Not a lot happens on a sea day on a cruise ship, but when you have two sea days in a row then you can be assured that not a lot will happen on two sea days on a cruise ship. At least for us. We’re not nature’s attendees of acupuncture/hot stones/rejuvenation cream/wellness sales pitches lightly veiled under the title of seminars. We’re certainly not going to join a group for singing or line dancing or yoga lessons. We don’t want to be told that the particular rare gem in the jewellery store we’ve never heard of is the next big thing in gaudy brooches. And that’s all fine. Clearly, enough people are that these events (being somewhat generous in that description) are pretty much common on almost all cruise lines we’ve experienced, but for us a sea day is all about watching the waves from our balcony, quizzing, reading, drinking, maybe swimming, and doing very little else.
And that’s why there won’t be a lot to say in this post from our Canary Islands cruise on Ventura despite it covering a 48-hour period at sea.
First day, then, and it was a lovely one at sea somewhere between the Canaries and Spain, and not at Madeira as originally planned (see Gran Canaria, Briefly, Unexpectedly for more on that).
To the pub after breakfast, not for drinks but for the trivia, and early enough to get a table because these things get rammed on sea days on cruise ships. We had some semi-regular quizzing teammates during this cruise and got a fair number of wins between us, although I don’t recall any victories on these two days.
And then some of that relaxation on our balcony. Sun, sea, a cup of tea, and a good read: that’s some pretty good holidaying right there.
But of course there will be beer-drinking on the cruise ship.
In the early evening of this first day of the two at sea we treated ourselves to a second visit to the Epicurean restaurant on Ventura. If you’ve read the other travelogues in this series, then you might already know that we’d eaten there early on (see Sea Days And Speciality Dining On P&O Ventura) and had enjoyed it enough – and only partly because we were comparing it to the atrocious equivalent experience we’d had on Iona (see A Week’s Cruise On Iona: Part 3: Food And Entertainment) – to book again. It was another lovely meal.
To the second sea day then, and if you thought the first one was jam-packed with not an awful lot then just you wait and see what we had in store for us here!
Beers to start! Okay, beers somewhen in the afternoon, just because I couldn’t be bothered taking any photos from the early part of the day. What? You wanted to see more pictures of the trivia venue and more pictures from our balcony? Of course you didn’t. You might notice from the photos of beers and ciders in this post that my wife, the cider drinker, tends to be more a creature of habit, while I, the beer drinker, tend towards mixing things up a little more.
It was formal night on Ventura, and we grudgingly dressed up. We’re not fans of the whole thing, or we’d be more fans if it only happened once on a cruise and it was really made to be a big event. Anyway, that explains the photo of the Vodka Martini below because that’s when I indulge. Food was eaten, drinks were thrown down throats, and we even checked out some of the musical entertainment on the ship. The less said about the resident band the better, but resident solo singer Nikki Jayne was enchantingly wonderful once again.
No, I don’t know why I snapped a photo of the empty atrium area sometime late at night on Ventura. I suspect alcohol played a part, though.
In the next post in this cruise travelogue series we’ll be making our first stop at Vigo in northern Spain and there will actually be some content you might want to read because we got off the ship and went on an excursion.