Happy Birthday to You – At Sea on Saturday 8th August 2015
Disaster One – the ship has run out of premium beer – Boddingtons! It is not even premium at home, but in this environment it is the best they have. I am fed up with cocktails so this is a serious blow (I never thought I would say that about Boddies!). So from now on it is cans of Bass!!!!!
Disaster Two – we are now eight hours behind schedule and the weather forecast is awful. We are sailing into Force 8 Gales, some crew and passengers say higher, the sea is certainly very choppy with waves breaking over the pointed end and passengers not allowed to walk the decks for safety reasons. We are a small boat and in this weather trying to go full speed into the wind is no joke. People are dropping like flies with sea sickness, tables and chairs are moving around and a fair bit of glassware is getting smashed. Worst they have ever experienced say some people.
Latest estimate is arrival in Liverpool at about 4pm Sunday with disembarkation about 6pm, the ship is scheduled to sail off to Norway at 11pm so the crew will have a hectic time turning the ship around.
No sign of the rest of the gang for most of day as Kath and myself start packing suitcases and then pass the time catching up on reading, chatting and drinking with other passengers. It is very nerve racking for some passengers just walking around as they get bounced around with every roll of the ship, I notice a few staff members beginning to look less than confident. The waves are crashing over the side of the ship, bouncing against portholes with a noise which takes you by surprise. The whole ship shudders and shakes each time another wave hits us.
Provided you keep your thoughts away from the age of this ship or what these unpredictable vibration noises are doing, it is quite exciting in a weird sort of way. Bottom line though, why worry? – there will be a small trawler out there, somewhere, being bounced around far more severely, yet all we have to worry about is spilling our drinks – bottoms up and doubles all round!
Liz is equipped with ginger sweets to ward off sea sickness and as more passengers succumb, Paul and Liz feel like “dealers” as they dish them out to needy looking people.
Then a nice surprise from the captain – a bottle of wine and chocolate covered strawberries appeared in the cabin – happy birthday to Kath, compliments of the Captain.
We eventually all meet up in the restaurant for another celebratory meal, this time for Kaths birthday and notice the restaurant is only half full. Of course we make a scene of ourselves and sing “Happy Birthday” to Kath. Another good meal topped off with the staff delivering a squidgy birthday cake and also singing happy birthday, it was good fun. We cannot finish the cake and share it with other passengers.
It is a makeshift show tonight in the theatre, the dancers cannot perform on a moving stage, so they get the night off whilst the singers provide a melody of rock numbers – it was so cool and very good.
This boat seems to be on full throttle and struggling against the waves, we are being rocked severely from front to back whilst at the same time rolling precariously from side to side. I watched in horror as my pint slid across the table towards me, I just caught it in time but could not prevent a glass of wine smashing all over the chair.
On the way to the disco, we are accosted by a woman in her pyjamas, desperately searching the corridors for sea sickness bags. We do the right thing and find lots of them for her. We load her up with as many as she can carry (quite a lot as it turns out) and supply her with some ginger sweets and she staggers back towards her cabin – not on our floor thank goodness.
Unsurprisingly, the disco was a failure tonight but we still attended with about eight other people, we had one last bop to maintain our 100% record. Who would have thought we celebrated our 50th wedding anniversary and Kaths birthday with so many discos in so few days! If I never see another disco again it will be too soon!
Six Sail to Iceland 