Did Pope John Paul know?

 London Tuesday 23rd May 2023

Unpublished Letter to "The Guardian"

Dear Editor,

In relation to your article "Did the Pope know?" I am one of those many UK Poles who loved Pope John Paul II for his vital and subtle role in the liberation of his country and for guiding the Polish state in the first decade after it had recovered its sovereignty. I have often quoted his maxim about the need to keep patriotism and love of one's country separate from nationalism which he always condemned, and I admired his bold steps into healing relations between Judaism and the Catholic Church worldwide. He had immense charisma and was truly a highly respected international figure. 

It does not mean that he was perfect. He was a figure of his time with conservative views on marriage and abortion and with the same traditional centuries old reaction to evidence of paedophilia among his priests. He certainly felt the need to defend the good name of the Polish Catholic Church against the perfidious attacks on this institution by a totalitarian Communist state. Also I would be very careful about utilizing any information based on the doctored files of a  corrupt and mendacious organization like the Polish secret police. 

I think that the current nationalist government in Poland is doing a disservice to the memory of this Pope by making any criticism of him an electoral issue. It serves simply to stifle an open and fair debate about Poland's past and gives the false impression by the monopolized Polish state media that the opposition parties are in some way responsible for running a campaign to blacken his character.  

Yours faithfully

Wiktor Moszczynski

ReplyForward

Southampton

 Southampton  Saturday 13th May 2023

The disembarkation went like clockwork. Borealis docked at 5am. Breakfast at 7.30. The last items were packed away in our two rucksacks and we left the cabin at 8am after leaving a thank you note to our cabin maid. People were being asked to leave in organized waves which were distinguished from each other by the colour of our luggage labels. As usual it was brilliantly organized. Our label was blue which was a reference to our corridoe of cabins on the port side of Deck 6. Previously all those living in suites on Deck 7 with different coloured labels had already been summoned. 

I took a last look from the Observation Platform on Deck 6. It was cold, overcast and Southampton Dock was a iserable looking place, with no exciting object on which to rest the eye except for a large white dome which looked like a mushroom top. There were two other passengers vessels in the docks. They were two gigantic glass warehouses, purporting to be cruise ships, with some 5 or 6 decks each above the level of the life boats, the kind that has a whole shipping centre and a complicated waterslide over the pool to cater for its 5000 or so guests. Give me  the Borealis any day with its 1300 passengers. At least it looks like a ship. As I was watching a giant Hapag Lloyd container ship glided past us towards a further berth. I returned to the cabin.

Now it was our turn at 8am. Clutching our two pieces of hand luggage, as well as the plush little sloth Albina bought for herself during the cruise, we made our way for the last time to the Neptune Lounge on the starboard side. Our names were checked off on the list as we queued to go in. We then went forward to a lovely young lady from the UK Border Force. I showed her my passport and held the toy sloth while Albina rummaged in her bag for her passport. The Border lady waited patiently and smiled at the sloth. "We got it in  Colombia," I explained. "No," intervened Albina, as she showed the lady her passport. "I got it in Costa Rica." God knows what the Border Force lady thought about that. Perhaps it was, spoilt cruise passengers, who can't even remember where they've been?

After showing our passports we were given a red card showing that our passport had been inspected and we proceeded for the last time to Deck 2 where we handed in the red pass. presented our yellow key cards and finally disembarked. After a struggle we eventually found our cases scatterd all over the area earmarked for the bags with blue labels,  and after grabbing two luggage trolleys we pushed our way out to the cargo terminal exit. There had been no customs checks for anyone. 

It was a cold morning. Albina waited in the waiting room, chatting to Rafal and Iga and to another Polish couple, while I hunted for our Addison Lee limousine outside. I finally made contact with the driver and he arrived somewhat late just before 10 am when we had been ashore on Horizon Terminal for almost 2 hours. Just minutes before, I had caught a glimpse of Ranald and Sharon entering a taxi and had a chance to exchange a wave with them as they whisked by for their return to Dunblane in Scotland.  

The limousine had originally been booked with Rol Cruise when we made that fateful booking in 2021, in the middle of the pandemic. Now we returned home along the M3 motorway, through the welcoming green fields of Southern England, happy and contented, with our six suitcases, 3 bags and one plush soft little sloth.

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We had originally booked this tour as a future prospect of a bright future event to comfort us during the pandemic and to celebrate 50 years of living together. It had then become a nightmare as the costs spiralled and we expressed doubts about whether we could survive such an ordeal. Albina saw it nevertheless as a chance to finally have a rest and have no domestic responsibilities and a chance to spend time with me away from my busy social and literary responsibilities. I saw it as a terrible ordeal of 80 wasted days being irrelevant and responsible for nothing. At least I imagined the cruise would have relevance as a recreation of the magic of Jules Verne's book. Albina looked forward to the cruise, while I dreaded it. When friends and office colleagues asked if I was excited by the cruise I looked at them in bewilderment. 

However, eventually I cleared away my social rsponsibilies in the Polish community, one by one. We  made the necessary medical preparations, and I cleared the unexpected length of this holiday with my employers. I took up the initiative of finding my reevance again by writing a blog. We paid the final instalment and we made ready to sail. 

