St. Maarten sunset
Today is Friday, 2/4/2005
When we get back, it is almost noon and our cabin has still not been made up. We drop our purchases and go work on the jigsaw puzzle until lunch time. Today is an Asian buffet at The Grill and that is where we head. I forgot my camera again, so no pictures. I don't really remember what we had.
We went back down to the cabin and it is made up by one. We brushed our teeth again, slathered on sunscreen and changed into bathing suits and went up to the pool with a book for Debbie and napping for me. There were fewer than a dozen people around the pool while we were there for about 1 1/2 hours. We were there from about 1:30PM to 3PM. After about an hour we were both hot and parched. We had both seen 2 different people get up and go to the Splash Bar and request a drink and take it back to their chaise. Debbie asked me if I would like a drink, she would go get it. I told her I felt like something really cold and she said she was going to ask for a banana milkshake and asked me if I would like a virgin Pina Colada. I would not and I do not want a milkshake. I tell her to order me a virgin peach daiquiri. There have 4 employees at the bar during this hour and none have come out and asked if anyone at the pool would like a drink. This does not seem right, but we have seen 2 other people go up and take drinks back to their chairs, so what do we know. Debbie goes up and sits down and waits. Eventually, some one walks by from the bridge area and tells the 4 they have a customer waiting. A young man comes over behind the bar and asks her what she wants. She points to me and tells him, my husband and I are sitting over there and I would like a banana milkshake and he would like....He interrupts her and says I can't do that, I don't have any bananas. She is speechless. She tells me that she just stared like a dog at the giant bunch of bananas 6 feet from him. He finally follows her gaze and laughs, oh I guess there are bananas. She continues, that her husband would like a virgin peach daiquiri. He tells her no he can't do that because like he was telling her, he has no fruit. She tells him and we have established that you do in fact have fruit. He offers to make a frozen virgin Pina Colada for me, her head almost explodes, but she will not argue for a daiquiri for me. She tells me she has had enough, between the Eggs Benedict, waiting outside to get the room made up, now this, I can't do anymore today, I won't. Drink it or don't. She sits and waits for the drinks and brings them back over to our chaises, the young man doesn't not offer to deliver them to us. When he picked up the big jug of Pina Colada mix, she says the the jug immediately behind it was clearly strawberry daiquiri mix and she would be willing to bet that one of the other 4 jugs in the well was peach daiquiri mix and I am welcome to go over and pick my own battle. But, she is right, I will not go and engage in a confrontation for a beverage on vacation. We drink our drinks, people go, new people come, the 4 bar employees stay in the shade behind the bar talking and laughing among themselves. As we start to pack it in at 3PM, a young woman comes out from behind the bar and makes the round of the chaises offering drinks or refills, but we have had enough sun and we decline.
Debbie is in for a shower and a nap, she is exhausted from last night. I decide that I can't take anymore sun on our balcony and I have napped enough by the pool and I shower and go work on the jigsaw puzzle inside. There is an Italian Ice Cream Social at 4pm. I go alone, then wake Debbie around 5:30pm to see us leave the dock.
We work on the jigsaw puzzle together some and then go to our balcony to watch Diamond prepare to leave. There is a problem, a couple are not on board. At last, they arrive, but now there is another problem, the winch/or winch motor that raises the gangway will not work. With the ship bobbing up and down, the gangway has been screeching on the concrete dock all day. It is right under our balcony. Debbie did not nap well because of the screeching through the closed door and drapes. Now there are a man and a woman down there in a golf cart to see us off and the man is cursing a blue streak and yelling that we need to get off his GD dock and how p**d off about the holes we have dug in his dock. Well. We were to have sailed at 6 and it is at least 6:30 before they get the gangway raised. The next day in St. Thomas we saw them using a hoist to raise a new motor out of Diamond's dingy, so guess they had to replace the winch motor for the gangway. We went up top to get a closer look at the winch situation, but did not see what magic they worked to finally winch the gangway up. While we were up there we wandered on up to the bridge to see us sailaway, but it got really windy so we didn't stay long. Tonight is the captain's reception and we go down, but there is a big line and we decide not to stand in it because the ship is starting to move around alot and Debbie is afraid to push the limits too far. We head back downstairs and see the shop open for the first time. We go in and each get a "Diamond 05" T-shirt. I guess these will soon be valuable collector's items.
