Port Power

The kebab was cooked for a couple of minutes on four sides and set aside. The steak was cooked for a few minutes each side and then set aside to rest. Once rested, the steak was sliced for serving. As a coeliac, I plated my steak with the coleslaw on top and the kebab to the side and ate with a knife and fork. It was tender and soooo delicious. For demonstration purposes, here is the completed sandwich that Chef Drake made.

Sunday, 10 December, 2023. At Sea. Our final day on Silver Dawn. It has been a wonderful cruise, the staff in particular making it so. This morning was my final SALT Lab class,”jerk rub and jerk steak sandwich”. Chef Drake was asked if he could suggest a ready made sauce, but he couldn’t. His mother is from Trinidad-Tobago and has always made jerk marinade herself, and therefore he does too. A stalk of rosemary was used as the skewer for the vegetables. Leave the top leaves and strip off the rest. The vegetable kebab was painted lightly with some of the jerk marinade. The coleslaw was tossed with its zesty marinade. The thin flank steak was then heavily coated on both sides with the jerk marinade.

I sailed with Silversea for the first time this year, and I am under 70 years of age. On classic ships, I like the dress code and I like to bring my dressier clothes. However, what I call casual, others would call semi-formal. There is room to move within the suggested guidelines. I leave my cool cotton short dresses for expedition cruises.

At 12:00pm there was a cocktail demonstration in Dolce Vita. I saw the mats describing three run based cocktails. However, a group of us was meeting in the Observation Library for our sea day game of LCR. Always fun and lots of laughter. It was still pretty warm outside, but some passengers were swimming. It was lunchtime by now and there was the seafood extravaganza in La Terrazza and at The Grill (with chef Grant cooking), which probably explained the empty sun lounges. 🦀 🦞 🍤

The SALT chef then made dough for bao buns, but of course had two cooked ones ready to fill. My New Zealand neighbour agreed the bao bun everyone was given was nothing like the Vietnamese ones we get at home. This recipe was more bread-like. The filling was julienned sweet potato and cabbage, pulled pork, a pesto sauce and topped with a sliver of pickled onion. This is the Bolivian sandwich.

Saturday, 9 December, 2023. At sea. S.A.L.T. did another presentation in the Venetian Lounge this morning, the time about the culture of sandwiches. Specialities from Chile, Peru and Bolivia featured. The SALT Bar matched with a light but tasty red with e from the Canary Islands.

The night finished sitting at the bar in Silver Note listening to Esther and Johan. There was also a chocolate extravaganza in Dolce Vita at 9:45pm. I turned up at 10:40pm and it was all packed away! Really sorry there are therefore no pictures of what was available.

The next stop was further up the mountains to La Coca Falls and the Yokahu Tower. The tower never fulfilled its original purpose as a military lookout, but certainly has a good view from the top. The falls were pretty tame today, but can wash across the road after heavy rain. It was a delightful area to visit.

This is the bread fruit tree. There is a ripe breadfruit peeping out from under the leaves.

Native species include the coqui frog, hummingbird, tiny Tody bird and the Puerto Rican parrot. The parrots are so endangered that there is a breeding program in the park’s bird centre. During Hurricane Maria in 2017 the cages were destroyed and the birds flew away. There is hope that they are surviving and breeding.

Today’s excursion was to the El Yunque National Park for a rainforest walk. Original rainforest had been removed long, long ago for coffee plantations. The area for some time now has been declared a National Park and has been undergoing reforestation to bring back the rainforest. Red ginger flowers White ginger flowers Yagrumo. Leaves sometimes used as umbrellas. Dark green on the top by white underneath.

Friday, 8 December, 2023. San Juan, Puerto Rico. This morning, all passengers and crew had to present face to face with USA immigration. Also, all passengers had to leave the ship and there be a “zero” count before any passengers could reboard. As I was on the first excursion of they day, our tour was called at 8:00ish. We collected our passports at one station (manned by two of the musicians), and presented ourselves at passport control. On the other side, we waited for everyone before proceeding to our bus. This continued through all excursions, finalising with those passengers wishing to return to the ship after immigration. From all reports, everything went smoothly for the rest of the passengers. I looked out from my starboard balcony early in the morning to see kitchen staff, housekeeping staff and assorted other personnel doing the immigration circuit. The rest of the ship’s staff and crew went through after total passenger clearance.

