Another sea day. Was it really only a week ago that we boarded the National Express coach for our journey to Southampton? And that famous south coast sea port was the last time we’d clapped eyes on terra firma. It seemed ages ago now; here we were on this floating hotel where time was of no consequence, and each day blended mellowly into the next…
Got up at eight o’clock as usual, and wandered out onto the balcony. The Atlantic Ocean was definitely a lot calmer, and that icy January nip in the air had disappeared as we continued in our west-south-westerly direction towards sunnier climes.
After breakfast in The View, we decided to have a walk out on the promenade deck. As we strolled around, we could see crew members in white overalls carrying out their never-ending maintenance tasks, and we could smell the quite-pleasant scents of fresh paint and varnish as they plied their brushes to keep the Borealis her bright, gleaming and pristine self. 😊
Looking at the Daily Times, we saw that they were holding an Indoor Kurling knockout competition at 9.30am. Trevor and I had not yet played this game, and it looked like fun, so we went along to the Ocean Bar to sign up. Entertainment host Annie was there, and as we walked in she put our names down; she didn’t need to ask, she knew us by now!
I had a lady called Marian on my team, and I got up and sent my ‘stone’ towards the target. Unlike traditional kurling that is played on ice, the indoor stones run on ball-bearings and need to be played on a wooden or laminate floor. My stone landed in the target amidst applause from the other watching competitors.
When my turn came around again, I managed once more to get my stone onto the target. Definitely more beginners’ luck than skill! The next person rather unsportingly sent their stone up with the express intention of knocking mine out, and indeed they did, but my remaining stone was still enough to win the round for our team, so Marian and I were through!
The game continued; Trevor’s team got through to the next round, then my team were knocked out. I stayed to watch the rest of the match, however, and Trevor’s team got through to the semi-final, and then the final. Two rounds per person were played and Trevor ended up on the winning team! 😊
Afterwards, because the weather was so lovely outside, we went out on deck and walked around. I took photos of various areas of the ship, despite the fact this was our fourth cruise on Borealis.
Meanwhile, Simon the entertainment manager’s voice came over the PA to say that the Neptune Lounge had suffered quite a lot of flooding, and that all scheduled lectures and entertainment would, regrettably, have to be cancelled. In one way it made life a little easier for us, and we didn’t have to ponder over the programme and decided what to do where events coincided. 😊
At 11.30am we therefore decided to go to the Morning Light pub and take part in the trivia. Trevor and I had a team of only two, and we scored the fairly respectable score of 17/20; the winners scored 19 but there was six of them in their team.
Afterwards we enjoyed lunch in The View and went out to the pool bar, sitting on a couple of bar stools and enjoying the cocktail of the day. Then it was back to 7055 for a post-luncheon power nap before the afternoon’s run of activities.
There was a game of Baggo on at 2.00pm and we went down to the already-crowded Ocean Bar. Obviously chucking beanbags at a board with the intention of getting them into a hole was a major attraction! 😊
Trevor and I were in the same team, and we progressed through the rounds until we made it to the final! We ended up winning and received some more prize tokens. You save these up and exchange them at the end of the cruise for Fred Olsen merchandise. The items are really useful, for example luggage straps or a shoeshine kit, and we have lots of FOCL goodies at home; some, like pens and coasters, in daily use.
At three o’clock I went up to The Studio on deck 9 for the watercolour class. Today, we had to paint a field of poppies, one flower in the foreground, but because I’d missed yesterday’s session I didn’t know the correct techniques to use. My resulting painting was colourful, but you’d need a lot of imagination to realise it was supposed to be poppies! 😊
After spending some time relaxing in our cabin, I went up to the Atlantis Spa for a relaxing foot and ankle treatment. I hoped that it would reduce the slight swelling I was experiencing that was preventing me from getting my feet into my shoes!! That would never do! I’d already had members of staff who remembered me from the cruise in November asking me which fantastic shoes I’d brought with me, and I was then having to show them my puffy flip-flop clad feet, and promising I’d put my shoes on later in the cruise.
The treatment started with an aromatic foot soak wherein the therapist smoothed marine mud, loaded with minerals, all over my feet and lower legs up to my knees. I could smell the evocative sea-weedy scent from the mud. I sat there gazing out to sea and thinking pleasant thoughts until the guy came and rinsed the mud from the legs before giving me a fabulous foot and ankle massage, flexing and smoothing my feet. He finished by slathering on a peppermint foot gel which gave a lovely cooling and tightening feeling. The 45-minute treatment was only 28 quid, so not a bad price at all really, and very enjoyable. 😊
Back in our cabin I had exactly 45 minutes to be washed and changed, and do my hair and makeup, before it was dinner time once again. I wore a pair of sparkly leggings with a blue and green sequinned top, and was delighted to find I was easily able to fit my feet into my gorgeous Irregular Choice blue and green sequinned shoes (I’d bought the top to go with the shoes, rather than the other way around!).
Dinner at table #87 was delicious as usual, punctuated by the amusing and stimulating conversation of our table mates. Because of the flooding and “technical issues” in the Neptune Lounge, tonight’s entertainment was cancelled and we were disappointed, because it was the multi-talented musician Davie Howes once again, and we’d really looked forward to seeing him. Instead, the entertainments team had hurriedly organised one of the singers to perform for us in the Observatory later on.
Meanwhile, Trevor and I went along to the Morning Light pub to bagsy the table for the quiz at 10 o’clock. We were joined by Lesley and the questions were really hard, or so it seemed. We only scored a pathetic 10/15, but the team whose paper we marked only scored 7/15. In fact, 10 turned out to be the winning score! If we hadn’t changed our minds about a couple of the answers (it happens all the time!) we would have won outright. As it was, it went to the tie-breaker which we actually won! We’d achieved our hat-trick of wins for the day, and our team won a bottle of Fred Olsen fizz. We decided we’d keep it until tomorrow night and bring it down to the restaurant to share amongst our table mates.
As Lesley said goodnight, Trevor and I just decided to remain in the Morning Light pub. We enjoyed a couple more drinks, including the cocktail of the day, before leaving around midnight to return to 7055. Tomorrow we were due to reach land! 😊