Day 6 - Civitavecchia and a "Day at Sea"

Midnight Engineering "repair".  (it worked!)

Last night we were buffeted by 6 meter waves (like 20 feet), mostly broadside.  So, the ship rocked side to side.  Anything that could move, did.  And anything that could move, stopped by colliding noisily with something not moving.  So, the balcony was full of “Bang!  Bang!  Clunk!  Bang!” all night long.  And the shower door slid back and forth crashing on each side, in addition to many other noises outside of our cabin.  On top, every few minutes the roll was enough to make it feel like we might “almost” slide off of the bed.  OK, sure, the likelihood of falling out of bed wasn’t large, but when you’re almost asleep, it’s not a fun way to wake.  So, by 5-6 AM, neither of us having slept a lot, we considered our tour of sitting on a bus for an hour, standing around for an hour or two, and another hour or so on the bus, and decided…let’s take a day off!  We opted to make this a personal “day at sea” and stay on the boat.  We slept in a bit, and then made it to breakfast. 

The sea was angry!!

Holding pattern!

As it happened, the port was not ready for us, so we held outside for about an hour or 90 minutes.  All of the tours were delayed for the start (but still had to get back in time), so it was stressful for many.  But, we had a leisurely breakfast with baby lamb chops, and some kind of “chickpea pancake”.  We took some time to check emails, do a little work (personal and professional), and even take a long nap!

Getting some work done!  With a drink!

In the afternoon, we had lunch with our friends from Maui, watched another lecture, played a little Backgammon (2-1 this time for one of us), made it to Trivia (taking 3^rd place again with our friends from Wisconsin, and then headed back to get ready for dinner.  We had dinner at the Italian restaurant, which was good.  Our tour “should” have included a wine tasting, so we went from Prosecco to white to red to port at the end, so had our ad hoc tasting!

Italian wine, Italian food, Italian restaurant, Italian coast!

After dinner, there was a movie they were showing, complete with popcorn and sodas (and whatever you brought in from the bar!).  The movie (Mafia Momma) was kind of terrible…on many levels!  But, we enjoyed the low key day anyway!

The end of the day!

But NOT before a nightcap!
(had to try it)