lady were impossible to engage in conversation despite the best efforts of Matt and I and everyone else on the table. They left before pudding to “catch a show”. (They could at least have stayed and ordered puddings which the rest of us could have shared.) The conversation flowed freely amongst the rest of us – one recently retired couple (Jackie and Ian) and another (shock horror!) still working (Janine and John). Janine is going to be 50 next year – she didn't didn't look a day over 38, and I didn't just say that to be nice, she really didn't.

We discovered that John's Aunty and Uncle used to own the pet shop in Hythe (very close to where I grew up). We talked lots and lots – I can't remember what about. We also laughed a lot. It was a really relaxed evening.

After dinner there was no dancing – a night off for our dance hosts. And after our day it was probably good that we were giving our feet a rest too. Our choices for this evening's entertainment were:

• A Phil Collins tribute act – eliminated. Vetoed by Matt
• A comedian (a different one to before) - possible
• “An evening at the races” - eliminated. It sounded a bit complicated
• A vocalist from the ship's theatre company – eliminated. Risky
• The ship's orchestra playing “east listening jazz” - possible
• The syndicate quiz – eliminated. Not likely to be successful in a team of two, especially when that team of two is Matt and I and we know next to nothing about sport and great swathes of popular culture
• A cocktail pianist – eliminated. We'd seen him already, he was excellent but was playing until late so we could always catch him after

We came to a consensus to try the comedian. He was very good and as a bonus the venue was our muster station – the captain had warned us that it would be getting a bit choppy so we would already be in place should we need to evacuate into the lifeboats.

Monday's black and white

Tuesday May 14th

It was black and white night last night. Which means there are a lot of people wearing black for whom it doesn't really suit, and a lot of people wearing white for whom it doesn't particularly suit (I have learnt this from my very chic friend Charlotte). Neither colour goes well with the lobster skin colour which is the look that a lot of people were going for after a day in the sunshine (obviously without sufficient factor 30); but you've got to be especially wary of men in white tuxedos.

We had dinner with a lovely middle-aged couple called Trevor and Patty (I got excited initially when I thought it was the people left behind in Cartagena) and a difficult-to-age lady travelling on her own. She was almost the opposite of Susan from the night before. I imagine that this lady (who shall remain nameless) got “rich” (she cruises a lot and has that “considerably richer than you” air about her) from an acrimonious divorce. She was very bitter towards a lot of people. She left the table early as she had to get back to the casino. Which left us to have much easier conversation with Trevor and Patty.

Hythe Pier

Patty is a big fan of online group deals and they had recently spent a night in a hotel in the New Forest. As coincidence would have it they had visited Hythe – just a mile or so from where I grew up. She had loved it and was thrilled that my mum is currently the lady mayoress of the parish. I gave them a bit of insider information (where they can park for free) and I think they plan to return to visit the pier and take the ferry and maybe go to the market. I hope the market's still going.

The meal was notable for two things in particular:

Pina Colada Soup

• Soup: There is always a choice of two (between starter and main, it's not compulsory) and today's choices were roasted plum tomato or chilled pina colada. I can eat tomato soup anywhere so went for the pina colada. It was interesting and not at all unpleasant but I'm not sure it's something that I'll be trying to recreate.
• Cheese: A cruise is potentially hazardous for a cheese lover such as myself.

  

  Cheese and biscuits

  You can have cheese and biscuits every evening of you want but I've tried to limit this to formal nights only. They bring out a board with lots of choice and it's just too difficult to pick one or two so I invariably went for a bit of everything. The waiter piled my plate high with biscuits too. The goat's cheese was fantastic, as was the stilton (served with a spoon from a whole stilton about a foot in diameter).

As if that wasn't enough, the lady who had dashed off to the casino had given me her shortbread biscuit. She didn't like shortbread. If you don't like shortbread what biscuit do you like?

As of last night I have worn every pair of shoes that I brought on holiday with me. All 12 pairs.

Sunday's evening

Sunday 12th May: continued

It was still stormy: I was still feeling fine, Matt was still feeling a bit unwell. He challenged me that I would feel unwell after having a shower. I didn't. We were a bit delayed in getting out to dinner as Matt insisted on moving around the cabin with his eyes shut in an effort to avoid the development of unmanageable nausea. I made a concession to the whole gale and wore flat shoes and we took the lift rather than risking the stairs. It amazed me the number of women tottering around on ill-fitting high-heels. I mean, style's all very well (although a lot of them weren't even stylish) but this was just plain stupidity.

I have also been amazed by the number of doddery old ladies going around with various mobility aids (sticks, frames, those terrifying fold out frames with wheels) who also attire themselves in high-heels, surely their travel insurance should preclude this. I got poked by an old lady with a stick this morning and I'm not entirely sure it was an accidental poke.

