Nothing exciting to report. We spend our days at lectures, watching a movie (the latest Lion King), hanging out, writing the blog, reading. It’s what sea days are all about.
We entered the Amazon River in the early morning hours of 12/1, so we didn’t get to see the actual sail in (which probably isn’t much). But when we wake up, we are definitely in the muddy waters of the Amazon with shorelines filled with trees, trees and more trees. We sail all morning long, arriving in Macapa for our “technical” stop about 2 hours late (which worries us for tomorrow in Santarem!). The technical stop is just for the Brazilian authorities to come inspect and clear the ship to sail up the Amazon, we don’t get off or anything, just sit here at anchor out in the river waiting for the process to be done.
The ship is finally cleared and we begin the journey up the Amazon a little after 2 – which is only an hour after the original schedule. However, one of the annoying things about this ship is there is little to no information about the navigation or what is happening outside our windows. The captain barely speaks. He gives his noon report like an robot: sea depth, sea temperature, lat/long, air temp, weather. Done. No navigation info, no estimated arrival times, no information about the Amazon, nothing. And Carson, the CD, while adorable, isn’t much better. His whole spiel, 3x a day mind you – including during dinner! – is about what’s going on around the ship. It’s really frustrating and annoying. We haven’t even had the equator ceremony, which should have been today since we just crossed it. And while that is understandable because of the “technical” stop, its still sort of, oh, I don’t know, haphazard? Or something.
Sigh.
The other annoying thing is the buffet. You are not allowed to serve yourself, they have line staff that serve you. Which, from a hygiene point of view is awesome. From a practicality point of view? The worst! They are totally understaffed (yeah, NCL owns them, what do you expect?) so you end up just standing in front of the food until someone can come over and serve you. Just give me the damn tongs! I could have served myself, eaten and come back for 2nds by the time I get one piece of chicken. Argh.
Oh, and you don’t get a tote bag in “normal” rooms, only concierge or higher (which is just chintzy).
Ok, rant over. We’re going to the Amazon (well, technically, we are IN the Amazon), we’re movin’ on.
Tomorrow: Santarem – at last!
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