Panama - day 1

Park in Downtown Tampa 

We are back from our repositioning cruise through the Panama canal from Tampa to Victoria. I cannot open my database at the moment. Something changed in the Oracle XE configuration. Being deprived of my work for a few more days highlights the things that give my life meaning apart from isolating myself in ancient texts. Things like running the house, planting in the garden, saying hello to people, going to GVYO rehearsals and to the Opera and so on. I am going to document the cruise to figure out how such an experience fits in for us.

Day 1. We had arrived via Air Canada (Victoria-Toronto-Tampa) the prior night. In the morning we took a short walk through the downtown area of Tampa from our hotel, the Meridien, located in the beautiful old courthouse building. We were looking for a card, a post office, and some tonic water to go with the gin we had purchased for the next three weeks on board the cruise: Tampa to Victoria via three ports in the Caribbean through the Panama canal and then up the coast of Central America to San Diego. 

Diana waited in this park while I searched for the post office. I duly weighed the card, attached the postage, and returned for her to write the card, an Easter card, but then we both forgot to mail it! 

We walked back to the hotel, intrigued by the architecture. We had an hour to spare before the shuttle to the dock, so we settled into the coffee shop in the hotel. 

As we entered the cruise terminal, I noted the card in my pocket. O dear. Ensured that we could mail the card from the ship, we boarded, but they didn't tell us they wouldn't be able to mail the card till San Diego, a week after Easter! Eventually we mailed it from our first stop, Hell, in the Cayman Islands, on the 7 mile beach where we had a lovely swim. I understand it arrived a few days ago. It was a long and tortuous journey from the post office in Hell to Regina, I expect.

The coffee shop in the old court house, now the Meridien hotel

Our trip from Victoria was very smooth and at every checkpoint we were given swift priority either for the handicapped or from our business class seat sale that we had purchased in January. The Rouge flight from Toronto was particularly enjoyable for the Ipad they loaned me with which I watched Arrival, a film we later saw on the ship and watched twice in our suite. I find the film a credible exploration of the problem of language perception and translation. I am still pondering it.

Google photos is a step backward from Picasa albums. The rest of the album is here. I have also tried it on Onedrive but it appears you have to sign in to view. Google vs Microsoft competition is not working for us at the moment.