15 May 14, 2007:

Last night at dinner, one of the waiters....whose name I will withhold to protect his job....was telling us about the fire last year on the Star Princess. For those of you who don’t follow cruise ship disasters, this was a pretty bad event...it resulted in one death (I think), it was a significant fire and could have been a major disaster. But the quick reaction of the ship’s crew contained the incident. First, our waiter mentioned the cool heads and good leadership of the ship’s officers, but he really praised the courage and the energy of the Filipino firefighting crew onboard.....with one exception....he said that among the Filipino crew was one guy who would lend money to the other crew....when the fire alarm went off, all the members of the disaster response team went off to their ‘battle stations’...except this one guy....who went around to all the crew cabins, banging on the doors, demanding payment of the loans before the ship went down...which, of course, it didn’t do. Apparently that guy was then “voted off the island” by the other crew members and he disappeared from the ship at the next port. Justice is swift and harsh on the high seas.....even on a cruise ship.

After dinner I made a quick trip to the casino where the “Pushie-Scrapie” machine (previously chronicled in the “Australia-New Zealand Cruise Tour” part of my website) ate my roll of quarters in record time. Dejected, broken....and now broke, I beat a hasty retreat to the room to hide and pout and plot revenge against the damnedable mechanical monster that is so addictive to play. As I skulked in the cabin, with evil thoughts and dark clouds swirling through my brain, I looked outside and there in the fading light of sunset was another pod of dolphins skipping happily across the waves....leaping and spinning and spiraling through the water. Not just a few dolphins, but wave after wave of them, coming to greet us as we sailed through their territory. That ended the dark thoughts and I was a satisfied sailor once again. 

Star Princess Factoids:

-          Each one of the Star Princess’ two six-bladed propellers weighs forty tons.

-          The ship is powered by six diesel alternators (generators) which produce enough electricity to drive two propeller-connected, electric motors at the stern which push us through the water at speeds of up to 22.5 knots.

-          The entire ship can be operated by any two alternators in an emergency and all are contained within independent watertight compartments.

-          The ship is steered with twin rudders that weigh 25 tons each.

-          The Star Princess is 43 feet wider than Panamax size (the width required to fit through the Panama Canal). She is roughly four times the length of Grand Central Station; 28 feet taller than Niagara Falls and 49 feet taller than the Statue of Liberty. She cost approximately $450 Million to build, almost twice the cost of the Pathfinder mission to Mars. The original “Love Boat”, the Pacific Princess, could fit inside the Star Princess’s Horizon Court and Lido areas......which are the areas for the buffet, ice cream shop, and hamburger grill.....now you know why cruisers gain weight.

Star Princess Statistics:

-          Weight: 109,000 tons (not counting overweight cruisers)

-          Height: 201 feet

-          Width: 159 feet  (including bridge wings)

-          Length: 951 feet

-          2600 passengers

-          1100 crew members

-          18 decks

Today we are sailing under cloudy skies, with a wind across the deck of 23 knots, intermittent rain and temperatures in the mid 50’s.  The seas are again moderate (4.0-7.5 foot waves). So, it is a brisk, invigorating Sea Day.

We have sailed 4237 nautical miles from Fort Lauderdale and have 378 miles remaining until our next port call at Le Havre, France.

Folks who have been following the voyage on the web may have noticed that I’ve been a little pressed for time and haven’t been putting captions on the photos recently or cleaning up formatting errors......sorry about that, but the time just seems to slip away and I find myself having to choose between logging on to the Internet or sleeping....and I choose sleep. I will go back and take care of those issues at some point.....but probably not until I am home and on a high-speed Internet connection. We are about to have 4 port days in a row, so I may have to skip a day or two of posting if things get busy.

I tried to give my dinner companions a break in the last email since I thought I was being a little rough on them.....but I received 2 emails asking for an update on James Bond and Mr. SuperGlue. So, here is the latest:

At dinner Mrs. SuperGlue was wearing a 2 stone diamond pendant.....2 large stones. Someone complimented her on the jewelry and she began to discuss the cost of the stones which were each purchased separately over a period of a couple of years. I missed the actual price for each of the two stones.....I was in my usual dinner conversation vegetative state where I nod and smile as what sounds to me like the buzzing of a thousand mosquitoes assaults my ears and I haven’t a clue what is actually being said. But, somehow I happened to catch the end of the conversation where it was mentioned that they have “their own Israeli diamond merchant” (that was said as if the diamond merchant was at that moment safely tucked into Mr. SuperGlues back pocket). And the story went on to include their quest for a third stone to “finish off” the pendant. It seems that a stone was almost purchased last year....after Mr. SupeGlue spent over 3 hours studying diamonds under a microscope in an unnamed third world country. But, the negotiations, which started at......are you ready......you better sit down.....OK, here it comes.....the negotiations, which started at $250,000 for the single stone stalled and the sale didn’t get completed on that trip......and a good thing too, because if Mrs. SuperGlue was sitting next to me at dinner wearing a 3 stone pendant....one stone of which was worth $250,000, I might be tempted to grab it and make a run for the border......which would involve a whole lot of swimming at the moment.

James Bond had a somewhat rambling and slightly incoherent story (as all of his stories are) about meeting Isaac Stern’s daughter at a party once.....becoming close friends with the woman....many dinners and parties over the period of a couple of years.....having the woman invite the Bonds to France where she toured them around Paris and the south of France.....on and on....  Cutting to the chase: Several years later Mrs. Bond happened to become friends with a woman who had written a biography about Isaac Stern. Of course, Mrs. Bond read the book and noted that the daughter wasn’t mentioned. So, she asked the author why the daughter wasn’t included in the book. Was it because she was a ‘black sheep’ in the family?   The answer was; “No, it’s because Isaac Stern didn’t have a daughter”.    So, who was this woman claiming to be the daughter?? An imposter?  A delusional psychotic?  A deep cover KGB agent plying the Bonds for state secrets? All three??  We may never know......until the secret archives of the Russian intelligence agency are finally opened.