Thursday

Hello! I want to first of all let you know that I posted a second blog yesterday -- not an edit to the first, but a second one (KCL is the only one who would care about that distinction, I think), but it has not appeared. I tried posting it again, but it still won't appear. That's happened to me once before, and the thing eventually appeared, in its proper chronological spot, long after I'd given up on it and blogged onward, so maybe that will happen this time. In any case, I can't remember a thing I said, so we'll have to hope so.

So, today. A nice busy one. It started early as we had to be on the tender to Bah Habah for our tour by 7:45 a.m. BH is a tiny place, only 5,000 year-round residents, but very pretty and right next to a beautiful national park. Our 2 1/2-hour tour took us around this park (whose name escapes me at the moment), stopping for little wanders at various scenic and woodsy places, including 1500 feet up atop Cadillac Mountain. That was kind of cool because we could look down at the Grand Princess far below, a little toy boat anchored in a pretty little bay. It was nice to do a nature-type tour after all these big cities. Ms K came with us on this tour, but intrepid TL went sea kayaking! (His muscles may have something to say about that tomorrow morning!)

The afternoon was all about games. TL made the grave tactical error of taking me on at Scrabble and then thought he could regain his self-esteem at shuffleboard but Ms K and I beat the guys at that, too. I finally got in on the 3:30 milk and cookies in the Conservatory (the upper level area above the covered pool). This guy travels around with a great tank of milk on his back and a hip container of paper cups, and dispenses milk from a hose! Cookie o' day was chocolate fudge. Yummy! Then it was time for today's late-afternoon trivia competition, which is immensely popular on this ship. We didn't win today!

French night at dinner. I had -- well, I think probably most of you can guess what my appetizer was. Yes, of course escargot. Then a pumpkin-turnip soup which I'm sure to some of you sounds vile, but was delicious. Then duck a l'orange. Then creme brulee. Rob had french onion soup, a salad, roast pork, and cheesecake.

I'm sorry. I'm a little distracted. There's a guy in the bar outside the internet cafe singing Hey, Jude at the top of his lungs. He is not an entertainer aboard this ship. And I use the term "singing" extremely loosely.

Okay. Now, the trivia is, as I said, popular on this ship, but it's nothing compared to the production shows. I arrived very early for the one last night because I like to get a good seat. I just take my book along and read while I'm waiting. The large theatre was already 1/2 full when I got there, 45 minutes ahead of time, and by 30 minutes before curtain, was packed to standing room only. I have never seen this before. In the past, 20 minutes ahead of time was always enough to get a decent seat. They did a different show tonight (unusual to have production shows on two consecutive nights!) and I scampered there immediately upon finishing dinner -- about 7:30 p.m. The show started at 8:45. The theatre was 1/4 full already, and SRO by 8:00. This is ridiculous!! I am clearly far from the only fan of this sort of entertainment aboard this ship, and the theatre is clearly not big enough! RH joined me for that show, a rock and roll retrospective featuring two of the singers doing an uncannily bang-on imitation of Sonny and Cher. TL and Ms K chose to see a comedian instead. Haven't seen them since it ended, so don't know how good he was.

I think the Hey Jude fellow may have been carted off. It's gone very quiet.

Anyway, that's it for today. I hope the blog with the rest of yesterday's info turns up soon.

Tomorrow -- St. John. The information booklet delivered to our room about this city advises us, among many other things, that Fredericton is the capital of St. John. Hmmm. We aren't doing a tour there -- kind of tired, by now, of getting up and boarding a bus. We'll just do our own thing.