We arrived in Key West at nearly 11:30. After clearance by the Port Authorities, the Immigration folks came on board to interview everybody. On a ship of 950 passengers, this can take time, so good organisation is crucial. Fortunately, things went relatively smoothly, with those passengers booked on excursions being the first asked to make their way to The Coral Club with their completed Visa Waiver forms, customs declarations and passports. The queue into the Coral Club was long and fractious, with a few passengers chuntering about the inconvenience and trying to wheedle their way into pole position.

My excursion this afternoon (it was just a half day today - shore leave ending at 4:30 for sailaway at 5pm) was 'Homes and Gardens'. What can I say? It is an hour and a half of my life that I'll never get back. As our guide led us off the quayside into the small town, I looked longingly at the small gathering of people who were being led off to their white knuckle high-speed boat expereince and let out a big sigh.

Okay, I told myself, this might just be a fantastic tour that I'm cruelly underestimating. Maybe the 90 minute walk we were about to take was going to be the highlight of the cruise.... it wasn't. Our guide, Denison, took us to three old houses; The Heritage House, The Curry Mansion and another one I can't recall the name of, droning on about their history and their occupants; Robert Frost, Hemmingway, and another bloke who I should be able to remember the name of but has slipped my memory. At each house, a fresh guide would take over and lead us into each room in turn, pointing out paintings, old furniture, pewter mugs, gold tea sets... Hemmingway's Hunting Rifle... Robert Frost's little book of doodles... it just went on and on and on... Since this was a walking tour, we passed places that were far more interesting; several people stopped to try and take photographs - The famous Sloppy Joe's Bar was busting with life and interesting characters, and beer; The Hog's Breath Bar had live country music - another bar was covered on every surface with old banknotes.... but as soon as anyone dragged their heels and seemed to be lagging behind and not paying him full attention, Denison would holler loudly from the front to try and keep up... aaargh!!

At the last house, our guide abandoned us completely and left us in the clutches of a woman who just rambled on incessantly about... well, actually I don't know what she was rambling on about because by then I'd pretty much lost the will to live. I could tell people were getting edgy and restless; we'd already lost one couple who flatly refused to walk another inch and wanted to go off and explore the town by themselves, and did so. Eventually, with the last guide still blathering on, people realised that the original guide had actually gone off and left us, and so they just drifted off - end of tour.

At 5pm we left Key West under leaden skies and set sail for Miami, where we should be arriving at about 10:30 tomorrow morning.

This is the last night on the Braemar, and people are busy packing, or thinking about it. Luggage has to be placed outside cabins between 10pm this evening and 2am in the morning, so when people do finally emerge, they'll be wearing their civvies; the clothes they'll be going home in.

It's been an interesting cruise, with some highlights and low-lights. The weather rather dominated people's thoughts in the first week, and the rough seas laid many up in their beds wishing they'd stayed at home after all. For me, the Island Safari trip stands out as a high point - on a par with The Dunns River Falls tour on the last cruise. The painting workshops have been succesfull, and yesterday's exhibition was a fitting end to my work this time around.

I'm coming home tomorrow, with things getting back to normality next week - back to reality. I've enjoyed my trip to the Caribbean, but it's always nice to come home....

To all my blog-readers; I hope you've enjoyed my ramblings and meanderings. I may be adding a post or two during the long hours waiting in Miami Airport, if I have anything to report - I arrive in Heathrow at about 2am on Friday morning, then make a time-machine-like leap forward by 5 hours before flying North to Manchester.

For now at least, the adventure is over.

The exhibition yesterday afternoon was FANTASTIC!!

With many hands making light work, the blue-tack, which was actually white, rolled freely and before you knew it, 81 paintings were proudly presented in the Skylark Club. The DJ booth, which has glass windows was festooned with work from 25 or so very proud students, and a free-standing display board was drafted in to take the excess, and it all looked terrific.

Because the event had been highlighted in the daily blurb and the Cruise Director had mentioned it in his address in the Neptune Lounge the night before, the turn-out was excellent, with folks doing lots of milling about and mingling and entering into the whole spirit of the thing. I was pleased; proud of the achievement, happy with the sale I made and, above all, pleased that Anthony the Cruise Director came up to see it and reported good feedback, which is the bottom-line as far as I'm concerned. All the work is in vain if the students haven't enjoyed their experience or the passengers are unhappy in any way with my performance.

