At Sea, Kamchatka

At Sea, Along Kamchatka Peninsula 

July 22, 23, 2019

I’m still trying to get photos into these posts. I didn’t bring the card reader so anything in my camera will be there until we get home. I tried moving a picture from phone to iCloud and then to this. So far the only one that worked was of Jim when we first arrived in our stateroom in Seattle. Then I took a picture with the very iPad that I’m now using. That transferred very nicely to a document, but then not to blog post. I may start drawing pictures on the screen with crayons. So, if there is a big, blank area in this, imagine a line of snow-capped mountains on the horizon of a deep, blue sea.

After a day or so of rough weather, suddenly we sailed into the sun, the sea flattened and we were 3 on the Beaufort Scale instead of 8 or 9. (Google it.)  The entire state of Alaska is in the same time zone, so as soon as we left Nome we started turning our clocks back one hour every night so we would be at the correct time when we docked in Petropavlovsk. We crossed the International Dateline early on, but we didn’t make that adjustment until Tuesday night. There’s always some numnutz who wants to set his clock forward 20 hours but one hour back, one calendar day gone and voilà you’re right time, right day. These are the monumental things that occupy our time at sea.

Jim keeps asking what there is to write about sea days. Well, there’s Boris and Natasha (names I’ve given them because they speak Russian), ping pong maniacs. She’s blond, tall, very tan  and model-thin, he’s 50-ish, very buff and tan. Every day she’s in very short shorts (suddenly all the old patoots on board find reasons to walk back and forth past the ping pong tables on the Lido Deck), barefoot and being coached by Boris as they slam the ball in endless rallies. I guess I could ask them their story but it’s much more fun to make one up.

The Cellar Master had a 30 bottle wine tasting one afternoon at 2 o’clock. Knitter Linda’s husband partook. As she put it, “He got his money’s worth” and was quite useless at trivia at 4 o’clock.

We sat next to a couple from Princeton at lunch. They were scheduled to take a birding trip in Nome and were, in fact, on the tender that made it to the dock in Nome but then was returned. Ah, ha. Birders! I now “have a guy” to help identify the birds that fly along with us for hours. A type of petral (sp?) escorted us from Nome. 

Got a question about something and no Google? Someone on this ship has the answer.

HAL sent emails a month or so ago asking us to bring something orange to wear to the Orange Party. For those who forgot, orange T-shirts, hats and scarves were available in the ship’s store. Then we found out that the Orange Party is at 10 pm after the pub crawl at 9. In Old People hours (same idea as  Dog Years compared to people years) that’s waaaaay past bedtime. I think my orange shirt still has the tags on it so back to Macy’s or failing that, into a quilt.

Sailing along the Kamchatka peninsula is other-worldy. The sun is out, the sky is blue and on the horizon you can just make out a snow-covered volcano. Many, many snow-covered volcanoes. This is part of the Ring of Fire that formed the land around the entire Pacific, north and south. We learned in one presentation that 30 or so of the 1,000 volcanoes of Kamchatka are active. At “Ask the Captain” (once during the cruise the captain gives a short talk about the workings of the ship and then answers questions posed by the passengers) one guy wanted to know if we could go close to one of the active volcanoes. “No.” 

As I write this we are dockside in Petropavlovsk. Lots of paperwork and procedure to clear the ship and passengers. We docked at 6 am but won’t get off until 10:30. We had to fill out some forms and then hand them in to Guest Services with our passports. When we’re ready to get off, we will get our passports (already checked by Russian officials who came on board) back to show to yet another official at the bottom of the gangway. Saw three of the young Russian dudes this morning about 7:30 desperately looking for a place to smoke. One of the HAL officers led them to the tiny little smoking area on a deck off the restaurant on the 11th floor, the only place to smoke on the entire ship.

It’s a lovely day. We’re in a commercial port with lots of small freighters and attendant activity. Biggest surprise so far is the stream of pleasure craft (sailboats, power boats) heading out of the harbor early this morning. We haven’t seen many if any since we left Seattle. Our Alaskan stops were commercial fishing ports for work not play.

I’m sure I’ll have tales to tell when we get back from our three hour tour.