Indian Ocean

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Sorry, it's been a while. I've had this miserable cold for the past week and haven't felt like doing much at all. Luckily, we've been "At sea" since last Thursday. So I'll try to catch things up.

Freemantle was lovely. An old fashioned city just an easy walk from the ship. We arrived very late in the afternoon (the first time we have been late!) so I was only able to walk into town and wander around for a while. They have lots of nice shops and one very good department store, Myer. Another Target, too.

The next morning mom and I took the shuttle bus to the train station and took the train up to Perth, about 15 miles away. It was a beautiful sunny day, about 80 degrees. The Perth station is right in the heart of the city which was great since mom didn't feel like walking much. We shopped in the Myer store for a long time--they have beautiful clothes, especially skirts--and ate lunch there. We called Sally from the pedestrian mall outside the store. There were crowds of people and street musicians, even a wonderful soprano. Perth, by the way, was not at all what I had had in my mind before the trip. I guess I had thought it would be a bit like our old wild west, but instead it was very modern, about the size of St. Paul. We took the train back to Freemantle (about half an hour) then did some more shopping there since mom hadn't been with me the day before. She certainly enjoys shopping!

We sailed at 5:00, right on the dot. We have a new captain now, Torbjorn Lund. Captains only work two months, then have two months off, and it was time for the switchover. I think he wanted to start off with a good impression by leaving on time.

Since then we have been in the Indian Ocean. We had 24 hours of very rough weather again (our plate of canapes slid right off the table during one big swell) but there are just "moderate" seas today. I am really bored. This cold makes me so lethargic all I want to do is sleep and read. And watch movies. I finished "The Life and Time of the Thunderbolt Kid" by Bill Bryson which was hilarious. I should have read it when it first came out a couple of years ago. All about growing up in Des Moines in the 1950s, but only as Bryson could tell it. Now I'm struggling through a Ruth Rendell mystery. I've never read her before. Don't think I will again.

Tomorrow we get to Mauritius, then Reunion Island which, because it is French, is pronounced Ray-oon-yon. See how much you are learning from reading this? Sorry if this is terribly disjointed. The Internet "facilitator" has been running around in here the whole time I've been writing this. He's trying to update all the computers with Explorer 7.0 (old!!!) and having lots of trouble.

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