Monday, October 13, 2008

various sightings

Wednesday 8th October 2008

11:40 p.m.
I got back on the Rotterdam yesterday for a four-week stint, almost exactly two months after I left the ship at the end of my last contract. My first night went very well indeed, despite the ship not being especially busy there was a good number and mix of people in the Sky Lounge throughout the evening, the audience was amenable and I had several requests, including some during my first set which is quite rare. Played a few numbers which I hadn’t played for a long time, including California Dreaming and Suspicious Minds, which went down particularly well. I had two encores and many words of gratitude afterwards. A pleasant way to begin a new contract and more than I could have hoped for.

I saw a couple of familiar faces last night as well – one chap who was on the ship back in July, who I allowed to play a song, and another slightly older bloke who I am sure is a regular.

Tonight was a similar story to last night. Conversely there were more people in the bar this evening even though there were less on the ship in general. There were quite a few groups and couples in who I had seen last night, obviously doing a round-trip (or ‘mini-cruise’ as it is known).

As the weather was fine in Holland this afternoon I went out for a walk down the road. A couple of kilometres from the port I managed to find a long path that ran between an avenue of tall trees, which looked quite picturesque with the sun catching their early autumn hues. On the way back I saw a stationary freight train near the terminal which had just been unloaded of its goods, probably waiting to be loaded up again.

Freight train in Europort

Saturday 11th October 2008

5:18 p.m.
Thursday night went fairly well, there was a large group in for the best part of the evening who were singing along and requesting several songs. After they left, several people seemed to follow suit as it was very quiet for my last set.

Last night went quite well too, again there was a good mix of people in and the bar was still quite busy by the time I finished.

Yesterday when we were in Holland I was doing some practise and I noticed another strange craft progressing slowly down one of the channels towards the sea. I managed to get a few pictures of it, this is probably the clearest one. Looking at the height of the columns I would probably assume they were going to form part of an oil platform.



Monday 13th October 2008

12:02 p.m.
Saturday night was a good night, busy as usual at the weekend with what seemed to be a largely German audience. There were several couples and groups in who stayed until the end of my last set. Also a few groups passing through who insisted on having their photo taken with me!

Last night went quite well despite it being one of those evenings where I seemed to be playing more background music rather than anything else. Nevertheless there were quite a lot of people in throughout the evening, and some people who were obviously enjoying the music. I played Neil Diamond’s ballad September Morn for the first time which was well appreciated.

On the subject of photos, during my most recent hiatus, my friend Sophie (one of the children’s entertainers or ‘hosts’ as they are now known) uploaded some photos from the ship to an album on her Facebook page, one of which features me playing and singing with some backing singers when I was on here back in July.



Also the other day when I was on my way to the Seafarer’s Mission (which these days is typically deserted since the introduction of crew internet access on the ferries) I noticed a large and well-seasoned cargo ship moored up by the old ferry terminal. I wonder where Ulaambaatar is!

Cargo ship in Hull port

1:33 p.m. Apparently it’s in Mongolia.

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