World Cruise Day 138/152 - Sea Day - Almost like a normal sea day, just without the people

Cruise day: 138/152

Ports days: 68
Sea days: 70
Countries: 22
Continents: 5
Ports: 50

We are at sea today, in the North Sea, specifically, about halfway between Tilbury and Bergen. And, we're a little sleepy as we changed time last night, moving ahead an hour.  We're once again at UTC+2 or six hours ahead of the east coast of the U.S. This should be the timezone we keep for the entire cruise.  The only port that is different is Mariehamn, Åland Islands as they are UTC+3.  My expectation is that we will stay on UTC+2 rather than change the time for a single day.  But, we'll see since we have a sea day immediately before Mariehamn.

It certainly is different sailing on a 930-passenger ship sporting only about 150 passengers.  I have to say, this is a great way to cruise.  Unfortunately, it will all end tomorrow when we get to Bergen, lose about 110 of us and pick up around 600 new passengers.  The count seems to have dropped over the last day or so and it looks like we'll have just over 600 on the ship for the Viking Homelands cruise.

With the World Cafe being rejuvenated, breakfast was held at Manfredi's this morning with a typical breakfast menu.  Of course, room service and Mamsen's were also available.

We had our last bridge lesson today.  We had two tables and played a couple of boards of duplicate bridge.  It was interesting seeing how duplicate bridge works where each table takes turns playing the same hands.  It was a good day as Arlona & I won both hands that we played, besting the other table.  I'd like to claim it was skill, cunning, and instinct that gave us the win but I'm pretty sure there was a large helping of luck thrown in there. We played for another hour with friends, Allan and Karin.

We also attended the final trivia - a game for nothing but bragging rights.  The theater was nearly empty and we formed a combined team with a few others.  We did not fare well.  The questions were tough and we could only eke out six correct answers.  Our dismal failures:

• What did Sir Walter Raleigh introduce to Ireland?
• Potatoes
• Megalophobia is the fear is what?
• Large things or objects
• Vanilla flavoring is extracted from which part of the plant?
• Seedpod
• According to Exodus, what was the first plague of Egypt?
• Blood
• Who wrote the novel, Far from the Madding Crowd?
• Thomas Hardy
• In which sea would you find Sicily?
• Mediterranean - we overthought it and said Ionian - part of the Med
• In which book of the Bible was Samson described?
• Judges
• What is the main additive in stainless steel that inhibits corrosion?
• Chromium
• Which city in India is known as The Pink City?
• Jaipur

We will miss Assistant Cruise Director, Sarah-Leanne, who will depart tomorrow.  We lost our other Assistant Cruise Director, Damian, in Tilbury.  We did meet the new ACD, Michael, yesterday.  he has big shoes to fill - actually two sets.

After a nice lunch from the pool grill, we decided to relax and catch a movie in our room.

Tonight's dinner was dreamt up by the officers and culinary team.  The idea - a family-style dinner for the 150-ish passengers with a senior officer (or two) at every table.  The menu featured a wide variety of cuisines and the ability to sample from each one.

As is typical, there was way too much food to eat and we skipped the delicious Bistecca steak as there was simply no more room to cram it in.  We were stuffed.

Our table's officer was Fredrik Elgh, the Staff Captain.  The Staff Captain is a 4-stripe bridge officer and the #2 officer on the ship after the Captain.  All bridge officers report to the Staff Captain.  He was gracious and friendly and we really enjoyed our evening talking with him.

As we exited The Restaurant, we got yet another huge smile (even from behind her mask) from the irrepressible, Maria.

Maria is our ray of sunshine, every single day.

Since we were sailing northerly, we were treated to another beautiful sunset out our port side stateroom window.

 

Tomorrow morning, we will dock in Bergen, Norway and most of the passengers will disembark.  We will have to clear immigration and then the nearly 600 new passengers will start making their way onboard.  We don't have anything planned for tomorrow.  We will decide on where to explore based on the weather.  It is absolutely beautiful here in the North Sea, but the forecast is still calling for rain for the next two days in Bergen.  We're still hoping for the Viking weather magic to do its thing.