I woke up at around 6 am today. I took my tablets and went back to sleep till around 9:30 am when I got up and went for breakfast.
At sea in the Mediterranean.
After breakfast, I looked for somewhere quiet to sit with a coffee. This was harder than it sounds. Once again, many bars and cafes are understaffed or closed. When I do find an open cafe my quiet was quickly broken due to rowdy kids or loud passengers.
After I wrote some of my notes up and had a Marocochino, I think it's a combination of coffee and chocolate, I then ordered a ginger mojito. It is very nice and after I have finished it, I again move because I'm annoyed by noisy kids. The highlight of my morning was when a loud, annoying child running around and bumping into my leg tripped over my walking stick and fell onto a table. Bursting out laughing isn't politically correct, but I am not politically correct when it comes to adults who let their spawn run riot as long as it doesn't bother them.
I can't find an open bar or cafe that hasn't got children running around in, and as it has gone 1 pm, I went for lunch at the Vignetio Astoria restaurant. It had a set menu that was not bad and had table service.
I have noticed that the ship's service is hit or miss. It appears hugely understaffed for so many passengers. My food is ok but the service today was not so good. The noise in a supposedly upmarket restaurant sounded like a noisy canteen with all the people onboard today. Why is it that both Spanish and Italian people can't speak in a normal voice but instead feel they must shout at each other? I sat with some quiet French ladies, but the noisy restaurant was not a pleasant experience. After lunch, I visited the tour desk and got an incorrectly billed trip removed from my account before returning to my cabin for peace and quiet.
I joined Lynda, Michael, and Sue and Bryan for dinner this evening. My friend Frouk in Spain had asked me to send photos of the food and I remembered to take some more dinner photos tonight. Unfortunately, it was a very ordinary meal tonight and was the poorest meal I ate on board.
After dinner, I went to watch a show at the Colosseum bar. It started slowly, and I was unsure if I would watch it all. It was the story of how a boy became part of the computer game he was playing. The show got better after the first set and reminded me of all the computer games I played as a young boy and how engrossed I got. I did video this show, but on watching them back I realised that the show was better for the memories it produced in me rather than the show itself, so I will not post the video. The three Kiwi cocktails I had may have also assisted in my enjoyment of the show.
When this show finished, I walked to the Poltrona Frau Arena to watch another show. This arena was poorly designed; many seats give you a poor sightline to any shows here. I did see an empty chair right next to the stage in the front row so I sat in it. An Italian man with his wife and three very young children took up the rest of the front row, preventing anyone else from using the rest of the seats. It would have been fine if the children were awake but they weren't. One was asleep and sat in a chair. The other two were stretched out across multiple chairs, fast asleep. None of the children were over 4 years old and the ship did have a babysitting service. My question, therefore, is aimed towards both the parents and the people who run the ship. To the parents, why do you not use the ship's babysitting facilities or take your children to bed at a regular hour, which would allow paying adults on the cruise to watch the shows? To the ship's crew, I ask why you are not preventing the parents from taking sleeping children into shows in bars that don't start until 11:45 pm and why you constantly allow children to run riot all over the ship without speaking to their parents about it.
For some reason, the Italian man took offence to me sitting in the only spare seat and complained to me in Italian. I just looked at him, growled and gestured that I neither understood his complaint nor cared. I waited for the show to start and noticed after the show had started that the man's wife eventually woke up her sleeping children to take them to bed, too late for any adults who wanted to see the show to use the seats.
The show was by the ship´s girl band Ultramarine and was very good.
After the show, I got a bottle of water and went to bed.