Saturday, August 29th

Onboard ship – Inside Passage




7:36 AM

Fog this morning. I woke up a couple hours ago and saw the shore slipping past, but woke up at seven and can see nothing. The fog horns are blaring but it really makes you realize how much easier today’s navigator’s have it with their GPS systems. I can’t imagine trying to steer through this with no instrumentation. I can barely see the water below us it’s that thick.

Noon

Steven’s taken a seasick pill but I’m hoping I won’t need to. Since last night the motion has been a gentle rocking. Not bad…but constant. It’s gotten to him and I’m hoping I can keep it from getting to me. I only had two buttermilk pancakes for breakfast with a glass of apple juice to help that.
Had a massage this morning. My masseuse was one of the dancers from the show last night. She may be petite but boy, is she strong! I was expecting a wimpy little massage like we get at home with the soft music and aromatherapy candles. Wrong! This was more like the massages you see in sports movies where she beats your muscles into submission. I have to admit though, while my spirit isn’t as relaxed, my body sure is!

I also have to admit I’ve done no work on any of my books this entire vacation. I had visions of sitting on the deck and writing my heart out. But it’s far too chilly for deck-sitting and there have been so many things to do that I haven’t wanted to miss out on. Now I need a month to just sit at the cabin and digest all this.

But unfortunately, school starts Tuesday for me. Back to the grind and stress. Summer’s over. Till then, however, I intend to pull a Scarlet O’Hara and let tomorrow take care of itself. I’m having too much fun to let a little thing like school spoil it!

Steven went to a presentation on disembarking. We’ve been wondering how we get our luggage from here to the airport and checking in there and getting boarding passes and all that. Apparently we’re going to get a packet delivered to our staterooms this evening that has all that information in it. I do hope we get one more breakfast aboard the Statendam. We dock at 7:00 am in Vancouver tomorrow – but their breakfasts are really, really good!

5:07 pm

Have just finished the Walk for the Cure – supposedly 5K, but we only did 12 times around the deck which is 3 miles. Steven came in first (of course) despite the fact that it was a non-competitive walk. He just walks really fast. He lapped me at lap three and five (my time). His final time: 40 min, 30 sec. Mine? 56 min, 32 sec. Not bad at all!

The day has turned beautiful. It’s our last day and although we could have wished for less fog and clouds earlier in the trip, right now Canada is clear and the colors vivid. We’re going through our narrowest channel -- it’s only seven-tenths of a mile across – and we have to do it at low tide because it gets wicked currents later. But the land seems so close you could touch it!

Off to dinner!

9:53 pm
Dinner was certainly a show tonight in the staid Rotterdam Dining Room. The wait staff combined with the Statendam Singers and Dancers to put on quite the spectacular. They entered to music with several of the wait staff carrying mounds of napkins. In time to the music, a second waiter would flip the napkin off the mound, give it a flourish and place it on a diner’s lap. Our roll was already on the plate and another waiter came around and put a delicacy on the plate beside it. I have no idea what it was, but I suspect a seafood of some time. I ate mine AND Steven’s, since he doesn’t like seafood of any sort.

There was a dance for the salad where the lead waiters came out banging on the huge salad bowls and the others followed with bowls of vegetables to mix together. By this time everyone was wearing the chef hats that had been at our places when we sat down.

The main meal progressed quietly…but then it was time for dessert. Again a big production with dancing in the aisles and a big pop of champagne corks at the end that popped out long gold and silver streamers. Yes, I got one for the scrapbook! The dessert was Neapolitan ice cream covered with meringue. Delicious!

Afterward Steven walked down to see the variety show, but I just wanted to sit on our veranda and watch the sun set and read. First time the sun’s been out this whole voyage and I didn’t want it to end. He joined me about 20 minutes later saying the show wasn’t very good. We watched till the sun was long gone and then he wanted to stay out a bit longer and I was getting chilled without the sun. So I headed down to the casino to lose the ten dollars I hadn’t been able to lose this afternoon.

Checking back, I see I didn’t write about that. In brief: I stopped at the casino in my travels at one point early this afternoon and decided to play the same machines Steven’s mom had been playing. I lost three of the ten dollars I’d decided to play, so I went to a different machine. I hit it almost immediately and ended up with $12.25. I know to quit while I’m ahead, so I’d stopped.

But that ten was burning a hole in my pocket, so I went again. Sat down at the same game but a different slot machine. Put in my ten and within three minutes had hit for seventeen! I walked in with ten and walked out with twenty-seven. Figured that was as far as my luck would take me, so again – I walked away like a good girl.

There’s a string quartet that plays on board and we’ve caught pieces of their playing as we’ve walked by the very quiet, very private lounge where they play. Tonight we made a point to go listen. They’re quite good and there’s just something perfect about ending a sea voyage listening to Hayden and Vivaldi while sipping a pina colada. Yes, I know it should have been a cognac, but I’ve never had it and decided I’ve had enough firsts for one trip.

Our suitcases are packed and ready to go…they need to be in the corridor by midnight. We have to be at the gangplank for disembarking by 8:00 tomorrow morning, so I will say good night!