Second and third of our lazy sea days. On Tuesday morning, we started out with a spin class taught by a Romanian instructor named Andrei Dragoni. Neither of us had ever done a spin class before and we should have known we were in for it by the instructor's name. I am pretty sure he learned how to teach this class in some sort of Romanian prison, because it was torture. Despite that, we'll probably go back for more on Thursday or Friday, if our butts can stand the bike seat by then!
After being beaten to a pulp by the stationary bikes, we had breakfast and then spent most of the day reading. We tried to lay out for about an hour up on the main deck, but the weather was not at all cooperative so we had to admit defeat and head back inside. We dined in the main dining room and opted out of the show, a comedic juggler, based on the lack of appeal of the comedic magician a few nights back.
Wednesday (today) we were awake by 5 am and hit the gym early. According to all posted information, the gym opens at 7 am. However, we have been suspicious of this from the beginning as, even if we would arrive at 6:45 am, it was always full. We have slowly started going earlier and earlier to see if we can determine the actual opening time. This morning we were there by 6 am and others were already working out. It has crossed our minds that it is open all the time, just not advertised. The seas were rough this morning and our 5K runs also had some excellent incline training components as an added bonus.
After the gym we had breakfast delivered in our cabin, which is always delightful. Before 9 am we were out of the cabin, picked up iced cappuccinos, and headed up to the reading lounge. By lunchtime, the seas had calmed considerably and the sky was blue and clear. We took the opportunity to secure a couple of lounge chairs by the pool for the afternoon to swim and soak in some sun. One definite bonus of Princess ships is that they have fresh-water pools, whereas Carnival has salt-water. It's always much nicer to swim in lovely fresh water!
We had to leave the pool about 2 pm to shower and get to our next wine tasting. This one was less expensive wines - which is nice since that is what we are more likely to buy at home. It's always fun to swirl your wine around and make comments such as, "Oh, you can't taste the pear? Tsk - I definitely do!" Even though I can barely taste the difference between the red wine and the white wine. Good thing it comes with the handy color coding!
Finally in our activity-packed day, we had the past-guest party to attend. All of the cruise ships have these as a "thank you" to their passengers who have sailed with them before, providing free cocktails and appetizers for an hour or so. This is our first time attending one on Princess (as this is only our second cruise with this line), and we found it to be nicer than the one that Carnival offers. Carnival shows a pre-taped video that highlights all their ships in their fleet, both current and retired. It's fun to see but, needless to say, we've seen that one several times! Princess had the captain present, and he spoke off-the-cuff for about 15 minutes about the ports we have stopped in on this voyage, the weather we've had and, more notably, the weather we have missed. We were aware of the terrible rains in Italy starting the day after we left, but we were not aware that we nearly missed stopping in the Azores due to high winds. In fact, the captain was advised not to stop, but thought he'd give it a try. Lucky for us,as the Azores was one of our favorites! He said that if we would have been one day later to that port, we definitely would not have docked due to winds over 40 mph. Another standard feature at the past-guest parties is that they introduced you to the most-traveled passengers on board. The gentleman who had the most days sailed with Princess tonight had over 1500 days! Can you imagine? That's about 5 years on a cruise ship! Andrew now has a goal to shoot for!
So, that's it for now. We have 3 sea days left, with little planned. Will likely post something in a day or two, unless we win big in the casino or something else thrilling happens! Until then, imagine us doing nothing much at all.
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