Slept in two shifts – got up in the middle of the night and then finished off shift 2. Got up a little later than usual and went up to the Lido Café closer to 8 AM. I did this to allow guests to get their breakfasts and then empty out the place on their way to excursions. That didn’t work out all that well since the place was still full when I got up there. I still haven’t been able to get fried eggs so today, it’s pancakes (that came out of a drawer) and scrambled eggs – I shook things up by getting some porridge (AKA oatmeal) with brown sugar.
We have not been getting off at the ports but today we decided to walk to the downtown area to get some bottled water at the supermarket. It was hot and humid and the walk to get out of the port area was quite a hike. We are docked here with the Explorer of the Seas and the Scientology Ship, Freewinds.
I was saddened by the look of the port area of Oranjestad.
In our past visits – pre-COVID – the downtown area had fancy stores and nice restaurants and even spas. Today, shops were shuttered, and the area looked in disrepair with weeds growing out of the pavers.
I did get a picture of an installation - a Blue Horse - as we made our way through the town. We did not run into any more blue horses during our walk - I thought the horses were part of some festival. Will never know.
We walked into a couple of souvenir shops –
Ellen found some butterflies for the house.
We did finally find a Supermercado
where we bought six large bottles of water ($1 each) to take back to the
ship. The walk back seemed endless but
we did make it – I had 6000 steps on my watch before lunch. We both wore masks in all the stores - locals were not wearing masks.
After dropping off the water we went up to the Lido Café for lunch. I ordered a Grolsch Beer
and a Diet Pepsi –
the beer was good. For lunch today, I had a salad with Balsamic Dressing (the
dressing was pretty good), some potato salad, and a cheese pizza that we
shared. The pizza was OK and the salad
was OK too. Best of all was the beer – I
had never had this brand of beer and I really liked it. All beer tastes terrific when you’re hot and
sweaty.
We went out on Deck 3 for a while but it was too hot so we found a place near the library that was A/Cd and had a view of the city and 4G phone signal.
I read more of my Spenser
novel but mostly caught up with Facebook and emails. I also posted a comment on Jenene Caramelio’s
FB Page telling her how much we enjoyed meeting her and attending her shows.
The crew was also checking out the life crafts - several of them were sailing around the ship. Probably a good idea to put them in the water every so often and see how they function.
I tried to find John to give him some receipts but he
wasn’t in the office. Plan B involved working with a nice woman at the Purser’s
Desk to email John the receipts along with a hard copy. She also made me a hard copy of the
receipts. She did a nice job of handling
the issue. The Purser’s Desk has been
very helpful throughout the cruise. They
also revealed that a few passengers had tested positive yesterday and were in
isolation. They also confirmed that we
were sailing with only 1300 passengers (out of 2081 capacity).
Back in the room live now – 5:17 PM and taking advantage
of the AC.
We pre-ordered two items for tonight’s dinner in the
Britannia Dining Room. Mushroom Soup
(off the veggie menu) (much thicker and darker than the standard soup we had a
couple of days ago but very good). We
also both had specially prepared spaghetti with pesto sauce. It came with pine nuts and garlic but a cup
short of pesto sauce. It was more like a
oglio but it was still good in its own way.
I doubt we will be able to do that again – the Maitre D seems to imply
that it would be a one off. I also had a
little salad with 1000 island. We did
not have dessert but did have the chocolate brownie petite fours and tea and
coffee. It was a good meal overall. We did not see anything on either of the
menus for tomorrow so we will need to fend for ourselves up in the Lido Café.
As we passed by the Grand Lobby, I took a picture of Ellen on the stairs across the way. Turned out to be a spectacular photo.
I also got a nice picture of the elegant Deck 2 - Home to the Queen's Room and the Pub.
before we took in the Everglow
Duo in the Queen’s Room after
dinner. We decided not to go to the show tonight, featuring violinist “Gary
Lovini” aka “The King of Strings”.
Instead, we went to the Library to read and enjoy the quiet. We finished up the evening in the Commodore
Room listening to Jacqueline Waugh sing her sad songs. The Commodore Room is set up so that it is difficult to establish any distance between tables. We did find some seats away from people.
The ship is very cold tonight but our room is just right.
Seas are smooth.
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