Day 19 - Tue Mar 6, 2018 Day 2 At Sea Sailing Toward Fiji - Crystal Symphony - Sydney to Tahiti

Day 19 – At Sea en route to Lautoka, Fiji – Tues, Mar 6, 2018

Another glorious sea day.  They have really changed up the activities for the day.  It was a very busy day for us.  We started with the Cooking Demonstration with Guest Chef John Ashton.  He is quite a dynamic character and we really enjoyed the Chicken and Fish Tacos demo.  Although, not all went well with the demo (the fry pan and deep fat fryer not preheated when he put the food in), John Ashton is so quick witted that he turned it into comedy.  With Mexican food being Bob’s favorite, he was also quite interested.  They handed out the recipe cards as well, so we can try to recreate them when we get home.

Good news is, the Tacos were offered for lunch in both The Waterside and The Marketplace (it's Taco Tuesday!!).  We chose to eat lunch in the Waterside – with a Smoked Salmon Quesadilla Appetizer and the Chicken Tacos.  Bob probably doesn’t want this told, but he ordered a second serving of the Chicken Tacos and ended up eating 3.5 of them! Bob was in heaven!!!!

The ship is sailing with about 720 passengers this segment.  Because it isn’t full, they were able to offer a “Stateroom Open House.”  It was nice to see other classes of cabins, particularly the ones recently renovated in the fall dry dock.  Here are some pics of the newly added Seabreeze Penthouse Suites (491 sq ft).  Unfortunately no pic of the walk in closet.  They are quite nice.

The lectures today included:

• “Inside CNN-Understanding TV News in a Changing Media World” by Special Interest Lecturer Richard Roth, who is a CNN longtime correspondent who took us behind the scenes from the start up to the wacky world now.
•  “Wild Jewels” Enrichment Lecture by Amy Cronhelm, focusing mostly on the jewels of NZ.
• “Beauty of Lautoka & Charm of Yasawa-i-Rara” by Laureli Blyth sharing interesting stories about the charm and beauty of these islands that we are soon to visit.  The people on these islands are a mix of Melanesian, Chinese, Indian and SE Asians.  Orchids and spices are cultivated here, and the famous Fijian Water.  Yasawa-i-Rara was one of the places where the ancient ritual of cannibalism took place.

We enjoyed another Magic Castle performance.  Joe Turner joined the ship in Auckland, so it was a totally different show than the one last segment.  He is a mentalist and sleight-of-hand magician.  His performance was amazing – both the mentalist portion and the sleight-of-hand tricks. We are still blown away by his skill.

Next we headed over to the Hollywood Theater for the 2:30pm showing of the movie “Big Eyes” about the awakening of painter Margaret Keane, her phenomenal success in the 1950s, and the subsequent legal difficulties she had with her husband, who claimed credit for her works in the 1960s.

Pre-dinner we enjoyed drinks in The Silk Bar, and then had dinner in the Churrascaria.  We enjoyed a nice salad and the Brazilian cooked meats.  We chatted with the Ship’s Computer Instructor and his partner.  His partner has two family members that work for the same organization that Julie does – Intermountain Healthcare.  Small world.

The entertainment this evening was vocalist Alison Ward from Liverpool.  She performed on a world tour with the UK’s number 1 Abba tribute show, and most recently was given the lead role in a production in the Las Vegas.  The show was filled with variety – everything from the Beatles to Adele.

We walked 5.7 miles and took 13,586 steps.