Dinner was a lot quieter than usual – I guess that a lot of people were weathering the storm in their cabins. We sat with just one other person, a fantastic lady called Susan who was on her first holiday post-kidney transplant. It was her first cruise and she described it as her branded yeast extract cruise – love it or hate it. Fortunately she loved it. She worked in logistics and was impressed with the slick running of the ship. It was a great evening; none of the conversation staples that we're becoming over familiar with when people don't have anything interesting to say (their opinions of various cruise lines, the next cruise they've got booked, how proud they are of their grandchildren who – with a few notable exceptions – sound quite unremarkable). We talked about entrepreneurship and economics. Susan was a lady who had worked very hard to get to where she was today, and clearly still worked very hard. I had a lot of respect for her, helped I suspect by her fantastic sense of humour.

None of us felt remotely ill at the end of the meal (I think there's a good deal of mind over matter and the good food and good company took Matt's mind off the storm) but the boat was still listing in all dimensions so ballroom dancing was definitely off – even in flat shoes.

Saturday's pirate dance

Saturday 11th May, continued

Having only consumed one of the little packets of biscuits that they put in your cabin and an ice-cream (all be it a very delicious ice-cream) since 9am we were rather peckish when we got back on the ship. Everything was gearing up for the evening meal but we legged it up 10 decks (we have been trying to avoid the lifts in an effort to burn energy, plus they are a bit temperamental and time was of the essence) to make it to the poolside pizzeria 10 minutes before it shut. I really enjoyed my hungrily eaten pizza (we were in Italy after all) and chips (it was only a little pizza). 

We'd have to wait a while for that to go down to make space for dinner. There were lots of other cruise ships in Civitavecchia so we took a walk around the deck to look at them all - I was particularly excited by the one with loads of waterslides at its stern. 

The captain's disdain of the Italians became apparent. He'd announced the previous evening that there would be quite a few cruise ships in Civitavecchia that day and due to the lack of "control" that "Port Control" ever exerted he would not be able to guarantee our docking time, even though it was booked for 7am. Then, this evening, he said that we would have to have a tug out of the port, even though there was no need, and insinuated that this was just for "jobs for the boys". 

We had the pool to ourselves for another vigorous pre-dinner swim. Again, on a ship with 3000 passengers this amazes me. In preparation for dinner Matt decided that his beard had got long enough and took his clippers to it. Unfortunately he had an accident with them on the back of his neck and I was thus entrusted to even things up. Hair dressing is clearly not one of my natural abilities but I was trusted enough to sort it out. I saw this as my perfect opportunity to adorn Matt with one of those little rat tail tufty bits popular with small Dutch boys (at least this was the case on French campsites in the early 1990s). Matt didn't like this style so I was benevolent and did my best to give him a straight hairline.

Dinner was a peculiar affair. We were on a table of 8 which is a difficult size to have a conversation involving the whole table so Matt and I mostly chatted with a lively older couple who had been engaged for 18 years. Also on our table were:

• a miserable looking middle-aged couple. He perked up a bit when talking about football. She didn't perk up at all.
• an older couple - Gladys and Glen. I think that Gladys was one of those older people who is deaf but doesn't realise it. She became very animated when talking about the potteries, the evils of drink and the unnecessary use of mobility scooters. They both became animated when talking about the gym. Gladys was also disproportionately excited about fountains. In this respect (rather than that of the potteries or the gym) Matt had found a like-minded traveller.

We were very late dining this evening and observed the waiters counting cutlery as we finished our coffees. I presumed that this was a safety precaution (to make sure no-one had removed a knife to use as a weapon) but our fellow diners suggested it was more likely to be to check for losses from an economic perspective.

I instructed Matt to be careful in his leading of the dance tonight as I had a rather short dress on; but we were quite successful, especially to my request of the Pirates of the Caribbean Tango. I particularly like this music because you can really get into character with some well placed ooh-ahh pirate noises. 

Friday's trip

A short hair cut

Thanks to a late night I was reasonably well prepared for my 9am departure to catch a train across south west England. All that I needed to do was eat breakfast, pack one item off the washing line and prepare a picnic for the train. Getting up at 8am gave me plenty of time to stay on schedule. That was until Matt decided that he wanted his hair cut. In fairness, I’ve been saying for a few weeks that he should get a haircut but up until today he’d been more tolerant of it than me. Our usual hairdresser, Katherine, being unavailable, the only course of action was for me to test my hairdressing skills. I was keen to use the kitchen scissors but Matt was insistent that I used his beard trimmer (he doesn’t really have a beard). 20 minutes later Matt was considerably de-haired (more de-haired than had been the original intention, but it was at least even) and I was no longer on schedule. We were both covered in lots of small bits of ginger hair.

