Pat and Norm's World Cruises and other adventures

December 21

Day 167.  I usually don’t refer to the “day” of the 180 day adventure, but sadly, we are winding down, less than 2 weeks left.  Funny, in the past I have thought a 2 week vacation was long!  But this feels like home and it will be sad to leave.

First, I want to post a picture sent to me by a fellow cruiser.  This is one where the children at the school in Gambia were delightedly looking at their pictures on my iphone.

Another funny story – one of the women on this excursion saw me using the selfie stick (which I used mostly NOT for selfies, but it was convenient to hold the iphone that way). She thought I must have been very vain, taking all those selfies.  As I was taking a picture at lunch, she asked me about it and told me what she thought.  She never had an iphone or a selfie stick so was then quite interested!

We have had 2 evenings of really great entertainment on board.  Mike Sterling was the first one – he is a singer that has performed in London’s West End – over 1000 performances as the Phantom in Phantom of the Opera and also as Valjean in Les Miserables. What a wonderful performance.

Last night we had a group called 4ever, a group that is like Il Divo.  Two of the men are from Spain, one from Italy and one from Uruguay. They were just spectacular.  Luckily we will hear both again before they leave the ship in Barbados.

Tonight they are showing the movie “White Christmas” and there are lots of other Christmas celebrations coming up.

Well, I entered my first ever Texas hold ’em tournament.  I watched a few and was encouraged by all the men to enter (you read that right, no women have entered).  So I lost in the very first round.  I had a Queen high flush and another guy kept betting, so I stayed in and it took all my chips.  Turned out he had an ace high flush.  Will I enter again?  We’ll see!  In both blackjack and poker tournaments, you just pay the $35 entry fee so that’s all the money that is at risk.  I don’t know that I’d play using real money vs just the entry fee!

So now on to Cape Verde.  It was a delightful surprise.  The town of Mindelo was about a one mile walk from the pier, so we walked to town and explored. The official language here is Portuguese and there are also 2 Creole dialects and so far citizens have not come to a consensus on which should predominate.

Here’s how we were greeted!

Water is a real problem here on the island.  In fact after the island was discovered in 1462, it remained practically uninhabited and was used only as a cattle pasture due to the lack of water.  Now their economy is based on commerce and services not agriculture due to the same issues. This is a volcanic island with some high points. The climate here is really beautiful, average 74 degrees all year round.  It felt breezy and wonderful today.

A small island off the coast of Cape Verde – from our balcony

First we visited the Mercado de Paixe, the local fish market, near Praia de Bote where the boats come in.  You don’t see a lot of tourists here, but you do see the fishermen bring their catch to market, and lots of different fish for sale.  It was the cleanest fish market we have seen on our trip. And yes, Mario bought fresh tuna for dinner.

Tuna for dinner!

Next we went to the Praca Estrela marketplace where the West African merchants display wares ranging from handmade crafts to fine jewelry. And just across the street, the colorful fruit and vegetable market is a busy place. We met a man whose brother lives in Brooklyn and he gave us each a necklace with the shell they consider to be good luck – which he had made.  We bought a coconut shell necklace from him.

We saw the Governor’s Palace and loved the cobblestone streets, colonial buildings, cafes, etc.  The people were friendly and didn’t follow us around like in Senegal. Some vendors would take American dollars but it took a bit of convincing. They like euros or their local Cape Verde Escudo. Luckily I have my iphone currency converter which showed that one dollar is about 101 of their dollars.

For my yaya friends!

Their idea of Santa?

In the garden outside the Governor’s Palace

Liceu Ludgero Lima

Governor’s Palace

Before heading back to the ship, we stopped to listen to a concert that was being held the central square. Then we had a refreshment break at a cafe where Norm had a very strong coffee. They like it strong here. Oh, and they had free wifi so there were a lot of crew members there too.  All in all, a very pleasant way to leave Africa.

December 19

Day 165. still can’t believe it!

We took the shuttle bus into town today.  Dakar is the capital of Senegal and is the western most city in the Old World and on the African mainland.  We actually changed planes here when we came for our safari in 2011. It is a big port and the city has many French expatriates and in fact most local people also speak French. The country was under French rule for 3 centuries.  This is another poor country as are most of the West African countries.

We left the bus at Independence Square and visited the Kermal Market which sells mostly Muslim garb and lots of souvenir type merchandise.  We walked past the President’s Palace where we saw lots of armed guards and weren’t allowed to take pictures.

Fountain at Independence Square

Chamber of Commerce

In a garden across from the Presidential Palace

Huge tree with Africa inscriptions

BIG bird nest in this tree, loved watching them

almost up this long staircase near the Palace

Our main stop today was at the Institut Francais, which is a garden with lots of trees.  Our unexpected surprise was that there was a local craft exhibit and sale set up there.  We bought some gifts and several pieces of jewelry that I fell in love with! They wanted either local currency or euros and we only had dollars with us.  I do have a currency converter on my iPhone, so we knew the exchange rate.  After they thoroughly checked out our money, and with my high school French, we were able to pay for our purchases.  The women there had never seen American money. Guess they don’t deal with too many tourists. The items are all locally made and not from China as so much of the street vendor merchandise is.

There were also vendors set up outside the ship on the pier, here is Norm’s giraffe shirt.  When we got back on the ship, we probably could have charged for the info about where he got it, many people went out to buy one of these batik t-shirts!

We had lunch today with Andy, our cruise director, and Tammy, his wife and the social hostess on board.  They have lots of extra things to do on this leg of the cruise due to the Christmas holidays and all of the events going on, both for crew and for guests.  So we are looking forward to all that is yet to come.  We made plans with friends Marilyn and Charlie for Christmas dinner. The ship is even doing a midnight service on Christmas eve.  I will post about all of the events as they unfold.  No one wants to give too much information away ahead of time. They have one channel on the TV showing all the Christmas movies, and they also have one with that fireplace always on (that we can see at home!)

One thing they are doing is having an auction to benefit the crew fund.  You can bid on dinner with one of the senior staff, and many other things.  Guests can donate to this auction, and they recommend seeing if you bought something you now don’t want to bring home!  This auction will be on Christmas Day.

I also don’t think I posted about the ship’s doctor who sponsors 2 orphanages in Africa. We donated items that a crew team brought to the orphanage.  You get a new appreciation for what you have when you visit these countries.

It is so different to be on the ship for 6 months, it is really like a small village with all the characters you might expect.  And we really get to know the crew very well.  One of our favorite head waiters has a new baby boy that he will be seeing soon.  We bought a gift for his new son.  We also buy Portuguese pastries whenever we see them in port –  for another favorite head waiter who is from Portugal and he misses these pastries.

One more port in West Africa, Cape Verde.  We arrive there on Monday.