#512 Boat Trip

If you are missing the MV Explorer, you might consider watching Boat Trip.

Boat Trip, a 2002 Cuba Gooding Jr movie, is not known for its cinematic excellence.  (Check out the trailer.) Cuba and his friend Horatio Sanz are having women trouble so they sign up for a cruise (not a voyage!) to get away - only to discover it's a gay cruise.  But if you look past all the shenanigans, you'll see that much of Boat Trip was filmed on board the Olympic Voyager (the sister ship to the MV Explorer) like this scene on the 7th deck port side.  

The happy ending involves Cuba parachuting into the pool on the 7th deck.

And if you watch closely, you can see some of the differences between the Olympic Voyager and the MV Explorer:

• The Olympic Voyager has a gangway entrance on deck 3. (The MV Explorer gangway is only on decks 2 and 5.)
• The Olympic Voyager deck 5 cabins have bay windows (The MV Explorer deck 5 cabins have balconies.)
• The Olympic Voyager has a sporty yellow racing stripe. (The MV Explorer stripe is orange.)

Yours in enjoying the Olympic Voyager as a substitute for the real thing,
Mary

#511 Like a Sea Salt

Back home again in Virginia! 

We're thankful for so many things on the spring voyage. 

Traveling with the 65 lifelong learners (aka Sea Salts) was a big highlight.  Our friends Theresa and Paul and 63 other adventurous adult passengers were wonderfully engaged with the community - taking classes, serving as shipboard parents and grandparents, proctoring exams, playing ping pong on Deck 7, hosting parties for us in the faculty lounge, competing in Sea Olympics, and making videos...  

And here's the official SAS slideshow...

Yours in wanting to be like a Sea Salt,
Mary

#510 America the Beautiful

Home again.

This morning, we awoke to Ray Charles singing America the Beautiful and docked in San Diego after our 104-day voyage around the world.

America IS beautiful and we're happy to be home again.

After final exams, we've celebrated at the Alumni Ball, laughed at the amazing Sea Salts video, partied with the faculty and staff, cheered the graduation of 30 seniors (including a GIS student!), and hugged every one of our adopted family, our 21 work-study students, and so many other hug-worthy shipmates.    

We are so very lucky to have been a part of the SAS 2011 spring voyage and we are so very lucky to be home again in America the Beautiful.

Yours in celebration,
Mary

#509 Touring the Bridge

Three voyages, three bridge tours.  Now we're starting to look beyond the captain's chair.

When it's your turn to parallel park the MV Explorer, this diagram is handy.

When the Captain dispatches you to the Tank Top deck, here's your map.

No bridge is complete without an artistic touch.

And no bridge tour is complete without a savvy guide.  Thanks MV Explorer Third Officer Jean from Panama.

Yours in seeing the bridge with new eyes,
Kelly

#508 Hilo's Japanese Garden

What a way to spend the last afternoon of the last day in our last port! 

We visited Hilo's fantastic Liliuokalani Japanese Garden.

This sprawling thirty-acre city park makes most of the gardens we've already visited on this trip seem like postage stamps. 

Liliuokalani's central pond is a tidal pool alive with exotropical fish and guarded by a massive Banyan tree. 

Maybe we saved one of the best places for last.

Yours in enjoying Japanese gardens everywhere,
Kelly

#507 Hawai'i Volcanoes National Park

Dreams can come true. We’re in Hawai’i!

Of course, the weather is a little wet. We’re in Hilo, after all, the rainiest city in the US.

But what does that matter if you’re off the ship for the first time in 11 days and you’re setting off with good friends to visit a US National Park?

Hawaii Volcanoes National Park is filled with all kinds of cool things like calderas…

And the rainforest…

And Hapuu tree ferns...

And lava tubes...

And the Holei Sea Arch...

 And a lava rock wall...

And the Pu’u Loa petroglyphs...

It’s true we didn’t see any molten lava, but then again, we’re kind of glad we didn’t.

Yours in appreciating all the positives of a volcano-covered island,
Mary

#506 Land Ho

After 11 days at sea, we dock in Honolulu to refuel.

Alas, the forward end of the ship is as close as we can get to the island of Oahu.

Yours in Hawaii dreaming,
Mary