I didn’t think that the schedule would permit me a shower to remove the small bits of ginger hair from my person, but in actual fact I made it to the station with plenty of time to spare. I was even able to position myself on the platform in anticipation of my allocated seat. Here I observed some teenage boys indulging in the peculiar practice of spraying deodorant all over themselves. They have clearly not yet learnt about the biology of sweat but I resisted indicating to them the parts of their body that would better benefit from the application of deodorant.

Phase one of my trip to Southampton Central station passed uneventfully. My allocated seat was in the quiet carriage. It wasn't very quiet but I didn't mind. A rather haughty sounding woman did mind and made an unofficial announcement that could everyone please keep the volume down. Which was mostly met with barely disguised sniggers of laughter from the rest of the carriage.

Phase two was so uneventful that I even managed a little snooze. That was until Sherbourne, when a posh couple boarded. At least they seemed posh to me. They had a rather dilapidated shopping trolley from which they extracted their picnic packaged in bags from a high end supermarket before precariously shoving it into the overhead stowage. The woman was pleasingly eccentrically (sorry about the double adverb use) dressed:

• bum-bag - which wasn't removed or ventured into at all
• sunglasses - even though she wasn't in the sun
• sunhat - even though she wasn't in the sun
• headphones - even though she was relentlessly talking the whole time
• elastic band around her wrist

Her picnic seemed to consist of lettuce leaves freshly plucked from a lettuce, which she did not pause in her talking to masticate. I felt rather sorry for the young lady from Jersey who happened to be sat next to them who did remarkably well whilst they argued about how she could best get to Regent Street (I think they thought that she'd never ventured onto public transport before). The posh lady wasn't wrong when she described the countryside through which we were traversing as ravishing though.

My tiffin

It wouldn't affect me, but there was much consternation when it was announced that the train wouldn't be stopping at Clapham Junction - apparently it was too hot. I just had time eat my picnic, which due to the morning's time constraints consisted of the leftovers from the day before's tea (sweet potato, mushroom and spinach curry). I don't know what the posh lady would have to say about this as she was now in full swing about her tea the day before:

• fish pie in which she couldn't find any fish
• meringue which surely wasn't made with free range eggs
• and if they could afford such good wine why couldn't they have organic potatoes?

With one stop to go, the train was ominously stationery. It was hot on the train and I was uncomfortable from all the little bits of ginger hair all over me. Apparently someone had driven into a bridge (apparently this is creatively called bridging) so we would have to take a slight detour. Still, I was only 10 minutes later than scheduled and hadn't kept my dad waiting too long.

Before heading home, dad kindly agreed that we could pop into the shops. It was a successful mini-trip as I bought no more and no less than had been intended (apart from a possibly unnecessary purchase in a large toiletry store to use up a voucher).

Dad's driving was funny, he kept insisting on pointing out various highway regulations both to me and other drivers (imagine a finger pointing at the speed limit sign).

Stag beetle - spotted whilst walking

After catching up with my friend Katie, it was time I made my way down the road to the Waterside Arts Festival event: "Jazz at the Grove". I was to join my parents and all my aunts and uncles (at least all those that I know about), and was to bring my mother-in-law's Yorkshire terrier, Fred, who is temporarily residing with my mum and dad. It was a very pleasant evening for the 1.7mile walk; unfortunately Fred didn't agree and refused to walk any further after less than 0.1miles. This meant that I had to carry him the rest of the way in his special carrying bag. I suppose he can be forgiven as he is 14 years old (which possibly makes him 98 in dog years although I always thought that whole thing was a bit dubious), but I think a few car accidents were only narrowly avoided as people gawped at me while I walked along with him cradled at my bosom - I have found this to be the most comfortable and secure way to carry a small dog. 

Tuesday's dining

Tuesday, May 7^th 2013: continued

To make up for our extreme laziness earlier in the day we did a vigorous 20 minute swim before getting ready for dinner. It was getting quite late now and it was strange being in the pool with the early buffeteers heading past in their formal night regalia.

One of the things I like about cruising is the possibility of getting dressed up. I love wearing dresses but rarely do so at home (maybe I should do more) but here I can wear one every night. And tonight I was planning on wearing my wedding dress. It’s not a supremely wedding-y wedding dress and since I had the bottom of it trimmed off it passes as a lovely ball gown. The challenge now was going to be fitting into it since I am at least 5kg heavier than I was on my wedding day plus with all the swimming I’ve been doing my back has got kind of muscly. It would definitely be wise to wear it towards the start of our holiday rather than saving it for the end.

