Our first day at sea was highlighted by the eclipse that occurred on April 8, 2024: it started at 2:15 pm and lasted for over an hour. Although it was only partial from our location, we were able to see it thanks to glasses borrowed from other passengers.
Our route passed through the Bermuda Triangle, an area roughly bounded by Miami, Bermuda, and Puerto Rico, also known as the Devil’s Triangle. This is a mythical zone where ships, planes, and people have mysteriously disappeared. Theories of supernatural causes have been developed for these disappearances but geophysical and environmental factors (like rogue waves) are most likely responsible. However, we definitely realized that it was important to follow navigation channels around Bermuda to avoid crashing in the many coral reefs surrounding the archipelago.
What is unique with Nieuw Statendam is that it is a floating art museum; about 50 modern pieces are displayed on the staircases of the 11 decks and on all 3 elevator banks. From collage and mixed media to photography and sculpture, the art might have been purchased from artists featured in world’s famous shows such as Art Basel.
One artist using feathers to create portraits was on display at the Art Palm Beach we visited last January. That makes your climbing the stairs more enjoyable!
We have been fortunate this year as the weather has been very calm during the first 8 days. No rough seas like in 2023. Mornings are foggy as we approach Europe and temperatures are in the 57 degrees Farhenheit (14 degrees Celcius) so we are bundling up for our morning walks on the Promenade Deck; but it usually clears up in the afternoon.
We have been using the gym frequently to burn the calories of our evening desserts. Additionally, I continued my “cruise challenge” of not using elevators at all during the entire journey and logging at least 10,000 steps each day.
Conferences and talks seemed to be focusing on Scandinavia this year, which reinforced our interest to visit our friends Helen and Stefan in Sweden soon.
We were disappointed that Holland America did not include any classical music into its programing as we enjoyed the afternoon’s concerts of previous cruises.
So reading, playing cards and chess as well as blogging did occupy our afternoons.
One morning, we were welcomed at breakfast by dozens of strange animals on deck 9 around the Lido Pool. See by yourself!
We also enjoyed attending the session about life behind the scene aboard our ship and how the crew makes it all happen.
We are 2565 guests and 967 crew on this cruise and a fun fact is that we are using 6 times less water when we flush the toilet here on board compared to a standard home. Our drinking water is also totally produced on the ship from sea water using a condensation process.
As always, we have been enjoying our evening diners at 7:15 pm in the Main Dining Room where the food is excellent, followed by a show at 9 pm on the impressive multimedia World Stage. A Dancing Company, Canadian Comedian Mike Delamont, magician Lain Shaw and the Roundaroud Kids band entertained us during the crossing.
We have been also moving our clock by an hour almost every day at sea and will be on European time zone when we arrive. So no jet lag is always a bonus when traveling.
Our cruising speed varied between 15 and 19 knots during the past few days and the ocean has been covered with white tips as we sailed over our last 200 nautical miles.
It’s our last day at sea before we set foot in Ireland tomorrow!
Time to smell the roses...Sur les Chemins du Monde... 