I though I had answered you, but my iPad sometimes has a mind of its own! The Silversea rep is a paid employee, so I don’t think they earn a commission as well. They job is to seal the deal! When you transfer the booking to your TA, that person does get the commission. There might be a way around this. Usually you have 24 or 48 hours of whatever to pay in full. You can pay a portion on the ship and then transfer to your TA and pay the balance through them the next day.

It was an early departure today at 2:00pm, although the ship pulled out I bit earlier than that as everyone was aboard. We waved goodbye to the neighbours.

Bird Island and another beach. All very pretty. The islands are all served by ferries, but I did notice there were very few small boats about.

There was a fishing line set up at the rear of the boat. There was much joy on catching a decent sized Spanish mackerel.

Thursday, 7 December, 2023. St John’s, Antigua. I did the catamaran tour to Bird Island with snorkelling and light lunch. See @canderson photo above of the yellow catamaran. There were about 26 of us including guest lecturer Mark as escort. It took one and a half hours to get out there, but the scenting the way was worth it.

I forgot to add the delicious cocktail prepared by SALT Bar to complement today’s food. No name yet.

The themed lunch in Dolce Vita today is “American Diner”. Lots of burgers and fried food! I saw one of the dancers departing with a cream-topped drink, but he easily works off any excess calories! Can some only kindly explain how I rotate the images, please? “Format”

I am simply demonstrating that not everything on Silver Dawn is perfect. There are flaws. Also that there are avenues for managing and resolving any problems or concerns. Some people reading this travel blog may be new to Silversea and might find this informative.

This morning’s cooking demonstration from SALT Lab and Kitchen. It was the corn cake we made in SALT Lab the other day, substituting cornmeal with all purpose flour and mashed potato, and using pulled pork. The mash did make the cake more moist, so when I make it at home, I will change out half of the cornmeal with mashed potato. (Chef Drake’s instructions.) Quinoa (a seed) The final dish, dotted with satay sauce.

This morning’s SALT cooking demonstration was about the “Grains of the gods”. The item made was a version of the corn cake we made in SALT Lab recently. This version swapped cornmeal with wheat flour and mashed potato, and used pulled pork in the middle. The mashed potato made the cake more moist, and I will add that to the cornmeal cake when I make it at home. Quinoa (a seed) The final dish, dotted with satay sauce.

We were seated just before 7:45pm. It was after 10:00pm when are mains were served. Every table around us were either gone or eating dessert. I totally agree with @drron29 about a good waiter keeping an eye on the order that mains leave the kitchen. Our waiter was most definitely missing! Other waiters were serving water and topping up our wine. Anyway, I spoke to the overall Restaurant Manager this morning at breakfast, so he will review last night’s service (and possibly staff). And speaking to Grant also provided valuable answers. I always find it better to speak directly to management about an issue rather than moan and do nothing, or write about it in the feedback after disembarking.

We did notice there had been a long wait but we kept thinking the main would appear. Or the waiter! The second starter was the vegetable course. It was definitely the conversation that kept us from noticing the time even though we were sipping 🍷. We did speak up, needing to go to the front desk to do so. Nevertheless there was still further delay. The person who left did have the very light quinoa salad and another starter, but not the main course. Naturally that appeared one minute after he left! I’m wondering if the kitchen ran out of 24-hour marinated prime rib? That could explain the different butterflied steak and the time delay while it was marinated for an hour.

Most unfortunately, dinner at Atlantide didn’t go very well tonight. There were five of us at the table. Our appetisers arrived in a timely manner. Two of us had ordered a second starter, and they also arrived in a reasonable time frame. However, an hour later we were still waiting for our main courses! As we were all having such a good time, we hadn’t noticed how long it had been. The waiter who took our order hadn’t been anywhere near the table since! A visit to the maître d’hotel seemed to get things moving, but no apology. One of our group left the restaurant without eating! To add insult to injury, the “prime rib” was not. It was steak, but butterflied! No idea what cut. For two of us, the meat was tender and delicious, for the other two it was tough. The succotash was delicious though, as was the potato galette. The sauce as demonstrated this morning was rich and tasty. Again, we had to speak to the maître d’ to order dessert. It was after 10:00pm by this time. The other couple were first time SS clients; they probably won’t be back, either. They do prefer Holland America and have also found life on board Silver Dawn somewhat boring. I really think Dolce Vita needs a piano man like Mark Farris, especially on transoceanic cruises. This is not the first time there has been an overlong delay in both Atlantide and La Terrazza. A small blip on an overall great cruise, but we think management needs to be informed.