Got talking to a wrinkled sea salt with a peppery beard in a Southampton pub the other day. He was even older than me and remembered taking his first sea cruise in the mid-1970s.
We compared notes over a glass or two of grog on what used to pass for on-board cruise ship entertainment at that time.
For some 1970s devout passengers whose prayers had been answered by a cruise, Holy Mass or its equivalent was held every day in the ship’s Chapel, usually around 7.30am. Still is, on some ships.
While you were wearing out your knees in the chapel, a schedule of the day’s activities was pushed under your cabin door.
The dawning of a cruise
If you weren’t a chapel-goer, some of you rose at the crack of a seagull bouncing off the hull for the early bird breakfast of coffee, tea, rolls and fruit juice. This is still served on most cruise ships, around 6-6.30am.
Or you could snuggle deeper into your hammock and save your stomach for the regular blow-out breakfast, an hour or two later. Greedy passengers ate both.
Past the time
The rest of the day was broken up with more food and booze (nothing changes), passenger talent shows, fancy dress parties, lectures on Bridge, bingo, Ping-Pong (the game, rather than a description of what you’ve just eaten from the Far Eastern buffet table), trap shooting on deck, golf clinics, needlepoint lessons, dance classes, afternoon tea accompanied by some sad shiftless devil on the keyboards, shuffle-board tournaments (some ships still do this, alas), scavenger hunts (kept the kids off your back for a while), chess tournaments (ho, hum), and spoon diving contests in one of the ship’s swimming pools.
There were times all those years ago when some passengers thought boat drill was the highlight of the day.
But, believe it or not, most passengers had a jolly old time of it and welcomed the break. Again, nothing changes.
Aside from the food, which if anything has got more exotic.
If all this has whetted your appetite, here’s a few dishes from the 1970s that don’t often appear on today’s cruise ship menus:
Jellied Consommé, Frosted Melon Balls au Rum, Calves Liver Sauté, Turtle Soup with Sherry, Goose Liver with Champagne Jelly, and Sherbets.
What I want to know is: what happened to the Baked Alaska?
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