I had to enter the dress head first (I used to be able to go feet first) but with assistance from Matt I was fastened in. Assistance is probably the wrong word as Matt did all of the fastening.

Alstromeria?

We had another great table at tonight. Jackie (travelling with her cousin Jill) was able to identify my up-until-now-unidentifiable flower as an Alstromeria. Debbie (travelling with her husband Simon who had celebrated his 50^th birthday last year) was celebrating her 50^th birthday whist on board – she looked amazing. They were some of the younger people who we met. Raymond (travelling with his delightful wife Rosa) looked like the eponymous captain from a brand of fish fingers. He had no social graces – which I loved. There was little pansying around with small talk as Raymond presented the topics available for conversation as religion, politics or sex. It turned out that he was highly into astrology (albeit in a highly amateur way) and when he asked what I thought about this I was duly tactful and said that I had an open mind; which he said was “very good, for a chemist.” I recounted the occasion that I was on a radio phone-in horoscope slot. We also had quite an in-depth discussion about the literature/film interface. So we didn’t talk about religion, politics or sex after all but it was a very engrossing evening.

More dancing tonight. I don’t know if it was the dress that I was wearing that made me feel particularly elegant but it seemed to go better. We even managed to navigate the oval dance floor for a bit of quickstep (one of my favourite dances to watch but least favourite to do as I always feel a bit like a galloping horse).

After 3 full days at sea (which have been immensely restful) I am finally feeling confident finding my way around the ship. My initial confusion was not helped by the facts that

1. there is no deck 13
2. all the decks have a number and a letter name
3. some of the decks’ letter names progress alphabetically but not all of them are included in this system (e.g. lido, sports, promenade)

But through repeated wanderings this has now passed. So much so that I was quickly able to direct us out of the smoking gauntlet on our pre-bed promenade on the promenade deck (or deck 7 if you prefer) - even in high heels.

Monday's evening

Tuesday, May 7^th 2013

Dinner last night was great. Not for the food (which was nonetheless very nice and pudding featured ice-cream again), but for the conversation. We sat with some ladies whose pensions from a well-known bank were clearly generous enough to fund frequent cruising. My accent deduction skills were on top form as I correctly identified that they were from Merseyside. They had worked in IT (or “computers” as it was in the 1980s) and one of them had been involved with the introduction of credit cards. It’s difficult now to think of the pre-plastic era let alone that someone had had the job of going around retailers installing the system for this.

Also on our table was a couple from Farnham, both of whom were (still) self-employed. The topics of conversation included:

• the perils of navigation (I had once got lost in Farnham and could think of nothing else to say about this settlement, unfortunately my mentioning of this resulted in an extensive discourse on Farnham’s one-way system)
• the dreadful weather we’ve been having in the UK over the last few years (I even threw in a comment about the jet stream)
• how much Americans eat (a lot)
• the benefits and pitfalls of working from home (you never have to get dressed versus lack of human contact)
• how good ice-cream is (and which cruise lines offer all you can eat ice-cream, they might be getting my custom next)
• the ridiculous health and safety notices on board. My personal favourite being “do not flush while seated”. Frankly if you need a sign to tell you this I think that you’ve got whatever’s coming to you. I would excuse this sign if they had those light activated flushes that you can set off by accident (I did this once in Switzerland, it was quite terrifying), but they are push button ones and the toilet seat lid covers the button up (until you put the lid down – I wish I had a diagram to show you) so you really would have to go to some effort to flush whilst seated.

Bonus calorie saving of the day: avoid the cheeseboard.

We decided to give the dance floor (and our feet) a rest and headed instead to one of the shop’s numerous bars. This one had a view to the stern (look at me with the nautical jargon) which at 10.30pm was not very much apart from a ship behind us. Matt took this opportunity to explain to me about port and starboard and red and green lights.

Amazingly, one of the bartenders recognised us from our previous cruise. Even more amazingly he recognised us as “The Dancers”.

A little night cap

Since the clocks were going forward overnight (which would be yet another complication to the alarm setting) we retired to our cabin after just one cocktail.

Monday's energy savings

Monday, May 6^th 2013: continued

After yesterday morning’s oversleeping I made sure that I turned up my phone to full volume before going to bed. I awoke feeling pleasingly refreshed (maybe the separate beds?) so was surprised that the alarm hadn’t gone off. I was even more surprised to find that it was gone 10 o’clock. Evidently the alarm doesn’t sound if the phone is turned off.

