Sea Day 4

We're sailing south now so our starboard cabin faces west which means we didn't have morning sun which means we really slept in today. We'll probably have to close the drapes this afternoon, but we should get the sunset without leaving the cabin today. Hand laundry is my priority today. Dinner tonight at Terrace is a Greek Buffet. We are sailing through the Torres Strait and there are lots of small interesting islands. The seas and sailing are our calmest yet. Great news. We are in pretty shallow water and the channel is quite narrow at times. We have seen the rusted hulk of a shipwreck off the starboard side.

Last night we got a form to fill out and return regarding our Sydney disembarkation choices. Only 25 days or so to go! We are planning on taking the ferry back to town from White Bay to get to our hotel near Central Station so we opted for the last departure time of 8:45am. I think they said Australian authorities require everyone to be off by 9am.

This morning we had a new form on our door when we woke up. It had to be filled out returned today. It was about the fact that we'll be docking miles from Darwin and not in Darwin. The news was that Oceania could not arrange a shuttle service. So, they are setting up a complimentary excursion called "Darwin on Your Own". You had one of 3 choices of departure times with a return 4 hours after you'd been dropped in town. So, 30 to 45 minutes ride to town, 4 hours in town and 45 minutes back to the ship. We have 3 nights hotel in Darwin as part of our Ghan train trip so we had already decided not to worry about planning anything here and just winging it. People on our Cruise Critic roll call were planning unrealistic plans and I did post the following warning. I hope those people altered their plans before today.

"In case no one else has noticed. According to the Port of Darwin schedule, Seabourn Encore will take the downtown berth and we will be docked out on the next peninsula inland from downtown Darwin. Looking at a map that is about 5 miles across water, but maybe as much as 15 by road. All this to say, that I don't think any of us will have the luxury of just wandering off the ship that day. Also, note the port information has us arriving 45 minutes later than Oceania's schedule shows.

Fri 17 Mar 2017 06:30 Fri 17 Mar 2017 18:00 SEABOURN ENCORE FHW West Berth
Fri 17 Mar 2017 09:45 Fri 17 Mar 2017 19:00 Sirena Bulk Liquid Berth (Tanker) "

So, the good news is that current events work perfectly with our plans, but I am guessing that some others are scrambling and complaining today. It was not clear that everyone who filled out the form would have their choices accommodated. It also did not state explicitly that you couldn't walk through the port, but it was certainly implied that they only way out of the port was on authorized transportation. I hope no one gets disappointed here. As Clay said before about Brisbane, if you advertise a cruise going to a particular port then you should be obliged to get passengers to that port and not 15 miles away. Hopefully, even though we'll all only have access to Darwin for only 4 hours of our port time, everyone who wants to go will get there for their 4 hours. Given that the schedule as shown said port time would be 9am to 7pm, I expect there will be lots of disappointment and scrambling to reset plans.

At some point today, we turned and ended the day sailing due west. We never got sunshine in the cabin or on the balcony so that was good. Sunset was not colorful today for the first time in days. We watched a movie on TV in the morning and in Sirena Lounge with popcorn in the afternoon. We both went to the gym after the movie.

We enjoyed the Greek buffet in Terrace. It was the biggest meal I've eaten onboard. I was excited to see that they were having galaktoboureko for dessert. Imagine my surprise when I went to get some and couldn't find it. Then the server offered me a pistachio-studded semolina cake called galaktoboureko. I didn't want to try it. Even Clay didn't like it! Oh well.

Tonight the Darwin saga continues. Either we are arriving there much earlier than originally published or than the Darwin port authority expects or we are picking up Immiigration officials at sea somewhere on the way. We had our "Darwin Your Way" tickets on the door after dinner and we got the 9am departure we had requested as it was the first offered departure. We figured it would only get hotter as the day progressed. On our bed was a letter informing us that Australian Immigration has to have a document check and face-to-face meeting with every person aboard before anyone can disembark  in Darwin. They say they will start with guests on tours at 8:15am. Deck 7 is the 3rd group they will call. Presumably they think everyone will be cleared before the time on their "complimentary ticket" since I assume they mean guests on paid tours. Well we'll see but we're really glad we did not commit to any costly plans here knowing that we'd be back with time on our own and a hotel for 3 nights.

We moved the clocks back 30 minutes tonight. I guess Darwin is in one of those weird time zones. There is no afternoon movie tomorrow. We should have a really lazy day!

I am sure I never saw Clay pick up his camera today so no photos.