At the end of the day, we both got what we wanted from the cruise. Albina wanted the rest that she desired so much in a warm climate, and I got the relevance I crave, by writing the blog, giving a lecture, making some friends and living one long dream of effortless travel in countries I had mostly never seen, and never expected to see.  It was a time of good living and a sea passage free of any storms or disasters. Finally, Albina came back to tell her friends that she got the rest that she wanted and had gained four extra kilos, which would please her doctors at the hospital. I too came back having had an enriching experience and a blog that could get published, if I can polish it up correctly. And I too had gained four kilos in weight, which is definetely four kilos too much. Most important of all, we both came away knowing each other better, flaws and all.

We got back to our falt in Brentford by non. Everything was left spick and span by our cleaner, the balcony was still under assault by the pigeons, the waiting corrwspondence of some seven domestic bills was waiting for us, of which all had been paid during the cruise, the promised bridge to Brentford Station had been built over the canal, my place at the Warsaw Book Fair had been booked for the end of May to promote my last Polish book, my blog had been completed and was awaiting revision, and I will be back at work at 9am on Monday.  

And now to get on with the rest of our lives................... 

The English Channel

 

Borealis Friday 12th May 2023

The day started just a little acrimoniously. Albina decided to cancel her massage appointment at the Spa. As usual I made a mess of announcing it to the Spa at 8am and they were not too happy about it.

 The morning evolved slowly as we searched our room to make sure everything will be packed. We will submit 6 cases and 1 bag as luggage which we will have to leave in the corridor for collection before 2am. We know now that we will all have our passports checked on board. As we have blue labels allocated to our luggage and we are housed on Deck 6, we are likely to be in the second wave of disembarking at around 7am. The vehicle is due to collect us at 10am. We will then be collected from Horizon Cruise Terminal by Addison Lee whose representative will arrive with a placard bearing our name.

Albina ate breakfast in our cabin, while I went upstairs for a hurried breakfast and lunch. Perhaps it was just me, but I felt there was a febrile attitude in the buffet restaurant as if they wanted us to leave quickly. At midday the Captain announced that we are now off the Lizard in Cornwall and therefore in the English Channel. The waves seem a little higher here than in the Bay of Biscay but it is hardly felt at all on board. However, the weather is clear and the temperature currently around 14C.

I went to the last lecture by Roy Paul on the history of Fred Olsen, with plenty of in-jokes. At least it is clear now where Canary Wharf got its name. It came from the Fred Olsen owned warehouse which stored bananas from Canary Islands. 

That afternoon I visited the Craft and Pottery Exhibition in the Arts centre in the same room which previously displayed the passengers' best paintings. In fact many of the paintings were still on the wall, but now acting as a back drop to a table displaying a colourfest of grotesque clay masks and another  dotted with the motley multicoloured display of clay parrots (or was it toucans?).  Another table was covered with sumptuous collages relating to highlights from the cruise, including an extraordinary display picture, showing a bright woollen red and white balloon floating over what seemed like a background of stormy sea and cloudy sky, created from strips of mohair and attached by a rope to an elephant's trunk. The final touch was a happy looking woollen Loch Ness monster emerging from the sea. Other exhibits included masquerade masks and dolls and two extraordinary detailed bound chronicles with every page containing the most colourful memento of the cruise with a page dedicated to each of the 26 ports we visited. I looked through them thinking that perhaps their version of the voyage may have more substance and be a worthier depiction of our glorious 80 days than my meagre and very wordy written offering. Sharon was at the Arts Centre as she moulded one of the horror masks and I came across her chatting to Lisa. I gave Lisa her customary hug and kiss. Sharon simply erupted. "Well I like that," she called out, "we've been friends for months of this voyage and he's never kissed me." Hastily, I gave the lovely Sharon a close hug and explained to a laughing Lisa, "You see, we'eve never actually been properly introduced." Now we have been.

 There was a melancholy concert of classical music in the Neptune Theatre with a Spanish guitar player interspersing some of the haunting Lennon-Mccartney numbers with Spanish and Latin tracts from Segovia and his XIXth century predecessors. It was such a calming atmosphere and there were not too many in the theatre to appreciate it. Still some of my fellow passengers who came were taking a rest from frantic last minute packaging and jumping up and down to close their suitcases. While our six suitcases were standing to attention around our bed, all appropriately packed and labelled, Albina was just finishing off our final bag. She had bought it hastily in the Borealis shop last month when she sensed that some of the extra clothes and the presents might be a little excessive in terms of the amount of luggage we brought into the ship. 

I watched the crowd at dinner as passengers hugged both each other and members of the buffet restaurant staff, posing for joint pictures and handing out generous tips, whether discretely or not. Inthe case of gratuities, discretion is vital here for good order.  I certainly don't feel that other waiters or cooks should be discriminated against by seeing their colleagues getting a gratuity which is denied to them. By all means have your favourites, but do not make it public. I much rather preferred the discrete method of Fred Olsen handing out the gratuities in accordane according to a hierarchy that can still be tweaked with discreet particular payments. Of couse if you want to thank someone in particular for special service, then do so with a few kind words, whether spoken or written, but if you want avoid ill feeling among the staff then give your handouts through the company. I still had the odd cash payments given quietly to some staff, like the chap who brought us canapes each afternoon and described their contents to us with relish, or the guys who delivered a morning breakfast to Albina in the last of couple of weeks. I remembered to leave something for the staff picking up the luggage on the last evening to deposit it on the quayside tomorrow morning, particularly as we had more luggage than most. That is impersonal and for that they will be pleased and feel pride that their work is appreciated.  

