Melsea's Adventures of South America & Pacific Adventures Part 27

Reports about cruises on Aurora
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melsea
Senior Second Officer
Senior Second Officer
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Joined: February 2013

Melsea's Adventures of South America & Pacific Adventures Part 27

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Post by melsea »

Melsea's Adventures of South America & Pacific Adventures Part 27

Day 91. At sea sailing towards the wonder that is the Panama Canal.
8th April Black Tie.

Hot and not so humid, cool breeze in the shade.
Clocks go forward at noon. -5 GMT

Awoke at 8.30 by the alarm but did't get up until past 9. Breakfast at Glass House. June, the Welsh lady we have come to know & love, stopped by and said that the art teacher's wife, Clair, has been taken off the ship but did not know if James went with her. After speaking to a few different people I learnt that Clair had been unwell for a while and was taking antibiotics for a chest infection and that she was asthmatic also. It sounds as though her chest infection did not get better and her asthma compounded it, which meant she may have had a bad attack. I hadn't been going the the art classes recently and so I hadn't known what was going on.
I sat downstairs on deck 7 for a while and continued to do some more drawings in my Art Diary.
At just before 2pm I went back to the cabin to meet up with Bill to go to the lunch. The clocks had gone forward at midday and became 1'o'clock.
We had a nice lunch and I was going to sit outside on deck 7 again but found I had become rather tired so decided to have a nap before I was due to go to the spa for my stone massage at 4.30pm.
Evening show were the Johnston Brothers. Very talented young men, a really enjoyable show.

Day 92. Transiting the Panama Canal.
9th April Evening Casual

I had set my alarm for 06.55 which did wake me but I really couldn't get myself to get out of bed. So I continued to snooze. I got up eventually at 8am. I went outside and saw that we had gone under the Bridge of Americas and we were heading towards very quickly to our first lock, Miraflores. The whole day was a marvel as always going through through the Panama Canal, it never fails to amaze me. I have been through a few times now and on each occasion I see something new. This time I saw a monkey which was some distance away. I almost missed it but someone on deck saw it and I thought it was a dog but having looked through my binoculars I could see what it was. One thing that was certainly in evident that wasn't so back in 2012 when we last went through was the expansion of the Canal. It is without a huge area of expansion of which I thought had come to a halt because of disputes between the various companies & countries involved but clearly this was not the case here as work was being done on a mega scale with so date set in stone for when completion will be. It was a good day weather wise which is always a good thing but with lots of sunscreen applied as the sun is rather strong in these parts and the only shade is inside. One new thing was that P&O did was to arrange various activities that were for both the crew & passengers. They were going to be competing against each other in Quoits, Shuffle board, Table Tennis & Cricket. From memory the passengers won everything which they should as they had been on here long enough to get good.
The whole day was a good one and one that I always enjoy and today was no different. So onwards we went into the Caribbean Sea sailing to Curaçao but not before another sea day to recover from our Panama Canal journey.

Day 93. At sea in the Caribbean Sea. Very Windy but sunny & warm.
10th April Smart, Jacket Required

Clocks went forward at midday. We set our clocks on New York time which just so happens to be the correct time zone for us to use. -4 GMT

Breakfast as per usual in the Glass House which was as always was a nice way to start our day. Afterwards I went walkabout via the Photography department where they had displayed yesterdays Panama Transit photos. I bought 3 of the photos of Aurora going through the locks. Buying 3 meant they came out at £5.30 each instead of £7.95. I then went down to the tours office to ask about the tickets to the cricket, they had sold out which I thought they would be. He did say however that if I got off early it is just 20 minutes away so I may still get to go, if I left there at say 3pm I could comfortably get back to the ship in time. There was to be an England vs Antigua Cricket match when we arrive in Antigua in a few days time.
I later went to the Spa to re schedule my last treatment to the 16th which is not a formal night and the new time is earlier at 11am, a much better time of day. Once I had done this I then collected my things from the cabin to go and sit on deck 7. After lunch I sat out the back of the ship until 5.30pm. It is without doubt the best view and perfect aspect of the ship.

Day 94. Curaçao, Caribbean. 9am - 6pm.
11th April Evening casual

Got up a little later than planned and ended up having breakfast with Bill at the Glass House.
I left the ship just after 10.30 and made my way towards the town. Before I left the perimeter of the Rift Fort I stopped to get connected to the wifi. I managed to get emails and down load some podcast.
When I got to where the Emma Bridge is I walked across to the other side and walked ahead away from the bridge and came to where there is a small square that has a couple to cafes and where there is a chime clock that is like a Swiss clock that has figures coming out when the clock strikes the hour. I videoed it and then sat down nearby when I heard my name called, it was Lorraine & Brian trying to catch my attention, they kindly bought me a diet coke. I sat there for a while and continued to download a few things. We later went our separate ways and I walked on further where there was another square and the wifi seems to extend there too. So again I continued with my downloads and replying to a couple of emails. I continued on to see how far I could go before I needed to turn back I came to a tiny beach that had a boardwalk that was behind a defence wall of rocks which was just as well as it was a very windy day and the seas were particularly strong in their waves pounding the shoreline. Got wet a couple of times due to the spray of the waves. I took a good few photos and I was making my way back to the street when I saw one of the ship's photographers. We chatted for a while and he told me something I did not know, the camera I am interested in will allow me to use my many lens I have from my old manual Olympus camera for the digital one I like to get. I shall investigate further when I get home.
I walked back to where the bridge is but found it was open and so I took the free ferry that operates when the bridge is not in use. Took more photos and headed back to ship. When I got back on ship I found Bill and we both went outside on shore so he could connect and I could reply to an urgent email. The sail away was somewhat windy and not many people were up on top deck.
In the evening we did not go to the restaurant but went upstairs to the buffet. I went to the show which was the very talented Johnson Brothers who have unbelievable opera voices. Superb they were.

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emjay45
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Re: Melsea's Adventures of South America & Pacific Adventures Part 27

#2

Post by emjay45 »

Thanks melsea I wondered what had happened to Curacao. ;)

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