Calorie saving of the day 1: skip breakfast. I persuaded Matt that as it could be less than 2 hours until lunch (we had already spent some time faffing) we could swim, shower and then eat. We headed to the largest of the ship’s 4 pools; it was overcast this morning and this pool has the benefit of being undercover in such conditions (like a convertible car). I did a 20 minute swim but not very vigorously (no risk of being mistaken for a channel swimmer) as I had my “beach” bikini on and was rather concerned about the security of various parts of my anatomy in it. I did however enjoy doing some forward somersaults (without any loss of anatomy).

Calorie saving of the day 2: opt for the lighter options. Which I enjoyed for starter and main at lunchtime. Followed by treacle sponge and ice-cream. We had signed up for a “soda” package (20 drinks for the price of 16 or something like that) and had spent quite some time deliberating as to whether to add 20 branded soft whipped ice-creams for an extra £7.50. While this seemed like a bargain (and I do like a bargain), 20 branded soft whipped ice-creams would be quite a lot to get through. It was not clear whether these branded soft whipped ice-creams would come with chocolate flakes and while I love ice-cream this branded soft whipped type is not my favourite and I figured that there would be good ice-cream opportunities available at the port stops. As it turns out there are also good ice-cream opportunities available every lunch time and dinner time. It is always a pudding option (seemingly different flavours on every occasion in addition to the standard vanilla) and, even better, it is possible to exchange whatever dessert condiment is allocated (e.g. custard for the treacle sponge) for an ice-cream “side”. You can even have ice-cream as well as the allocated dessert condiment. It was a good call to opt out of the branded soft whipped ice-cream.

Over lunch I practised my small talk. Today’s subjects included the various ways of travelling to Southampton (in particular from Edinburgh) and Scottish (and other bits of the UK) independence, which I suppose might really be classed as political debate rather than small talk. Although you couldn’t really class it as debate as everyone joining in had the same opinion.

Calorie saving of the day 3: avoid the afternoon tea buffet. We had spent most of the afternoon in the convertible area by the pool, reading and playing my favourite fruit based word game. A 4 o’clock hoards of people started walking through this area. It was a few hours since we’d eaten and we were getting a bit peckish. So I suggested to Matt that we pack up our stuff and get afternoon tea (rather than go for the poolside pizzeria). We had always intended to go to the restaurant for this, as it is a civilised thing to do that doesn’t happen in day-to-day life (well not in ours anyway), plus there would be several flights of stairs to navigate which would be good exercise. In order to get to the waiter service restaurant we had to walk through the buffet area. This was clearly where the hordes were heading and now settling with their plates piled high with cakes, rolls, scones, samosas and curry. Yes, samosas and curry: since when afternoon tea has featured these I do not know. In the restaurant I was much more restrained – it is somehow ore difficult to over-eat when other people give you food rather than you putting it on your plate yourself from a seemingly unending supply. The only disruption to the aforementioned civility was when I failed to differentiate between the butter and the cream on my mini-toasted tea cake. Retrospectively the difference was obvious since the butter was in those little gold wrapping papers.

Then we re-settled by the pool. I wanted to paint the mini-fruit tart that Matt and I had just shared. I am not particularly good at painting and I particularly not good if I am trying to do it from memory. So I braved venturing into the buffet to see if I could pick up a tart to model for me. Unfortunately I was too late – afternoon tea had been cleared to make way for the Enid Blyton character themed tea. I didn’t think that the under 5s would have appreciated me taking one of their jam tarts to help me with my art so I would have to rely on my powers of recall. Whether you would identify my creation as a fruit tart is doubtful, but it’s colourful at least.  

Painting a fruit tart

Sunday's relaxation

Monday, May 6^th 2013

We’d opted for freedom dining, which meant that for evening meals we could turn up when we wanted and then sit with different people each night who had turned up at the same time. This has the drawback that you don’t get to know anyone else really well; but this is, in my opinion, vastly outweighed by the benefit that you don’t run the risk of being stuck with the same people each night yet have the chance to meet lots of interesting people. (On our previous cruise we had been very lucky with our fixed dining table but the freedom dining seemed like a much better option overall.) Yesterday lunchtime (when you also turn up when you want and sit with whoever turns up at the same time) demonstrated why you might not want to sit with the same people all the time. We were sat with 3 older couples. That in itself was not a problem (there are plenty of delightful older couples). It was their nature that was troubling:

1) Mr and Mrs A. Mrs A seemed a bit grumpy and barely uttered a word. Mr A was one of those men who insist on imparting their “wisdom” to you, which I don’t mind too much if it’s interesting wisdom. But Mr A’s wasn’t as he inisted on regaling to us i) details of the (numerous) cruises that he and Mrs A have been on before ii) an (excessive) discourse on the Panama Canal. I don’t even know where the Panama Canal is, which I’m sure would have been some better wisdom to acquire.

