Final day sailing the Indian Ocean

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Really! Sometime this morning, we should round Cape Agulhas (the southernmost point of Africa) and enter the Atlantic Ocean. According to the captain we should be within 23 nm of it. That would mean on a clear day, it would be visible off our starboard side. But not today. Seas are about 10 feet and we're inside a rain cloud with low visibility. We should arrive in Cape Town at 7pm. We will dock and then between 11 and midnight, we'll move berths to be closer to the passenger terminal.

In other news, the guest laundries (for reasons that remain unknown) will be closed at noon today and reopen after midnight on March 14. I'm glad we got our laundry done. As this is a segment changeover, I am sure it is going to be a problem for some.

We got and RSVP'd yes to the 2nd exclusive 2019 WC shore-side event. It is as obscure as the Auckland invite was but the location was at least given this time. The Great Namib Desert. Now we know, though that doesn't narrow it down much! Coaches will not depart before 5:30pm. South African wines and beer and soft drinks and water as well as special hot and cold heavy hors d'oeuvres will be served. Smart Casual dress. So, we are going.

We also have booked ship tours in both Namibian ports. We had only vague notes about doing our own thing there but neither of us could figure out what yesterday so we booked onboard for good or ill. We'll definitely be overpaying. Crystal offers Robben Island in Cape Town for $189 pp. We booked and printed our tickets directly from Robben Island Museum. We paid about $50 for two. Of course, it may be immaterial as the website shows all tours today are canceled and winds tomorrow are predicted to be 10 mph higher. We'll see. Sometimes, it is better not to make plans and just see what happens. Anyway time will tell. Case in point, we'd made no plans for 3/14, our final day in Cape Town, and yesterday we were notified that instead of the expected 6 pm all aboard for 7pm sailing that it is 4pm. Evidently we are required to walk through a face to face South Africa immigration exit clearance. That takes a pretty big chunk out of that day. Everything that we had as potential options that day run to 5 pm or so and won't work we now learn. If we'd booked early and locked down our plans, we'd be out of money and out of luck that day.

Next up in news. We've had a celebrity chef, Jon Ashton, onboard since LA in January. He's been filming a TV show. In Reflections today we learned his videos have been posted online at YouTube. New episodes will air twice monthly. We have seen them yet. They will not play onboard on our TVs. Internet is spotty, so we won't see them for a while.

We plan to dine at Waterside tonight. Low expectations. We've had 2 back to back unsatisfactory experiences there that I won't detail. Just saying. Tonight is casual and of course after dinner we should be docked. Hopefully we'll sleep right through the dock repositioning. More tomorrow.

I'm back. Sometime around 5 pm, I felt a difference. I got up and looked out. The water I could see was smooth, no swells, now whitecaps. Something was happening. I told Clay to turn on the TV because on the starboard side we were still within a cloud though straight up was blue sky. I ducked
into the bathroom. Clay yelled, Table Mountain is in front of us. Clay was changing to go up to Palm Court for the sail in before dinner after 6 pm. I turned back from the closet to find a miracle. The clouds were parting and there was the rocky backside of Table Mountain. You could even see the cable car station on top. We never did see any cable cars running though you could make out the cables. I see from the website that the cable cars are closed. There was strong wind. Fingers crossed that the weather will be better tomorrow and Robben Island will be open.

It is 7:57 pm and they just announced that the ship cleared. It took about an hour! We are docked at Duncan Dock. There are 2 much smaller cruise ships already docked here. I guess the larger will move later and we'll slide back. I am sure that Crown Odyssey, the ship we were here aboard in 2001, was bigger than either of these 2 and we docked right in front of Table Bay Hotel at the Victoria & Alfred Waterfront. We wonder if they don't allow cruise ships there at all anymore.

We got a letter and a gift on the bed tonight. A giraffe charm to go on the stainless steel bangle bracelet along with the WC 2019 logo and kangaroo. The letter states the captain and hotel director are leaving to be replaced. The cruise director has already been swapped out.

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