Friday, April 19th
I added two new postings today: Mumbai-Day 2 and this one. I am caught up again.
Good to be back at sea after several days in Sri Lankan and Indian ports. You kind of get burnt out on taking tours every day. So as you see we are in the Arabian Sea now heading for Dubai and are scheduled to arrive there at 11am on Sunday. It is another smooth day sailing today. We have really been fortunate so far with the sea conditions and weather. Only one rainy day so far and rest sunny but pretty warm. In today's posting I want to give you some impressions of our cruise so far and talk about the ship's security precautions for the part of the world we are entering now.
IMPRESSIONS: Nothing is perfect but Regent is about as close as a cruise line can get. The Voyager is much smaller than the "mega" ships of the more traditional cruise lines, ie, Princess, RCL. There are 700 passengers and a crew of 450 so it is more intimate. We try to call the crew members we see often by their names as they seem to know us. For a long time I could not figure out how crew members that we had not met knew our names. Then someone told me. If you are nice and treat the crew with respect, they will go to screens down in crew area and look up your names by our photos. (We are photographed when we initially board so security can check us every time we reboard the ship when in ports. They swipe our room key card and our photo appears.) On other cruise lines you are rarely called by name. We have sailed with many of the crew on our other cruises with Regent and they always remember us, just as we also remember them. Guess what I am trying to say is we feel at home here. Same with some passengers who we know from previous cruises. We just last night ran into a couple who just boarded yesterday that was on our South America cruise last year. I would say we know 30 or more couples now aboard who we have cruised previously with. We tend to socialize with this group but add others as we meet interesting people. For example we knew everyone on our tour bus yesterday in Mumbai as we arranged with the ship's tour person to be on it together. Now for my thoughts on Sri Lanka and India. Sorry if I am blunt. Ok, about the only good thing I can say is the people there were very friendly. They are dirty countries. Trash on the streets, in the rivers, everywhere. I never saw one attractive woman in those countries. I now know why they wear saris, it's to cover their big, ugly bellies. Rebecca says that is due to their high carbs diet. They eat very little protein. Glad to see the countries once but we have no desire to return. New guests keep asking us what our favorite port has been so far. This is very difficult to answer as each one is so different. If I had to pick just one, I would have to say Beijing. Seeing and standing on the Great Wall was incredible. Other notable ports were: Shanghai, Bangkok, Halong Bay in Vietnam, and Phuket. I think Thailand is my favorite country in Southeast Asia. Daily life aboard the ship when at sea is very simple for us. We always go to the gym for an hour workout. Sandra Bowern usually has an hour lecture on the part of the world we are about to be visiting. She is EXCELLENT and I call her a walking encyclopedia. Today's lecture and slide show was on the magnificent buildings we will be seeing in the Mideast. Can't wait to photograph them for you. We have lately been having room service bring us a salad for lunch. Going up to the buffet is just too tempting and I eat more than I need. Besides I can work on the blog during lunch. There are tons of scheduled activities for all interests during sea days but we just enjoy relaxing. When not in ports the shops and casino are open also.
SHIP'S SECURITY: We have entered an area known as a "High Risk Area" (HRA) for piracy here in the north Arabian Sea. There have only been 4 acts of attempted piracy this year, way down from over 100 for each of the past two years. Still, Regent and our Captain is taking no chances. Cruise ships are not a prime target for the pirates, because of their high sides (from water level to promenade deck) and the high speed cruise ships can do. The US and British navy patrol ships know our exact position at all times and are ready to send assets if needed. At 10am we first had a 30 minute security drill followed by the normal life boat/emergency drill. The Captain described over the PA as the drill progressed what steps were being taken by the crew. If an unidentified ship comes with 3 miles of us the we will go on "yellow" alert. It was very reassuring knowing all the steps that are being taken with each stage. If they cannot contact the unidentified boat, we will alter our course to see if the come after us. If so, we will go to "orange" level and Coalition forces will be notified that we have a definite threat. If they continue to close on us we will go to "red". All passengers and crew, except those assigned to defend the ship, will go to interior hallways and lie down. Our ship will be doing evasive maneuvers and standing will be almost impossible. They want us in interior spaces in case of breaking windows from bullets or rockets. As I showed you, we have water cannons on both sides of our ship. In addition on the rear of the ship there is a "LRAD", high frequency noise producing radar-like piece of equipment that can render anyone approaching us in a boat unable to fight. I just went back and took some photos of our defensive devices.
LRAD, high frequency noise beam can be emitted to render bad guys useless.
This will be manned if a threat is detected.
A crew member was testing the water cannon mounted on back of the ship.
One of ship's security personnel stationed on back of ship to keep watch. They will be there day and night for next couple of weeks.
While I was there he spotted a small boat in distance and radioed the bridge. At our speed it was not a threat.
Ship's wake. Our speed today is 18 kts.
