On February 1st we celebrated our first anniversary of being homeless, aboard Oceania’s ship the Insignia, on our way from Honolulu to Auckland New Zealand.

One of the great joys of being vagabonds is that there is no rush to get where we are going.

So rather than endure a fifteen hour flight to New Zealand, we opted for a 24-day cruise instead.

Haunted by Beethoven – When we first boarded the ship, we dropped our bags in the cabin and strolled the ship, checking out our new home.    All very nice, and we noticed that the ship had Beethoven’s music playing very subtly throughout the ship.  It was a nice touch.

When we got back to our cabin, we discovered that the music was also playing in our room.  That was OK, but we couldn’t find the control to turn it off and didn’t think we wanted it to play all the time.  So we stepped out in the hall and asked the room steward to help us turn the music off.  She came in, looking a bit confused.  She said there is no music playing in rooms.

We finally hunted down the source of the music.  Frank’s iPhone had been playing Beethoven music from his pocket for the last 30 minutes.  Doop!

Life on board was relaxed.  We read, ate well, went to the gym, visited exotic islands, and made some great new friends.

Oh, and we played scrabble every day.  In one game, Brian scored 140 points for the seven-letter word on the top right by also bridging two triple word squares, making it a nine-times word score, plus a fifty point bonus for using all seven letters. Yes, life was good.

 

We had some great excursions off the boat too.  We went on a snorkeling trip in Bora Bora.  Swimming with hundreds of fish, including sharks and rays.  Most amazing was watching our guide grab the fin of a shark and go for a ride.  OK, maybe the most amazing thing was our guide, and his swimsuit.

In Tahiti we hired a van for a four hour tour around the island.  Our driver and guide was a spirited woman from the UK who raised her kids in Tahiti and seemed to know everybody on the island.

In Fiji, a group of us rented a van and driver for a tour of the island, including a beautifully manicured jungle / orchid farm which was owned by Raymond Burr (aka Perry Mason).

And so very, very much ocean.

Greetings from the South Pacific, with all our love.

Our hearts are filled with gratitude for this adventure and the love we share.