April 16, At Last, Some Rest

Yesterday was our first full day of cruising. It could only be described as a day of rest. We had essentially been on the go every day, since landing in Christchurch, March 29. Every day, we were up and out, walking and going different places, seeing so many new things and meeting interesting people along the way. All the while though, we had told ourselves that we would look forward to doing nothing in the early days on the cruise ship.

So yesterday, we basically did NOT A THING (LOLOLOL). We had breakfast in our state room. We stayed in bed (or on the sofa) and read our books. We took naps. We had scheduled massages: me at 1:30pm, Patrise at 3pm. We went to the Concierge Lounge about 4:45pm, had some hors d’oeurves and drinks, then back to the room. Later in the evening, we dressed and went to dinner at 8:15.

(Patrise standing on our suite balcony, observing the very placid ocean waves)

(Picture of one of the pools aboard the ship)

(At times, the wave pool is really in motion.)

(The large screen television in the pool area. Movies are show here each night.)

(There is an outdoor track on the 15th deck of the ship.)

(Pictures of the sports complex call the SeaPlex. One side is available for basketball, another side is available for soccer. At times they take down the net and use it as the floor for bumper cars for kids. Not seen in this picture, but on the sides, are table tennis, Fuseball and air hockey tables, Xbox screens, and a variety of arcade games. Needless to say, this is one of the favorite hangout areas for the kids adolescents and teens on board.)

(The SeaPlex sports complex electronic sign.)

(The sunsets on our first full day of sailing, April 16.)

After dinner, we went to a 10pm magic and comedy show given by Phil Cass and Philippa (his wife). They were an Australian magic-comedy duo, although he carried all of the speaking parts. He was funny, and a bit edgy, without being raunchy. And the magic was very respectable.. The four most notable magic tricks consisted of: (1) taking a woman’s $100 (US) bill, placing it in his pants pocket; cutting one man’s tie into two pieces; taking a woman’s diamond ring and appearing to lose it; and “borrowing” a woman’s (analog) watch, asking her at what time did she want the watch stopped, and then losing it. At the end of the evening, the $100 bill reappeared inside the pants of the man with the cut-up tie. The diamond ring reappeared in a gumball machine that had been on stage in sight the entire time. The woman’s watch reappeared inside of a can in a wrapped-up box that had been sitting on a table in sight the entire time; and the watched was stopped at the time 11pm that she had stated out loud at the time he “borrowed it” from her. Lastly, the tie that appeared cut up in two pieces was reassembled into it original constitution. It was an entertaining magic act with a lot of good stand-up comedy enmeshed throughout the evening.

(Awaiting the Phil Cass and Philippa "Trust Me" magic and comedy show.)

After the show, we returned to the state room, changed for bed. I worked on creating and publishing the blog post for April 15, then we went to sleep.