The Captain arrived bright and early this morning, and we are alongside and tied up by the time we get up out of bed.  Nothing much is happening this early, except the crude oil truck parked outside – but soon small refrigerator vans pull up and stage off to the side of the ship.  Contrary to what we had figured, no one is wearing Haz Mat suits, heck only a few people even have on masks.  Go figure! 

We hang on the balcony watching the lack of activity for a while, then hit the gym, and return to watch the now busy pier loading activities.  This gets rather boring after a bit, so we head off in search of, well, something!  Who knows?  By the time we make it back to the cabin, the loading and fueling has been completed. And while we were scheduled to leave at 1, there is absolutely no sign of any line releasing activity.  Uh oh, once again, we know something is afoot.

At 2pm, we go downstairs to Guest Relations to collect our passports, and surprise!  No passports are being distributed.  Oh yeah, there is definitely something going on!  The natives are getting restless, and the poor GR guys are trying to keep everyone calm, telling us the Captain will make an announcement soon.  Soon enough, Captain does just that, explaining we are once again being diverted.  Now it is India that has closed their ports, so we are heading straight to the Gulf States. Our itinerary now has us sailing for 4 more days (a total of 10 sea days! That’s our record!) then stopping in Muscat, Oman for a day, Abu Dhabi for a day, before finally ending in Dubai where we will all debark.  Well, Phooey.  We’ve been to all those places and have pretty much done what there is to be done – but they are giving discounts on shore excursions, so we’ll see what they are setting up and make a decision then.

What a crazy situation!  But, what to do? Besides continue on with our daily schedule and hang out. Our destiny is definitely not in our hands right now – so our biggest focus is getting those Prize Stamps so we can get swag at the end of the cruise!  Hey, what can we say?  You have to have something to lighten the mood!

As it turns out, we remain in port until close to 6pm – not because of any port closures, but because there are 2 Israeli nationals who must get off the ship here to fly home.  They are not allowed in UAE, and were planning to disembark in Mumbai, but since that is now out of the question, it is here they must leave.  The ship is in negotiations with Sri Lankan Immigration, Health and Customs – the former of which have approved their disembarkation, the latter which won’t.  Honestly!  Let the poor people go home!

Finally, they are allowed to disembark and we wave goodbye from our balcony while the gangway is pulled in and we begin our next 4 days at sea.

At least we had White Night that night, which was so amazingly good and so much fun. We snagged a table right off the stage, sort of tucked into the curving stairs to the upper balcony, which put us out of the wind and in perfect position for both the buffet and the festivities after dinner.  It was a perfect way to release some of the tensions all this crazy Coronavirus thing is causing us, even though, let’s be honest, we are safe and secure and healthy and happy aboard our little bubble of a ship.  So, really, this night is also a celebration of that as well.

We actually end up spending the entire night up on deck, eating fabulous food, chatting with a couple who sat down next to us, with Chai, our wonderful waiter from the Patio, serving us beer and wine the entire time – he was adorable, when he couldn’t get to me because of the dancers, I just held out my wine glass under the stairs, and he reached over with the bottle and filled it up.  Later he said, “I’ve never poured wine that way before!” Obviously a big deal – I’ll be in his memory forever….remember when I poured wine for that lady under the staircase….  😊