Sailing the Indian Ocean

Never have we seen so many dolphins. We are currently sailing west towards Sri Lanka, somewhere in the Pacific Ocean and south of the Bay of Bengal. The ocean is a mesmerising glassy sapphire blue – prophetic really as Sri Lanka is renown for its high quality sapphires. Each hour or so we see large pods of dolphins surfing the ships wake. The pods can number in the hundreds – we have never seen anything like it and unless viewed personally – would not have believed so many dolphins could be seen in the wild.
After a “chocoholics smorgasbord” yesterday we are steering clear of the food today and have just returned from an extremely informative lecture on the worlds oceans by onboard guest speaker – scientist Gloria Barnett. I did not know that up to 80% of the worlds oxygen is produced in our oceans. Our forests only account for 20%. This makes it all the more important that we look after them and judging by the amount of rubbish we see floating by – something that definitely needs improving upon.

Earlier this morning our captain – Ashley Cook or “Captain Cook”, announced that our starboard propellsion system was experiencing problems. Put in layman terms – we are currently operating under one engine. While it doesn’t appear to be hindering our progress much – fingers crossed we get the second engine back online.

The Arcadia is currently on the fourth of its five leg around the world voyage. While there are some “whole cruise” stalwarts around – each leg sees people leaving and new passengers arriving. Where the new passengers alight can often dictate the vibe of the commencing leg. Its arrival in Sydney a few weeks ago saw a large number of Australians party their way to Hong Kong or Singapore where most disembarked. They have obviously been replaced by more elderly sedate Brits on a fly out, cruise home holiday. The fifth and final leg commences in Dubai and it will be interesting to see what vibe eventuates from here as there is apparently going to be a large turnover.
Interesting things we are learning – don’t bother introducing yourself – at 2100 passengers we are the size of a small town and no one is ever going to remember anyone’s name. Pirates are still a big thing around this part of the world. We have so far undertaken two emergency drills with specific training on what to do in the case of an attack plus been given written and verbal instructions. Spirits are cheap while wine and champagne are not and Captain Cook does still exist.