Last night was the final Formal Night; dinner jackets and ballgowns were aired for one last time and the photographers flashed away capturing the occasion. The highlight of the evening was the Crew Show, where engineers, chefs, cabin staff, waiters; basically, the people who keep the ship running and operating on a day-to-day basis, entertained us with dance and song. The show was run 15-minutes apart, concurrently in both the Neptune Lounge and the Coral Club, twice, to take account of the two restaurant sittings. This was all very well, but it left very little in the way of alternative options. I had a drink and a sing in the Morning Light Pub (Jeff invited me up to sing 'The Boxer' again) and then sort of drifted about aimlessly looking for something, anything, to entertain me that wasn't the Crew Show. I joined in the quiz night again, and our team scored 20 correct questions out of 20. Unfortunately, so did 5 other teams (cos it was so easy), and the tie-break question was a tough one - what year was Nelson's flag-ship first launched? Who cares? Needless to say we didn't wiin.

Later on, they announced the Chef's Grand Gala Buffet in the Thistle Restaurant. This wasn't so much an opportunity to eat late , as a feast for the eyes. Apparently it is a very long tradition dating back to goodness knows when. The Head Chef and his team carve animals out of great lumps of ice and do lots of arty things with meat and butter and anything else they can lay their hands on. People queued for ages to walk through this grotto of delights, like you would to see a rare exhibit at a museum or art gallery.... now, I was brought up being told not to play with my food and, despite being quite clever; castles built out of butter; a joint of pork made up to look like a... pig; a miniature playground made out of chocolate; eagles and dolphins carved out of ice... I'm not sure I entirely GET it.

Anyway, today we arrive in Key West in Florida; the last of our port stops before concluding our trip in Miami tomorrow morning. Interestingly enough, this is the last year that Fred Olsen will be flying passengers into, and sailing out of, the United States, I've heard. This is because the US immigration system is changing; they're doing away with the green waiver forms which we have to fill in - instead, anyone travelling to the States will need to fill in an on-line form, personally, 72 hours before entry. This is all very well, but many passengers are not on the internet and don't own computers (and travel agents will not be allowed to do it for them) - all very inconvenient - kind of makes you think they don't really want us to visit, doesn't it? In future, then, cruises will fly into, and sail out of, Barbados, where no such silliness applies.

I have a tour today. It's a short day, and we'll have the fiasco of all passengers having to have a face-to-face interview with immigration officials who will come aboard, before being allowed onto US soil (even those who are not going ashore). The good thing about being on a tour is that I'll be amongst the earliest to be seen. I'm a little disappointed at the excursion I've been given though; out of a list of trips which includes two 'White Knucle Thrill Boat Rides', I've been given 'Homes and Gardens', which all sounds a bit sedentary to me. Hmm... we'll see!

This is our final full sea-day.

It's unlikely that anything is going to eclipse the excitement of yesterday's whale-sighting (folks are still to be heard asking "did you see the whale?), this afternoon is the big Art Exhibition, though, so you never know...

I realised there are several things that I've always done on cruises before that I don't seem to have done this time around, and am setting about trying to rectify that today. Last night, I went upstairs to the Skylark Club and joined in the Quiz Night, for instance. Previously, I would always have sought out and participated in these fantastic coming-together-and-battling-it-out events, but it's something I seem to have completely overlooked on this trip. I joined Carl De Marco (singer) and his team in the musical 'Film Themes' quiz, which should have been right up my street; not being able to recognise the theme to Pirates of The Caribbean scuppered us though. The winning team, apparently, have been wiping out the competition pretty much every night since the start of the cruise, much to the upset of other teams who insist that they have an unfair advantage by having 7 in the team, which is against the rules stipulating teams should consist of no more than 6 players. By all accounts, a fracas broke out in the Coral Club Afternoon quiz a couple of days ago. A winning team consisting of 7 players were called to account by another team; the quizmaster asked the room to decide whether or not they should be allowed to keep their winning vouchers and the entire room chanted "out, out out" in a chorus of disapproval.... yessss! Justice prevails!

Visiting the gym is also something I've rather overlooked this time around, and am hoping to catch an hour in there later, before showering and dressing up for our final Formal Night. There are fewer people walking or running circuits around the Lounge deck (5 laps = 1 mile), although there does seem to be a marked increase of activity around about sunset time. Mostly, the decks have been populated by people lounging on sunbeds roasting themselves, reading or doing the daily crosswords or soduko provided by the ship. The Marquee Deck (top deck) has been a sea of sunbathing bodies since the good weather kicked in. This is also where the swimming pools are situated, which seem to have been very busy whenever I've taken a walk up there.

