Fall Waning Autumn Moon

NB  internet is slow onboard and expensive.  I’m dispensing with titles and have no capacity to edit photos right now.

Card on the pillow last night: a gentle reminder that the ship’s clocks will be set BACK an hour at 2 am. We’ve sailed west enough now to reenter the Central Time Zone. I have no idea why it was a gentle reminder? Is there a harsh one coming if we don’t comply? Odd.

Each night our cabin steward folds a towel into an animal shape complete with paper eyes. I’m not sure why he does this. I do like the piece of chocolate.

This morning we listened to a briefing on ports and excursions available through Valparaiso, Chile. One I”m looking forward to especially is the Cerro Tololo observatory, one of many in the Andes in Chile.

Today the ocean, rather the Caribbean Sea, has little surface disturbance, gentle ripples as far as the earth’s curvature. A light breeze blows along the deck, a light slight scent of salty water and a warm, not hot temperature makes it a perfect time for sitting in our deck chairs, reading, writing, relaxing. Kate’s knitting, a scarf for me for the cooler parts of our trip.

As we spend more time out here, certain people show up regularly, deck walkers doing a series of laps around the ¼ mile deck. Some walk with sneakers, arms pumping, folks who walk regularly elsewhere, others walk with a grim look as if their doctors have said, “Walk. You have to at leasts walk.” And so they do.

There’s the Australian couple, he in black and she in mauve, who walk at a brisk pace, sometimes doing multiple turns, perhaps 8. An older woman, dressed in a nice blouse, expensive sun glasses, wind pants and sneakers strides along a happy look on her face. A few walk at a pace that could be barely be called moving, strides so slow and deliberate that each movement seems considered.

I do my own walking, too, at a much faster pace than any of these, but early in the day, 6 laps this morning, 8 each day.

I’m writing this sitting on one of our deck chairs, the sound of the ocean laps against the hull, the thrum of the Veendam’s huge engines a constant low-pitched noise. Not a bad way to spend a morning.