2) Mr and Mrs B who seemed very friendly but as they were sat opposite us on quite a large table it seemed somehow socially inappropriate to bellow across to them.

3) Mr and Mrs C who seemed nice enough but despite varied conversation starters from Matt and myself just weren’t very chatty. They became animated during an exchange with Mr A about the benefits of high end supermarkets’ ready meals. At which point Mr A asked me if I cook. Since Matt and I had been having a private conversation about sun protection I initially responded about the perils that Matt faces from ultra-violet radiation. Until Mr A made it clear that he meant the kitchen type of cooking and not the skin type. Apparently his daughter-in-law never cooks  - he seemed to be quite cross about this. I felt very smug in replying that I cook frequently and even on busy nights we don’t have ready meals (from high end or low end supermarkets). Unless of course you include homemade reheat.

Sunday afternoon passed highly uneventfully. After taking a turn on the promenade deck to walk off lunch (which included edible proof of a pudding that Matt had previously not believed existed: Brown Betty), in which I was successful in not losing anything overboard (one of my main cruise fears), we avoided the organised deck sports, donned appropriate sun protection and found some loungers in a quiet spot. We read for a bit, looked at the clouds and topped up our sun protection. I wasn’t particularly comfortable as I had to sit with my head clamped against the lounger to prevent the loss of my (rather lovely) sun hat to the occasional gust of wind.

I managed to retain my hat

After a couple of hours we moved inside and I got my watercolours out and painted the sky and sea. Matt mostly read and passed occasional comment on my interpretation of the sky and sea.

 

I clearly have some way to go before
I'll be exhibiting at the Royal Academy

And then it was 7 o’clock and probably time to contemplate getting ready for dinner. This would mainly consist of ironing (Matt) and dealing with nails (me). As usual I made a right mess of painting my right finger nails but did a very neutral colour so hopefully it didn’t look too bad to a casual observer.  

We ate dinner with a lovely, recently retired couple from Waterlooville. Sharon was particularly pleased to live somewhere called this. Neil had worked shifts for many years and they were “making up for lost time” cruising now. I was rather disconcerted by Neil’s earring (it just somehow didn’t go with a dickie bow). We enjoyed sharing stories of camping (our usual holiday mode) and discovered that they had met in Germany. Neil had been in the forces and Sharon had gone out married to one serviceman and come back married to  another (Neil).

I had my first ever experience of Lobster. And very nice it was too. It had a cheesey sauce and, as we know, cheese improves almost everything.

We rounded off Sunday with some more ballroom and latin dancing – a  bit better this evening mainly because I think that I had found my proverbial sea legs and Matt wasn’t drugged.

Saturday's and Sunday's feeding and exercising

Saturday, May 4^th 2013

First impressions indicated that we were well below average age. Although maybe not to the same extent as on our previous cruise since today there were a few couples with babies and toddlers. I quite like the company of the older generation but if past experience was anything to go by the greatest challenge of sharing a ship where the mean, mode and median age of your fellow travellers is over 70 would be avoiding sharp elbows at the buffet and not getting too annoyed at disregard for queue etiquette.

Setting sail (or more technically powering
off with marine diesel) from Southampton

If you look hard enough you can spot
my Mum and Dad waving us off from the
garden of The Grove, Hythe.

              

  Sunday, May 5^th 2013

We did some dancing after dinner last night. This was not entirely successful as:

1) The dance floor was oval. We are used to a quadrilateral which provides helpful position markers for our moves

2) There was a lot of sequence dancing. We don’t don sequence dancing – it’s too regulated

3) Matt, my husband, was lacking his usual assertiveness in leading. He put this down to me having “drugged” him with sea-sickness tablets.

Despite all that I ended the evening with only 1 dancing related injury (a bit of a smashed up big toe nail) and had half learnt a Square Tango (from Paul the dance host while Matt was having some liquid refreshment). Matt kindly dealt with my toenail (which I suppose is only fair given that he is at least partially responsible for it) and I feel sure that our dancing will improve over the fortnight.

We ate dinner last night with a man from Wales, his Brazilian wife, their 5½ year old son (fluent in at least 3 languages, or as fluent as it’s possible for a 5½ year old to be) and her parents (her mother originally being from Japan). They spoke only Portuguese (and I suppose maybe Japanese but that was definitely not going to help) and despite my best efforts to combine French, Italian and Spanish (in descending order of competence) it was very difficult to converse with them. I did manage to deduce that Ida is very excited about going to Rome and Jose identified that Matt talks a lot and I am “silent” in comparison.

