Inca Empire Cruise - Day 21 Sea Day

Bad news this morning, after a rough night of coughing, Val felt worse today.  One good thing is she got an extra hour of sleep last night as we are headed back northwest and so the clocks were set back an hour.  We also crossed the equator for the second time on the trip during the night, this time headed north. 

We had our usual breakfast and then went to hear guest lecturer, Tommie Sue Montgomery talk about the history of Costa Rica which was very interesting.  Unfortunately for Val, she felt her coughing might be bothering other people so she left early.  From what I heard though, there were a lot of people coughing so I think a cold may be circulating around the ship.

After the talk, I decided to attend the King Neptune Ceremony where members of the crew who have never crossed the equator are initiated.  It is kind of hokey, but fun.

The King Neptune ceremony takes place at the Sea View Pool.

First, the crimes of those to be initiated are read by King Neptune.

Then they must kiss the fish.

Then doused with some unpleasant looking gooey substance.

The captain and officers pass judgement.

And in the end they all take a plunge into the pool.  Needless to say, after the ceremony the Sea View Pool is closed for the day for cleaning.

After the ceremony I returned to the room and spent some time updating the blog while Val rested.  She decided that she was tired of lying around and despite not feeling well, decided to go to trivia.  After trivia we went to lunch and then it was back to the room.

At 4:00 we attended a talk by Location Guide Kainoa on the upcoming ports of Nicaragua and Guatemala.  After that we walked around the ship for a bit and then returned to the room.  Val was feeling a little better so we did our usual dinner routine.  After dinner it was back to the casino where I had my third straight night of winning plus they had a promotion where they picked out someone who was playing and gave out a prize and I won one of them.  It wasn’t much of a prize (a hat, a deck of cards and some drink coupons), but it was nice to win something for a change.

Tomorrow we would be arriving in Puerto Caldera, Costa Rica and have a tour planned that left right at 9:00 when the ship docked so we had to get up a little early.