Antarctic Cruise Day 15/40 - sea day - we just went from fall to spring

Antarctic Cruise Day 15 / 40 - sea day 3/11 - sailing across the equator for the third time this year

Trip day: 15 / 40

Port days: 6
Sea days: 8
Countries: 3
Continents: 2
Ports: 3

This morning found us just north of the equator, heading for a crossing at about 12:20PM local time. 

We took a walk out on the bow and found this stowaway trying to get a free ride to the southern hemisphere.

With the blessing of an onboard naturalist, Arlona vanquished it to the great beyond.

We faced the officers in another spirited Baggo competition.  Our story is that we needed to let them win one so they felt better about themselves.  Yeah - that's our story.  We were handily defeated today, but it was still all great fun with a wonderful group of guests and crew.

We headed from Baggo in The Aula to trivia in The Living Room.  We had another picture competition, this time...flags.

 Lucky for us, our partners today are extremely well-traveled and we aced this.  #12 eluded us, but we got the rest.

1. South Africa
2. Brazil
3. United States
4. Argentina
5. Philippines
6. India
7. Norway
8. Vatican City
9. Ukraine
10. Chile
11. Portugal
12. United Arab Emirates

We scored 13/15 in trivia, continuing our unbeaten streak.  Our two misses:

• In Trivial Pursuit, what color is the pie slice that represents Geography?
• Every team guessed green - it was blue
• In art, what color is used to represent royalty?
• I thought purple but we talked ourselves into blue - it was purple

Trivia was interrupted briefly when the captain announced we were passing over the equator, moving from the northern to the southern hemisphere, and immediately changing seasons from fall to spring.

Yup - that's the equator out the window

We took a photo of our nearly vertical shadows

We had company alongside again today with boobys fishing for flying fish.

Got one

Using landing gear to control the snag

In hot pursuit

This afternoon, in honor of the equator crossing, they rounded up all the pollywogs – folks that have never sailed across the equator.  They have to answer to King Neptune for their crimes and beg for safe passage over the equator, provided they atone.  This is done by kissing a fish, plunging into the water, being painted with colors, and downing a shot of Aquavit. They will then be shellbacks.

The crowd - the passengers in robes were pollywogs

Our host 

The fish

Captain Olivier, getting into character

King Neptune, depending on atonement for crimes

Crew pollywogs are being brought out

The plunge

Drinking Aquavit

Getting painted

After the crew, it was time for the handful of passenger pollywogs to pay for their crimes.

It was then noted that the entertainment manager, Arann, was himself a pollywog.

The fish wasn't smiling either...

All guests were presented with certificates that documented the crossing.

In the daily briefing, Chris presented the meaning of some nautical terms. We thought that the origin of port and starboard was interesting.

Starboard comes from the fact that ships had steering boards on the right side of the ship. That turned into the “starboard” side.  The left side was initially called “larboard”, but that was difficult for people to differentiate from “starboard” in loud environments.  Since the ship cannot dock on the side with the steering board, the other side, the one that faces the port when docked, became the port side.

Over dinner, we watched our first southern hemisphere sunset.

Tonight, they had a "campout" on the Finse Terrace with smores and more.  We skipped that and enjoyed music and conversation in the Explorers' Bar.

Tomorrow, we continue our journey to The Falkland Islands.