March 29, 2013 Sea Day
The new cast of the Amsterdam singers and dancers were the guests at Good Morning, Amsterdam this morning. Seven of the nine of them are from England and have worked as singers and dancers in shows in London’s West End. One boy and one girl are from Russia and Moldavia and both have two parents who were ballet dancers.
Travel guide Barbara presented things to see and do when we are in Richard’s Bay, South Africa in a few days.
Two new lecturers boarded the ship yesterday. The first was George Sranko who spoke on “Unique Wildlife of Madagascar.” George is a Naturalist and a biologist from Canada. He spoke about how Madagascar is home to some of the most unique creatures on the planet and some of the highest biodiversity, with about 150,000 species that exist nowhere else in the world. He had wonderful photos of Lemurs, many chameleons as well as the exotic and unusual creatures.
We had lunch with a fellow guest by the name of Jeri from Oregon. She was an English teacher and has MS. She gets along fairly well although she does use a scooter when she has to be on her feet for long periods of time. She had planned to come on this trip with her significant other, but unfortunately he died of a severe heart attack in November, only a few weeks before the ship was set to sail. She thought long and hard about coming on the trip but, in the end, decided it was the right thing to do and that he would have wanted her to. In her room when she got on board were the flowers and a loving message from him, which he had ordered before his death. WOW!
Jeri had an accident when we were in Lima and had to have several stitches in her head after her scooter’s power and brakes didn’t work. She slid backwards down a steep incline before being thrown from the scooter. Even with all of that pain and diversity she has a great attitude and is always smiling and happy. And, she plans to book another cruise before she gets off the ship.
The afternoon brought out another new speaker by the name of Lawrence Kuznets who lectured on NASA. Lawrence had worked for NASA for over 35 years in the space suit department and has incredible knowledge about the space program. His lecture on this day was a general introduction about NASA, where they get their money, what their goals and objectives are and what things are planned for the future.
The entertainment this night was a leading musical theater from the UK with a concert featuring music from Les Miserables. They were a group of four singers and a pianist who also directed the Amsterdam orchestra and the music is beautiful.