Winding down: a few days at sea

It’s now Day 8 of our Sea Princess cruise and at last we are starting to relax and unwind from our busy-ness of the first half of 2018… I was definitely looking forward to six days straight at sea after Brisbane.  And we’ve left winter behind. All the woollens have been packed away, probably until we reach Iceland. The past two days have been 30C with totally clear skies and brilliant sunshine.  Many people sunbaking, seemingly without worrying about skin cancer. Not us, however.  We were just as pleased to sit in the shade and watch, listen to rock music and chat to many friendly couples – Kiwis, Aussies, Scots, English, Dutch and Italian – residents of New Zealand and Australia all.

Yesterday, we rounded the tip of Cape York and turned west, passing about 100 miles north of Darwin, on our way to Kokodo Island (Indonesia).

Our only port so far has been Brisbane where we met daughter Karen and grand-daughter Amaris (on study vac from Queensland University) for a three-hour lunch at an Italian restaurant just near the port. Amaris is son Ray’s daughter. Ray, Tiffany, Ken and Lysandra (Karen’s daughter) were working, and the others are all down south.

It’s been great having friends on board – Hazel and Deb from Computer Pals, Val from our village (our next-door neighbour in fact) and Computer Pals, Laine (Loraine Melier) from school all those years ago, Sue & Barry, Margaret & Robert, Diane & Paul, and Lynda & Rob (Kiwis) from our 2016 cruise. And we keep bumping into others who were on the 2016 Sea Princess World Cruise.

About accessibility: as we expected, the furniture had to be slightly re-arranged so that John’s wheelchair could be positioned beside the bed.  Although not perfect, the bathroom is usable for John, as is the room itself.  Storage space is adequate for our gear – even for John’s significant medical and equipment supplies.  The disability rooms, of which there are never enough, are larger than other suites.

Yesterday was our wedding anniversary so we invited our friends Hazel, Deb and Val from Computer Pals to join us for “Anytime dining” in the Traviata Restaurant.  anniversary, and awoke to balloons and a big sign on our cabin door yesterday morning.  And during the meal we were presented with a small cake which we duly shared five ways.  It was delicious, and very naughty considering Hazel, Deb and I are all on diets!

Generally, John and I “dine” in the Bistro most evenings but it was nice to enjoy a restaurant meal for a change.  Unlike 2016, we informed the ship about our