With all these plans and procedures we feel completely safe. Much safer than if we were in Boston or West. Even an Indian yesterday was talking to me and said he was so sorry for what was happening in Boston. There was a bombing at train station by terrorists in Bombay back in 2008, you may recall.
I better go workout. Tonight is Captain's Welcome aboard party and dinner again for the new guests (and us of course). It is again a formal night so got to pull out the tux. We have been invited to dine at the Food & Beverage Manager's table. Always fun to get together with our friend, Goren.
https://goo.gl/photos/3urvE8CJpteVCvet6
I added two new postings today: Mumbai-Day 2 and this one. I am caught up again.
IMPRESSIONS: Nothing is perfect but Regent is about as close as a cruise line can get. The Voyager is much smaller than the "mega" ships of the more traditional cruise lines, ie, Princess, RCL. There are 700 passengers and a crew of 450 so it is more intimate. We try to call the crew members we see often by their names as they seem to know us. For a long time I could not figure out how crew members that we had not met knew our names. Then someone told me. If you are nice and treat the crew with respect, they will go to screens down in crew area and look up your names by our photos. (We are photographed when we initially board so security can check us every time we reboard the ship when in ports. They swipe our room key card and our photo appears.) On other cruise lines you are rarely called by name. We have sailed with many of the crew on our other cruises with Regent and they always remember us, just as we also remember them. Guess what I am trying to say is we feel at home here. Same with some passengers who we know from previous cruises. We just last night ran into a couple who just boarded yesterday that was on our South America cruise last year. I would say we know 30 or more couples now aboard who we have cruised previously with. We tend to socialize with this group but add others as we meet interesting people. For example we knew everyone on our tour bus yesterday in Mumbai as we arranged with the ship's tour person to be on it together. Now for my thoughts on Sri Lanka and India. Sorry if I am blunt. Ok, about the only good thing I can say is the people there were very friendly. They are dirty countries. Trash on the streets, in the rivers, everywhere. I never saw one attractive woman in those countries. I now know why they wear saris, it's to cover their big, ugly bellies. Rebecca says that is due to their high carbs diet. They eat very little protein. Glad to see the countries once but we have no desire to return. New guests keep asking us what our favorite port has been so far. This is very difficult to answer as each one is so different. If I had to pick just one, I would have to say Beijing. Seeing and standing on the Great Wall was incredible. Other notable ports were: Shanghai, Bangkok, Halong Bay in Vietnam, and Phuket. I think Thailand is my favorite country in Southeast Asia. Daily life aboard the ship when at sea is very simple for us. We always go to the gym for an hour workout. Sandra Bowern usually has an hour lecture on the part of the world we are about to be visiting. She is EXCELLENT and I call her a walking encyclopedia. Today's lecture and slide show was on the magnificent buildings we will be seeing in the Mideast. Can't wait to photograph them for you. We have lately been having room service bring us a salad for lunch. Going up to the buffet is just too tempting and I eat more than I need. Besides I can work on the blog during lunch. There are tons of scheduled activities for all interests during sea days but we just enjoy relaxing. When not in ports the shops and casino are open also.
SHIP'S SECURITY: We have entered an area known as a "High Risk Area" (HRA) for piracy here in the north Arabian Sea. There have only been 4 acts of attempted piracy this year, way down from over 100 for each of the past two years. Still, Regent and our Captain is taking no chances. Cruise ships are not a prime target for the pirates, because of their high sides (from water level to promenade deck) and the high speed cruise ships can do. The US and British navy patrol ships know our exact position at all times and are ready to send assets if needed. At 10am we first had a 30 minute security drill followed by the normal life boat/emergency drill. The Captain described over the PA as the drill progressed what steps were being taken by the crew. If an unidentified ship comes with 3 miles of us the we will go on "yellow" alert. It was very reassuring knowing all the steps that are being taken with each stage. If they cannot contact the unidentified boat, we will alter our course to see if the come after us. If so, we will go to "orange" level and Coalition forces will be notified that we have a definite threat. If they continue to close on us we will go to "red". All passengers and crew, except those assigned to defend the ship, will go to interior hallways and lie down. Our ship will be doing evasive maneuvers and standing will be almost impossible. They want us in interior spaces in case of breaking windows from bullets or rockets. As I showed you, we have water cannons on both sides of our ship. In addition on the rear of the ship there is a "LRAD", high frequency noise producing radar-like piece of equipment that can render anyone approaching us in a boat unable to fight. I just went back and took some photos of our defensive devices.
With all these plans and procedures we feel completely safe. Much safer than if we were in Boston or West. Even an Indian yesterday was talking to me and said he was so sorry for what was happening in Boston. There was a bombing at train station by terrorists in Bombay back in 2008, you may recall.
I better go workout. Tonight is Captain's Welcome aboard party and dinner again for the new guests (and us of course). It is again a formal night so got to pull out the tux. We have been invited to dine at the Food & Beverage Manager's table. Always fun to get together with our friend, Goren.
https://goo.gl/photos/3urvE8CJpteVCvet6
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