Bring me some food!

Sunday 20^th Jan. 2013

Entertainment at breakfast was never part of the deal, I’m sure, but we had a great entertainer at our table this morning! We were the first to be seated at a table for 6. 2 couples travelling together soon filled the other seats. The 2 girls had cruised before, the 2 guys hadn’t.  The guys had never had eggs benedict before, so decided to give it a try. One guy took the standard path and used his knife and fork, the other guy thought that seeing it was food on an English muffin, he could save on the washing up and just pick it up!! Who knew that a poached egg would be have a runny yolk? Not this guy!! Talk about hilarious! It went all down his beard and hand!! We all had such a good laugh. Round 2 – he also ordered some croissants and was disappointed when there was no chocolate inside, like the ones he had ‘before’. Putting butter on them didn’t really solve the problem, so I suggested he get some jam. He caught the waiter’s attention and asked for jam. A plate was brought over with about 4 bowls of different jams. The waiter gestured for him to select a jam. The guy didn’t specify what sort of jam he wanted, just ‘jam’. This went back and forth a couple of times until I asked did he want strawberry jam? Yeah, he says – jam. So the waiter dobs a spoonful of strawberry jam on both croissants and left. Again we all laughed and the girls said they would have do some serious training before formal night tonight. Jam is jam, unless it’s figjam! Cue more laughter……………….

Did a bit more exploration until it was time to go to the Waterfront Restaurant at 11am for ‘The Taste of the Grape’. $16 pp with tastings of a sparkling wine, a chardonnay, sauv blanc, shiraz, tempranillo and a blush moscato. The waitstaff from the restaurant hosted the event, with one being the MC and others introducing each wine and telling us what to look for with regard to colour, smell and taste.  A fair amount of humour was thrown in, one waiter becoming so embarrassed when the Captain walked in on his talk he couldn’t continue and struggled to regain his composure. He was leading up to saying something a bit risqué and was so worried as to how much the Captain had overheard! 

As always, there’s a marketing op at these things, apart from letting you taste wines you might not ordinarily buy on the cruise. 2 wines were well over our budget, and 2 were at the top end, considering the price for the wine we had last night at dinner was at the lower price point but still well over what we’d pay at home. The other op is a very detailed explanation of the Chef’s Table, another dining option on board. For a price, you meet in a bar for a pre-dinner cocktail, be taken on a tour of the galley while it’s in dinner service mode, then head to the Chef’s Table in the main restaurant to dine with the chef +/-  the Maitre d’. Apparently the Maitre d’ might be too busy, whereas the chef has nothing much to do!! The meal is a 7 course degustation menu with matched wines to each course. Sounds tempting, so we sign up for it, and instantly we are invited to another passenger’s 50^th birthday celebration. That’s on the 25^th, so we’ll wait and see how it goes.

After lunch we wander outside to see what the weather’s like. Still a bit cool and cloudy but slowly warming. We worked our way forward, past some young cool dudes playing shuffleboard and found our way to the only forward vantage point, an almost secret door on deck 10. The sun is starting to shine and it’s actually quite warm out the front, especially with the reflected heat from all the white painted metal behind us. We spot some flying fish which is always an amazing sight. Heading upstairs, we turn up at the day spa to check out the facilities we now have access to. Looks pretty good if you’re into that sort of thing. The relaxation room looks like about the only bit I’ll be venturing to, a quiet room with comfy sunlounge type chairs. The lure of complimentary champers on request is also a bit of a draw card. 

The plan to do nothing this cruise is working so far.  Except for the excessive eating and drinking!

Tonight we have a booking at Salt Grill, Luke Mangan’s restaurant. We heard so many good reports about it on our last cruise but were unable to get a booking. Things got off to a less than ideal start when the wine we chose was out of stock. On the 2^nd night of the cruise!! Mr Waiter said it had been so popular on the last cruise that it had sold out. What the….??!!  Anyway, letters will be written! Not happy Jan! On the upside, the food was fabulous and the service was pretty good. We both ate so much that we were on the verge of exploding! It’s been a long time since we were served tea and coffee with the sugar served in cubes! I had to get changed and do a couple of laps of the deck to offset the meal. I can’t imagine I’ll ever need to eat again, but I’m sure I’ll be over that by breakfast! 

It was a bit weird to lay on deck on a sun lounge looking at the stars swaying in the sky, not fixed in position like they usually are. The ship is rocking and rolling so little that it’s easy to forget we’re the ones that are moving. Not like last time, I was not feeling too good at this stage of the trip.