September 26, 2026 ~ At Sea

There is always a lot going on every day while on a cruise ship with a wide range of activities to choose from. They are quite good at offering a variety. Here are some examples of today’s options.

Want to get active? Besides the gym, there were classes offered in Zumba, Line dancing, and a 80’s Grooves dance class.

Improve your health? You can attend a lecture or class on Acupuncture for pain management, How to increase your metabolism, Better posture and alignment or Relieve back, neck & shoulder pain naturally.

Hair and beauty? I found these options – Master hair class, Look 10 years younger, Non-surgical facelift.

Enrichment? Coffee and chat with the officers, Destination talk on Tokyo, and a lecture on Bears and survival in the north.

Shopping? Besides the many shops that offer a wide range of products, there are usually some special discounts on offer. Inch of gold chains 50% off second item, Art auction, Men’s jewelry collection, Accessorize your medallions.

Arts and Crafts? How about Origami…

Throughout the day there are movies shown, Sudoku games, quiz shows and competitions, choir rehearsal, a raffle, bingo, a wide selection of musical entertainment, as well as several trivia competitions.

And this is just the “Tip of the Iceberg”. Sorry, pun intended, but true 😁

On Day #2 of our cruise, I asked my sister if she would do the Progressive Trivia and the Scavenger Hunt with me. Both will last the duration of the cruise.

The Progressive Trivia did not meet on our two port days, so as of this moment while I’m writing this post, we have had just had our 4th day of competition. Now here’s the deal…

1. Twenty questions get asked each day on a different topic.
2. Jan comes up with the answer
3. I write it down 😁

That formula worked quite well, and after day 1, Jan and I were in a three way tie for 1st place with 18 out of 20 correct answers.

We can have up to six people our team, so our husbands decided to join us for the second day of the contest. The topic of the day was Geography.

We dropped down a little and ended up in a tie for 4th place after day 2.

The next days category was entertainment. We did OK and managed to hang on to 4th place after day 3

Today the topic was History and we got 18 out of 20. Paco will give us our updated standings at our next meeting.

The other “game” we are participating in has to do with the 50 different nationalities of the 1300 crew members on board. This is all contained on a two sided sheet of paper. On the front side is a list of 42 countries. You keep the paper (and a pen) on you and as you roam around the ship, you either glance at the crew members name tag which includes what country they are from, or as I often do, simply ask them. If it is one of the blank spaces, they sign the form and include what department or position they have on the ship. Each of these signatures are worth 5 points.

On the other side of the form it gets a bit more difficult and is broken down into several sections including 18 countries with fewer crew members, 20 officers & departments heads and 6 from the activity team. These findings on the back are more valuable and worth extra points. This comes to a grand total of 86 people to track down and get to sign our paper. The forms with as many signatures as you are able to collect will be turned in on our last cruise day before arriving in Tokyo and a winner will be selected.

We have a good start. Our form is getting rather wrinkled after being carried around in my back pocket all day long.

I have no idea what, if any prize will be awarded to the winner of either of these contests, but we are having fun nonetheless and have started a few interesting conversations along the way.

Now for the last topic. Our captain advised us at our noon update that, in his words, the weather was deteriorating. He indicated that there are three storms approaching with a slight break between each one. We expect it to be rough cruising for the next two days, ease up for two, rough again for two, ease up for two and perhaps rough again our final day before arriving Tokyo.

Standard safety warnings were reviewed with reminders to use the handrails both on the stairs and in the hallways, don’t leave anything out on your balcony, and the little white paper bags you once found in the seat back pockets on airplanes have been strategically places around the ship, “Just in case needed”.

GRATITUDE MOMENT: Today I am so thankful that Tim and I are both good sailors and the motion does not bother us. My heart goes out to anyone who is affected.