Day 17 - Sunday January 20, 2008 - at sea

Slept late again. Breakfast in Compass Rose was weird. No pastries passed around. Margie and Debbie ordered the Eggs Benedict plain again and this time got only 1 egg each. It was fine. We could stand to cut back, but it was strange. We all went to Terry Breen's talk on Chile and Astronomy. We thought from a quick look in Passages that it was about the radio telescopes in the desert highlands of Atacama. But, that was only her segway into a discussion of historic astronomy by the Mayan, Incan, etc. It was very interesting. We still wonder about a talk of the southern night sky for the passengers. If we don't hear anything back soon, guess we will pursue it again.
Sailing was not good, not bad. Captain Romeo said at noon that we were in 6-8 foot swells. This was producing some side to side swaying or rocking of the ship and both the swells and rocking increased as the day progressed.
Today was the International BBQ again on the Pool Deck. It is only 63F today and in the wind feels much colder. Margie and Debbie headed in to LaVeranda and Clay got a plate outside and joined them inside.
Naps all around today. Margie went to needlepoint. It has been a little rougher as the day progressed, but it has been nice on the port side with the coast of Chile to follow in the distance.
Tonight was Informal and we went to Compass Rose. They have been serving a lot of local foods on this cruise for both lunch and dinner. Clay has really enjoyed that and got ahold of a surprisingly hot tonight and turned red and hiccuped! Unfortunately, he forgot to take his camera to dinner tonight. Debbie and Margie both had chicken parmigana. Hopefully at some point we will get an opportunity to scan some menus and post them on this blog. Clay turned in early and Debbie and Margie got cafe lattes from the coffee corner and went to do some work on the jigsaw puzzle because Margie's needlepoint buddy, Kim, was complaining that she had no help now on it. We managed to get a few pieces in before Kim showed up to help. There were some good Billy Joel tunes drifting out of the Horizon Lounge for us to listen. Then we went to the 9:45pm show in Constellation Theater. It was a variety show. Singer Julie Grace, the ballroom dancers and the violinist/comedian Beverly Davison. It was a good show.
Today we learned that we have 670 guests onboard for this segment. Tomorrow we dock early in Valparaiso. We have a private guide booked here for a walking andpublic transit tour. We are really looking forward to it. More later.