
My characters would not have had to endure the tedium of the fortnightly lifeboat drills that Health and Safety requires today. Disasters such as the sinking of the Costa Concordia underline the importance and necessity of these, but it doesn’t make them any less boring – especially when you have to wait while the drill is repeated in German and Dutch.
I doubt my characters would have had the struggle I had to find a spot on the ship where there was no music playing. Nor would they have been able to escape to their cabin and watch movies. And no fretting for them about lack of internet connectivity.
I recently read the on-board diary of a man travelling with his wife and daughter from England to Hong Kong in the 1930s and then the same by his daughter travelling from Singapore to Mombasa in the 1940s after the Japanese invasion of Malaya. (If you’re interested in how sea travel was then, the book was Castles in the Air, a memoir by Alison Ripley-Cubitt and her late mother). One of the many things that struck me is that the urge for people to play silly games and do things they wouldn’t do on land seems to be universal and timeless. Now, as then, there are shuffleboard games on the promenade deck, quizzes, dances and shows. My instinct was to avoid these like the plague, preferring reading, knitting, painting and sketching and watching movies. Getting drawn into some form of communal activity is inevitable and having said “I never dance these days” I ended up eating my words on more than one occasion. I did watch King Neptune's Crossing the Line ceremony on the pool deck with the ritual dunkings for first-time crew members (after being covered in flour, eggs and cream) and was awarded my certificate. I drew the line a kissing a dead fish though!
Under and on the sea

I am afraid I was a bit of a disaster when it came to spotting wildlife. I didn’t see a single dolphin until we got to Gibraltar on the home leg – although I might have seen a dwarf species or a baby near Acapulco – I thought it was a huge flying salmon but was assured it wasn’t. I saw no whales either. No albatrosses. But lots of flying fish.
On the other hand, I didn’t see ANY floating plastic – I suppose I had expected to run into these enormous country-sized plastic islands but as far as the distant horizon was endless sea.
The Pacific is VERY big. It goes on forever. That gets boring! We had a continuous ten-day stint without sight of land caused when we had to divert to rescue a stricken yacht (see photo). This sounds dramatic but actually was just annoying – especially when the medical emergency that necessitated our 64,000 ton cruise liner to perform the rescue turned out not to be one at all and we missed out on visiting the French Polynesian island, Nuka Hiva.
Sail Aways and Arrivals

One of the biggest benefits of sea voyages is arriving and leaving port – the Sail-in and the Sail-Away. I will always remember arriving at Sydney in the dark early morning as the city was waking up and leaving by night two days later, watching the lights of the 'Coat Hanger" and the Opera House fading into the distance behind me. In Japan at Yokahama we were serenaded from the dockside by a talented high school jazz band – an experience that brought tears to my eyes. And arriving at the beautiful Bay of Islands in New Zealand after the long trek across the Pacific and smelling the manuka trees as we took the tender to shore. Even cities I know well offer up different treasures when seen this way – Valetta in Malta with the early morning sunshine bathing the honey-coloured buildings, leaving Lisbon along the Tagus and passing under the road bridge that vibrates above your head like the sound of a swarm of bees, Kagoshima with its erupting volcano just across the bay, and the experience of passing through both the Panama and Suez Canals.
All in all, I found my journey amazing – but not one I would repeat. I’m so glad I did it. I met some wonderful people and saw some incredible countries. Undertaking a continuous voyage of more than thirty-five thousand miles is a truly once-in-a-lifetime experience.
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