Jeff Diamond payed a fantastic set in the Coral Club last night - he really is a great guitarist, and with the backing of the Braemar Orchestra instead of his usual pre-recorded tracks, he successfully rocked the ship with some good ol' raw blues numbers.

So anyway, this afternoon's big exhibition looms.... There are no fewer than 80 paintings, all to be blu-tacked to the walls of the Skylark Club. Proceedings start at 2pm, and I'm hoping it's going to attract a good crowd.

Bring it on!

This afternoon, I completed my last workshop. I had them paint a simple beach scene, with palm trees and figures. It went well and, best of all, everyone has contributed a huge pile of paintings ready for tomorrow's big exhibition. I keep telling them; their fellow passengers will be in awe of them when they see what talented folks they are, and that should they be asked if they can buy their work, they should start at £1000 and work downwards.

The session went so well that we went over time, and folks were still painting right up until about 4:30. At 4:15, though, the captain's voice came over the loudspeakers advising us that passengers might want to head on outside and take a look to the portside of the ship....

As people flocked out on deck, and fought for the best position by the railings, you could sense the anticipation in the air, until finally someone called out "There it is!" And there it was... a whale!

Every now and then it would break through the surface and a spout of water would burst into the air before slipping slowly and silently back beneath the waves. For about ten minutes we all watched, some still not seeing it when pointed out by others, but it was difficult as we were looking into the sun... then, on a couple of particularly wonderful occasions, its tail came fully into view as it curved over and into the water, to the delight of the crowd who cheered with delight.

Wonderful!!

We're at sea again, and I seem to have slipped instantly back into sleep mode . Despite the ship's extensive entertainment machine grinding away at its hardest last night, all I found myself wanting to do was chill out to a free pay-per-view movie in my cabin (My Best Friend's Girl - good movie), and was asleep by 10 o'clock.

After a post-dinner pint in the Morning Light Pub, I wandered along to the Neptune Lounge to see what was happening there, only to stop dead in my tracks at its entrance at the sight of hundreds of little Union Jacks being waved about enthusiastically to the strains of 'Land of Hope and Glory'. I caught the eye of Brian the Dance Host who was sat in the foyer to the Lounge trying to look small. His eyes said "Go on; I dare you...", and then shook his head as if to share the sinking in my stomach. I shook my head in reply and doubled-back, muttering "Nope, I just can't do it".

Jeff the guitarist/singer's voice is almost better, but he is still inviting folks up to sing, which I'm starting to think is a bad idea. The numbers in the pub have swelled considerably in the last few days, and I told him that I thought he'd have to be careful. He agreed that word seemed to be getting around, and that people may start to expect it. He's in danger of just becoming a karaoke machine and it no longer being HIS show.

I slipped into the Coral Club Lounge to watch the Braemar Show Company do their 'Cool Britannia' show, which was good. The show company consists of 6 girl dancers, two of whom sing, and two lads who dance also, but mainly sing. The quality of their shows is very high (best I've seen I reckon), but I do find some of the dance routines a little 'samey'. Anyway; more flag-waving... I noticed the Captain had slipped in to watch at the back of the room. He seemed to be enjoying it, but I didn't see him waving any flags about.

The ship's Doctor was on my dinner table, and she was asked if they'd been busy down in the medical centre. Yes, she told us; apparently they'd had a bit of a struggle with passengers suffering from bad colds and flu... largely with those who had been on the Gatwick and Stansted charter flights. One lady asked her, during a pause between coughing, if the air-conditioning on board ship helped pass it around, to which she said no; air-con doesn't spread the infections but it can exacerbate the symptoms, particularly dry coughs. She recommended running the shower with the bathroom door open, or even better; boiling the cabin kettle and holding the button down to release steam into the cabin. Must remember that!

This morning I woke at 8am - a wacking great 10 hours sleep! I'm hoping I can eek out my stash of clothes without having to resort to going to the laundry room. Very aggressive and unfriendly places, ships' laundry rooms! Fights have been known to break out in them - in fact, going off at a tangent; apparently, someone was saying that a fight broke out on the Ventura on New Years Eve - quite a rumpus by all accounts - no such excitement here!

This afternoon I will be conducting my last workshop (a Willemstad beach scene). The good news is that while we were alongside the Boudicca the other day, in Barbados, we managed to procure a nice big stash of watercolour paper from them... woo hoooo!

