Last night we actually had to turn the clocks forward one hour, so we actually lost an hour of sleep last night. That’s the first time we’ve had to do this on the trip, since we have typically been moving in a westerly direction and moving the clocks back. But going from Laem Chabang, Thailand to Singapore moves us slightly east and into a new time zone. So I was up way before sunrise (I woke up at 6:30a, sunrise was at 7:09a), but the sun wasn’t really visible after sunrise until about 7:30a, when I took this pic:
Not one of my better sunrise photos, but with the clouds and haze we have had lately, that’s about as good as it gets for now. Hopefully things will start clearing up again in a few days after we get past Singapore.
You might also wonder why we are doing Thailand-Singapore-Thailand in that order. We are visiting the eastern side of Thailand (Laem Chabang, Bangkok), then the western side of Thailand (Phuket) and you have to travel past the southern tip of the Malaysian peninsula to get from one side of Thailand to the other (look at a world map), past the sea gate of Singapore, then back up the west coast to Phuket.
We’ve been having some trouble with Internet access the last couple of days, which isn’t a big deal for us (I just have to post my blog entries late), but it is causing an issue with all of the people getting off after segment 3 in Singapore on Thursday (who need to get checked in for their flights, etc.). No idea when it will be back up, but I guess since you’re reading this, I either: a) got access on the ship; or b) got off in Singapore to send it from a wifi hotspot. [I am adding to this blog post in Singapore—they finally fixed the Internet connection today in Singapore, so sending from the ship]
So remember the calculation in an earlier blog posting about how many days this cruise actually takes? Originally, the math got kinda funny because we lose a day (at the International Dateline) and we gain back a part of a day due to the clock changes. So I just put together a spreadsheet calculating how much Internet time I had available per day for the rest of the cruise. But then I ran it out to Apr 30 (last day of the cruise) and then wanted to double-check my “Day XX” on each day’s posting to see if it’s correct. And I found out that we’re not onboard 107 days, we’re onboard 109. Or 108. If you count each day inclusively (so Jan 13 to Jan 14 would be two days), it is 109 days. If you count each day exclusively (so Jan 13 to Jan 14 would be one day), it is 108 days. So I guess they get 107 days by not counting the “lost” day along the way? Anyway, we are onboard the entire month of February, March and April (we get off on the 30th, so I guess that’s a partial day), so that’s 90 days (29+31+30) and we are onboard in January on the 13th (so either 18 or 19 days, depending on inclusive/exclusive). So my last blog post for the cruise will read “Day 109” if I’m doing my calculations correctly? So, to get more precise, we left at 4p Fort Lauderdale time on Jan 17th and will arrive at 7a Venice time on Apr 30, which would be 10p Apr 29 Fort Lauderdale time. So the cruise duration is 107 days and 6 hours, to be precise. So I guess that’s why they call it 107 days. But my blog will have 109 daily entries. Confused? So am I. But less confused than when I did the spreadsheet (I was sure I had an error somewhere and manually went through each line of the spreadsheet counting the days).
Trivia was pretty tough this morning, we only got 7 out of 20, winning team got 12. Here are the questions we missed: A cast is a group of what animals? Falcons (we said penguins). Which animal can go longer than a camel without water? Rat (we said ostrich). What continent is South Georgia? South America (we said Asia). What is the longest song to reach #1? I would do anything for love (we said American Pie). What is the name of John Lennon’s first girlfriend? Thelma Pickles (we said Yoko Ono). What is the top-selling single of all time? Candle in the Wind (we said White Christmas). What was the last province to join Canada? Newfoundland (we said Labrador). What was the name of Hitler’s dog? Blondie (we said Wagner). What country’s civil war was known as the Onin War? Japan (we said Spain). Rod Stewart was a member of which band before going solo? Steam Packet (we said Strawberry Alarm Clock). What language is commonly used to train police dogs? German (we said sign language). What animal can walk underwater? Armadillo (we said tiger). What is used to make camel hair brushes? Squirrel hair (we said boar’s hair). Some of the tough questions we got: Where was Marco Polo born? Venice, Italy. Queen Elizabeth has four dogs of this breed. Corgi. How many furlongs in a mile? 8.
Trivia in the afternoon we got 15 (really 16) out of 20, winning team got 18. The questions we missed included: Who is the Duchess of Cornwall? Chelsea’s answer sheet said “Prince Charles” which was clearly wrong, but that’s what she said was the correct answer (sorry to all my loyal British readers out there), we had Camilla Parker Bowles. What exercise machine was used for prisoner reform in the 18th and 19th century? Treadmill (we put bicycle). What profession were the first female flight attendants? Nurses (we put waitresses). What treat is called dairy floss? Cotton candy (we heard “tree” instead of “treat” and put willow). Who was the first Japanese position player other than a pitcher to play in Major League Baseball? Ichiro Suzuki (we put Hidiki Osui). Other interesting questions: What classic dog name comes from the Latin word for faithful? Fido. What is the more common term for Hypertext Markup Language? HTML. Yanaguni formation, which experts debate is either a sunken city or rock formation, is in which country? Japan. What is considered to be the ancient birthplace of the wheel and a B52s song? Mesopotamia. What is the northernmost capital in the world? Reykjavik. How many voyages did Columbus make to the Caribbean? 4. What was the first building in the world over 100 stories? Empire State Building.
Here is the cruise summary of the last 31 days (segment 3):
Sydney to Cairns – 1250 nautical miles – 15.4 knots
Cairns to Guam – 2153 nautical miles – 16.4 knots
Guam to Iwo Jima – 698 nautical miles – 17.9 knots
Iwo Jima to Tokyo – 634 nautical miles – 16.0 knots
Tokyo to Hiroshima – 444 nautical miles – 18.1 knots
Hiroshima to Busan – 214 nautical miles – 14.0 knots
Busan to Shanghai – 418 nautical miles – 13.6 knots
Shanghai to Hong Kong – 787 nautical miles – 15.7 knots
Hong Kong to Phu My – 913 nautical miles – 15.3 knots
Phu My to Laem Chabang – 606 nautical miles – 17.4 knots
Laem Chabang to Singapore – 803 nautical miles – 14.3 knots
Total distance Sydney to Singapore = 8,920 nautical miles = 10,258 statute miles = 16,519 kilometers.
Tonight’s entertainment was the Pacific Princess World Cruise Choir:
Lorraine got a solo of sorts on the song “I can do anything better than you” and everyone is supposed to look at her while she holds a note longer than everyone else:
…and then everyone had a nice laugh:
Some of the other songs included Somewhere Over the Rainbow, I Believe, Climb Every Mountain, Any Dream Will Do and You’ll Never Walk Alone.
Tomorrow is Singapore. Krissie and I are going to take the metro around the city to Chinatown, Little India and Orchard Road, maybe also go to the Singapore Botanical Gardens and the National Orchid Garden.
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