June 22

Saturday June 22 - Day At Sea

Saturday was our first full day at sea and we had a very busy and adventurous day despite what you might think! We headed up to Deck 14 for our breakfast and we were both "good" as Kim had an egg-white omlet filled with veggies and I picked out some fresh fruit and a couple of pieces of English bacon. We then went outside to the exercise track and promptly walked 3 1/4 miles! YAY us! We met Sue and Dan who had equally healthy breakfast choices and they too were logging miles on the track. As we were walking there was a big commotion at one point with everyone pointing over the one side......WHALE sighting! You could just see his dorsal tail on several occassions - see it highlighted below! 

After the morning walk, Kim has won the previous day a workout in the Fitness Center with a personal trainer. So while she went through her exercises, Sue, Dan and I headed down to the main dining room where the Culinary staff was conducting a tour of the galley. We were surprised to find that there was a huge turnout of guests; so many so that we were divided into groups of twenty at a time and there had to have been about 15 such groups!

Before we headed into the kitchen area, "the man in charge" - Martin - introduced the entire chef staff, who each had their own specialties - either restaurants or types of food preparation. And finally the Master Chef - Bobby (who was from Australia!) - was introduced. It was very interesting because as two groups would go off (one into the Level 3 galley while another toured the Level 4 galley) Martin would walk around the room and take questions from the guests, while Bobby would answer them. Some of the statistics they laid on us was the fact that 90% of the food is brought on board at our initial departure site - in this case Seattle; and that the ship serves about 15,000 meals.......A DAY! Another interesting question was about how much waste there was over the course of a cruise like this. Chef Bobby answered that in preparing for a cruise they look back over the span of nearly a year's worth of cruises and see how much food was actually consumed, then they take an average of that number and add 10%. He concluded by saying that surprisingly there is very little food left over and/or wasted. He said, "We have this down pretty good!" 

The galley tour itself was not that long, and honestly the kitchen area was much smaller than I would have guessed. It was difficult at times to hear (much less understand) the chef who led our group (his specialty was the desert menu....yum!). But just seeing the behind the scenes was pretty cool. For much of the tour Sue, Dan and I were trapped at the back of the group and with the narrow confines of the galley we couldn't hear what was being said. But by the time we'd gone half way we had worked our way near the front, and Sue actually achieved "front-row status" by the end of the trip! It was very interesting....and at the conclusion when we exited the galley the chefs of the "Specialty Restaurants" had laid out a spread to represent their menus. Below is that prepared by the Tuscany Grill, a specialty spot we plan to take advantage of later on the cruise. 

Later that afternoon Sue decided to try her hand at the slots......yes, as you can see in the photo we took before dinner, she was HIGHLY successful! You can see the Alexander Hamilton bill on top ($10), but what you cannot see is the Benjamin Franklin bill ($100) on the bottom - just with a few spins on a one-line quarter machine! YEA Sue! 

In mid afternoon we went to the main theatre where a naturalist, Brent, gave a very informative presentation/show about whales. He had listed several times we would have an excellent chance of seeing whales, not just one off in the distance mind you, and made the comment that "if you don't see whales, you must be dead!" 

It was great to hear him say that the very BEST place to see whales was on the Juneau tour, "Evening Whale Watch" - which we are booked to go on this coming Monday! He said that naturalist teams are constantly going out on scientific missions and that the excursion companies track those missions with GPS satellites so that by the time the travellers from cruise ships like ours show up they know EXACTLY where the whales are! We are very hopeful of having a "close encounter" with multiple whales! 

The last "event" of the day was our first "Formal Night" - everyone was dressed up to "the nines" including the four of us as you can tell by the photos. We watched the live entertainment - a tribute to Broadway shows (including Phantom of the Opera, Wicked, and Jersey Boys) and then we were truly "party animals" as the we headed out of the theatre and into the "late night, Adult comedy show" produced out of Las Vegas by Sin City from Planet Hollywood Casino. It was very funny and had just enough burlesque to tease without being even a strong "R" rating. When Kim and I headed back to our cabin we were greeted by a perfect moon glistening over the waters as the Celebrity Solstice continued on it's journey towards Ketchikan, Alaska.....the first stop on our week-long adventure!