I've just been down to the entertainments office to ask about details regarding our art exhibition tomorrow afternoon. I've been bigging it up to my students, promising a grand occasion, to get them to cough up their work. I'm hoping the Cruise Director will come along and metaphorically cut the ribbon... I think asking for a couple of bottles of bubbly to make the thing go off with a bang may have been pushing things a tad too far though... we'll see!

I have a couple of hours to kill so i may just go in search of someone to teach Esh-ban to as I'm getting severe withdrawal symtoms, or look in on one of the lectures that are being given - we have a financial expert who is giving a talk on 'How to enjoy paying taxes', and a presentation telling passengers what to do and what not to do when we get to Miami, and what to expect with regards to Immigration procedures (again). We have a prominent MP on board, too (whose name escapes me), who is giving a lecture entitled 'My Life in Crime - being an MP'. Hmm.... I'm rather spoilt for choice.... Next thought, I think I'll go and paint for a bit.......

Today we visited St. Johns in Antigua.

This was our final stop in the Caribbean before heading on towards Key West, the most southerly point in the United States of America. Unfortunately it was a short stop; arriving at 8am, and all-aboard by 12:15pm to sail at 1pm,

I woke early considering I'd had a relatively late night. After dinner, I had a pint in the Morning Light Pub, where Jeff Diamond, the guitarist/singer regularly performed. Over the last few days, he's been suffering with a chest infection, making singing very difficult for him, so he's been drafting in people to come up and do a song or two to his accompaniment, to help him out. I did my bit for him by agreeing to get up and sing Paul Simon's 'The Boxer', which seemed to go down well. This was followed by a comedy show in the Neptune Lounge and Dancing Under The Stars on the Aft Deck, which didn't look like it would get going at all due to very strong winds, but by 10:30, there was a decent turnout of folks willing to bop-til-they-drop. I'd pretty much had enough and was heading for bed at 11pm when they went and unveiled a late-night barbeque - one whiff, and I was well and truly hooked!

Before I could go into Antigua this morning, I had some final preparation and photocopying to do in the entertainments office for tomorrow's extra workshop. By the time I'd done all that, I had little over an hour and a half to take a shoreside meander, find something for the Red, White and Blue night tonight (I bought a light blue Antigua baseball cap - very fetching), and hunt out an internet cafe. many folks were complaining about the short stop, but I guess its just the way things have worked out.

Yet more partying on the Aft deck accompanied our departure from the island. Once more, the Rum punch flowed freely, but I avoided it on this occasion because I had a class to teach at 2pm. Several of my students didn't, however... thank goodness my regular students at least turn up sober... mostly

After what was to be my penultimate workshop (summer trees on a leafy lane), I headed upstairs to catch the Passenger Talent Show, which was pretty good - out of 950 passengers, though, only 6 had come forward to entertain us; 4 singers, a comedian and a bloke who played the spoons (extremely well, it has to be said). My hats go off to the Braemar Orchestra who have to accompany the singers; the last bloke up sang Frank Sinatra's 'My Way', in something that can only be described as flexi-timing... absolutely well done to the orchestra for keeping up with him when his singing obviously didn't match up to the dots, and for making the little transitory hiccoughs smooth and apparently seemless.

Tonight it's Red, White and Blue Night, so that'll be fun. Pretty much all cruises have theme nights; British Night (R, W & B), Country & Western Night and Tropical Night are firm favourites on trips to this area. The Palm Cafe has had themed food nights too: we've had Curry Night, and the other evening it was Chinese Buffet. Generally speaking, I have to say that the food is good, although sometimes it seems to have a particular 'cruise-food' taste to it that's difficult to put your finger on. Very often, though, the chef will be found at the end of the self-service units cooking a stir-fry to demand - a firm favourite of mine - today at lunch, he was carving up a huge joint of pork - mmmmmm - lovely!!

Today, we visited St. Lucia.

Unfortunately, the weather took a turn for the worse, and it rained pretty much all day. I didn't have a tour today, so I just took the 20-minute walk into town and back, and got thoroughly drenched in the process. Don't get me wrong, the temperature was still 24-degrees, but there was something undeniably depressing about it, like it was raining with attitude. Many people didn't even bother to leave the ship it was so manky outside, preferring to view what little could be seen through the sheets of driving liquid-sun from the comfort of the Braemar; a couple of tours were even cancelled due to the bad weather and dodgy coastal currents.

