Valparaiso

Beautiful sunny day with perfect temperature and no wind, it could not be better. Ken and I spent several days here pre-cruise on Koala and also have visited the port before. So we were lazy this morning and did not go on a tour.

We were amazed watching six huge and four smaller fully loaded containers were on the dock. They have been unloading these containers since early morning and are still working at 3.00 pm with still a lot of containers left to unload. What a chore it must be to store the supplies once they are all onboard. First time I have seen this much activity on loading a ship. Probably happens all the time just not seen it so clearly before. Ken swears he saw fresh berries being loaded – good news although they have been plentiful on the ship and available whenever I asked.

I realized I have not mentioned the food that has been really excellent so far. Prime 7 last night with Jan and Fred was wonderful and there is a great lobster dish in La Verandah with three tails. For the welcome aboard dinner in compass rose I had a lobster tail in a light sauce as an appetizer and beef wellington for a main, a fantastic dinner. The Signature’s menu has changed dramatically and I have not been yet but the reports back have been excellent. Tonight I see a Chilean Salmon and New Zealand Leg of Lamb on the menu we will be eating with Jerry and Peggy so good company too!

The wines too have been really good, far better than on my last few trips. I am now really only a red wine drinker so cannot comment on the white wines, Ken said they are good. The Peter Lehman Australian Shiraz was excellent and last night in Prime 7 I had a 2002 Arrowood Cabernet Sauvignon.

There are quite a few new crew members and still the service has been fine. I had a small issue the other day when I forgot to order a hollandaise sauce in Compass Rose at lunch. This was my fault that I did not think of it when I ordered initially. I asked another waiter if I could get some hollandaise sauce but it did not arrive. I was not worried about this the lemon on the fish was fantastic and I really totally forgot about it. Later that night a waiter came up to me in Prime 7 and apologized for not getting that back to me before I finished my fish. I would never have recognized him as the waiter that did not bring the sauce and he was so apologetic and honest about it I was quite touched. You could tell it upset him not to deliver that to me as asked.

After lunch we went into town to walk around but there was not much of interest. This is a great port but you really need to do a tour here. We did see Eugene and Gail downstairs and they said their morning tour was terrific and they were headed to Vina Del Mar this afternoon.

So going to work a little this afternoon and then see if we can do better at trivia today. If we had not changed answers yesterday we would have won – good news is Peggy’s group won so that made me happy.

Ngaire