Certainly over the last months I noticed more and more passengers were calling kitchen and waiting staff by their first names, and this was reciprocated. I feel a polite distance should be the norm as too much over familiarization undermines the quality of the service. Close friendships between guests and staff may be permissible, but should be the exception, rather than the norm. If you try and befriend tham a present of money for their service could demean the friendship. And if your relationship has deeper emotional connotations, as I know in some cases with fellow passengers it did have, than a final tip could be considered an insult, and would make the recipient feel cheapened, if they had any self respect. 

The exception should be the professional relationship with your housemaid. They see you at your worst, or most slovenly, The saying is that no officer looks like a hero to his valet, even if there os mutual respect. If the maid has done a good job then give her the biggest tip of all, certainly a good few hundred pounds after an 80 day service. But you can also ask her about her family, if she wishes to tell you the details, and you can disclose your own little family secrets to her. But unless she saved your life, or looked after you during an illness, then respect her professionalism and her time, and don't wallow in overfamiliarization. 

The nine mmbers of the Borealis Theatre Company put on a final dramatic and colourful show, based on an antholgy of some of their earlier numbers. They gave a rendering of an operatic uet called Barcelona. In fact it was Anya from yesterday who sang the female part, and her voice was as strong and passionate as during last night's solo performance. They also repeated at least two songs from their wonderful Paintbox presentation. But again, it is not just the attractive physique, the grace and athleticism and the rhythm of the dancers. Nor is it just the wide range of voices of the vocalists. Success lies in the whole package, including the choreography, the lighting and the extraordinary costumes into which the performers change four or five times in any one 45 minute performance. And to that should I should add the fact the all the performers appear to be enjoying what they are doing, their expressions nearly always smiling (unless the material requires something more sombre). That enjoyment and energy imparts itself to the audience. And let us not forget that they put on this energetc performance twice in a night, after barely four or five days of rehearsals between the shows. The Theatre Company is one of the best features of the overall excellent service provided by Fred Olsen on this cruise.  

We all five turned up for our last General Knowledge Quiz. The actual theme was the voyage itself, a subject on which I personally should have done much better. I failed to reread my lecture notes, for instance, which would have given me half of the information required.  Sure, we knew, or at least could calculate, how many stops there were on the tour, and what stop came after Hong Kong, and when the Borealis was built, but I should have remembered the number of passengers on the ship, and the number of crew, particularly after my visit to the bridge. We only got a sad 8 out of 15. But we mostly just sat there absorbing the fact that this was our last time together. This was helped by the fact that this time we were no longer suffering the distracting music of Howard Johnson, who for the last 80 days, always drowned our conversation in the lounge with his noise, immediately before and oimmediately after each quiz. Now we could talk, and reminisce and simply enjoy each other's company just a little lobger, before we finally kissed and hugged and went our separate way.

This may sound a bit unfair to Howard Johnson, primarily a guitar playing rock singer, who had spent the entire cruise as musical wallpaper in the Morning Light Lounge, singing in the background every evening. He had also laid on special appearances at every on board festival held at the Poolside, and held late evening concerts at the Observatory. He had recently completed a series of one man shows singing all the published songs of Queen. He had his fans, who included Sharon, and I take my hat off to him for his resilience, and his willingness to broaden his genre by singing ballads or even Scottish country sings when the occasion required it.  It's just that I have never been, as they say, "into" rock music and he was always scheduled to play when all I wanted was silence to be able to talk and listen to my friends. Nothing personal, Howard.

Before turning in I went up for one last time to party and dance for half an hour or so at the Obesrvatory on Deck 9. It was already 11pm and I knew Albina would be waiting and watching TV, but I just wanted the last night to end with a bang. Sammee and Tom had doffed their entertainment manager roles and were singing a series of lively dance music. I found myself dancing with the girls from the Borealis Theatre Company. It is great how after a single drink and with the accompaniment of the right music such a farewll party become emotionaol as you hug and kiss people to whom until now you had merely been polite and exchanged small talk. Suddenly you feel how nice it would have been to have spent more time with each and every one of them, and now that opportunity is gone. You can then sample the rich sweet sauce of an aching regret, to give your future nostalgic memories about the cruise that much stronger a taste. The last person I hugged, just before I left the room, was Sammee herself, the queen of entertainment and most certainly the most charismatic outstanding personality of the cruise. 

I made some notes of the day and put out our six suitcase plus one bag out in the corridor.  before 12 they were gone. We would see them again tomorrow waiting for us on the quayside.  

 

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The Last Ukelele

 

Borealis Thursday 11th May 2023

The morning looks promising. It is colder now at sea, but the clouds are intermittent and the sea is calm.

Albina has resumed her packing and she has a further 3 cases packed. All our smart clothes have been packed already, including my winning champagne, the mezcal from Jack and the model of Borealis. That is 6 cases in all now. But initially we arrived on the ship with 6 just suitcases. We still have extra goods to pack so, not only have we gained in weight, we have gained in material possessions as well. I went to Roy Paul's lecture on the history of Fred Olsen. It was interesting to hear how this sensible unshowy company which was founded in 1848, had developed from a local vessel on the North Sea run to a fleet of tankers, planes and cruise ships. I introduced myself to Dr Paul, as he knew of my earlier lecture, and his earlier talk on Jules Verne had filled a gap which he acknowledged had been partly already filled by me. 

That took up the whole morning. When I eventually left for lunch I got there too late to the buffet restaurant and settled for a fresh portion of fish and chips at the Poolside. I then slipped into the Art Room on the rear of Deck 9 to view the paintings and etchings by various passengers, including Lisa's husband, Steve. It was great to see the hidden u sung talents of so many of our fellow passengers. They must have spent many quiet hours in the remote Arts Centre on the ship, often completing projects suggested by their art adviser, and drawing fromthings they saw and experienced on the route. 

