Last Full Day of Sailing To Our Hawaiian Destination ~~ March 3

LAST FULL DAY OF SAILING TO OUR HAWAIIAN DESTINATION ~~ March 3

6:00 a.m. Awake! It’s hard to think that it is 10:00 a.m. at home already. We will have adjustments to make when we get back home.

This is our last full day at sea before we reach Hilo on Friday morning. There’s nothing like a week at sea for relaxing by the pool, reading a book, browsing through the boutiques and taking part in a long list of organized activities that are listed in each day’s Princess Patter. As a passenger, you can stay on the go throughout the day and into the night or you can lay low and enjoy the quiet and beauty of sailing from your deck. That’s the beauty of “personal choice cruising.” We’ve done our share of interspersing activities with periods of being in our room and out on our balcony. We have really enjoyed the cruising portion of our trip to Hawaii.

FROM THE NAVIGATOR in Today’s Princess Patter:
Throughout the day on Wednesday, Golden Princess maintained her west south westerly track to reach our first port of call HILO on Friday.

THE NAUTICAL CHART
All of our courses are drawn in advance on nautical charts by the First Officer who is the ship’s navigator. One of the main duties of the officer of the watch on the bridge is to make sure that the ship is correctly following the track in use. A nautical chart is a representation on a plane, in a certain type of projection of portion of the spherical surface of the Earth, for the purpose of navigation. It is essentially a map of a sea area showing as well coastlines, rocks buoys, lighthouses and other prominent features, such as characteristics of all lights and depths of water. Currently, Golden Princess is navigating through the means of an ECDIS (Electronic Chart Display Information System): an approved digital system of self plotting charts that no longer require deck officers to fix the ship’s position on paper charts and facilitate the process of correcting them.

THURSDAY’S WEATHER FORECAST:
Temperature: 68
Sky: Partly Cloudy
Wind: ENE’ly (18 knots/21 mph)

OCEAN MOTION SICKNESS
We are so very thankful that we have not gotten sick as we have heard that several have gotten sick. We both had a headache on Tuesday evening so, just to be sure, we popped an early (drowsy) Dramamine (our usual night dose), a couple of Tylenol, stayed in, went to bed early, and have been fine ever since. The Ocean Motion is quite relaxing when sleeping and even when sitting but it can definitely make walking a straight line nearly impossible. You feel foolish, but “we’re all in the same boat” so to speak.

TODAY’S EVENTS
We plan to attend the customary lectures both morning and afternoon that we have attended all week and have so much enjoyed. There is an Illusionist on board that we haven’t seen yet so maybe we can catch some of his show. The “Street Entertainment” today will be provided by the “Golden Princess Singers” at 4:00 so perhaps we can enjoy seeing/hearing them this afternoon. There is a class to learn to do the HULA today but somehow, I don’t think I’ll bother with that one.

8:00 a.m. We are back from a delicious breakfast. I had a bowl of oatmeal, a bran muffin, and an assortment of fresh fruits. It was a healthy and very yummy breakfast. We are now back in our room to get ready to go to today’s 9:00 a.m. lecture by John Maxtone-Graham. It is session III of his book, “The Only Way to Cross.” It has been a fascinating lecture series.

We will sit tight when he is finished at 10:00 so we can hear the “port talk” with today’s focus on “Maui” which will be our last port stop and will take place on Monday. After that, we are open until lunchtime unless we decide we want to go play trivia challenge, participate in a basketball free throw competition, attend a designer watch event, play BUNCO, go to a bridge lecture, play jackpot bingo with the kitty up to $2,200, attend a ukulele class, go the bar and learn how to make mixed drinks (for sure NOT!), play charades with musical melodies, go to the rum tasting and raffle event (NOT!), or enjoy relaxing Hawaiian melodies out in the sun on deck around the pool. (Now that sounds like a possibility!) After all of those possibilities (10:00 through 12:30) it will be lunchtime…. And I didn’t even mention sitting out on our private balcony! Life is rough out here on the open sea!

We hope you all are having a great day stateside!!