North by North West

Thus was our direction of travel as we awoke on Friday. 22nd November, running parallel with the coast of India some thirty miles off to our right. We’d seen very few big ships since rounding the tip of India but there were literally hundreds of small fishing boats scattered around.

S was still smarting over the ‘waddled’ comment some days back and the alarm went off at hideous o’clock.

“Time for Pilates and Gym” she bawled, happily.

“Why can’t you just go for a swim by yourself”, I muttered, trying to cling onto the bedclothes.

“The pool’s not really big enough for proper exercise” she smiled, as she won control of the duvet.

“I wasn’t thinking of the pool”, I snarled, looking meaningfully at the balcony door.

We went to the gym.

Then it was a quick breakfast before the first big decision of the day; The Concorde pilot was due to give a lecture on his time in the RAF flying Harriers and this clashed with the next Bridge class. Still taken aback by S’s sudden conversion to technical topics, I pointed out that learning Bridge would probably have more social value when we got home than learning how to pilot a fighter jet, and so we went to Bridge which, for once, was fairly uneventful.

However, S was keen to get away at the end, in order not to miss (once more to my surprise) the Q&A sessions with the ship’s captain and senior officers. This was very well attended with questions varying from good to inane, but it was generally interesting. Eventually, it was S’s turn;

“Captain, in terms of navigation, do you prefer the Plessey 220 system or the StarSat Global Maritime Plus?”

OK, that last bit didn’t actually happen, but the way things have been going, it is surely only a matter of time.

Inevitably, it was an American who asked the question that no-one else dared;

“Are you anticipating any problems with the Iranians in the Straights of Hormuz?”

The captain said that if he had been, we wouldn’t be going there and that in any case, there were absolutely no circumstances where he would enter Iranian waters!!

The presentation ended with everyone suitably reassured. Well, almost… but this was still some days ahead.

The rest of the day passed with sunbathing, eating and drinking and it was all very relaxing.

The later afternoon was very hot and hazy, although with a good breeze, so we stayed on our sun-loungers as the sun dropped towards the horizon. Contemplating nothing in particular, two points disturbed my tranquility. The first was that in the hazy evening light and at a certain angle, some of the small fishing craft had a profile silhouette not unlike a WW2 U-Boat!

The second point was that at this time next week, we would be on the M4 returning from Heathrow.

One of these thoughts was far more unsettling than the other!