                            

So each one had their version of the Taj Mahal, or the Pyramids, or of Japanese cherry blossom, or    Colombian ladies in costume. The most interesting were the sketch books of some of the artists with priceless gems hidden inside the pages. Here too was another hidden world, revealed like the wall paintings in Tutankhamon's tomb only when the exhibition was opened.

At 4pm we had the much heralded Guest Ukelele Concert in which Sharon and some thirty other ukelele minstrels put on a show, despite their instructor having earlier left the ship. This was followed by a final performance of the choir with Sharon again participating. Both groups had played songs connected with world travel, to the extent that when the choir played the Japanese tune Sakura, they showed slides of the cherry blossom season in Japan, individually photographed by choir members.

Everything seemed to be rolled up in some kind of denouement, as we all contemplated the end of our voyage and searched for mementoes of the last 80 days in whatever form it could take, whether as a play, a concert, a ukelele production, a photo competition or a painting display. 

However, one fresh item on the programme for today was a series of Broadway musical songs by Anya Spencer-Turner, one of the Borealis Theatre Company vocalists. She was appearing at 5.30pm in the Observatory on Deck 9. As I left the cabin on Deck 6 with Albina now packing an extra bag, I could hear the sound of her voice coming down the staircase four storeys above, a bit like the voice of Doris Day drifting up the staircase of the hostile Embassy. Anya’s voice was clear and powerful as I mounted the staircase and eventually reached the Observatory. She had just finished singing “The street where you live” from My Fair Lady. The audience was no bigger than thirty people, of whom ten were from her Borealis troupe. But then it is quality and not quantity that counts. She continued with her numbers, consisting of quite sophisticated difficult songs from lesser-known musicals. Each song met with the exuberant applause of the audience She sang a song about a girl living in Flat 14 g, whose peace and quiet is being disturbed by a singer practising in the flat above, and another in the flat below. Her song covered the voice of the timid girl and the loud cacophony of her awkward neighbours. It was at this point that I interjected that her voice could be heard four storeys down, which amused everybody.  She performed for half an hour ending with Barbra Streisand’s “Don't Rain on my Parade”, another difficult song. I wish her well in her career.

At dinner I met a "young" couple in their sixties who had enjoyed the cruise, mostly hiring cars for each port, and travelling with their own programme. I was surprised initially that they were retired at such an early age, but then it transpired that the lady had been a Colonel in the British Army, at one stage the most senior woman in the British Armed Forces. They revealed that that very afternoon, people on the Observation Platform had spotted a whole school of whales, which they had observed more than half an hour. Ah well, another sighting I had missed. 

Albina had stayed in the cabin all day and again I brought some food own for her. I was late getting to  a Variety Showtime, which included performers who had got on at St Kitts, and whom I had been too busy to watch until now. Baritone Gordon Cree and female singer Cheryl Forbes did a fine duet singing songs about the moon, before making room for the cheeky ventriloquist Jimmy Tamley. I find these variety shows somewhat bewildering as each artist does not have time to deliver a rounded memorable performance. Obviously they have other their own performances as well, but this is more like watching a frustrating series of film trailers, rather than the film itself. If you import these performers all the way from Britain to appear on stage, then surely you get your money's worth with a series of full dedicated shows. Obviously, I am being too picky, as other guests appear happy enough with this arrangement.

It was a near thing again with the General Quiz. We were in full compliment again and we gave 14 correct answers out of 15, guessing that Obama taught at the University of Chicago, that Toronto was the most populous city in Canada, and that a stapler was drowned in jelly in an American rendition of The Office, which none of us had ever watched. The only one we failed to get was a question about the makers of butterfinger biscuits. There was one other team which also got 14 out of 15. The tiebraker was a question on the height in centimetres of a Turkish peasant who was the tallest person in the world. After arguing among ourselves we settled for 265 centimertes amd the other tram offered 240. The right answer was 251 so we lost by just a couple of centimetres. Nothing to be ashamed of, but still another bottle of champagne missed us by an inch, literally. 

We decided to make an early night of it. In bed before 12.

 

The final formal night

 Borealis Wednesday 10th May 2023

A day like any other. Alone at sea with no land and no ship in sight. Sea calm and weather overcast but possibly improving. Temperature 17C. Spent the whole morning in the cabin writing while Albina was sleeping all the way to 3pm. 

At 4pm I went to the Neptune Theatre to watch the show Astound the World in 40 Minutes that Helen, Sharon and Ranald and their colleagues in the Borealis Amateur Dramatics (cryptonym BAD) put on as a spoof of Around the World in 80 Days. It was a recreation of the story but with hilarious reinterpretations of the interplay between the characters (Aouda was played as a vamp) and constant references to our daily grind on the vessel, including spoof announcements from the captain's bridge. In fact, the ship used by Fogg was the Borealis, and later the crossing of the Pacific was by one of Olsen's sister ships. The amateur company made itself even more amateur by overstressing when they needed a prompt and by pretending to have French or American accents and then dropping back into their native tongue when being misunderstood by another character. They even had a joke in the prologue about the balloon not being part of the original story. I normally watch shows and lectures at the far back of the balcony on the left side, particularly to remain inconspicuous when I inevitably doze off. However, on this occasion, to show my support to my friends, I sat in the front row. I was so entranced and so amused by the show that I did not drop off to sleep once. Not only that, but I also forgot to take a single photograph. Incidentally, Albina watched the show on the cabin TV. 

