TREVOR’S BIRTHDAY
We were awake nice and early this morning because of the extra hour in bed. Trevor opened his birthday cards and stood them up on the table, then we went up to The View for our breakfast.
We had another pleasant sea day today, so we looked on the programme to see what shipboard games were on. At 9.30am there was a game of golf putting on in the Ocean Bar, so we decided to take part in that.
There were eight numbered ‘arches’ which differed in size; the smaller the ‘arch’ the greater the number of points. You had to putt your ball through the arches to score anything from 1 to 10 points. Each player had three balls (5 white and 1 pink) and you had to putt three with right hand and three with your left hand; you got double points for the pink ball.
The game was made interesting once again by the movement of the ship influencing which way the balls went! It was all good fun with a lot of friendly competition and banter. 🙂
We stayed in the Ocean for the next game at 10.30am which was Baggo. I managed to get into the semi-final but was then knocked out. I still got a point for third place, however, for the “Sail & Play” league table. 🙂
We then spent the morning pottering around the ship, looking in the shops and wandering around on the deck, in case we should spot any whales, which we could reasonably expect to see on this voyage. Bolette is a lovely ship, beautifully decorated, and we went around taking lots of photos.
Then we ate a light lunch in The View once again, before going out onto the stern. The weather was cloudy and colder than you would expect for August (around 10°C) and the grey North Atlantic ocean swirled and foamed below us. We hoped that, no matter what the weather was like on this cruise, we would have a perfect day for the much-anticipated total solar eclipse in three days’ time. 🙂
At one o’clock we returned to the Ocean Bar for a game of indoor kurling, but we were knocked out pretty quickly, so no prize points for us this time. Then we decided to enjoy a post-luncheon cocktail at the pool deck.
When we arrived, it was not surprising to find that the pool was only half full and there was a net stretched across it. However, the choppy sea and the ship’s motion caused the water to slosh about all over, sometimes cascading up and over any nearby sun loungers and people! 🙂
It was then time to make our way to the Neptune Lounge for a lecture called “A Beginner’s Guide to the Night Sky” by astrophysicist Dr. Maggie Lieu. It was very interesting, and we could look forward to hearing more from Dr Lieu in a couple of days’ time, when she would be telling us what we could expect during a solar eclipse. 🙂
We then returned to 3388 and settled down for a power nap. Then it was time to start getting dressed up a little smarter to attend the Oceans Club cocktail party. The Oceans Club is Fred Olsen’s loyalty club, and you get one point for every night spent on board a FOCL ship. Trevor and I are in the Platinum tier, and after this cruise we will have 285 nights. We get various perks, such as 5% off a future cruise, 10% off any on-board spending, a free bag of laundry “wash and fold” service each week, and three free ‘posh’ coffees each per week in the Bookmark Café. The freebies are quite good because it would cost us over 50 quid if we were to pay for them.
We arrived at the Neptune Lounge before 5.00pm and we only had a few minutes to wait until the doors opened, so we went inside, where we were greeted once again by Captain Davor Dubravica and some of the Future Cruises staff. Then we enjoyed the ‘free’ glasses of fizz, gin & tonic and sherry, as well as tasty hot & cold canapés. While Trevor and I had made the effort to dress a little more smartly (plus we would be heading for dinner straight afterwards), several people were dressed as if they were popping to the local shops rather than for a cocktail party! 🙂
As ever, the Captain thanked everyone for their loyalty to FOCL and gave some numbers about the numbers of nights spent on board one of their ships. He told us that if you added up all the nights that Oceans Club member had ever spent on a Fred ship, it would come to over 200 years!
The person on board with the most nights was a lady who had over 900 nights, so she was given a bottle of fizz and some flowers and had her photo taken with the Captain.
The cocktail party finished in nice time for us to go to dinner, so off we went to the Bloomsbury Restaurant and table #207, where we enjoyed the usual extravagant meal in excellent company, with lots of anecdotes and laughs. When we reached the dessert stage, we heard the jingling sounds of tambourines coming closer, then a group of waiters with guitars joined them and gathered around Trevor, who was seated at the head of the table. On of them placed a birthday cake with a candle in front of him, while they all struck up with “Happy Birthday”, and we all joined in. Then the cake was taken away to be cut into six portions; it was served to us with ice cream. As ever, we finished our meal with a liqueur from the drinks trolley; only our third night on board and they already know to send the trolley over to table #207. 🙂 🙂
The show tonight featured The Bolette Show Cast with an all-singing, all-dancing extravaganza called “Let’s Swing”. It was an excellent show; there really are some talented singers in the cast.
Afterwards, we noticed that the sun was quite low in the sky on this mellow August evening, so we decided to go out onto the promenade deck to try to get some photos – you can’t beat a sunset at sea. The westering sun reflected beautifully on the glass balcony doors, bathing everything in a warm, golden light. As an added bonus, a brief shower of rain added a rainbow, the colourful arc of which was reflected on the sea. Absolutely wonderful.
At 10 o’clock we took part in the quiz in the Morning Light pub with Steve and Susan, but once again a win eluded us. We disagreed over the answer to one of the questions (which country in the world has the most islands?) – Trevor and I said it was the Philippines and Steve said it was Sweden. We put the Philippines down but Steve was correct, and he made sure we didn’t forget it. 🙂 🙂
Trevor and I then finished the evening off by going up to the Observatory to listen to Cosmic Lemon, who really are excellent, and enjoy a few more cocktails.
It was about midnight once again when we left to return to 3388, and we got washed and changed and into our jammies, ready to settle down.
Tomorrow we would arrive in our first port of call, the island of Heimaey in the Vestmannaeyjar archipelago off mainland Iceland, where our adventures would begin in earnest.