Funny timing with our “Pastel de Choclo”. Silversea gave a demonstration of cooking this Chilean casserole-like pie yesterday, and we were given it during lunch while on a tour. Then that afternoon I cooked it in the S.A.L.T. kitchen. It’s simple in creation, so not many pictures. Rather than a crust or whipped potato topping we use a corn smoothie mixture.

We start by browning the spiced ground beef, then mix the corn slurry, butter and milk into the pot. After thickening we spread it upon the meat and bake. We then made a condiment called Aji Pebre, which you can consider a type of salsa. I learned that some of the heat from hot peppers are from the seeds, but mainly the pith. So, I removed those from the chopped pepper and enjoyed the slight heat in the Pebre.

After baking we got our meals back and enjoyed with our sauce. The corn had a consistency of mashed potatoes, where the locally provided lunch had more of a corn-bread consistency and taste. I can easily see endless variations.

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The pool on the Silver Moon is similar to the Silver Whisper‘s in shape – note the ledge at all sides to reduce any waves escaping the pool and swamping nearby passengers. There are showers and hot tubs on each side, with walk-in steps. The Whisper had portable steps that had to be installed when needed, so I think this is a good change.

However, and this is a big “however”, the Moon does not offer one of my favorite Whisper seaday pastimes – no water volleyball. The Cruise Director told me it takes too much time to lower the pool level for volleyball and then raise it again for swimming afterwards. I don’t know if having a water volleyball requirement fits Silversea’s target demographic, but I’m a bit disappointed.

But it turns out they empty the pool during rough seas to lower the ship’s center of gravity.

At noon each day the bridge announces ship information, like our location, how far we’ve travelled and so on. Today the depth of the sea bottom was over 20,000 feet (6000 m) below us. Um, that’s a long way.