Sailing South. Tuesday, February 5

Sea day.  Lots of organized activities on the ship.  Parka exchange.  Beginner’s bridge lesson.  Port talk — seemed mainly to sell excursions.  Team trivia — my team won this round!  Talk about whales — boring.  Very interesting talk about penguins.  Kayaking orientation.  Distinctive Journeys cocktail reception.  Captain’s welcome.  Formal night.  Dinner at the Chief Purser’s table.  I hope I didn’t forget anything!

·        Get up my normal 1 hour after mjp.  The ships chat app hasn’t been helpful so far.  The ship doesn't really tell people of this possibility -- we'd only gotten it because I overheard someone at guest services talking about it.

·        Find coffee (more difficult than it should be) and sit at pool drinking it

·        Whale lecture in afternoon – boring.

·        Lunch at pool. Who can serve me please?!?!?  Food perfectly fine.  But clearly this is the start of unimpressive service.

·        Desserts have NOT been that special but I keep eating them.  Need to cut back for sure…

·        11am lecture about Stanley and Ushuaia.  Sit through half just because Ushuaia is 10 days from now.  I don’t need to hear.

·        Quick nap.  MJP goes to penguin lecture and I stay in bed/finish first book

·        Go to “get acquainted” with kayaks demo and practice getting in/out.  They hope to have you do it from land but teach zodiac entry/exit. I’m concerned it will be difficult but Robert’s rote answer is “you did fine”.  Discover that you do it in scuba dry suits!  Decide to sign up for more than one but are now on wait list

·        “Distinctive Voyages” cocktail party. Michael and the rest from Asheville.  Not impressive.  We split rather than plan dinner with them.  Mostly because they’re an integral group.  Captain’s reception then dinner with chief purser Julian who talks about his male partner and living in JoBerg.  We wonder if it is Nic Botha but can never figure out.  Julian talks about wanting to go into cruise sales to avoid management conflict with his partner as their careers advance.