DAY 50 Mar 3 - Sea Day Southern Atlantic Ocean

The good news is that it appears that overnight our a/c system worked as we both slept well and the room was coolish, but we are still keeping fingers crossed as temperatures sore today.

It's another beautiful day with the additional bonus of a a calm sea.

As we approach the equator we notice that the sunrise is getting earlier and earlier. Today it was 5.30, half an hour before I went up for my first coffee of the day.

From the Lido restaurant terrace the lower aft deck and pool area were looking very inviting indeed even at this early hour of the morning. It never actually becomes too busy down here during the day and there is always a good availability of loungers.

I suspect the two HOT tubs are a bit redundant at the moment and probably will remain so for the next two weeks!

Maria slept in until 8.30 before sorting out the laundry that had just been returned to the cabin by Deden. Another batch would be going out today, as we tend to wear and change clothes more frequently in the current climate.

By ten o'clock we were sunning ourselves by the pool, Maria, with her book, and me with headphone in my ears. I was enjoying a heart stirring selection from those two masters, Rachmaninov and Tchaikovsky, coupled with a few other 'show' pieces from the classics.

It really doesn't get much better than that and I do commend an hour or two of this particular musical selection to anyone who does want to have their spirits lifted to a new plain.

Rather than tempt providence we departed the pool after a couple of hours.

On our return to the cabin we were mortified to find that the a/c was not working properly and things had not improved.

A phone call to the every present concierge lady, Nancy, informed us that she had indeed been to our room to check temperatures there. She was also mortified, it would appear, with the prospect of having to face us once again on the issue of a hot cabin.

Her temperature readings this morning had been 73 degrees over the wall fan outlet and 77 degrees by the bed. Unacceptable in any language!

Once again the engineers were being summoned, she said. We requested that the portable fan be returned which had prematurely been removed earlier from the cabin.

Maria escaped to the balcony where there was a cooling breeze and where fortunately the sun had not yet appeared, so it offered a pleasant corner to sit in.

By keeping our cabin door open we benefited considerably from the cooling air in the corridor.

Deden, always sympathetic with our plight, told us that only us and one other cabin on our deck and on the port side had this same overheating problem. Small consolation that was!!

We noticed that there is a fair amount of coastal traffic now as we head towards our next port of call, Recife. This is a reasonably well populated coastline, it would appear from looking at the map, with lots of small ports around.

Our ship continued cruising close to the Brazilian coast and for a good part of the night lights could be seen on the coastline.

However by mid-morning land had vanished from the horizon. The Captain has just informed us that we are traveling 23 nautical miles from the coast and we have a depth of 7,000 feet under the keel. He added that the temperature is currently 30C or 86F and there is a comfortable sea breeze making it all quite bearable.

Our sunbathing exploits today did in fact leave us a little bit burnt so we will definitely have to watch it over the next week or so.

Before adjourning to the Crow’s Nest bar for a cocktail before dinner we watched a glorious sunset on the horizon. The last ten minutes of the evening sun were quite mesmerizing and hopefully this will be the first of many such sunsets to come.

George and Rosalyn, Robin and Jennifer very kindly invited us to be their guests in the Pinnacle Grill tonight. It wasn’t any night there it was an Indian Curry night with all seating to commence at 7.00 pm.

Once all assembled we were shown to an excellent table in a little alcove off the main dining room.

A specially prepared menu was presented to us. Very soon after that a typical four course Indian meal was graciously served.

As can be imagined the table sparkled with good conversation and even the odd little bit of gossip no less. It was close to 10.00 o’clock when we left our Canadian hosts after having a very enjoyable evening in their company.

Immediately prior to us leaving for dinner the a/c people arrived in the cabin and again tinkered with the system.

On our return from dinner there was voice mail awaiting us on the phone. Nancy had been up taking temperature readings again and noted a good improvement and hoped that we were satisfied. She suggested that we hang onto the fan for the time being.

Well done concierge Nancy for keeping an eye on this problem for us and ensuring we were regularly updated on developments.