Western Mediterranean Cruise - Days 3 & 4 Sea Days

Day 3

We awoke to quite a swell and nothingness and it stayed that way for both our sea days.  Day 3 was probably the worst for the swell with people staggering a bit at times.  I get very sea sick and was rather worried about the Bay of Biscay with a swell being the worst for me but I was fine and didn’t feel sick at all.

We were late down for breakfast but found that most people seemed to have overslept too but we had gone onto European time overnight so we were all an hour behind!

We found some loungers near the pool and settled down but we soon realised that we were right by the smoking area so moved down a bit.  We chatted and read and generally relaxed after the hecticness of the past few days.

We went to lunch in the Oceanview (self service) restaurant and, I guess, ate far too much! That has to stop!!!  We just mooched in the afternoon but when it came time for dinner Penny didn’t want any and the rest of us didn’t want much - which is why big lunches must stop!  Leaving Penny in her cabin we went back to Oceanview and had a light dinner.

During the afternoon the ship had to perform a Medi-vac.  The Captain came on the tannoy to say that a helicopter would be landing on the helipad to evacuate someone who could not be treated on board.  We then realised that we had turned and slowed almost to a halt.  We didn’t see what happened but apparently the helicopter didn’t land, instead the casualty had to winched up.  How sad for it to happen on the first day of their holiday and I hope that the person travelling with the casualty was also winched up.

The show for the evening was a group of four young men called The Barricades Boys who had all appeared in Les Miserables either in the West End, on tour or in the film.  They were brilliant and I really didn’t want them to stop singing.  They did some songs from films and musicals (including Les Mis of course) plus others. I have to say that the Les Mis songs made my spine tingle!  If you ever get chance to see them do go.

We were pleased to see that the Baileys had been replenished so decided to lower their stock a bit!

These are a couple of photos of our cabin.

Day 4

We managed to get up a bit earlier today and made breakfast just after 9am and then went and found four loungers and spent most of the day on them.  Richard and Jim went for lunch but Penny and I took it in turns to go and get a salad.

It was an Evening Chic night which, according to Celebrity, is dressier than smart casual but is intended to be less dressy than formal attire.  Richard wore his new burgundy waistcoat under his new suit and looked very handsome while I wore a long skirt with a bold stripey top.  It’s a strange evening as some people are in their DJs and long dresses while others are still in their shorts and t-shirts but they are not allowed in the main dining room. This cruise the early sitting for dinner is 5.30pm which is much too early for us and the late sitting is 8.00pm which is a tad on the late side so we thought we would try Select Dining which means that we can go at any time but must be prepared for a wait.  We did have to wait - all of five minutes!  The food in the main dining room is very good but I was worried that the service might not be as good as if we had had a regular waiter but it was good except the sommelier wasn’t as attentive as she might have been!

We sat in the Grand Foyer after dinner and listened to the house band, Trust Me Jack.  They were OK but we had been spoilt last night by the Barricade Boys.

If you have followed this post up to here you can join in with the excitement that was waiting in our cabin, however if you have given up on our boring (to you) day then tough!  Sitting on our bed was an invitation to the Sail-in to Gibraltar on the Helipad.  If you are regular cruisers then you will know that this is quite a prestigious party to be invited to and if you aren’t then let me tell you that I could hardly contain my excitement!!  Penny and Jim hadn’t come up with us so I was dashing out of our cabin every couple of minutes to make sure they had got an invitation too - they had 😃. I have to say that I didn’t realise that there were Sail-in parties as well as Sail-away ones.  As the party is on the bow the sail-in must be better as you get a great view.