Today definitely started off on the right note – my suitcase has been found! Our Air Tahiti flight from LAX to Papeete continued on to Auckland, New Zealand, and apparently my suitcase went with it. Air New Zealand is flying it back to Papeete tonight, and it will hopefully arrive before our ship actually departs at 4am. If not, they will send it to tomorrow’s destination, the island of Moorea, and we’ll be able to pick it up there. Whew. Crisis averted!
But back to today – first of all, it is unbelievably peaceful to sleep in an overwater bungalow. (Or maybe it was just because we’d been up for nearly 48 hours. No, I’m going to go with the bungalow.) We had an incredibly relaxing day in Tahiti before heading to the cruise terminal to catch our ship. Dan wants it noted that he sat quietly and read a book in a beach chair for two days in a row – that’s probably all the relaxing I’ll get him to do this whole trip.
After a leisurely morning of swimming and sunning, we had lunch by the pool and then it was time to bid au revoir to Le Meridien and head to our home-away-from-home for the next 15 days, the Ocean Princess cruise ship. The check-in and boarding process was really quick, and then we had time to venture back out to the Papeete market place to pick up a few necessities. It’s great knowing that my suitcase is on it’s way, but in the meantime I’m still wearing the same knit dress I wore on the plane and rocking the no-mascara look. (Ladies, take note – always pack ALL of your makeup essentials in your carry-on bag. Concealer and lipstick can take you a long way, but mascara definitely helps.)
After our shopping excursion, we had time to orient ourselves to the ship before cleaning up for dinner. Dinner was yummy, but being in the full dining room reinforced that we are among the youngest guests on the cruise. Plenty of more seasoned travelers were trading stories of being in Giza, cruising from Capetown to Rome, and other great trips. One lady wants to “cover the earth before the earth covers her” – an adventurous spirit if ever there was one!
After dinner, we met up with three other couples that will be going on tomorrow’s island tour of Moorea with us, and based on the people we met, I’m sure tomorrow’s blog entry will have lots of funny stories and quotes. They are all, shall we say, experienced cruisers. Two are pretty outspoken New Jersey natives. It promises to be very interesting. We have a 7:45am meeting time in the morning, so I’ll have to wrap this up and get some sleep. Next stop, Moorea!
