Sailing from the North Pacific to
the South Pacific, crossing the Equator
and the two halves of the Pacific
Sometime tonight
Thank you for those who wrote. The sea sickness seems to be somewhat under control now. Skipped breakfast this morning but did manage to go to lunch with Mary. She was able to attend the cooking class this morning. Had a light lunch in anticipation of our dinner reservation at Chartreuse tonight.
Most of the day was spent in the suite. We did go to reception to tour in our passports and get our visa situation sorted out. It was thought that this had all been done prior to leave for the voyage but apparently it wasn’t. It all seems to be under control now.
The brain fog from the anti-nausea medication allowed Mary to win the game of canasta, again. Although it does seem to go in streaks. Maybe it is just her turn. We missed Terry Bishop’s talk on the U.S.S. Indianapolis. It is an interesting story with a nice end, but it is also a been-there-done-that lecture.
Did get a load of laundry done for Mary before heading out to dinner. As of 17:30 the Mariner is still some 1,050 miles from our next stop, which is Nuku Hiva, Marquesas Islands, French Polynesia. The ship is still about 330 miles north of the Equator. We still have about 40 hours to reach Nuku Hiva.
Tonight we turn our clocks to Marquesas Time (MART). MART is 9:30 hours behind Coordinated Universal Time (UTC). There is no daylight savings time here, and the Marquesas Time Zone is a half-hour time zone. That is, the local time differed by 30 minutes instead of the normal whole hour. MART is observed all year round in French Polynesia and the Marquesas Islands.
Most of have never really thought about it, but there are a few time zone which are not a full hour off from UTC. Some of them are 30 minutes, like Nuku Hiva, and some are even 45 minutes different. Australia has a lot of time zones. Some of them are thirty-minutes different, some of them are forty-five-minutes different, and not off them use daylight savings time. This probably causes some issues, but it is unlikely the Australians really care.
We are still several days from the imaginary international date lines. In theory, or in naval practice, it is a line 180 degrees east, and or west, from the prime meridian (which is an imaginary line running through Greenwich England. In truth it is a voluntary line which follows country borders. If you look at a map you will see it is anything but straight. https://www.timeanddate.com/time/dateline.html However there will be more on that as we get close.
Interestingly, in all of our travels we have been on both sides of this imaginary line, but we have never “crossed” the line. We will cross the international date line on Grace Hapke’s birthday, February 16th. Yes, I made a mistake. I had her birthday in my calendar as February 2, turns out it is the 16th. But on the 16th we lose a day. So, does that mean we celebrate it twice with in physical hours? The would be true is you were traveling east. However, then you travel west over the international date line, you gain a day. So it is possible the 16th will or could only happen in a moments time. It will also be true that half the ship will be on one date and the other half on another for a few minutes. Too much to think about there.
Tonight is date night. We have reservations at Chartreuse at 7. We were all dressed up and ready to go at 6:30, so we decided to hit the Horizon Lounge and have a drink before dinner. The Mariner band was there and a singer was there singing songs from Cabaret. She sang “Life is a Cabaret”. Very nice. I have heard her speaking to one of the crew yesterday, and it is fairly obvious, from her voice, that she is, or at least from a, Germany speaking community.
Ok, Dinner, For Hors D’oeuvres, Mary chose the Mesclun et Chip de Legumes. It is interesting. According to Webster’s dictionary a Mesclun salad is “a salad made from a selection of lettuces and other editable leaves such as dandelion greens, mustard greens and radicchio.” This was one of the outer leaves of iceberg lettuce, with a very fancily sliced tomato, and presented on a bed of, again fancily sliced radishes. The English description on the menu was Mesclun Salad, Radishes & Root Vegetables chips, Lemon Vinaigrette. A fancy way of saying a mixed salad. Unfortunately, while the presentation was quite beautiful there was simply no taste to it. Maybe they forgot the lemon vinaigrette?
Now I had the Bisque de Homars a l’Armagnac. The French interpretation of Lobster Bisque with Armagnac. A little dry sherry is more New England traditional than using Armagnac which is a nice French brandy. But ok. Unfortunately after one spoon full it was obvious that this wasn’t a New England lobster bisque. It was quite obviously made with a fish broth base. A very strong fish broth base. New England lobster bisque is made with a lobster broth, there are NO fish flavors in lobster bisque.
The main course was much better. Mary chose the Filet de Veau, Endives Brausees, Condiment Raisin Aigre-Doug, Jus de Veau aux Noix, or in English Roasted milk feed veal fillet, braised endive, grape chutney with walnut-veal jus. It looked quite nice and apparently tasted the same. I chose the Carré d’Agneau en Persillade, or Roasted Rack of Lamb, Rosemary Persillade with Chickpea Fritters. A “persillade” is a French fresh parsley sauce used in seasoning a variety of dishes. Escargot has a light persillade, usually with garlic. The Italians call it a pesto sauce. Basically, it is parsley, garlic, olive oil and an acid like lemon juice. Sometimes, depending on the accompanying dish, other aromatic herbs such as rosemary, chives or mint are added to the sauce.
The lamb was presented as two chops form the rack, resting on the chickpea fritters which were rectangular in shape. There was a “green” coating on top of each of the chops. A think dry coating. The waiter did offer me mint jelly and yes I took him up on his offer. However, before the arrival of the mint jelly I did try a bit of one of the chops with the green coating. Neither the lamb nor the coating had much flavor. The mint jelly helped my finish it all. The chickpea fritter actually had no flavor whatsoever ever. Again, very disappointing. But the company was wonderful.
After dinner we returned to the suite, I put on my smoking jacket and headed to the lounge. Tomorrow we set the clock a half-hour ahead. I am not sure I am going to be able to get either my phone or watch to agree to this. Will try to set it to manual.
Buonanotte e ciao, Enrico
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