Written at 430pm, Tuesday, 4 September on Crown Princess at 28° 9.19′N, 72° 2.34′ W
Well, after several days of nice weather, we seem to have finally hit some fun.
I’m writing this from the closed side of Horizon Court, one of the buffets onboard the ship, while my wife is in the spa making herself prettier for formal night tonight, and while I skedaddle to let our room steward do her job.
I’m being treated to a fine view of a storm that we’re going through (and presumably attempting to dodge just a bit, judging by our heading). It’s pouring down rain, there are some impressive clouds in the sky, and the Atlantic looks far more active than it has the rest of this trip (leading me to believe that the sea conditions widget on the shipscan channel on TV is broken, because it was reporting “Smooth: calm/wavelets” when I left the room).
There’s a bit more motion in the ship, and up here on Deck 15 there is an interesting vibration I haven’t encountered previously…but it’s not bad. Kind of fun actually.
When we departed Grand Turk last night, the captain announced via the ship’s P.A. system that there were a few clouds on the satellite and we might have some showers. However, I saw when I was last online at St. Thomas that this patch of weather was being modeled to possible form a tropical depression right about now. For some reason, the ship’s crew doesn’t seem inclined to trouble us with the “t” word.
And, for anyone who was wondering, we weren’t anywhere really near Felix. The shower I wrote about at St. Martin might qualify as being associated with Felix…but otherwise, our only knowledge of that storm was what one might have caught on CNN or BBC.
This formal night is supposed to feature a champagne waterfall in the central atrium. I’ve read that it’s a tradition that’s been maintained even in some very rough seas (of which I don’t think this really qualifies). Still, I’ll be interested to see how it fares if the ship is still swaying.
Leading up to the cruise, I have been joking that, given my wife’s and my luck, we would be impacted by tropical weather. I’m kind of hoping that this storm does actually get a name, so I can claim knowing the jinx we live under, rather than having to write that prediction off as cynicism.