20250207 Seabourn Sojourn Grand Africa Cruise Day 74/96 - Sea Day

Grand Africa Cruise Trip Day 74/96 - Sea Day Royalty and a Mystery Solved

It was sea day 5/6 en route to Benin. The day started with Baggo, but we opted to not play today after a couple of back-to-back wins. We still went and had fun with the group.

It was another big day as we'll pass south to north over the equator sometime overnight tonight. Since we had new passengers and crew on the ship, that meant some newbies who had never sailed across the equator.  This called for a visit from King Neptune, his lovely (subject to personal taste) wife, and the royal court.

If you take a good look at Neptune's wife (with the blonde pigtails), I think you'll agree that Neptune could use a visit to the ophthalmologist

The court made a pass through the pool deck before assuming places in the court

The Queen seemed to be reveling in the experience

Guests and crew faced their accusers with charges like:

• Taking underwear from the dryers in the guest launderette rather than washing their own
• Eating three breakfasts each day
• Watering down the wine
• Not knowing the difference between sangria and merlot
• Not knowing which side of the ship was port and starboard

They had to kiss a fish, get slathered with merengue, and jump in the pool. As always, it was great fun and everyone enjoyed it.

Arlona worked on beading today, creating a matching mother-of-pearl necklace and bracelet set.

Trivia was rough today. We'll wrap up this accumulative tournament tomorrow and finish in the top half. The swings and misses today:

• Cork is a natural product of what tree?
• We had team members who swore it was the cork tree, but it is the cork oak - it is informally known as the cork tree and we still didn't get the points
• How many black keys are on a piano keyboard?
• We guessed 37 but it was 36
• What is the musical term for plucking strings on a violin?
• We guessed staccato but it was pizzicato
• What is the shortest horse racing triple crown racetrack?
• We guessed the Kentucky Derby, but The Belmont Stakes is the longest race at 1 1/2 miles; The Kentucky Derby is 1 1/4 miles long; The Preakness Stakes is the shortest at 1 3/16 miles
• What is dendrophobia?
• The irrational fear of trees - we guessed fear of dandruff
• Today's bonus was to identify the only free-floating bone in the human body
• We guessed the patella or kneecap - it was the hyoid bone, located in the front of the neck, below the lower jaw, and above the thyroid cartilage

I participated in another golf 75-yard challenge. Once again, we leveraged Cruise Director Nick's swing analyzer to calculate the distance. I was pleased with my 73.8-yard shot, only 1.2 yards off. But three other golfers score shots within 0.4 and 0.3 yards from the target.

We tried our hand at Name That Tune. Today's theme was love songs. We were back in the runner-up position but at least it was a respectable finish.

Today, Arlona solved a long-standing mystery for us. Early on, we noticed this thing on the wall in our cabin. 

It's on the wall between the bathroom door and the makeup table - the switch turned the LED green when on and red when off but we couldn't figure out what it was for

We kept meaning to ask our cabin stewards about it but kept forgetting. Today, Arlona heard some workers doing maintenance outside our suite so she asked. They explained its use and now we understand.

Grab the top and bottom and wiggle it free

It popped out and became an emergency flashlight

As long as the switch was set to on, if we lost cabin power, the light would turn on as an emergency light. The bottom line is that it is a safety feature of the room. Mystery solved.

We enjoyed cocktails and conversation in the Observation Bar and then a quiet dinner in The Restaurant. We already saw tonight's show, Queen, King, and Prince from the Seabourn Six so we skipped it and called it an early evening.

Tomorrow will be our last sea day for a couple of days.