This is all a bit of a shame really, since at 5pm, when the ship set sail for Antigua and folks made their way out onto the aft deck for sailaway music and dancing, the skies brightened up and for the first time in the day, we could actually see what a beautiful island it is. Very green and mountainous, its highest, volcanic peaks rise up into egg-shaped domes on its distant horizon, and I felt a little sorry to be leaving it and slightly guilty for having felt so down on it, particularly having spent all afternoon in my cabin working; I've had to prepare an extra workshop as I've just found out that Antigua is only a half-day in port, and tomorrow afternoon they need a painting class. I also took the opportunity to tart up the paintings that I've done so far during the previous workshops, in preparation for the end-of-cruise exhibition we'll be holding on Wednesday.

Antigua will be the last port until Wednesday, and it feels like we're very much on the home straight now. On Wednesday we'll be touching US soil again and having to endure their strict immigration procedures, then on Thursday it'll all be over...

The most interesting conversation I heard today was between a vet and a builder on my lunch table. She was describing how dead animals are prepared before being bagged up and put into the freezer to be disposed of, and what a pain it is when the owners change their mind and come back asking for their precious little dog or cat to go bury it in the garden after all. Thawing them out and making them look fresh and spritely (or relatively spritely for a dead animal) is an art in itself apparently. The bloke opposite (the builder) told us this story of a neighbour whose cat, was found flattened to a pancake in the middle of the road. They were absolutely distraught of course, and beside themselves with grief, and eventually, after they'd calmed down they vowed to do the right thing by burying it in the garden. They planned it beautifully; a ceremonial lowering of the coffin and a few words from each member of the family. Three days later, their neighbour on the other side opened their garage to take the car out, and out bounded the dead cat - alive and well and wailing to be fed!

I liked St Georges, yesterday

It is a gentle and colourful place, if a little quiet on our visit since, being a national holiday, most places were closed.

I went for a relaxed meander, climbing the hill to check out the Fort and down into the harbour-side of town and returned via a short tunnel to the port. A harbourside bar provided me with a drink and wi-fi
enabling me to make a video call back home.

In the last hour of our visit, which was a relatively short one, we were entertained on the top deck by a local steel drum band, who were absolutley terrific. they belted out popular tunes with a sharp resonance that had folks dancing in the aisles. The P&O cruiser, Ventura, docked alongside us, also had the benefit of the band. Since the ship is much larger than the Braemar, it enabled their passengers to look down upon us and enjoy the music too. At the end of the concert, The Ventura sounded it's horn in appreciation, and as it sailed away before us, the Braemar returned the booming horns in something resembling a parody of Close Encounters of the Third Kind.

Today, we arrived in Bridgetown, Barbados. We were docked alongside the Boudicca, which means we've abe to stock up with watercolour paper from their supplies at last.

At 8:15, I was down on the dockside awaiting to start a tour billed as an 'Island Safari', which turned out to be BRILLIANT!!! Without doubt one of the best, and most entertaining excursions I've ever been on in all five cruises (well, perhaps with the exception of the Dunns River Falls in April). 19 passengers from the Braemar and 7 passengers from the Boudicca were loaded into the back of 3 Nissan 4x4 safari vehicles, which had roofs, but were open-sided. Being the last to get on, I got to sit at the back, which was good because I was able to look out of the opening at the jeep following on behind us.

The trip began exciting enough as we hurtled through Bridgetown in convoy. Being open, it was just so much more fun that being stuck inside an eclosed coach. After about 20 minutes or so of road riding, we turned off into rough tracks that were muddy and pitted, and we were bounced around in the back like sacks of potatoes. At one point, our driver said "oh-oh", and skidded to an halt, "Tree in the de road", he announced, and we had to back up and seek out an alternative route. The track got rougher, and steeper in places, and everyone screeched and whooped with glee every time we splashed through water or dropped through a hole in the ground.

Soon we were back on tarmac again - but not for long. Hanging a right, we entered the forest... We were whipped by overhanging palms and branches, and the track got windier and rougher, which made it even more fun. Throughout the trip, the convoy of 3 vehicles (each one had 10 seats in the back, five on each side facing each other) kept changing positions - occasionally we would be in the lead, sometimes we were in the middle. As we bounced through the forest, we were bringing up the rear, when suddenly there was an almighty bang followed by a great hissing sound; the jeep in front had hit something and got a flat tyre.

All three jeeps ground to a halt and the drivers got out to see about changing the wheel, only to discover that between de tree of dem, there wasn't a single spare!!

So everyone climbed out, the music was turned on, Rum punch and tortillas were handed out and we had a little party in the middle of the forest while we waited for a spare to be brought out to us from
Bridgetown. We were told the spare shouldn't be more than 15 minutes, but Barbados-time meant it was 30 minutes before a 4th jeep appeared to cheers and hollers from the passengers who actually didn't care... the rum punch was kicking-in and a growing sense of bonding and comerarderie was developing.

