Rarotonga...almost

We were awakened this morning by the loudest clap of thunder we’ve ever heard. Mom thought we’d hit an iceberg, but wrong part of the world for that. We looked out and saw the very blustery skies and knew we were in for a day of it. The captain came over the intercom in our room about 8:00 AM, which was unusual, since normally it only comes across in public areas. We were anchored off Rarotonga in the Cook Islands, but due to the weather, we were not going to be able to use the tenders. A quick look outside at the incoming weather made it even more apparent. 

As close as we'll get to the Cook Islands

We were then informed that we were awaiting 4 passengers who were trying to come aboard via a tugboat. They had evidently missed getting aboard in Papeete and were having to venture out in this weather. I did get to see the process and I will say they are braver souls than I would be. It wasn’t but minutes before the very strong storm set it and we couldn’t see a thing from our window. The captain came on once more to inform us that we were picking up anchor and starting to head towards New Zealand to hopefully get out of this weather. They quickly rearranged the schedule for the day to include many new activities since we now had a day at sea. There was a watercolor painting class that we both attended. It was much more challenging than anticipated, but the results weren’t bad. We spent several hours working on our “masterpieces”. 

Highest bid accepted :)

We, along with everyone else on board, decided to go to La Terrazza for lunch. We were still pitching and rolling quite a bit, but still it hasn’t seemed to bother us. After a late lunch we came back and decided to do a little laundry. We’ve only just been gone a week, but wearing 2-3 outfits a day adds up! At 4:00 we went and enjoyed our first high tea on board. Tea is not as big of a deal on here as the QM2, but was still enjoyable. By this point the weather had improved considerably and blue skies were starting to appear. 

Back to calm seas

There was a repeat of last night’s classical piano concert (which we had missed), so we definitely wanted to make it there tonight. Gregory Kinda was the performing artist and was absolutely incredible. I’ve never seen any musician with such natural talent. Dinner followed the performance and we were fortunate enough to dine with he and several other guests. 

As always, the food was most enjoyable, but we ended up skipping dessert so we could get to the evening’s main performance by the ship’s singers and dancers. They performed Euro 2011, which was comprised of a number of different songs from around the globe. They must have had about 10 costume changes during the one-hour performance. For a small ship, it was really well done. It is now almost midnight and we are finally calling it a day.