LIFE ON BOARD SHIP

After many many days at sea (7 to be precise) we finally succeeded in staying ahead of Hurrican Rene and arrived safely in beautiful New Zealand on Wednesday 17th Feb.
(More about that in my next blog).
So what is life like on board this ship? Well, there are over 2000 people on board including passengers and crew. 85% of the staff are Indian - very charming and very hardworking. 65% of the passengers are doing the full world cruise from Southampton to Southampton and all of them almost without exception have been on numerous cruises before. The majority of the passengers are from the UK and of those approximately 75% are northerners - the predominant accent being Yorkshire. I would say the average age on board is 65. There are young people on board but they are all members of staff including a large troupe of entertainers.
One can engage in all types of activities - Bridge, Gaming classes, Ballroom Dancing, Line Dancing, Gym and Exercise classes, Beauty treatments, Quoits, Shuffleboard, Short Tennis, Swimming, Photography, Spanish, IT classes, Quizzes, Bingo, Cinema. Then there is a large theatre called the Palladium which seats 800 people and in there they hold talks during the day time. There are speakers on birds, Whales and all manner of wildlie, crime, wine, jewellery, precious stones. There are talks about the history and geography and available excurisions at the different ports of call. Then there are celebrity speakers such as Murray Walker and currently we have Brian Hanrahan on board talking about his experiences as a BBC foreign correspondent. We have met up with him several times as he and Mike exchange their BBC/ITN reminiscences. Then there is loads of entertainment - singers, dancers, comedians, musical shos, sailaway parties, discos etc etc
MJ and I are to a large extent on the periphery of it all - observing a lot and dipping in and out of this cruising life when it suits us. We spend a large part of our time meeting and chatting with people in the various restaurants and bars from breakfast throught to lunch and dinner. So far we've managed to avoid afternoon tea. We go for the odd brisk walk around the promenade deck and spend the rest of our time lounging around our cabin and balcony reading, writing and sunbathying when the weather is fine and looking for albatrosses and whales. All in all a bizarre but quite pleasant way of life. Nevertheless we really relish arriving at the ports of call and I'm sure we will have had our fill of "sea days" by the time we get to Hong Kong.