Today we spent our last day at sea.

It's been a busy day, partly spent packing (far easier at the end of a cruise than at the start; you just kind of throw everything willy-nilly into the suitcase and squish it down as best you can), partly spent playing Scrabble, and partly spent hosting our grand end-of-tour art exhibition.

I played two games of Scrabble with Moyra in the Library, just before lunch; lost the first and won the second (mostly on a very fortuitous turn, where I was able to drop QUIZ on a triple-word square, where the Z was also on a Triple-letter square, making it a whopping 96 in one drop).

After lunch I made my way to the area just outside The Neptune Lounge, armed with almost 100 paintings and only a small amount of blue-tack, hoping that there'd be enough to do the job. I was kicking myself because, before coming away, I debated whether or not to take a huge wad of my own blue-tack with me, knowing how these thing often panned out, and didn't - ah well.

My eager students turned out to help with the 'hanging', and by 3 o'clock, we were ready to roll; and what a turnout!! The room was thronged with people for the whole hour. I looked on with pride as their fellow passengers cooed over the work on display. It looked absolutely terrific, as I knew it would - believe me; when you get all those paintings together, whatever the ability (and there was a huge variation in ability), they look great.... I looked at the mass of people gazing on and thought, fleetingly, how nice it would be to have that sort of turnout at my own exhibitions. Anyway; the feedback was remarkably good, and so I thought; My work is done here....

One last piece of work  needs to be done. The Cruise Director decided that there should be some certificates handed out to some of the students in recognition of particularly outstanding work. He's had six printed up, and I had to select which 6 should be the recipients (I drafted in the help of Peter Roach for some completely independent input), which wasn't an easy task (and one which I'm a little uncomfortable with, but am happy to participate in). Before both shows tonight, I will be awarding the certificates to the lucky students, up on stage - woo hoooo! I get to go up on stage!!

And so, with our impending arrival at Portsmouth expected to be around 3:30 tomorrow morning, the cruise comes to an end. Suitcases have to placed outside cabins before we go to bed, and they'll be collected and transferred to the terminal for when we disembark. Cabins have to be vacated by 8am in the morning, after which, folks will be sat around in the lounges waiting for their turn to leave the ship. I expect to be off at about 10am, then I have a 5 hour drive North...

It's been an enjoyable 3 weeks. I've visited some great places, and take home lots of memories. It's always great to go away, but it's equally great to come home....

I'm in severe need of a haircut (I had considered asking in the Beauty Salon on board ship, but figured they'd probably charge per hair), some decent beer, and some fast, cheap broadband...

Since this is likely to be my last post for this cruise, I'd like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who has read my inane ramblings and meanderings (I know from the statistics that there are quite a lot of you out there) and in particular to those who have contributed to the blog with their comments.

Tomorrow, it's back to reality, and back to work....

 

Hello Peter,
On my own account, and probably on behalf of everyone who has been reading along along, I would just like to say thank you for the stalwart effort you have made keeping us up to date with life on the high seas.It has been a very entertaining three weeks, and a privilege to share your perspective of life on board the Boudicca. Thank you.
Kindest regards,
Sylvia:):)

I agree totally with Sylvia and would like to add my thanks to you for a fun blog.. I feel like I've been on a virtual cruise myself. However, I feel there is some unfinished business regarding the missing passenger, and am losing sleep imagining all kinds of grizzly ends he may be experiencing.
Anyway off you pop and PUT THE KETTLE ON!!!!!!!!
Cheers
Pip

When I returned to the ship, I spoke to Rebecca, the Shore Excursions Manager, on a couple of occasions, to ask what had become of the mysterious disappearing passenger. When we set sail from Lisbon, all passengers were accounted for, with no-one missing, so one can only summise that whoever it was, for whatever reason known only to him, he made his own way back to the ship, without notifying anybody. Some people just don't think about the knock-on effect of their actions - at least we know he's not stuck in Portugal....