I had a remarkably good night’s sleep. This was despite Matt and me sharing a single bed. We had booked late and hence got an incredibly bargainous holiday but were allocated a “twin beds only” cabin. I took the outside of the bed as Matt was worried about falling out (I didn’t see this as a risk as long as the sea stayed calm). Unfortunately Matt didn’t sleep as well as me so we may have to take separate beds from tonight.

The plan for today, a full day at sea, was to do not very much, but to make the most of the day and take advantage of some of the on board facilities. Therefore I set an alarm on my mobile for 8am. This would facilitate an early morning swim but still give us time for a leisurely breakfast.

As we have an inside cabin there are no solar clues as to the hour of the day. I was shocked when I awoke and checked the time: it was 9.20am. I had clearly neglected the fact that my alarm doesn’t sound if I leave my phone on silent. (This wasn’t as bad as the time that I locked my phone with alarm set in a hotel safe overnight when I was in Greece with a friend. We didn’t hear it go off and overslept so badly that we missed an extensive boat trip that we had booked the previous day.

So, early morning swim and leisurely breakfast were off. Buffet breakfast and mid-morning snack was on. As well as the aforementioned risk of sharp elbows at the buffet, the other risk is of over-eating. We both showed extreme restraint on this, our first, visit – Matt having his usual of a bowl of porridge (bolstered with a side of blueberry smoothie) and me breakfasting on a bowl of fresh fruit plus one piece of toast with a few beans, mushrooms and tomatoes. Pleasingly they even had mini portions of my favourite yeast extract spread which enhances greatly such a toast based morning meal.

At breakfast we were joined by an older couple who had lived in Plymouth in the 1960s. They enjoyed reminiscing about some of their favourite haunts back then, many of which are still around now. I enjoyed listening to their stories – one of their daughters was born at the hospital that used to be on the site where I lived when I first moved to the city. I think that we might have persuaded them to take a holiday to Plymouth – I hope that they’re not disappointed! – but apparently it will be better than the Northern town in which they currently live (which shall remain nameless).

We swam in the adults’ only pool, which we had found during our explorations yesterday. It is deceptively located within the spa complex (which I had no intention of paying extra for) and at first I thought there was and additional charge to swim her. However we managed to ascertain from dandy Daniel (Matt’s choice of adjective) that this was not the case. It is apparently one of those pools with a current that you swim against but that didn’t seem to be working this morning and it was too short to swim lengths so I did laps. It was too late when I realised that persistently going round in the same direction would make me dizzy, and there was a bit of a swell picking up too which can’t have helped that sensation. I got out after about 20 minutes and, hilariously, one of the older “spectators” asked me if I was a channel swimmer because I “looked like one”. I took that as a compliment rather than a comment on my layers of body insulation.

Friday's complete failure of both engines

I had wanted Friday afternoon off work to get to London for a girl's weekend with some of my best friends, staying at Alex's new(ish) flat. Since college we all dispersed around the country and try to catch up a couple of times a year. But a colleague wanted Thurs and Fri off work and I felt mean that she wouldn't be able to have  it because I wanted a half day. So I duly booked myself on the 1844 from Plymouth, to arrive at Paddington at 2230. I arrived at the station a bit early and the nice man let me on a different train that had been delayed from Penzance. This should get me to London half an hour earlier and have the bonus of being direct rather than having to change at Taunton. It would prove to have some rather negative consequences. 

I started off in carriage B. I had to move just after Newton Abbot as I was surrounded by people sniffing. I would rather they had got  a tissue and done a big blow and got it over and done with.

So into carriage C. Here I was able to get a forward facing seat. Which meant that I could read my book without the risk of nausea. It was somewhat difficult to concentrate on my aging copy of A Farewell to Arms, due to all the various random people, who's conversations it was impossible not to listen in to.

Behind me was a mother and son. In front a girl in her late teens. Across the aisle a chap, maybe my sort of age, consuming quantities of Australian branded lager (I think that it's brewed in the UK). Behind him a younger chap with an accent I couldn't quite get, and in front of him a rather posh looking middle aged lady.

The banter began at Exeter where 2 welsh ladies joined the train. It turned out that they were mother (maybe of about 70) and daughter, travelling from Ilfracombe to Swansea. This apparently required 5 changes, which struck me as real train dedication. The daughter had a print out with all the connections but seemed rather confused about when they would actually be getting anywhere. During this leg of the journey the conversation revolved my travelling companions being worried that someone was going to walk off with their luggage. Welsh daughter would not sit down so that she could keep an eye on her's. Posh woman kept standing up and walking to hers (interestingly she was also reading Hemingway, but had a pristine looking volume and didn't actually seem to be reading very much as she kept getting up). I recounted the time that my luggage had been removed by someone at Taunton. It wasn't until we got to London and the case left on the train was clearly not mine that we realised, but the situation was resolved as my case was sent up on the last train and the other one returned to Somerset. The lager chap went to get his bag then and spent the rest of the journey with it on the seat next to him.