Next we were invited to attend a farewell reception with Captain Stoica. A glass of champagne was offered to everyone on arrival at the theatre and the captain thanked us for our cooperation. He gave some gift vouchers to three members of the staff who had been proposed by their departments for being exemplary employees. He asked each of them how they would spend the money, which I thought, was none of his business, especially as he joked about the amount being £1000, and then made it clear that it was not a big amount. One replied contemptuously that they would use the prize voucher for hair gel, which got a laugh. 

It was a formal night and I finally convinced Albina to change into something a little more formal (i.e. not her pyjamas), if only to have a photograph together. It would be good to show to our friends as a climax to our 80 day cruise. In the end she did not put on anything too glamorous, because in every sparkly bit of clothing hanging in the wardrobe she found a last minute flaw, or because it did not match another portion of her wardrobe. Finally, she put on an elegant black dress, and I was grateful to her for that. Reluctantly we went to the Borealis Restaurant where the service was again reliably slow and the menu was still incomprehensible, especially to Albina, who again ordered something she could not eat. Also the dessert basically offered 5 choices, all including chocolate, which Albina did not like either. She ended up with the cheese board option again. However, the chicken we both ordered for our main course was quite good. Well, something had to go right. 

We went to have our photograph taken by the staff photographer. While we waited in a queue by the Ocean Lounge we watched the Dance Class couples rehearsing their many steps while dressed in their dinner jackets and evening dresses. The couples, as well as the ladies dancing with Olsen's professional dance partners, must have had a sense of achievement that they had now returned to everyday life with new dance steps to wow their friends and make them jealous. 

After the picture was taken we went to watch the Borealis Crew Show. It was wonderful to see members of the crew from all departments in the vessel, including the cabin maids and the engineers from the boiler room, showing off their talents and strutting their stuff as dancers. At one stage I thought the boys from the boiler room were going to do a carefully choreographed Chippendale strip show as they removed the tops of their overalls. Certainly the audience would have appreciated it. The Filipino crew members presented a number of stately dances from their country.  For a finale they sang movingly about being children of the world and that they wanted the world to live in friendship and harmony. It was something resembling one of those feel good Coca Cola adverts, and more a song for children than for young adults. However, in view of the relative age of most of the elderly audience and the youthful figures, mostly in their twenties, appearing on the stage, the message of the song was not out of place. The whole show was met with rapturous applause and even a standing ovation.

It was noticeable thar Sammee introduced each of their acts by naming them individually, at least with their first names.  Thankfully to her they were not a nameless collective, but individuals, no matter how humble or remote was their daily task. She congratulated them for finding the time and being willing to make the effort to rehearse, particularly for the group dances, amidst their daily routines in different parts of the ship. Although all of us as passengers may have got to know a little about those members of staff with whom they were most frequently in direct contact, to most of us they appeared as shadows, only there when we most needed them. That is partly because we only see them when they are directly serving us. Just as in Hogwarts, hidden beneath the areas frequented by the pupils, there was an underground of secret passages with various ghosts and spirits living in parallel with the teachers and the schoolchildren above. They only had access to the main building by secret portals. So too it was with the Borealis. Hidden from us passengers was a whole world of corridors and stairs leading from A Deck, below Deck 1, of which we would only have a glimpse when we needed access to the gangway to leave the ship on excursions. Yet this secret world stretches all the way up, as far even as Deck 9, and its only link to our world was behind a series of unmarked doors on each deck, where these staff members woud suddenly make an unheralded appearance to take up their scheduled task. We as passengers would pass these unmarked doors every day without giving them a second thought, unless by chance we witnessed the sudden emergence of one or more of crew members from their parallel world. It was pretty surreal, but it was also the reason why so many of them would remain like shadows without individual personalities and life histories. Yet when asked, while they prepared our food or served us a drink, they could reveal sufficient information about their lives to give us an inkling about their country and how they provided the funds to help their families, including children, from whom they would be seperated for many months at a time. At least their Crew Show gave us the opportunity of humanizing them in our eyes, before they returned to their mundane daily service. I salute them.

Helen and Tony did not appear in the Morning Light Lounge for the daily quiz. Probably Helen was just too tired, just as she was after the Coronation Fayre. However Albina did join us, which was a pleasant surprise, especially for Ranald and Sharon. It was not one of our more  succesful nights with scoring only 10, and the winners were at 13, but then we were two of our members short. We chatted for a good half hour after the quiz and Sharon and Ranald were fascinated by Albina's life history and by the story of how we met. Sharon still had a ukelele concert and a singing concert next day, so we all retired before midnight. We also had to move our watches forward by one hour. For the last time. We will now have the same time as London. 

Ponta Delgada

 

Borealis Tuesday 9th May 2023

The Captain got it wrong. His fine weather prediction for the Azores was not to be. We slid into a rain soaked Ponta Delgada at 8am. That did not put us in too good a mood. The view from the breakfast room onto the main area of the city is actually quite pleasing because, while the day remained overcast, the dark menacing clouds were only over the hills. We had our hurried breakfast and turned up at the theatre to report for our morning excursion only to find that it had already left the ship. We hurried down to the gangplank and the port terminal  and passed on to the coach. There were no passport controls of any kind. 

