Spring 2015 - Day 21

I slept until 10:30 and it was glorious. My aching body was so grateful. My bed never felt so comfortable. Weirdly, my calves really hurt. The muscles are just so sore. Ugh. 

 

I discovered the internet was on and took full advantage of that until I went to Jessi's room at 11:30. 

We went to lunch together at noon where there were delicious green beans and soup. 

 

In the afternoon we just sat in her room and did nothing. I blogged and finished reading Amy Poehler's book Yes Please. Annie is really the one reading it. Andi bought it, finished it, and gave it to Annie to read. Then Jessi was going to read it and then it would be my turn. But Annie has already had to for almost a week and is only 65 pages into it. I have been reading it little by little when I just hang out in their room. I surpassed her 65 pages the first time I did that. It didn't take me very long to finish it this afternoon.

 

After that I blogged and messed around on my computer, setting up things and just staring at it. It is so pretty. 

 

Coming back from lunch we saw a poster saying that all spa services were 15% off. Then we got an email saying there wasn't going to be a fuel charge. 

 

That is HUGE. I had budgeted 700 dollars for my fuel charge. And now it wasn't going to happen. 

 

Have you figured out what did happen? That's right, we went to the spa. What a great place to spend that leftover fuel charge money, and at 15% off it was a great deal. 

 

We went up early in the afternoon and made appointments, a massage for Jessi and a facial for me. I always rave about how much I love facials and then always go for the massage. Massages are just so amazing I can't pass one up. But this time I stuck to my guns and went for the facial. 

 

It was totally worth it. She massaged my arms and shoulders and face and head and it was all glorious. My face is so happy now. And while my calves still hurt my shoulders and completely recovered. Totally worth it.

 

While I was at the spa I also got this leave in spray for my hair. The water on the ship is chlorinated and sometimes even salinated, it is really harsh on my hairs. Jessi got this stuff and I used it a few times and it really helped my hair. The ends have been dry and crinkly. So I invested in this stuff to help them survive the water. I probably will get it trimmed at the end of the voyage when it is really destroyed. And no, as of yet I don't think I will shave my head on Neptune Day. 

 

We had made our appointments for 4:30. Each of our things was to take 50 minutes, leaving us 40 minutes to get ready for dinner at 6. (fancy dinner!) 

 

They must have been nice and given us a bit longer because we got there right at 4:30 and we didn't get back to Jessi's room until 5:45!

 

Gah! 

 

I ran and showered so fast. We were ready within 2 minutes after 6, which I think is pretty impressive. 

 

Dinner was amazing. We started with sweet potato soup, then caesar salad. The entree I chose was the steak, and we finished with a very delicious fudge brownie for dessert. 

 

We sat with a family that I hadn't met until tonight. The dad, Howard, teaches environmental classes on the ship. His wife name is on the tip of my tongue and so is the daughters but the sons were Charlie and Simon. They were great to talk to and the kids were cute. I know Charlie is 8, turning 9 on the very last day of the voyage. He was definitely the youngest so the other two wer probably 10 and 11 or 12. They were pretty awesome, we had great conversation. 

 

It definitely fulfilled my craving for fancy dining, and I didn't have to pay 30 bucks for it! 

 

After dinner Jessi and I did the exact same thing we had done all day, absolutely nothing. I blogged more and emailed a bit. 

 

We played bananagrams! It is a game like scrabble except without a board and instead of alternating turns you have to form words and build your board as quickly as possible. It is more of a race and of someone uses all of their available tiles within their board and yells "peel" the other person also has to draw a new tile. The goal is to be the one with all letters in their board, using real words, when all of the tiles are gone. I won the first game and got really close the second. We ended the second game early because of sleepiness. 

 

I was proud of my second game because my goal was to use words bigger than 4 letters and nearly succeeded! I only had 4 four letter words and had words like vikings and definitely. I was proud of myself. 

 

When we finished I went back to my room to pack for our trip. We arrive in Kobe tomorrow and both of us are going on an over night to Hiroshima and Kyoto. I am excited to learn more about the history and see some shrines and temples. 

 

It was really nice to go overland in the ship, I was beat after just 2 days. I need to work myself up to going 6 days in a row. It is weird that we are still in Japan though. The only time I went overland with the ship was between Portugal and Spain so we entered a new country like we normally do after a sea day. I feel like we should be doing that again but no, still Japan. 

 

Here we go! Round 2!