After the forest came the beautiful coastal village of Bathsheba, where we stopped for photos and loos, before setting off on out final leg. At one point, the lady across from me, who was trying very hard not to spill her rum punch called out to Tony, our driver, that she'd lost her Ray Bans... her sunglasses had flown off her head into the road; so Tony backed up, narrowly missing crushing them under the tyres, and handed them back to her. Everyone cheered. Actually, I'm certain that they would have cheered at anything. "More rum punch!" someone called out, and there, in the middle of the road, he refilled everyone's plastic beakers.... needless to say, by the time we arrived back at the
terminal everyone was well and truly razzed, and extremely happy.

After making a short call home via the terminal internet, I bumped into some people from the ship who were going to the beach, and did I want to come? Well, despite being in desperate need of food and a long lie down, I tagged along and was glad to have done so, since I ended up having a shot at jet ski-ing, which was excellent fun, and a great way to end a day packed with adventure and excitement.

This morning we arrived in St. Georges in Grenada.

Located north of Trinidad and Tobago and south of The Grenadines, it is the second-smallest independent country in the Western Hemisphere, Christopher Columbus first sighted the island in 1498 and named it first Conception Island. Grenada was made a Crown Colony in 1877. St. Georges is the capital, with a population of approximately 103,000.

I'm surpised at the number of people up and about this morning, considering the heavy partying going on last night. The New Years Banquet in the Thistle Restaurant was lovely, with all the fine trimmings you would expect from a posh joint, but I don't expect to be dining in there again. I'd spoken to the Cruise Director earlier in the day to say that I'd been invited into the restaurant, and he promised me he'd speak to the Maitre De to make sure it was going to be okay, However, when I arrived for dinner at 8:45, the Maitre de assured me that he'd had no such phone call and that there were no spare seats on table 6. After a few minutes of awkwardness, and double-checking with the folks who were sat at the table, I was ready to dump the idea and head for the Palms Cafe. I'd been told by that there were two spare places there, but he still had passengers on his list filling those spaces, and despite the fact that those passengers hadn't eaten at that table since the start of the cruise, he initially wasn't prepared to take the chance of them turning up and finding me in one of their places. Eventually he conceded, common sense prevailed, and I was allowed to stay.

The dinner was good - you could tell it was posh because the portions were minute. The Haggis was duly piped-in and paraded around the room before being addressed by a gruff scotsman. I had a serving of haggis with taties and neeps, and a wee dram, as did most on the table. Not everyone was interested in the wee dram, though, so I offered to drink that of anyone who didn't wish to partake and bagged myself 3 extra shots of whiskey - YESSS! The free drink hunter strikes again!

Further free beverages were available later on the top deck, in the form of flutes of champagne, ensuring that everyone had a glass in their hand for the countdown to the new year. At the moment of changeover from the old to the new, a huge ice sculpture of the numbers 2008 were ceremonially lifted high and thrown into the swimming pool, leaving only the 2009 one standing.

For a couple of hours following this, I partook in the ritual of getting up and getting on down with my bad sounds and daddy-dancing with all and sundry - what a tart! At 2am, I'd pretty much had enough, congratulated myself on going the distance and promptly headed for bed with the partying still going strong.

Its 10:40am now, so I'm going to take a walk into the town and see what's occuring. Sailaway is at 6pm today, so all passengers have to be back on board for 5pm.

Today's workshop went well, and I've started collecting work from students in readiness for our exhibtion which will take place at the very back end of the cruise. I've also started making a few of those all-important sales, too, which makes the whole thing just that little bit more worthwhile.

My other good news is that I've been invited onto a table in the Thistle Restaurant for the New Year's Dinner, which is an absolute first for me (tutors are not allowed to dine in either of the two formal restaurants unless specifically invited by a passenger). My Christmas Day meal was okay, but being dressed up to the nines and eating in the Palms cafe by yourself kind of misses some of the festiveness of the occasion. Tonight is also a formal night, so I'll be able to enjoy the formal dinner, dressed in my formal wear, in appropriate formal surroundings - woo hoooo!!

The New Year is a few hours away here (although the evening activities will start in just over an hour's time), but because The new year in the UK will come around 4 hours earlier, I'd like to just take this opportunity to wish everyone who has taken the time to read this blog (and I happen to know there are a fair number of you because I'm able to check statistics), a very happy, healthy and prosperous new year.

Roll on 2009!