At sea, September 17, 2026

We are onboard the Ruby Princess  and headed for Hawaii. Embarkation was easy. We found out today, once onboard, that the ship will not be able to stop in Kauai due to the recent disastrous storm.  We will overnight in Honolulu instead.

John did his usual in San Francisco and left one of his painted rocks to be found. It is in a raised garden in the Fisherman’s Wharf area.

We noticed that there are several types of self-driving vehicles in San Francisco.  We assume that they are all in the taxi/Uber/Lyft business.  There was even a Jaguar self-driver.  Most are Waymo brand.  There were many of them.                           

When we were having lunch, we found that Sandra, our friend from past cruises, was sailing with us. Sandra is the Food and Beverage Manager.  Big hugs all around, she was as happy to see us as we were to see her.  She helped us immensely on our first cruise post transplant by sending us menus at home so we could decide what was safe to eat.  She arranged to have our meals sent to our cabin, so we weren’t exposed to any possible infection agents. She was also with us on the “COVID cruise’ in 2020 and was very solicitous of our well-being when we were confined to our cabin, checking in on us daily.

At dinner tonight several tables spotted whales, which was a thrill.

We are 'at sea' now until we arrive in Honolulu on September 22.