Day 75 25th March 2011

When we reach the open sea last night after leaving San Francisco it was quite rough and the ship was moving with some force side to side. However, by this morning the sea was calm and very smooth. During the day the temperature has risen and we were able to sit on our balcony for the first time in several days. There is still a lot of cloud and the ocean is very dark almost black in colour. We are meeting the occasional freighter since we are sailing parallel with the coast of California but no signs of animal life in the sea. I won one dollar from an Australian passenger by betting him that India would beat Australia in the Cricket World Cup. One of the waiters also won with the same bet.

This morning we attended a talk on the wines of California by an American expert from the Rutherford Ranch winery. They provide two main brands Rutherford Ranch and Round Hills. We had a chance to taste five of their wines this afternoon: Chardonnay, Chardonnay/Viognier blend, Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon and a Zinfandel. They were all perfectly good wines but the best was the Cabernet Sauvignon which was also the most expensive while I also liked the zinfandel which was the cheapest. The difference in price was $20 to $8, respectively. There was a good deal of interest in the wines.

After tasting the wines we later attend a talk by Johnnie Ball about mathematics. You may remember him from the television where he tried to make maths interesting for children. He was doing much the same on board the ship. He covered a lot of ground showing interesting solutions to making multiplication easier. He is speaking again in a few days time about science.

The weather in Acapulco is apparently a lot hotter than here with temperatures reaching 31C so that after the cold and wet of San Francisco everyone is looking forward to arriving there.