Our flight to Los Angeles was uneventful (just the way we like it). We flew in a day before our cruise departed cause flying in the same day makes me nervous. It would be just our luck that our flight would be delayed, or our luggage would get lost. Murphy’s law in action. No fun waving from the shore to our fellow passengers who were smart enough to get there a day early. And although I do work out regularly at the gym on the rowing machine, I’d be no match for a 32,346 ton cruise ship, even if I could find a row boat. Row faster, Jeff, faster!
So we no sooner leave the port of LA when the Captain makes an announcement that our first stop will be Huntington Beach, CA. Huh? Our first port was supposed to be Honolulu. We need to spend about 8 hours in Huntington Beach he says, to have our bottom cleaned.
I tried not to take offense. There’s nothing wrong with my personal hygiene and I arrived with a clean bottom, thank you very much. But El Capitan went on to explain New Zealand has a new, very strict requirement that the bottom of a cruise ship has to be scrubbed and free of weeds, barnacles, and other alien species before entering NZ waters.
This bottom cleaning, which in more polite terms is called hull polishing, takes many hours and must be done within 30 days of arriving in NZ. But it will take us 34 days to reach Auckland. So they started the process of cleaning in San Francisco, did some more in Huntington Beach, and will finish the job in Hawaii. Divers have to get in the water and scrub the bottom of the hull and the Captain has to produce photographic evidence. Apparently barnacles and mollusks grow fast when attached to the hull. I am expecting that we will see mussels on the menu shortly before we reach New Zealand. Hey, waste not, want not.
Oh and one more thing. It costs about $50,000 to do this cleaning. So this new law might keep some cruise ships from going to NZ. But on the positive side, we’ll get better fuel mileage with a clean bottom. Less drag when you’re clean as a baby’s behind.
The Captain held a Q&A session this morning and talked about the big mass of floating rubbish in the Pacific. In nautical terms that’s flotsam and jetsam. This can be found where the currents bring large quantities of seaweed together. This then provides a place for plastic water bottles, oil cans, and other debris discarded by numerous nations to take hold. The mass of this garbage patch in the Pacific is about twice the size of Texas. We won’t see it on this trip as we’ll be passing about 700 miles south of it. It could be cleaned up, but at a great cost which no nation has stepped up to pay. Rubbish, I say, rubbish.
Someone asked the captain what keeps him awake at night. He said, the cost of putting his two kids through college. But when pressed for a more nautical answer he said being in port in a harbor when a tsunami hits. The ship would pop out of the water like a cork and end up somewhere inland. I was trying to picture the insurance claim on that one. Captain to insurance adjuster, “We’ll there I was minding my own business, tied up to the pier, when this big wave came along and the next thing I knew my ship was in someone’s back yard.” Does that come out of the Captain’s salary?
So today is our fourth full day at sea. That means 12 big meals, plus the two we ate on embarkation day, plus hourly snacks. Now we’re not talking fat free yogurt for breakfast, a salad for lunch and skinless chicken breast with asparagus spears for dinner. We’re talking full fat yogurt with fried eggs and bacon with hash browns for breakfast, grilled paninis with French fries and ice cream sundaes for lunch. And dinner... well don’t even get me going. My fingers can’t type that many words. Let’s just say that for our fellow passengers who want to do some whale watching, they need look no further than at me sitting by the pool.
They have a fully equipped gym on board with the most modern exercise equipment. I know this because I looked at it. I really did look at it. One of these days I might actually turn on the treadmill machine. And then walk away from it before someone suggests that I step on it.
There’s always tomorrow. The exercise equipment will still be there... dormant. And I will still be eating as if I had been chosen for the centerfold in Whale Watchers magazine.
