REMEMBRANCE SUNDAY
It’s easy to remember our cabin number, hence the title of today’s blog. 🙂
Last night saw us reach a major cruising milestone – we have now cruised more than 100,000 nautical miles. So I think that calls for a bottle of champers at the dinner table tonight.
We got up about 8.20am and had a nice breakfast in the Secret Garden self-service café; I enjoyed some cold meats, smoked salmon and cheese, washed down with coffee and orange juice. Afterwards we tentatively took a look outside, but it was cold and windy with the threat of rain in the air. It is November after all!
We had a good wander around the ship; the Boudicca had a major refit in 2013 so she looked different from when we were on her in 2008, although there were obviously a lot of things that were very familiar. Then we pottered around for a bit before going along to the Neptune Lounge around 10.45am, in preparation for today’s Remembrance Day service. We are not particularly religious, but I do find Remembrance Day to be very moving, and we always watch the events at the Cenotaph on television every year.
I draped a huge flag around my shoulders; it depicts the silhouette of WW1 soldiers, a large poppy, and the words “Lest We Forget” emblazoned across it. I brought it especially, as I knew there was a good chance that the cruise line would do something for Armistice Day.
The service was very good; it finished with a bugler playing the Last Post followed by two minutes’ silence. Then we all went to the aft decks, where a large memorial wreath was committed to the deep.
Afterwards we returned to 5050 and I got changed into my gym gear! Yes, I am actually determined to go to the gym every day to try to keep my fitness up and also to work off at least some of the extra calories I will no doubt be consuming this next fortnight. Every little helps.
I did 40 minutes of cardiovascular exercise using the treadmill, cross-trainer and stationary bike. I also did some arm-work using dumb-bells. It was a completely new experience to be using the treadmill on a moving ship; the vessel’s motion meant that sometimes you’d be going uphill, and sometimes down. When I was using the dumb-bells I didn’t need the stability ball; the constant movement of the Boudicca did that for me!
After working up a good sweat we returned to the cabin, got changed and freshened up a bit, then went to the Secret Garden again to have a light lunch.
At three o’clock I went along to the salon to get my hair put up in preparation for the captain’s welcome cocktail party at 5.30pm. The hairdresser did a really nice job, and I left the salon looking as though my hair had loads of volume. Several people commented on the elegant style. 🙂
Then I got a glass of fizz to enjoy back in our cabin, before it was time to get ready, dressed in our glad-rags. I wore a gorgeous floor-length black velvet off-the-shoulder gown, with a black lace choker and silver platform shoes, and Trevor looked very smart in his dinner suit with a red bow-tie and cummerbund.
As we were standing in the queue outside the Neptune Lounge, waiting to go into the captain’s party, we got talking to a couple of ladies who recognised our North-East accent. One of them asked where we were from, and we said “Durham”. She then said “Are you Debbie?” much to my astonishment. “Yes”, I replied, “How did you know?” She replied that she’d heard me mentioned on the local radio, BBC Radio Newcastle! Yesterday morning while we were having our breakfast at 6.30am, the female DJ on the radio had said “So what are our listeners doing today? Anything exciting? Send us a text and let us know.” So I’d texted in, telling them we were off up above the Arctic Circle, hopefully to see the Northern Lights. I’d signed the message “Debbie from Durham” and the two ladies we were speaking to had heard it! Particularly since the DJ had been talking about it quite a lot. An amazing coincidence.
During the cocktail party we enjoyed a couple of canapés and three glasses of free ‘champagne’. However, since we’re travelling all-inclusive, it’s all gratis, so the thrill of getting a freebie isn’t quite the same.
Then it was off to dinner, where once again we ate a sumptuous meal and I enjoyed a glass of chilled Lanson’s champagne, to celebrate our 100,000 nautical miles.
After dinner we had a wait of about an hour before the Neptune Lounge opened for tonight’s show, so we sat and chatted with another couple, and here was the second coincidence of the night; they are booked to go on the same cruise as we are, to Africa in January 2015!
We managed to get front-row seats for the show, which featured a male-female duo singing classical songs with a modern twist. They were absolutely excellent, and they finished the show with a superb rendition of Time To Say Goodbye, made famous by Andrea Boticelli and Sarah Brightman. We thoroughly enjoyed their performance.
We finished off the evening by going to the Lido Lounge, but there wasn’t a quiz on tonight for some reason. So we just listened to the resident musicians/singers (which are pretty dire to be honest), had a couple more drinks, then went off to bed for our second night on board. Tonight we had to put our watches forward an hour to Norwegian time, so we would lose an hour of sleep.