09:30 am (Mumbai time zone)

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The last day of the year has dawned and once again time was stolen from us overnight. This time it was only half an hour, but before that it was a full 60 minutes. To adapt us to the time zone of Mumbai, this is certainly useful in stages. One does not get around it, because by loudspeaker announcement, among other things during the meal, it is pointed out. In general, there are many informative announcements. According to current information from the bridge, there are now 445 nautical miles, or 824 km, to Mumbai. The ship is sailing at 17 knots on a course to the east-southeast and we are on the same latitude as Havana in Cuba. There, by the way, it is similarly warm as here, the captain knows, 23 degrees this morning. The humidity is 75 percent and it doesn’t get any better in Mumbai. According to the forecast, the 34 degrees will feel like 38 degrees.

11:30 pm

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After a festive meal in the market restaurant (you don’t have to spend extra money on the Rossini, an à la carte restaurant here on board, to get a special menu), after a little break on the dice (2 games, 2 wins 🙂 ), we head to the Hemingway Lounge, where a well-chilled bottle of Dom Pérignon Rosé from 2004 is waiting for us. This is now again a separate arrangement, since there are only 25 seats in the lounge, which serves as a library for the rest of the trip. For it one has sufficient movement free space and a little peace without loud music, so that we can talk in the evening with another couple well. Fleetingly we had met the evening before, when by a mix-up of the waiter in the bar our room cards (which are necessary for payment) were mixed up. So later yesterday evening – I had gone to the cabin a bit earlier – a strange man stood in front of my door and knocked to hand in the mistakenly received room card. As chance would have it, however, the two also live only six cabins away.

So that then led to us getting into conversation this evening as well and the two sharing their magnum bottle of Moët with us. Shortly before midnight, all the guests gathered around the pool for the countdown, which was counted down by the captain himself, to at least get some of the party atmosphere. In the absence of fireworks, there was a laser show and then a performance by the “Fire Dancers”, a dance group that moved to the music, armed with fire torches.