Geiranger

July 15th
Geiranger

Well, I’m pushing the envelope yet again. Instead of staying out of trouble, it looks as if I continue to do everything to invite it my way. Today in Geiranger, I was scheduled for an all day tour that drove from a drop off point in Hellesylt through the fjords and mountains to where the ship would meet us in Geiranger. The problem was that I had both a department meeting and a meeting with the MD to turn in my time card (which I had forgotten to do the previous day and had received a note about) in the middle of the tour. I had decided to take a chance and go on the tour anyways, certainly more fulfilling than what was sure to be a pointless meeting. I had filled out my time card as well and left it on Gordon’s bed so that he could turn it in for me. Hopefully it would all work out fine.
So I went on the tour. The weather was less than pleasant - getting rained on in Norwegian mountains is about the furthest thing from warm and comfortable you can experience – but the tour was gorgeous. The terrain we traveled was unbelievable and despite the cloudy skies, it wasn’t hard to appreciate the natural beauty we were surrounded by. We stopped at 10 different sites on our overland tour, including a stop at the deepest lake in northern Europe, a drive to the top of a mountain, and a lunch consisting of the best salmon I’ve ever had. There was even a ski slope at the top of one of these fjords for summer skiing! It’s too bad we fought the rain all day and that I came back to the ship soaked and freezing, but it was still a great tour.
I got back to the ship around 4:00, way after the meetings had taken place expecting some note informing me of my absence. Guess what? No note! At the rehearsal the MD didn’t say a word to me about missing the meeting, and even asked me if I saw the trombone player there. I’m really confused about how this guy is missing so much stuff, but hey, who’s complaining?
The night I decided to push my luck even a little further. I don’t usually try to get myself in trouble on these ships, it’s the absolute last thing in the world I want to do, but sometimes you have to break a couple rules. This time involved me wanting to get a chessboard for my cabin. The best place to pick one up is in the Golden Lion Pub on the ship, where they have about 10 of them in a pile. I figured they really didn’t need all 10 and decided to borrow one for the rest of my contract. So late at night, I snuck up to the pub, nonchalantly walked by the passengers to the chess game, grabbed it and walked back to my cabin. I guess it’s no mission impossible or anything, but it was still slightly nerve-racking taking the game. But I think that’s going to be it for my career as a thief for the rest of the contract, let’s just hope I can stay out of trouble for a while now. Thanks for reading!