Day 3 - At Sea on Way to Hilo, Hawaii - January 15, 2011

Smooth sailing all night and we slept until almost 8:00am.   Fred brought Jan tea and a croissant for breakfast as her tummy wasn’t feeling all that well.  Tea was just the right thing and everyone was up around feeling good for the day.

After breakfast, Jan went to Intermediate Bridge class while Fred explored the ship.  Also went to a lecture by a photographer, Peter Simon, that was not very interesting.  At 11:00am Fred joined for a lecture by Dr. Ronnie Sampson and Cooks Endeavor – his early life and naval career.  That one was interesting.  He will be speaking about Captain Cook over the next several sea days.

Today was Fish Al Fresco Lunch on the deck.  It was a little windy and cook but Tom and Martha had found a table back out of the wind and we joined them for a light lunch.  Tonight is the Captain’s Welcome Party so we ate a light lunch.

The ship arranged for reception of ESPN/FOX for the two playoff games so most of the afternoon was spent resting and watching the football games.

The staff for this segment of the cruise are:

Captain Pier Paolo Scala

General Manager – Michael Coghlan

Staff Captain – Hjalmar Lonn

Cruise Director – Jamie Logan

Assistant Cruise Director – Elda Pauluzzi

Food & Beverage Manager – Florian Kibgilka

Executive Chef – Fabien Alujas

Restaurant Manager – Anatoli Makaev

Captain Pier Paolo Scala will be leaving in Sydney.

Most of the staff is new to us except Florian, Elda and Anatoli.  We did go to the Captain’s Welcome just to see the staff.  Then we went up to the Observation Lounge since the restaurants get very busy when the special events let out.   We were joined by Tom and Martha.   Everyone look good in their “dress up” clothes.  Both Tom and Fred decided on dark suits rather than tuxedos.   The crowd was mixed with I think tuxs being in the minority.

We decided to go to La Veranda for a more relaxed dinner and were very please with our meals.  It was almost empty as most chose the Compass Rose where they serve Beef Wellington and Lobster.  We have found that most of the time the lobster in La Veranda is better and tonight was no exception.  Tom had the lobster, Martha the Beef Tornados, Fred had the lamb chops and Jan had the Osso Buco.  Everyone said their meal was excellent as was the wine and the service.  We all skipped desert.

I know some people don’t like La Veranda for dinner.  It is true that the appetizers and desert are from the buffet but everything else is served table side.  If the quality of the food continues as good as it was last night, we will spend many evenings at La Veranda