Day 56 - 11/27/22 - Hobart, Tasmania, Australia

 It was a short night, but we were ready to be picked up at 8:15am by Virginia to be taken to her church in the Kingston area.  The church (Summerleas)  meets in a rented school gymnasium and there were several hundred in attendance and it was good to see an average age in the 30's.  After church, we went to a second sister's house (Kate) where we joined the families of Virginia and Kate in an Aussie barbecue that did not disappoint.  We had lots of great conversation and Kate's oldest daughter, age 7, instructed Angela and I in a craft project.  Mine is now hanging on our stateroom door.  She was very precise in her instruction and knew exactly how the art work was to be constructed.  It was a super cute activity.  We had a lot of sharing and conversation as these sisters along with their other two sisters and mother and dad are like family to us. We hosted another sister as an exchange student over 20 years ago and we come back to Tasmania for a graduation, a wedding, and just general visits.








Yes, Christmas is in full swing in this household

All too soon it was time for Kate to take us back to the ship.  We brought her 7 year old along so she could see the big ship.  We said our goodbyes and re=boarded the ship.  I finished preparations for my sermon to be preached at the 6pm interdenominational service on the ship and watched the sail away from the Lido pool area as 1/2 the Crow's. Nest was cordoned off for a private event.  It was cool to sail by Kingston and a few minutes later I received from Virginia a picture of the Westerdam sailing out.  She had taken it from her patio which faces the bay.  Very cool.

The interdenominational service went well and afterwards we ate meat pies for dinner along with Hot Smoked Tasmanian Salmon.  It seems that the provisions department found the meat pies.  During dinner another couple from Sidney sat with us and we enjoyed a pleasant chat with Helen & Boyd.  Our plan was to go to the 9pm Main Stage Dance show.  When I got to the theater, the 9pm show had been cancelled due to the increasing motion of the ship.  Alternatively, they were replaying Bullet Train on the big screen.  We didn't want to watch that, so we watched a Country set at Billboard Onboard before returning to our stateroom where I am writing this update.  The ship is definitely moving around.  The motion really started as soon as we left the protection of the bay formed by the River Derwent that Hobart is located on.  The Captain said in his departure message that we should begin to have large swells around 2am. We're experiencing them a bit earlier it seems. Even the Billboard Onboard artists commented on them and they were sitting down.  The Casino was closed and I suspect it had to do with the rough seas.

Meat Pies on the Westerdam

We have 4 new Covid cases with 12 passengers and 2 crew in isolation.  The Captain once again mentioned the hand sanitizer use and the requirement for masking when indoors except when eating.  

My Art Project

Tomorrow we have a sea day with programming all day with the high point being our last Ask the Captain presentation.  These are always good, and Captain Wouter takes them to a higher level.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Day 27- 10/29/22 At sea to Alotau, Papua New Guinea - Day 2

Image
 Today was a different sort of day.  While it started off like normal with breakfast and Rachael's coffee chat with Dr. John Hardy, the rest of the morning was sort of free time because of the mandatory safety drill for all guests.  We were required to watch the safety movie on our stateroom TV between 10 and 12 noon, check in at our muster station 16 on Deck 3, and listen to the Captain's instruction about the drill.  For the rest of the morning I uploaded my CPAP data to WWW.sleephq.com and reviewed my activity for the past 10 days or so.  It was totally normal. My lunch today was a basic green salad as our dinner meal will be a bit heavy, In the Captain's noon announcement, he reported 44 passenger COVID cases and 4 crew cases.  All are mild or asymptomatic.  He also announced that we would have two days in the Conflict Islands and that was very well received by everyone.  Jonathon, one of the new first officers had worked out the details and permission from the Seattle
Read more

Day 61 - 12/02/22 - At Sea to Melbourne, Australia

Image
 On this next to last sea day it was a pretty quiet day on board the Westerdam.  Carlos, the lead entertainment host was the coffee chat host.  He's a ball of energy and well suited for the task.  Dr. Woodman presented a morning talk on gender differences in language and an afternoon talk on how children learn language.  Her teaching style and content has grown on me over the weeks she has been on board and it's been good content.  It is, however, sparsely attended. We were invited to attend a Mariner's award ceremony (I think they needed to have some "filler" in the audience).  4 couples and a single lady received medallions.  Those of us who were 'most valued' members were also acknowledged as well and we could have had our picture taken with the Captain and the Hotel Director.  But we declined and enjoyed a free soda and some nuts along with a short discussion with Chris, our Cruise & Travel  car with yesterday.  It was fun to reminisce and I airdro
Read more

Day 10 - 10/11/22 - Kona, Hawaii

 Overnight we arrived at the bay at Kona where the ship anchored in position for the day.  Angela booked us on a snorkeling trip with Captain Zodiac tours through Holland America the night before.  We met in the Main Stage area and got our tour stickers (RED 10).  Soon we were off the ship and in the tender which was the first tender ride of this trip.  The Westerdam's tenders are old and of a very different design than any other we have ridden in on all the other Holland ships.  There is much more window area and the driver sits high on the right side. We checked in for a HAL zodiac snorkeling tour that Angela had booked the night before.  We boarded the zodiac which was captained by Rick and assisted by Brenna.  I took a front position and we rocketed to K .  Once there I realized that we had snorkeled there in 2016. I was first in the water and it was very clear and about 20' deep.  There were many small and colorful fish but not quite the variety we saw in 2016.  The best s
Read more