March 9 – Day 2 on the Tasman Sea

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Hello following another restful Sunday sailing on the Tasman Sea. The low today was supposed to have been 66 and the high was 76. It was cloudy early in the morning, but mostly sunny the rest of the day.



This was fairly low key day today. We had breakfast at the buffet and then went to a few of the shipboard activities. Janet spent part of the morning with her Knitters and Natters friends. She brought along two different projects, so today she worked on the second one with her friends.



David went to watch the Fruit Carving demonstration and then stayed for the Martini Demonstration. Both of these were held on the steps of the Grand Piazza and David was able to get a nice close place to view from. Unfortunately he did not get chosen to help shake any of the martinis so he did not get the free drinks, but it was interesting anyway. The final demo was for the bartender to mix and pour 7 martinis all at once.



Afterwards, we met up for lunch and ate at the Verdi Pizzeria. This is a nice quiet area with very good pizzas. On some of the other ships there have been pizza oven in a booth somewhere around the pool, but this is almost a specialty restaurant, inside on deck-8. Janet had Pepperoni and David had Ham. Since he didn’t get a martini, David had one of the Foster beers with his pizza.



We returned to the cabin and watched on TV the second half of the movie we started last night – Gravity. It had been disappointing to have it break at a cliff-hanger moment, but now we know how the story ends. It’s a nice movie, but is a little hard to understand why it was considered as a Best Movie award – very good cinematography and special effects, but not much else.



As soon as the show was over, it was time to go to a Wine Tasting. This was a little bit pricey, but since we aren’t buying as much wine with the dinners, we figures we could splurge here. There was one champagne, two whites, and three red wines. We only got a sample of each (see picture), but it gave a good representation of the flavor. One of the Head waiters told the story of each wine and explained why that one had such and such taste characteristics. Anyway, it was fun.



Tonight is the first of our Formal Dinners – everyone gets dressed in the fancy outfits. We had 8 people tonight (4 new people but 2 previous ones did not show up). We later ran into the missing ones and they said they’re going to eat at the buffet in the future so 8 may be the max the rest of the trip – if the new ones return. We both had crabmeat quiche and lobster bisque. Janet had veal and pasta as her main course and David had steak. For dessert, Janet had chocolate ice cream with chocolate syrup and David had the “Loveboat Deam” which is chocolate mousse and vanilla ice cream.



After the dinner, the Captain was hosting his welcome celebration for everyone in the main atrium. This is a champagne event where you can get several glasses and watch all other people and the Captain pouring champagne into a fountain of glasses.



After the party, we went to the evening show in the Princess Theater – called “Piano Man”. We had actually seen the show before on our Panama Canal cruise, but it was good the first time so we watched it again. It was a high energy sequence of songs by Barry Manilow, Elton John, and Billy Joel. They did a good job and we enjoyed it again



Here is a comment about last night’s show. David went to see Joey Fimmano’s show and it was a very high energy singing and instrumental show. Joey played both the electric keyboard and the accordion (not at the same time), and sang several other songs played by the accompanying band. David enjoyed it a lot and if he does a second show later in the cruise, then will try to get Janet down to see the show.



No time changes tonight, however we have an early excursion, so that will have to be all for today. We will see you tomorrow from New Zealand.

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Photos

Janet & David
at Wine Tasting