Woke up to another nice sunrise over the water. It’s one of my favourite things on a cruise.

Today finds us in Sydney, Nova Scotia. The big deal here is the “world’s largest fiddle”, which was just outside our balcony.

We were here on a similar cruise in 2019 and it rained the entire time, plus it was after Labour Day and nearly everything was closed. This time, it’s a beautiful sunny day, it’s a holiday weekend, and there’s still not much to do here. I suppose when a big fiddle is your main attraction, I should’ve expected as much. Still, we had a nice walk around town.

The RCL was having a craft fair, so we poked our heads in. Homemade crafts really aren’t my thing, but having a browse does give you a flavour for the community. The crafts inside were made with found objects (sea glass, driftwood, etc) and represented Scottish heritage and seafaring themes. We took a stroll down Charlotte Street, the main ‘high street’ in town.

For a former capital city (of Cape Breton Island, before it merged with Nova Scotia and the capital moved to Halifax), it’s a sleepy little town. It was designated a city in 1904, but it hasn’t been a “city” since August 1, 1995 when the people who decide such things apparently took a stroll around and decided, “yeah… no.”

The locals we encountered all seemed very friendly and were happy that you were visiting their town. We had pretty much seen our fill of it by noon and headed back to the ship by way of the “Big Fiddle Market” next to the ship. More artsy-crafty stuff.

Back on board, we enjoyed our lunch al fresco on the back deck of the ship, enjoying the sunshine and the tranquil water views while most of the ship was still poking around on shore. I had a green salad, a bowl of Cantonese noodles, and a ‘spicy noodle salad’ that was exactly what was advertised. It was delicious!

Naps happened. Nice!

Decided to start in on writing this post, and took advantage of the nice weather by working on it outside on the balcony, stopping every so often to do some people watching.

We have a new set dinner time and table, which saves on logistics when we’re all doing our own things during the day. So at 5pm every evening now, we’ll be at table 115 at the back of the ship by the windows.

Several of us had haddock and chips, which was very good. Then it was off to 80’s music trivia - where we got nearly all of the answers right. We put Debbie Gibson for Tiffany on one song and Men Without Hats instead of Men at Work for another. Two teams got everything correct and had to break the tie with a dance-off. I’m glad we missed a couple!

There was a stand-up comic for the big show, but being on a cruise ship, a comic is severely limited by what they can say. Rob, Michelle, and I sat through a few minutes of ‘dad bod’ jokes, then bailed. The show was PACKED, though, so I guess people enjoyed it.

We ended up at Mix Bar, where Grace was…um… gracing us with her… um…. talents. Literally, we’d be in the middle of a conversation and we’d all stop and our eyes would get wide and we’d look over at the piano like “what the actual fuck was that?”

And if you think that’s an exaggeration, let me present to you the highlight of the evening:

Now, since I subjected you to that, I’ll treat you with this. I just found this while I was waiting for the above video to upload. I don’t care how many cover versions of Bohemian Rhapsody you’ve heard, you need to hear this one. A good arrangement of a song will make you “hear it again for the first time.” In other words, it’s familiar but it feels like something new. This is that. From the quality of the vocals to the mesmerizing video to the absolutely genius vocal arrangement, this is astonishing. Enjoy.

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