Day 30 At Sea (Tasman Sea)

Last night and today the sea was much more calm ergo our cruising was much more enjoyable. I take back a little of what I said about the Dutch yesterday. Until we are safely and comfortably docked in Melbourne harbour I reserve the balance of my rant.
Today we were back in our normal routine for a sea day. Which meant Chris on deck 5 and me in lectures until we meet for Trivia. Tonight we are having dinner with a couple from Lakeside, Montana who contacted us a few days ago, having noticed our address in the ships guest list. We met them for drinks and decided to have dinner tonight.
We are now back on course to Melbourne having altered our course to minimize the severity of the ocean by cutting across the waves due to cyclone Ray. We all appreciated the alteration and are now trying to make up the time we lost. It may have helped that the Captain's wife joined us in New Zealand as she may have whispered in his ear to take it easy on us.
Tomorrow our last sea day on this ship.

Chris - Pirate's and other scary things part II - Let's talk about cyclones. Who knew there were sooo many cyclones and they could affect water 1,000 miles away! Well there a ship with roughly 800 passengers and crew who knows. We have now been through 3 cyclones and the talk of the ship is which was worse the "LA Cyclone" or the "Tasman Cyclone." The Tasman Cyclone is actually Cyclone Ray and it was REALLY wild! The first tremendous wave hit at 3AM and when asked at the show that night how many people were awakened at 3 AM by it, all hands went up. From then until about 4pm the next day this ship was wild. My precious deck 5 was closed as the waves were crashing over the deck. Our balcony on deck 6 has salt on it as did our glass door. The winds were registering 172 kilometers at the bridge. We had to enter into some of the bad weather as we had to come from the channel between the islands in New Zealand into the Tasman Sea. The Captain then altered the course twice to try and find calmer water, first heading toward Sydney then north of Sydney. Having his wife on board was helpful because unlike the last LA cyclone the Captain came on the PA system at 8am. (I'm sure she insisted he do that!) He started with "Good Morning this is your Captain speaking. It's never a good thing really to hear from your Captain first thing in the morning..now is it?" Well I figured it was better to hear from him than the abandon ship signal! He was very reassuring and he made the day much better by coming on every few hours with weather updates. After breakfast (back to the candied ginger) I was headed back to the room around 9 and our stewardess said of the 10 rooms she services, we were the only one up and functioning. I hated not to be outside so around 10:30 the wind had died down to the point I could open the door. I found a spot on 7 where I could see the ocean and wrapped in every conceivable piece of clothing, including a hood, I sat and read and watched the waves. I loved it! When I left I had to wash my jacket because the ocean spray had deposited salt all over me! Despite the tossing around neither of us got sick and once I knew the ship could cope with the weather I found it quite exciting. I'm not sure your Dad shared my enthusiasm, but he was a trooper. Having a cabin toward the center of the ship is very helpful at night as it doesn't get as much rocking action as forward or aft. Today the cleanup continued and eventually by this afternoon they got deck 5 opened and my hot tub refilled ... so all is right with the world! Onward!