From the Navigator (this appears on page 1 of today's Princess Patter): During the day, Pacific Princess will continue to follow her northerly course through the Pacific Ocean bound for Hilo. The Pacific Ocean is the largest of the Earth's oceanic divisions, 63.8 million square miles, and covers about 46% of the Earth's water surface and about one-third of its total surface area, making it larger than all of the Earth's land area combined.
So, no mention of a single island that the Pacific Princess might be cruising by today. Here's my correlation: the Pacific Princess is a speck the size of a pencil eraser floating in a pool full of water. We are so much in the middle of nowhere that there isn't even another pencil eraser-sized speck of land nearby to mention relative to our location today.
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Why, you ask, were we stuck in our cabin watching the games?? Well, on my first critical note of this entire cruise season and, specifically, this little ship, the only two suitable lounges for football spectatorship, the Casino Lounge and the Cabaret Lounge, were both booked all morning and afternoon with other events. Now, I could debate the value of an interdenominational worship service or a lecture on metabolism enhancement v. NFL DIVISIONAL PLAYOFF GAMES, but that's just not my way. ;-) And, as it was explained by Deputy Cruise Director Mike, Princess is contractually obligated to provide space on the ship for the spa and shops to conduct their "lectures". However, due to the complaints that were being received, game-watching space was quickly set up on Deck 4 in the Atrium, but seating there was extremely limited and we opted for our cabin after all. There is something about the friendly rivalries that we enjoy during playoff season that we were clearly missing out on, but after today, I'm not sure I care.
On a related side note...we'll be watching the Super Bowl on February 1st on the Grand Princess, which was the first Princess ship with MUTS and on which we watched Super Bowl 2005, ten years ago (again with the ten years ago!). It seems like yesterday.
So, back to this morning...the mimosas were gone and we were considering our food and drink options as things started to turn tough for the Broncos in the second half. We could have left at half time to go to lunch in the Club Restaurant. Ordered room service. Brought pizza back from the Panorama Buffet. No, my stomach was hurting by then, I'm sure from stress. The fact that we had mixed the mimosas with Lays Sour Cream and Onion potato chips left over from the Champion Supermarché shopping trip on December 31 in Papeete had nothing to do with it, I'm sure. I texted a friend whose point was well made: If the Broncos are going to play like this, and like they have since November, there is no sense in them even going to New England next weekend. Just end it. None of us can bear a repeat of last year. By the time it was officially over, we were exhausted. I keep telling myself I don't care (is anyone fooled?)...Seattle will win it all again this year. Ho hum. The bigger unknown is where St. Peyton will be next year.
By 3pm I started getting cleaned up for tonight's formal night, and G went to the Passenger Services Desk. There had been a notice in today's Patter that our passports could be picked up today, and -yay!- there was a stamp in it from the day we left Bora Bora. Passport stamps are getting rarer and rarer these days, and they are the best souvenirs of all.
83 days in French Polynesia! Who would've predicted it when we left home October 19 (besides Bob and Donna)? :-)
I was hungry by then, but decided to just stay that way. I knew our formal night dinner menu would be a good one, and, with first seating dinner starting at 5:30pm, I didn't have to be hungry for long. The day stayed sunny and beautiful all day long, but I didn't want to go outside after I had showered for the evening, so I simply read (and finished another book, Sue Monk Kidd's The Invention of Wings, which would have poofed off my iPad in five days), and G napped.
Dinner was a formal night feast tonight. I had part of a bottle of Disano Malbec and chose smoked duck, onion soup and beef tenderloins to go with it. Hungry no more, we went to the Casino Lounge to listen to Eula perform Hawaiian music, then to our final viewing (and the production team's final performance) of Motor City, then back to the Casino Lounge to listen to pianoman Jere Ring.
Although our formal "Crossing the Line" ceremony will be held on the Pacific Princess tomorrow, we keep checking our navigational position on TV to see where we currently are in relation to the equator: latitude 4 degrees 41 minutes South this afternoon, latitude 3 degrees 14 minutes South, latitude 2 degrees 38 minutes South, and, as I type this at 11pm, latitude 0 degrees 50 minutes South. Soon...soon. If we were crossing the equator at a reasonable hour, we'd be as far forward as we could get with arms outstretched trying to be the first passengers on the ship to do so (as we did on the Diamond Princess in 2006...and we weren't the only ones!). But it is supposed to occur around 1am, so I'll just have to wait until tomorrow to recognize that WE'LL BE IN THE NORTHERN HEMISPHERE AGAIN!!
I've missed it. ;-)