Day 119, Sailing towards Cartagena

Another lazy day at sea as we continue south toward Cartagena. There is a little more deck motion than yesterday, but nothing close to what we experienced while crossing the Atlantic last week.

I spent the morning in the cabin straightening up and reading. Judy headed off to Donna’s class on making body scrubs. Donna demonstrated combining the ingredients. Her best tip was not to use food coloring to color the scrubs because the food coloring will stain the skin.

I went to the Blackjack tournament at 12:30 and was able to qualify for the finals at 2 pm. My score of 4100 was the highest qualifying hand which was usually not enough to even make the finals during the world cruise. On the world, you needed at least 5000 to even think about making the finals and usually closer to 7000 as people were far more aggressive and played better. For example, today it was not uncommon to see someone hit a 16 against the dealer showing a 5.

After the qualifying round, we stopped by the LIDO to try the custom Pasta bar. It was very nice and I wonder if this is more popular or cheaper than the sandwich maker or just different. It may be easier to serve more people faster once they hit the Alaska Season. I learned that the ship is working on getting the crew to start and think Alaska with its 7 day turns, new passengers every week and repeat, repeat, repeat.

The finals for the Blackjack tournament were disappointing. I finished 4^th overall and got another Club 21 hat, a free drink and a match play coupon.

Immediately following the Blackjack tournament, 6 of us started the Texas Hold’em game and I managed to finish 3^rd, just out of the money. Once again my two over cards were beat by trips on the flop and turn. That’s poker.

We were joined by Brad, Gloria and Barbara for dinner and they will be permanent additions to Table 52. We now have a good group of 6 people.

The service in the MDR has returned to normal after a few start up issues and they have figured out how to get the soup temperature correct as it was fine this evening. I had the Lasagna while Judy had the Cobb salad. Both were very good.

We learned that on the World Cruise they would typically serve 70 people in the MDR for breakfast while this morning they served 290. We always get room service breakfast so we haven’t experienced any issues there one way or the other.

Buzz Sutherland was in the Queens Lounge tonight.   This is the third time we have seen him and he remains just OK.   Some people found him hilarious, but I found his act inconsistent and lacking any theme. His show lasted 65 minutes which was quite long by cruise ship standards. He also works in a serious salute to veterans in the middle of his act and while his heart is in the right place, this seems out of place in the middle of a comedy show. This would be better at the beginning of his act before he got rolling.

We will be in Cartagena tomorrow for a short day – all aboard at 12:30. We don’t have anything special planned.

• Buzz Sutherland