Easter with Easter Bunnies and big animals

Easter at sea and then in Port Elizabeth, South Africa, was a completely different way to celebrate Easter. The ship's crew made a great effort to create an Easter atmosphere, although the rough sea made it difficult. The big dinner with lobster and delicious food was quite lively, despite the good stabilizers of the ship, so the glasses clinked a bit. The subsequent cocktail party certainly caused some swaying, but not because of the alcoholic drinks. Steadfastness was required in the truest sense of the word. Fortunately, I have no problems with that, and after a long time on board, I'm already good at walking in my medium-high heels. (After all, I'm already past the 100th day).

After the Easter breakfast in the restaurant, my maid Shirley placed a chocolate Easter bunny with greetings from the captain in my cabin as a greeting from the ship's crew. In the morning, there were church services of all Christian denominations on board. The day was relaxed, but without an Easter walk on deck, because they were all closed for safety reasons due to the rough sea. An egg drop competition that was supposed to take place on Deck 9 was moved to the Grand Lobby. However, the raw egg was so cleverly packaged by the participants, for example, with a small parachute, that no egg was broken. A nice meeting including lunch in my international group and the destination film "Invictus" about Nelson Mandela in the on-board cinema rounded off the day until dinner and the cocktail party, and then the big Easter chocolate buffet. All the pastry chefs had made a great effort for this, creating Easter bunnies and Easter eggs with great creativity, and preparing the most delicious desserts and cakes with chocolate. Unfortunately, we couldn't manage to eat all the beautiful things, but many photos were taken. The artistically designed creations were then exhibited again on the 2nd day of Easter as decoration in the Grand Lobby on the Purser's Deck.

After so many Easter bunnies, we set off on safari early in the morning on the 2nd day of Easter from Port Elizabeth, where I had the opportunity to encounter larger animals in the jeep, such as quite a few elephants, kudus, buffaloes, and in some distance, a group of lions with 5 animals, which were quite lazy and apparently full lying on their side sleeping. The elephants came surprisingly close to our jeep, so that with my large zoom lens, I was almost too close. This allowed me to take a few detailed shots, such as the long eyelashes of an elephant. It was definitely an interesting morning. I then spent the afternoon taking a walk on the beach in Port Elizabeth, which was only for brave surfers with high surf and quite cold water, and only something to look at for the many families with children who had made an Easter trip here.

Tomorrow, on April 19th, the ship will dock in Cape Town, which will definitely be a highlight. In the evening, all world travelers will have dinner on shore by invitation of the ship's crew. We are all very excited.

I hope you all had a nice Easter! Greetings to all of you!

Eva