April 24, At Sea

Friday, April 24 - Day 81 - At Sea
Sun rise is at 7:21AM, but it is still very dark. It rained off and on all night, still looks like rain, and is very humid this morning another day of air you can wear. This is to be expected though since we are right at the Equator and will actually cross the yellow line at 1PM. Today we are still sailing northwesterly and will pass some 650 nautical miles west of the Gulf of Guinea.

We go to breakfast at the usual time. Then walk along the promenade deck to the forward elevators. It seems much shorter than taking the aft elevators and walking forward to the room on our deck! Guess it is having something to look at that makes it seem shorter. Our fitbits tell us it is about 800-900 steps for the return trip.

There are three talks today, but they don’t appeal to us. Carolyn is well into the books she got yesterday from the library and Dick has found a book on the Boers that he is enjoying so we plan to read in the room today.

The crossing ceremony is at 12:15PM today so Carolyn goes to get some pictures. She does this one time for each of the ships we have been on. Being high noon and within 45 minutes of the actually crossing it is bloody hot, humid and a burning bright sun! Fortunately it is short and sweet. Back in the room we take Jack out to see the yellow line and to feel the bump as we cross at 1PM. The Captain blows the horn to celebrate the event. The Queen Mary has several horn sounds and he blows the whole range as we cross....neat. We order a sandwich from room service for lunch today.

The rest of the afternoon passes by as we read and nap....what a life! It is another informal night to night, we prefer this to formal. The menu doesn’t appeal to much to Carolyn so she has a fruit plate as a starter and the tempura shrimp part of another "always available" starter as a main course with a baked potato. Our waiter now asks if we want a potato with all the trimmings since we have asked for this most nights. Dick has an Indian dish and we both have cherries jubilee done table side for dessert. Sunset is at 7:24PM and we do our evening walk in the twilight for the first time.