The coach drove out of the town of Ponta Delgado, the maintown of the island of Sao Miguel, which in turn is the largest of the 9 islands of the Azores archipelago. On the map the island has a long sausage shape with our port being on the south western corner of the island. The town was not large with probably no more than 100,000 inhabitants. The town had only one high rise residence and its highest buildings were the church towers and the town hall bell tower. It was clean with limited traffic and good quality roads. Everything looked neat and in place, the road signs and road markings looked new, and there was not a drop of litter in sight.

Of course this was really Europe now. Azores had always been Portuguese. When the Portuguese first discovered the island in 1432 as a result of Prince Henry the Navigator's prodding of the possible routes to India, nobody was living here. It is possible that there had been Phoenician and Viking landings on these islands, because the explorer who discovered it, Cabral, had maps showing the outlines of some of the islands. It was first settled by landless Portuguese peasants seeking to eke out a living in a new virgin territory, but it was organized by a group of Flemish nobles imported here at the behest of Henry's sister, the Duchess of Burgundy, when their land was overrun in the Hundred Years War. The main product was initially wheat, but then it became a useful entrepot for Spanish galleons trading some of their treasures for Azorian supplies of provisions and fresh water. Its prosperity suffered under Spanish occupation but in the eighteenth and nineteenth century it became dependent on the production of oranges, especially for British and Amercan armed forces. Following a catastophic collapse of orange production caused by a disease the Azores needed to diversify and became reliant on producing and exporting whale fat, pineapple, tea, sugar beet, tobacco and dairy products. The last of these, the production of beef, milk, butter and cheese remains a primary export of these islands to this day. The countryside is scattered with meadows full of Friesian cows with their traditional black and white patches. 

As we left the town we began to drive in the direction of the higher hills we could see from the port.  Despite the altitude the hills were covered with the deepest lushiest green vegetation. But as we looked further up we could see the higher ground was still enveloped in a thick white cloud, which remained as dense when close at hand as it did from a distance. Our first stop was supposed to be the Lake of Fire but we were beginning to have our doubts about being able to see it, though we left the matter unsaid initially. Of course I did express my concern about this quietly to Albina. She was not pleased and started complaing about why we were travelling in that direction if we were not going to be able to see it.

In the end, Anna, our tour guide, voiced her concern about this in public. Apparantly these heavy mists normally appeared in June and were occasioned by the mistiming of the increase in summer warmth between the land and the sea. This is because the sea warms more quickly. In the past these mists were called the "St John's fog" and were the most common cause of fatal shipwrecks at this time of the year. However, with the increasing quirkiness of the climate here, as well as everywhere else, the mists have been coming earlier. Anna explained over the bus' sound system that we were now approaching the lake she wanted to show us, but there was a danger we might not see it. She was praying hard, she said, for the cloud to disperse, as this was supposed to be "the highlight of the tour". On hearing about this being the highlight, the British tourists in the bus burst out laughing. It was a welcome British recognition of the fact that in Britain the weather always has the last laugh. Albina angrily vented her frustration to me but I just shrugged. We actually stopped at the viewing point and Anna asked if anyone wanted to get out. But we all looked down on the milky obstruction below us and stayed in the coach. Anna consoled us by walking the length of the bus and showing us pictures of the lake in its pristine form. Of course it was nobody's fault, but it would have been wonderful to see the lake resting on the floor of the crater, both as a scientific wonder and as a picture of natural harmony of colours. It is also a warning. The particular crater had erupted in 1563, as recorded by the Portuguese, and hence the name Lake of Fire. What erupted once, can erupt again. The whole archipelago is potentially under threat as it sits on the dividing line between three tectonic plates, African, American and European. The mist prevented us from dwelling on the potential danger. Yet, withn two minutes of us leaving the site, we were looking down on a beautiful valley without even a smidgeon of mist in sight.

We drove lower into the valley, now lush with Japanese cedars and a forest of ginger and heavy fern. The humidity increased as we got out of the coach at a place called Caldera de Velha, which translates as Old Hot Springs. We walked down a path through the lush forest until, certainly to my surprise, we passd a series of cubicles for chamging clothes, from which emerged a young lady in a bikini. She skipped past us a few yards further down and to our left we came onto a natural hot spring with some ten people bathing in it. A few steps further and there was a second pool full of more locals, which included a couple of young children. Anna led us past the pools up into another larger pool. "This one is not just warm, it is hot," said Anna. These pools were sitting on top of hot geysers caused by the hot water heated from the magma bubbling not so far beneath. We walked to a further pool, where the sides were yellow from contact with the iron. Then things went a little awry. Our group seemed to have got split up. Anna disappeared somewhere, as did the Fred Olsen rep, Anya, one of the Borealis Theatre Company dancers. We wandered around looking where other members of the group were going, wondering where to go and who to follow. Albina and I reached the spot where the coach had left us. Some of our group were there too, looking lost. I remembered our guide had said something about the bus picking us up lower down. I found a steep staircase leading further down some 100 or so deep steps. At the bottom of the stairs was our coach and our driver waiting for us. I began climbing the steps again to retrieve Albina and the others. When I got to the top, exhausted, I found that Anna had just turned up and seemed unaware that she had lost some of us on the way. We all went down the stairs again and then waited in the coach for the remaining stragglers that Anya had rounded up. And then we were off. Cheekily, I asked Anya in the coach, "Which was more difficult? Herding passengers or learning the choreography?" She gave a grin and pretended to give the matter some thought. "Depends on what kind of passengers I get," she finally answered.

