Northern Lights 2025

 Today was our next to last day at sea and the daily schedule was quite similar to the prior sea days except that not many events were scheduled in the morning due to a muster drill that was optional for passengers but we were encouraged to participate for reasons I'll describe below. After our morning bible study and breakfast the drill was scheduled for 10am.  When the general emergency alarm was sounded, we were to report to our muster stations and await further instructions.  Our muster station was D. (Explorer's Lounge).  By the time I got there after receiving the announcement while walking the outside deck, it was pretty crowded and there were no remaining seats in the lounge.  So Angela and I found seats in the outside hallway.  The reason for our needing to stay there became apparent as they wanted the crew to practice crowd control, demonstrate how to put on life jackets and demonstrate how to walk slowly to the outside "crocodile style" which was...

 Sea days tend to blend together.  There's a rhythm that we fall into that's very comfortable.  Our pace is slower and there's time to read and walk the deck and chat with fellow passengers. After our 8am interdenominational Bible study and breakfast, we attended the Meet the Captain session in the Princess Theater.  It was good and the guests asked good questions.   Immediately following this there was a crew tug of war among the ship departments staff.  After three rounds, the Stateroom staff out pulled the beverage department.  The Stateroom staff also won the best decorated contest.  For their victories, there was some form of cash prize that wasn't specified.  All of this took place on Deck 15 by the forward pool.  It was very sunny and warm, but I found a nice viewpoint on Deck 16 under an overhang. After lunch there was only one activity of interest to me (an enrichment lecture by Jacob on Spanish treasure (really good)) , so I sp...

 Today we literally passed the halfway point at noon when the Officer of the Watch gave the noon PA announcement as to our location.  I found today a much more fulfilling day as there were 3 lectures / events during the day following our customary interdenominational Bible study. First up was the behind the scenes presentation by the 2nd Engineer.  He covered all things below the deck and was proud to declare that they were truly the ones in control of the ship and not the bridge personnel. It was very interesting and he fielded many questions. After lunch, the Bridge 1st and 2nd officers gave their presentation about navigating and how the bridge operates.  It was also very interesting.  Immediately following their presentation, Mark Ruebery gave a fantastic matinee concert featuring rock hits by various artists with particular emphasis on George Harrison.  He covered several artists I had never heard of but their songs were nice. Following my customary wa...

 Today, unfortunately was our last short night as our Seattle Mariners lost game 7 with a score of 4-3.  The Toronto Blue Jays go on to play the LA Dodgers in the World Series.  We came so close, but so far away.  Today was the poorest schedule of the entire voyage.  Apart from the excellent interdenominational bible study, there was literally nothing scheduled all day in terms of enrichment lectures, meet the cast, etc.  Even the evening cast show (Disco: Blame it on the Boogie was a repeat for us of a show that we saw earlier in the cruise and we've seen it on other ships as well.  It was very well attended, however. For the majority of my day, I spent reading and finished my mystery novel and started on another one by the same author.  To get my steps in, I did 4 laps around the 8th floor as the wind really picked up this afternoon.  The temperatures outside have been in the mid 70's, but I don't like walking in the wind or rain.  We ...

 It was another very short night.  The Mariners played starting at 1am our time and unfortunately they lost which forced a final game 7 which will be played tonight starting just after midnight our time.  It's been helpful that we are getting back timezones as the ship sails west.  So when the game hopefully ends around 3am it will actually be 2am our time as the clocks went back at 2am during the game.   We were able to get up for the interdenominational Bible study and it was once again very good.  Afterwards we enjoyed a light breakfast in the LIDO before attending the enrichment lecture at 10am presented by Jacob Marvin.  His topic today was three Atlantic crossings and the myths that they were.  For me there were no further activities of interest for the rest of the day until 2pm when some of the singers and dancers were interviewed by Pauline, our Cruise Director and they took questions from the audience.  What I found most interesting ...

 For a sea day, today was pretty busy for me.  Without a baseball game playing during the middle of the night, I got 6 straight hours of sleep before needing a bio break.  Then another hour until it  time to get up for our 8am interdenominational church service which was held in the aft in Club Fusion.  It wasn't as well attended as the last service we attended and the person who volunteered to lead it was a choir director who did okay leading the songs but there could have been more singing as that's something we tend to have in common.  Preaching wasn't his strong suit and unfortunately nobody else was allowed to speak.  The ship did provide communion ingredients, so we were able to celebrate communion.   Afterwards we ate a quick breakfast before heading to the Princess Theater for a young new lecturer, Jacob Marvin, who spoke on the Islands of the Atlantic with a focus on the Azores and the Canary Islands.  He was a great lecturer who did...