Woke up this morning feeling quite sad that this was our last full day on the Borealis, and tomorrow afternoon we would be disembarking this lovely vessel and flying home. 🙁
Trevor had already left to walk his mile around the promenade deck, so I went out onto the balcony and just stood there, gazing at the wake and the blue sea, and breathing in great lungfuls of the warm sea air.
While this was an unplanned sea day and we should have been exploring Golfito, Costa Rica, we determined to enjoy our last day on board, and we looked at the Daily Times activities programme to see what we fancied doing after breakfast.
There was the inevitable game of Baggo at 9.30am, so we went along to the Ocean Bar where all the regulars were there and the floor had been set up with the board with the hole in it, and a chair to hold onto, as there was quite a bit of movement from the Borealis, which was going along at a decent speed, around 19 knots. 🙂
You can’t believe how competitive some players were, all about chucking a beanbag at a hole in a board! Trevor and I got through to the next round but were knocked out after that. We watched the rest of the game; the winners received some prize tokens to trade in for Fred Olsen merchandise at the end of the cruise. Trevor and I only had six tokens, but one competitor had collected 68 so far!
As the weather was so perfect outside, we decided to have a swim again, and we returned to 7063 to get changed into our swimwear and collect our towels. When we arrived at the poolside, it was quite crowded and I couldn’t find a sunlounger in the shade. Instead, we sat at a table and dumped our towels, phones, cruise cards etc before making our way to the pool.
The decking was very hot underfoot, as was the tiled area around the pool, and we did a sort of ungainly hopping walk before going down the ladder into the cool water. There were quite a few people in the pool; not many were swimming, but I think most people had taken to the water just to cool down.
Trevor and I swam around in a pleasant unhurried way for around half an hour, then we decided to get out and get dried off. As I left the pool I felt self-conscious in my cossie, and it wasn’t helped by my clumsy tip-toeing walk, each step punctuated by me saying “hot…hot…hot…hot” as I hurried back to the table and chair, much to the amusement of some of the other passengers. “I was exactly the same as that!” laughed one lady, sitting nearby.
I put on my sarong and accepted a glass of iced water from a passing bar maid. Trevor and I then ordered a freezing cold beer each; Trevor wanted to go to listen to a lecture at 11 o’clock, but I thought it was too nice to go below decks so I said I’d wait for him to come back.
I sat there and people-watched and enjoyed my beer; some of the waiting staff then came around with cold fruit ‘kebabs’ consisting of chunks of cold melon and pineapple threaded onto wooden skewers. They were delicious and refreshing (and healthy!) in the hot sunshine.
I allowed the warm weather to dry me off as I waited for Trevor to return. We then returned to 7063 where I finished drying myself off and changed into clean clothes before we decided to go to The View for our lunch.
I enjoyed a plate of chilli con carne with rice; the chilli certainly had a spicy kick to it and I had to take frequent sips from my glass of cold water!
At one o’clock we went up to the Observatory to play “Name that Tune”. Due to everyone making the most of the sunshine there weren’t many people in there, so we thought we might have had a chance to win something, but we simply couldn’t do it; there were too many modern songs about which we hadn’t a clue.
We decided afterwards that we had better make a start with our packing, and we returned to our suite and began to put things in the case that we knew we wouldn’t need again this cruise. We filled one case which we decided was enough for now; we had plenty of time to do the rest of it later.
Afterwards we settled down for a power nap; we were going to prop open the balcony door, but it really was quite a sun trap and it was very hot out there, too hot for bare feet. For once we actually preferred the coolness of the air con. 🙂
We spent the rest of the afternoon relaxing, reading, watching TV and (in my case) doing some of this blog. I was trying not to think about the fact that we’d be going home tomorrow, while all those lucky people would be remaining on board, but we really can’t take a longer holiday as we have too many commitments at home (and I still work on a temporary basis). In addition, it’s not fair to Cedric, our cat, to leave him in the cattery too long. In any case, we’d only be home six weeks before our next cruise!
Soon it was time to get ready for dinner, during which the time was punctuated by the arrival of the canapé man. I wore a floral cotton maxi-dress with a little short cardigan; we’d decided to leave the rest of our packing until it was almost bedtime, as our cases didn’t have to be outside our stateroom until 2.00am. We enjoyed the usual delicious meal and thanked everyone on table #87 for their company; we wondered who (if anyone) would be taking our places at this table tomorrow night.
Just before we left the restaurant, we handed each couple our calling card which included the URL for this web site, as they had already expressed an interest in reading this blog. 🙂
Mark Shortland, the excellent magician, featured in the Neptune Lounge once again as the main entertainment tonight. He included audience participation in his act, and it was very amusing as well as being quite clever; some of his tricks/illusions are amazing. We really enjoyed his show a lot.
Then it was along to the Morning Light pub once again for the final evening quiz, which we didn’t win. We did, however, make the most of the all-inclusing drinks and enjoyed the company of Alan and Lesley, who were staying on board the Borealis until Sydney, Australia. Incidentally, Sydney is where we would be boarding the Celebrity Edge in March for our next cruise. Strange to think that the Borealis still would not have completed her world cruise by then! 🙂
We finished the evening by going up to the Observatory where one of the female vocalists, Molly Thompson, was performing a tribute act to some of the iconic female singers over the decades, such as Cher and Tina Turner.
It was after midnight when we left the Observatory to return to 7063 and finish our packing. It didn’t take too long to put everything in the case, and I left out the clothes we’d be travelling home in, which I’d had freshly laundered a few days ago. If you are in a suite on FOCL ships, you get laundry vouchers of up to £10.00 per week, so we’d made good use of them.
Finally we settled down in our comfortable bed and slept very well. We weren’t due to disembark the vessel until two o’clock tomorrow afternoon, and we didn’t have to be out of our cabins until 10.00am, so we could have a lie-in in the morning instead of having to be up too early, which is often the case on disembarkation day.