<<What follows again today is more history >>
The Hawaiian Islands are an archipelago of eight major islands, several atolls and numerous smaller islets. Once known as the "Sandwich Islands", the name chosen by James Cook in honor of the then First Lord of the Admirality John Montagu, 4th Earl of Sandwich, the archipelago now takes its name from the largest island in the cluster.
Sunrise: 6:43am; Sunset 6:03pm (22 fewer minutes of daylight than yesterday)
The weather again today was ALL SUN, ALL THE TIME, gorgeous with a high of 84F and a low of 81F.
In other words, we have been very fortunate with weather and sea conditions during these five days at sea.
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Sunrise this morning woke me up again, but since it's happening later and later each day, I'm rather enjoying it. I immediately checked Internet (had it!) for an email from Mom, then settled in to read a little in bed (in the morning, that's a luxury of unimaginable proportions at home). Neither G nor I was interested in breakfast today. Instead we eventually went up to the terrace behind the Panorama Buffet and had coffee and chatted with our fellow passengers.
I returned to the cabin and opened up our suitcases to wipe them out on the inside, then straightened out the items in the pockets of our over the door shoe rack, hanging on the outside of the bathroom door. We have a quart sized ziploc with first aid supplies and moleskin; a quart sized ziploc with business supplies (a roll of tape, twist ties, binder clips, a highlighter); a quart sized ziploc of Purex laundry tablets, dryer sheets and Oxyclean gel stain remover (which was heavy to bring from home, but worth every ounce this trip). After I was done labeling and organizing, I read an issue of Real Simple magazine about organization and then re-wrote my packing lists on my Awesome Notes app and...well, can you see why sea days are dangerous things for me? Nothing to do and all day to do it is not something I handle well.
Luckily, we had a noontime diversion, as this cruise's Most Traveled Passenger luncheon was taking place today. Apparently last cruise (the one we missed), there were not 40 Elite passengers on board, and so Elites were given a voucher for a specialty restaurant dinner. But this cruise, with nearly 200 Elites and lots of sea days, called for a luncheon. I had gotten to know Captain Ciruzzi a bit more since the last time we were seated with him (the man was in the elevator with me en route to the laundry room yesterday, as I furtively tried to tuck unmentionables into the folds of the more mentionable clothing items I was carrying in my arms. Does anyone else have that kind of luck??), and I guess it's just easier to talk to a man after he's seen a bra strap dangling from a bunch of shirts, because we had a very nice conversation today, and if he remembered what he had seen yesterday he kept it well to himself. Lunch was a feast but I could feel myself starting to fade a little by the end of it.
Honestly, five days at sea and this afternoon I came down with a cold. I am a good passenger, though, and stayed in the cabin for the rest of the day, leaving only to go to a quick dinner in the Club Restaurant. Tonight is the final performances of Do You Wanna Dance, and I guess it's proof of how lousy I feel that I am not even going to that. I am back in the cabin and medicated up with Sudafed, guafinisin and ibuprofen; hopefully, this will be a short lived URI and I will be up and at 'em early tomorrow, feeling chipper for our 7am arrival in Hilo and 7:30am appointment with US immigration on the ship.
We're coming to America!!!