Today’s Chronicle can be found here.
We woke this morning officially on Pitcairn time, which meant an hour later than the night before. But – with no early morning landings – the burden was modest at most.
Usual routine – breakfast, followed by reading / writing / homework.
My son switched it up this morning, and ordered waffles:
This sort of thing is newsworthy on sea days, as was the beautiful rainbow in the distance:
Also a big thank-you to my iPhone for capturing what is perhaps the fakest looking rainbow I have ever seen. But it was real, I tell you – real!
After, we went to Harry’s lecture on the Mutiny on the Bounty:
I was amazed to learn that there were only 7 inches of freeboard on Blith’s launch when he cast off to sea with the 18 other men on what was meant to be a 10 man boat. Also remarkable that he managed to navigate the Great Barrier Reef when the Pandora – the ship that eventually recovered some of the crew and mutineers – ran aground while making the return trip from Polynesia.
Off to trivia, where we had a rare non-podium finish. We missed the two parts of the body with the greatest concentration of sweat glands – the hands and feet – and there was some controversy over how many players and subs were on a regulation football team. Ah, well – next time.
As we were wrapping, Captain Ligthelm gave his midday update – we will be arriving at Pitcairn early tomorrow morning, which seems ahead of schedule. Swells are expected to be a modest 1 to 1.5 metres but he made no comments as to whether we were likely to land, only that an official would be coming aboard and the determination would be made then.
Time for lunch – my daughter and I once more went to the Restaurant:
I had the dynamite shrimp, which was small but stellar:
Followed by the squid:
The squid was fine, but seemed a bit chewey and salty. I suppose I’ve been spoiled by the squid we had in the Falkland Islands.
This was followed by the Banoffee pie:
Which was very good indeed.
Back to the room once more, where the kids carried on with homework and I called LATAM to arrange a refund of our flights. Previous complaints did not convince them to allow us to downgrade our premium economy flights – so we are stuck paying double for worse tickets. To add insult to injury, the call to request the refund took around 45 minutes.
Fortunately, some of the travel logistics did go smoothly this morning – we contacted Cristian Herrerra at Vamanos Tours at the recommendation of cashmeremypuppydog. Cristian wasn’t immediately available but he had a driver who could take us. I was thrilled by how responsive he was – he made the reservation process quick and easy. Fingers crossed the transfer itself goes just as smoothly!
Off for another swim, this one in the rain – unsurprisingly, there was not a lot of competition for the pool at that point. I wonder if they’ll start heating the pool as we move into cooler climes?
It is still quite temperate, however, so I ordered frozen margaritas for myself and my wife, which were delicious but very strong. Our daughter also had a frozen lemonade.
Back to the room to sit out on the balcony. The water is now almost purple in colour:
Remarkable!
We have also started to spot a few sea birds, which is further evidence of our proximity to Pitcairn.
Then it was time to head to the evening briefing, our first in three days.
Conditions are (hopefully) looking favourable for our landing at Pitcairn Island, and they have a whole day planned for us!
This is remarkable, as I’ve heard that many stops at Pitcairn are a half day at most – though a full day on island seems almost too much to hope for. We’re particularly interested in the strenuous hike to the viewpoint, visiting Christian’s Cave, and the trip out to St Paul’s Pool. So basically, all of it.
This might force some difficult choices over dinner. Plus, we also need to deal with our party being split up during the Rapa Nui hikes.
In case you’re wondering how that looks when laid out chronologically, the Silversea team did just that:
Time for recaps. Malcolm went through the various films that have been done regarding the Mutiny on the Bounty:
The kids are particularly interested in seeing the Looney Tunes take on these historical events – Mutiny on the Bunny.
Then Todd provided us with a very helpful guide to the Pitcairn dialect:
I particularly like the name of our initial walking route (the Hill of Difficulty) and how to say, “Help yourself to some food, don’t wait!” (Gelp yu self to some wettles! Doo waet.)
Dinnertime. I ran my camera and the kids’ eReaders back to the room while my wife headed to the Expedition Desk to deal with the various admin points, and then off to dinner at the Restaurant:
My son had the schnitzel:
My wife had the lemongrass beef:
I had the chicken jhinga:
And my daughter had the steak (not pictured).
For dessert, my daughter had the raspberry vanilla cream puff:
My son had the apple pie:
He enjoyed the ice cream, but not the pie itself – like many of us, he’s not a huge fan of raisins in apple pie.
And I had the chocolate mille feuille:
It was fabulous, and both children plan to order it later this cruise.
We also debated our Pitcairn options during dinner. We initially signed up for the Christian’s Cave trek – of which we were to be guests 18 to 22 of a 20 guest excursion. But after some discussion, we realized that St Paul’s Pool was the main goal for this outing, so we decided to start with the very strenuous hike and consider peeling off early if needed.
While running to and from the Expedition Desk, I buttonholed the Expedition Leader Peter to mention a minor nag – they have regularly been dispatching the expedition groups as pairs. 1 and 2, 3 and 4, and so on. And as they rotate, they also rotate the pairs. So 1 and 2 might go first one round, but 3 and 4 might go next the following round. So far so good.
The issue lies in that they are not switching up the orders within the groups themselves. So in the 3 / 4 pairing, group 3 always gets to go first. Which is irritating, as that’s something we always like with Silversea – you may start off going last, but you can expect to be first at some point during the trip. Except we can’t – we’ll always come after group 3.
Is this the end of the world? No. Is it a minor annoyance that could easily be fixed by the Expedition team? Yes.
So I gently mentioned it to Peter, and we’ll see if it results in any changes down the line. After five previous expedition segments it would certainly be an unwelcome first if the zodiac groups don’t properly rotate. To Peter’s credit, he said he would get us on the Christian’s Cave tour if we wanted to go – but we ultimately decided to cancel that in favour of the strenuous hike.
With all of that settled, it was time to head to bed – an early start of 6:40 am tomorrow so we can make our timings and (hopefully) be among the first ashore.
We drifted off to sleep on the gently bobbing Cloud as visions of Pitcairn danced in our heads.