Day 26: Third time lucky? (Yellow Sea)

Emma put her neck out, which kept her on the inactive list for most of today. I fetched her a latte (she needed the coffee, I needed the exercise), and I left her in the stateroom while I went off to play poker

Yeah, this is another poker post. Because poker is Adventure! in its purest form.

Now having gone broke in two $60 poker tournaments twice before this cruise you'd think I'd know better. But I was determined to give it one last shot.

The usual culprits were there, so I was expecting the a string of dodgy calls that end up overturning the laws of probability. But at least Carmen, the strongest player at the table, wasn't on my right today.

Atypically I was dealt decent cards. I'd bet, some nong with a pair of deuces would call, I'd raise again, they'd call, and I'd win the showdown. 

After this happened three or four times I had a strong chip lead, and they began to believe my bets meant I had a hand, and started folding. 

Which is when I started stealing pots with nothing. Heheheheheh.

Eventually it was down to two of us. I figured I'd tapped my luck enough, so I agreed to chop, and we split the payout for $225 each.

I floated back to the cabin, did a little happy dance, and figured since I had money to play with I'd head back down and join a $1/$2 cash game until lunch. After an hour and a half I ended up in a big pot with a guy betting into me who thought his pair of 9s were good. My trip aces were better, So I won another $80.

$305 - $180 (3x$60 buy-ins) = $125 profit. If I keep that ROI up I'll be able to finance a lifetime of cruising with poker.

Yeah. Dream on.

We had lunch at the cafe, and my plans to go to gym slowly evaporated. Emma managed to finish the third of the "girl with the dragon tattoo" books, while I managed a spa. Later we dodged another formal night by having dinner with Carol and Wayne in the buffet.

I paid for the wine, of course.

Dalian tomorrow. It's the third largest port in China, but doesn't look like much of a tour destination based 0n the photos. But a port's a port, so we'll take the shuttle in and see what happens.