Day 2 – Aboard the “Pearl Mist”

   If every step of the journey is the journey, then we had some long steps into the night. The ship was delayed coming from Cuba and they never seemed to give us a real answer why; but we are on board, so I guess it is all good. (We just learned at our first talk, the Cuban government sets for each cruise what programs the ship can and cannot do and it is always different. For example the delayed cruise got only got one day in Havana and we get two. Go us!)

   We did not leave our hotel until 8:00 last night, which of course is almost my usual bedtime. Off the bus we pointed out our bags and on board we went. The good thing is we were greeted by the bartender and some delicious Hor D’Oeuvres, but only for a short twenty minutes before our mandatory life boat drill. Since it is mandatory, every person must be there, and of course our muster station had three missing cabins. I imagine every muster station was missing someone because we had to sit there for a very long time while they went and hunted these people down. It would have been nice if everyone had just followed the rules.

    This morning we ate breakfast with one of the guest lecturers, Sam Ladley and his wife. He is a freelance historian. He goes to elementary schools and tries to excite kids into the importance of history. He said that if one really studies geography, then one can guess the history. Like why would people build a city here? I told him I love history, so it was interesting talking to him. I had to laugh when he said that he thinks the older kids should be out building roads or farming. Remembering my middle and high school teaching days, I agreed.

   We are now sailing through the Florida Straits which is the narrow connection between the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico.  It can be extremely rough, but we are traveling on calm seas at the present so that is a plus.

 “Every step of the journey is the journey.” Zen Saying

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Tom and Holly