Engine Trouble

After our brief stop in Singapore, we headed northwest through the Malacca Straight and into the Indian Ocean.

Late on the second night, the ship slowed to a crawl a number of times and in the morning we were only doing around 15 kn compared to our average cruising speed of about 20 kn.

Later in the day, there was an announcement from the Captain that there was an issue of some kind and we could not obtain top speed. We continued on at a reduced rate and this resulted in a delayed arrival in Columbo. The original schedule was for an 8:00 am Arrival and this slipped to 2:00 pm. This affected our planned overland trip to India with our flight from Columbo scheduled for 2 pm from the airport. There was a day of so waiting for an update on this which we did receive before docking and this involved a much later flight leaving at 11:20 pm and a stop in Mumbai rather than the direct flight to Delhi. All in all, this meant we would be flying overnight and not sleeping in Delhi for the first night and it would also impact our planned train to Agra on the morning of the second day. Anyway, we were pleased to be going rather than have the trip cancelled.

So once we had arrived at Colombo there was just time to step ashore (with Piney) onto the dock for some shopping at dockside stalls and a welcome by a local dance troupe (and drums)

Then time to board the ship and try and get some rest before our Indian adventure started later that evening