Another day another Ocean

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All I can say is WOW! We did the transit of the Panama Canal yesterday and it was absolutely amazing. The day started rather earlier that I would have liked for a holiday but at around 6 am Nigel was already on deck watching the ship enter the breakwater that starts the transit of the canal. I joined him a little later ;-) at about 7am for breakfast before we approached the first set of locks. We already knew the gap would be tight but when you actually witness a ship of this size squeezing into a space with about a foot each side, the mind boggles! Impossible to describe the details in a short blog but needless to say it's rightly decribed as the eighth wonder of the world and we hope you enjoy the pictures. It's a bizarre feeling as you cruise through the top lake in what is clearly a tropical rain forest watching out for crocodiles in the mud flats. Nigel did suggest throwing some of the more miserable passengers overboard to see if we could attract a few to the ship! With all the excitement and things to see and temperatures in the mid 90's and high humidity, we are now feeling slightly jaded today and enjoying a welcome couple of days relaxing at sea. Sorry to those of you who tried to look at the webcam as it appears the ships cam has been out of satelite range for a good deal of the cruise, however the shore side panama canal cams were working so maybe you saw that.

We have now moved from the Atlantic to the Pacific and passed our nearest point to the equator (about 8 degrees N) and are now heading North West passing Costa Rica in Central America on our way to Acapulco. Our new found favourite bar is the Spinnaker bar where the choice of cocktails never fail to amaze and the best cup of coffee on the ship can be found. A lovely contemporary art deco style bar which is ideal for relaxing and people watching – and boy, are there some people worth watching on here!

So far today we have been to a presentation on all the ships departments with everything from a bedmaking challenge to guess the weight of a cake competition. The engine room guys obviously attracted our attention with a piston on display with a price tag of nearly £14,000. Must check our prices when we get home!

For some reason we have had an invite to the Captains cocktail party this evening, which bearing in mind is being held in a very small room, in fact where we were married, we must be some of the chosen few this time. The last invite from the Captain also included about 1000 others around the main lido deck!! Will report back on the party tomorrow.

We seem to have done pretty well this cruise with gaining special access to fancy dinners and hob-nobbing with men in white coats, sorry uniforms! Looks like we will have to start to pretend to get married on every cruise to be celebrities. It is a strange feeling as fellow passengers are still coming up to us shaking hands and congratulating us. Not surprising I suppose as it may take several days before you bump into the same people twice. On the other hand it is a bit bizarre that you see the same people every day.

Bye for now
Nigel & Edina
p.s Happy birthday to Sue for tomorrow :-)

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