Our final day at sea began leisurely, so we headed for the served breakfast in the Dining Room about 9am. Karen started the day properly with a Mimosa. I decided it was time to try the Corned Beef Hash, but as it was mixed with peppers it failed to meet my expectations. Nor did the Steel Cut Irish Oatmeal, which had been made with water and proved to be more endurance sport than breakfast.
It was then time to spend our onboard credit. Karen, however, was not in the mood for shopping and was distinctly grumpy, browsing only half-heartedly. In the end we decided to “waste” the credit on a couple of bamboo soft plain T-shirts for me. I would never normally spend that much money on a plain T-shirt, but nothing else caught our eye.
Karen’s mood improved once we secured the right table by the outside pool. I fetched a couple of mugs of tea and we then progressed to ordering smoothies and other cold drinks from the waiters.
I attempted to upload the latest blog but couldn’t get anywhere near logging in. At first I suspected a lack of bandwidth, but then correctly concluded it was due to restrictions on the ship’s Starlink WiFi as we were close enough to the coast of China to see towns passing by. Many websites such as Google are restricted in China. I spent ages trying, with no success. Hopefully everything would sort itself out once we reached Hong Kong.
Meanwhile, Karen sat contentedly reading her book, determined to finish it today — and pleasingly she did, before the afternoon was out.
Today had been designated Cake Day and just after noon we were surrounded by people eating enormous slices from the 140 cakes on offer. It was absolute cake frenzy. I waited an hour before getting Karen a slice of carrot cake, while I chose a very chocolatey salted caramel slice. Karen declared hers “average”, while mine was decidedly above average.
After this we returned to our cupboard, as Karen was keen to start packing. I again tried in vain to get WiFi access, finally conceding defeat when the streaming channels disappeared from the TV as well. My packing, meanwhile, took almost six minutes.
At 4pm, as arranged, we went to the Billboard Lounge to take part in Team Trivia again. This time Karen and I contributed more than half the points, and it could have been more had we not been overruled on one answer. Our team came a very close second. Lois, being Lois, went to quiz the winning team, who had also won the previous time we’d entered. It turned out they had spent over 400 nights cruising on Holland America ships and had encountered all the same questions before. We decided we were the moral victors, and Lois persuaded José the Cruise Director to award us stickers for being runners-up.
By now it was time to head back and change for dinner. I lost track of time, so we were later than planned heading out for pre-dinner drinks and a farewell dinner with Lois and Superman. They’d had the same idea, so we simply took our drinks into dinner with us.
Karen and I both had the Chicken Alfredo Linguine, which was very good. Amusingly, the ship had run out of all white wine, which I blamed entirely on Karen and Lois. They switched to bubbles instead. As it was the last night, tradition dictated that the departing waiters and kitchen staff sang a farewell song as they marched around the dining room, while we all waved our napkins over our heads. Lois decided our waiter wasn’t joining in enthusiastically enough and tried to get him to dance instead — which he eventually did, after some initial embarrassment.
The main topic of conversation, apart from Lois trying to persuade us to go deep into Alaska with them in the middle of winter, was that Chris had been randomly selected by the Chinese authorities to be ‘inspected’ before the ship would be cleared in Hong Kong. He had to present his credentials at 6am, meaning a very early start. We wondered just how thorough this probing might be.
After hurrying through dessert, we headed to the World Stage to watch the cast perform Celtic Spirit. Set in an Irish pub, it featured old favourites such as Galway Bay and Danny Boy. It was excellent, with energetic singers and dancers of a very high standard.
And so we said a sad farewell to Lois and Chris, as they needed to be up early. We do hope to see them again someday — in Norwich, Down Under, or on another adventure entirely.
Karen and I headed to the Piano Bar for one final cocktail. We sang heartily along to Keiji’s selections and enjoyed ourselves thoroughly but eventually called it a night. Back in our cupboard, we left our large suitcases outside the cabin door ready to be taken off the ship and into the terminal once we docked.
Our cruise was ending. We were sad it was over, but happy to have done it. Karen said she was just about ready for the next leg, and then home. In her mind though she is already counting down the days to her operation — to be free of pain and to walk normally again.
I still wouldn’t say we are “cruisers” as such… but we do enjoy the adventure.