We moved on to another beauty spot on the northern coast of the island. Suddenly, the mist was back. This time we got out of the bus and walked to the look out point. We went through a natural archway formed by two Japanese cedars. These trees are everywhere. We got to the platform edge. Again, just milk. Yet there was also historical interest in the site. It was the spot where liberal troops backing King Pedro landed to begin the reconquest of the island in 1832 in their struggle with the absolutists. I made some intelligent comment about that struggle with Anna, and one of the other passengers, whom I did not know, personally commented on the fact that she remembered my talk. Then one of the other passengers said "Oh yes, I remember. You said the balloon was not  part of the novel." "That's true," I agreed. "I'm amazed you people still remember. My talk was a month ago." "Shows we were listening," the second lady laughed. I was impressed. These people were still talking about my lecture, when they have, on average, listened to some 120 lectures since the start of the cruise. I obviously supplied a need at the time.

Last stop was the tea factory. Although the economy was now moving further into fields like tourism and the dairy industry, tea, which had been adopted as one of the prime industries of the Azores in the XIXth century, still has several factory farms in the country. Tea can be grown in this country in the months between April and December. We came to one such farm called Cha Gorreana, which is still operating with machinery from the last two centuries and still housed in the same old building. Pitched against the deafening noise of the machinery, Anna tried to overcome that obstacle as she struggled to give us a lecture on how the orange pekoe from inside the tea plant was placed into rollers, then oxidized, then dried and finally separated and packed into sacks. The factory produced both green tea and three varieties of black tea. The main difference between the two is the initial steaming process of the green tea.  

We were invited to the tasting area which combined as a shop for visitors. We were able to drink both the green and the black variety along with a complementary pineapple cake. The surrounding slopes were covered with neat measured green bushes of tea through which you could walk in very narrow paths that brushed against your clothes on either side. There were also other plants around the factory, such as the pretty blue flower of the Agapanthus plant which flowers at the time of the year in the Azores, along with pink azaleas. Albina was also drawn to the factory cat lazing outside. It had the traditional black and white colours associated with the country's cows.  As we drew away from the farm Anna suddenly announced. "Oh, I forgot one detail. Because of its enzymes, tea can also be a good substitute to viagra. If you have not bought any tea, shall I stop the coach so you can go back and buy more tea?" Of course that raised a laugh in the coach. It's probably her standard joke at this section of the tour, especially when she has a group of older passengers. 

On our way back to Ponte Delgada we passed one of the island's geothermal power plants which generates a quarter of the island's electricity needs. The country is also more and more dependent on tourism and is looking for further investment in that field while wishing to preserve the island's culture and traditions. Apart from the attractiveness of the climate and the rolling green fields and forested mountains of the country, there is also the attraction of sperm whales and other riches of marine life in the surrounding seas. Whaling as an industry was dropped in the last century.

On returning to the town the coach stopped at the square beside the old XVIIth century fortress.  Anna  asked if anybody wanted to get out here to visit the town individually. Some 10 of us got out. The rest, including Albina, were driven back to the ship which was nearby. I visited the fortress, built to withstand pirates and the French navy attacks. It was an imposing sight, although the ramparts were not very high, they still dominated the western part of the town and also the harbour area. Inside the rooms and internal passages looked dark and dank, like something from the middle ages. Yet there were fine exhibits in neat glass cages of uniforms and firearms throughout the centuries, from the sixteenth upto and including the twentieth century, with well documented exhibits of the history of the fortress. 

Emerging from there I crossed over to the Convent of Hope chapel and church. The full name was Santuario de Nosso Senhor Santo Cristo das Milagres attached to the Convento de Las Esperanza. The interior of the church was beautiful with a barrel vaulted ceiling beautifully adorned with blue and gold panels, while the walls were lined with large blue and white ceramic panels depicting the life of a local saint. There was also a richly adorned balcony protruding from one of the walls, which may or may not have been a pulpit. The other end of the nave ended in a heavy duty grating behind which was a further chapel dominated by a bright gold portrait of the Christ surrounded with a silver framed altarpiece with numerous candles arranged beaneath it. A small number of parishioners were praying on our side of the grating and it was obviously a place of veneration. There were candles ("cirios") on sale at the entrance, but these were not the sort of mini candles supplied in a British church. Each of these was was a think wax tube at least 3 metres long. These people take their veneration seriously, especially as they associated the church with miracles. The front of the church was covered with some scaffolding and a large banner proclaiming a coming church festival to be celebrated next weekend.

I walked further into town along a narrow pedestrianized street roughly parallel to the harbour. The overwhelming colour of the largely two storey buildings was white. Some had balconies jutting out onto the street, but most just had shuttered windows on the first floor. The streets were largely quiet and clean, and pictureque enough to be a tourist attraction in their own right. I reached the historic town hall with a double staircase emerging in the middle. At the back of it was a bell tower which I foolishly chose to climb to the top. There must have been more than a hundred steep steps inside the tower, which was dark and without any hand rail for support. Large gaps would appear between the vertical and horizontal stones of each step, through which you could see the ground way beneath. There was a wonderful view of the town from the top, but coming down you felt as if each step had to be leaped, rather than just stepped down, to avoid the yawning gaps. The Bell tower must have been in the same state of decaying repair that it was when it was first constructed some 350 years ago. I needed to recover and eat a burger at one of the nearby cafes adjoing the civic centre. A group of Azorian school children had just been rehearsing for a concert while standing on a platform facing the town hall. Behind the platform was a long fountain and a statue of the patron saint of the island, St Michael the Archangel.  To the left of the civic centre were the 18th century city gates, consisting of three ornate arches, which stood between the town and harbour. In front of them was the statue of the seafarer Cabral who first discovered Sao Miguel Island in 1432. Behind the gates was another prominent baroque church called St Sebastian with a white square tower attached, which was from a later period, and which had been visible above the rooftops of the town from the ship when we came in. 