Taunton to nearly Reading passed fairly uneventfully. The girl in front was busy for most of that time having loud and irate conversations. She was clearly planning on a night out in Reading but her friends appeared to be inadequately organised for her liking. She finally said that she would get a lift from her dad (who would take her luggage) to someone else's house. She called her dad who (based on the expletives) evidently refused to pick her up. Apparently he had had 2 glasses of wine and she had no capacity to appreciate that this might be a problem: "he's not on the floor".

The tickets were inspected. Someone further back was trying to justify why he didn't have a ticket. The lager chap tried to get a refund. Apparently someone else had bought the ticket for him and booked him on a 6am train, rather than 6pm. So he'd bought a ticket for the current journey but was trying to get the money back for the other one. It didn't wash. We learnt that he was a carpenter / builder, that he lived in Devon but most of his family were in Oxford and that he was on the way to the capital for a "massive" party. He had 10 lagers to get through before the end of the journey and, rather wisely decided that he wouldn't be able to do this alone so offered them around. The chap behind him accepted. From this brief exchange I decided that he was Polish. The posh woman had disappeared off somewhere.

About 2115 we were coming into Reading. The guard announced that we were just waiting for a local train before pulling in to the station. 5 minutes later: "Ladies and gentlemen, I am sorry to announce that there has been a total engine failure". Much groaning ensued. We were stationary for the next 2 hours in which ensued the most farcical train delay I have ever had the misfortune to be involved in. Initially there were a number of announcements in which the guard told us that he was trying to find the driver to find out what was going on. Surely there are a limited number of places for a driver to be on a train. 

After about 15 minutes the driver had clearly been found and we were told that the front engine had now also failed, in addition to the rear engine which had been in a state of failure since St Austell. That was all. After a while they said that someone was coming to fix the engine.

Clearly the fix didn't work as the next announcement was that a spare engine was making it's way from a depot near Paddington and that it may take an hour to arrive. Cue more groaning.

A few of my neighbours went to have a smoke out of the window. Possibly of tobacco.

I struck up conversation with the 9 year old behind me. The kid was good company. He's hoping to get scouted this year. I thought he was a bit young to be moving on from the cubs but soon realised that he meant by a football club. I think I can now safely say that I have a comprehensive understanding of the football league system. And Plymouth Argyle's standing in that. He talked with me while his mother argued with someone in London about how they would get home from Paddington. Her, Josh, and Candy and Lola would be stranded. Candy and Lola? It was at this point that it dawned on me that the strange noises that I was occasionally hearing were not coming from a passenger with sleep apnoea but from these 2 dogs. Bichon Frise apparently.

I paused my conversation with Josh; it was 2230 and I was starting to get worried about my onward journey. If we were ever going to get going again.

I put an emergency call out to my Dad for train times from onwards from Paddington - I would have to cross London to get Alex's.

I put out an emergency social media appeal for accommodation near Reading.

I called Alex to update her on my whereabouts.

I called, Matt, my husband for moral support.

I trod on Candy or Lola. The ensuing noise was not pleasant. I am no longer phobic of dogs but I am wary. Cue feet to chest in a frantic manoeuvre to avoid ankle biting.

Eventually the rescue engine came. The guard was refusing to answer any questions. An old friend had messaged me to say that I could stay at her's if I could get to Wokingham. My home counties geography is appalling: cue a further call to my Dad. Current time approx 2310, last train to Wokingham from Reading 2334.

At some point I realised that the chap I thought was Polish was actually from Newcastle.

Further announcement that they were waiting for permission to attach the rescue engine. Time was passing (there's an unnecessary statement if ever there was one). Unless I could get to Paddington by 2345 I was going to struggle to get to Alex's. The guard told me that unless I had bought a through ticket to Earlsfield that was my own problem.

2330: Paddington was not going to happen. Wokingham was looking dodgy.

Eventually the engine was attached. Further announcement: we were now waiting for signalling approval. At 2345 we pulled into Reading. Cue cheering.

The emergency accommodation in Wokingham would now rely on me getting there by some other means than the dubious rail network. Fortunately there was a nice man at Reading station who was kind enough to put me in a taxi with some other people going in the same direction. I was delighted to see my old friend Lauren waiting for me. I was exhausted (it hadn't been an easy day at work either) and I was so pleased to be somewhere safe to sleep - after a cup of tea and a brief catch up.

I made it to Alex's uneventfully in the morning. Although I did hear someone use the word heterogeneous in "normal" conversation. Hopefully my journey back to Plymouth will be unremarkable....