While walking the streets of Ponta Delgada I kept running into passengers and crew from the vessel. All of them said the same thing, They agreed that Ponta Delgada was a pretty town, with little traffic and noise, nice shops and cafes, and free of litter and dirt. Most would happily revisit the place.

We sailed at 6pm. We seemed to be departing from the island for a long time as it was still close and vsible for the next hour and a half. I assume that we were simply circumnavigating the island, so as to be able to proceed through the Atlantic ftom the island's northern coast. Yet the island looked magical as we sailed on because it as enveloped by clouds at two levels forming distinct strata of cloud at the top and the middle of the mountains. It was quite eerie, even romantic. What added to the magic and the romance was a pod of dolphins playing around the ship as we slipped further and further away from the island.

I spent most of the evening watching films on out TV and also a show from the Neptune Theatre with a rather earthy ventriloquist called Jimmy Tanley. I cam dwnstairs to the Morning Light Lounge for another quiz, which was particularly tricky. We were disappointed with our 8 points until we realized that the winner only received 9. I took back to the cabin my Pere Ventura bottle of champagne which we had won on our third victory a couple of days back. Albina was very please until she realized tht Fred Olsen's prize bottles given away as every day prizes were dated no later than 20th December 2022.

Bacharach and Champagne

 

Borealis Monday 8th May 2023

The sky is grey and overcast and the sea is likewise grey with a moderate swell. Actually those words sound familiar. Have I said that somewhere before? 

In the morning I prepared and polished up the text I wrote on the 3 day visit to India. I sent it to Regina Wasiak-Taylor who seemed keen to publish an excerpt of my blog for her literary journal "Pamietnik Literacki". She wanted to publish the first couple of days of the blog starting with the day of embarkation as a way of introducing the ship and to explain the purpose of my journey. Howewer, as my journey had no purposes in that sense, then I did not think that a good idea. I prepared my blog several months earlier than the start of the cruise and my mixed feelings about it cannot be encompassed in one day's entryin February.

At lunchtime the Captain announced we were just 255 miles from Flores, one of the Azore Islands, and pointed out that the sea was calmer now than in the morning. It was still overcast but somehow lighter as if the clouds could break soon and show some sunlight. 

I had sorted out how to distribute the gratuity money totalling £790, based on the formula of £5 per guest per day,  with proper provision for our housekeeper and for the staff at the View buffet restaurant. As we had given up eating at the posh Borealis Restaurant quite early we saw no pint diverting any gratuity there, as otherwise they would have got as much as £400 from us. I asked to save some money for the Guest Services themselves and something for Shiri of course. Gratuities is a messy business at the best of times, but this way Fred Olsen distributes the money for you tidily in accordance with you wishes.

I picked up the remainder of the photos taken by Fred Olsen photographic staff of us as the gangplank at each port. I then went to a lecture by Dr Roy Paul on Jules Verne at the Neptune Theatre. To my surprise, my rather pleasant surprise, Dr Paul referred to my lecture a month ago. The reason it was surprising was that I have never spoken or even met Dr Paul before and he joined the vessel long after I had made the lecture. I can only assume he was briefed by Sammy or Tom about my contribution. 

Albina was still staying in the cabin all day as she felt unwell. She has remained secluded most of the week and that is quite troubling, but she seems happy, she is not moping and she is happy to see me when I am here. She also seems happy for me to take part in activities. As far she is concerned she is on holiday doing what she always wanted to sleep, rest, relax, and to participate in excursions when they are available. Not my idea of a holiday, perhaps, but then I am living mine. The only thing I am missing is to be able to share some of my fun with her, and that is not to be. 

Sammee had opted to put on a show, all her own, on Burt Bacharach songs. I chose to watch this with Albina in the cabin just for companionship, although I could easily have watched the concet in the theatre. Unlike the self confident Sammie who sang the Karen Carpenter songs earlier on thr ctuise, she seemed a bit more bervous this tine, as she had never sone such a concert devoted to Bacharach before. Imitially, as soon as he started to sung Albina went to sleep and I was left on my own watching the concert on the TV screen. However this had the advantage that I could see the lyrics displayed for each song while she was singing it. Bacharach songs have a wonderful sensitivity that is all feminine and see love above all else from the feminine point of view, with a vulnerable poignancy like Walk on By or Not Going Home Anymore, or Anyne who Had a Heart, or else they carried a hard edged assessment of  male insincerity and insecurity like Alfie or I'll Never Fall in Love Again . Even the happy romantic songs like Say a Little Prayer or Look of Love honour female deication and loyalty. As Sammie grew more confident her rendition became seasoned in the big American singing style. She delivered her last songs with the full volume and full passion of Cilla Black or Dusty Springfield. Hoever, yo me there is nothing to match |Dionne Warwick's version of "Walk on By" and Sammie version was faultless. I often lose the full impact of a song as the words get blurred and you are left being carried forward by the music alone, but on this occasion the wonderful poetry and the realism of the words were revealed as well. An enriching experience which Albina sadly missed.

Our intrepid quiz team shared the first of the bottles of champagne tonight as we played again. in my case and Albina's we would rather take the bottle home. We got an honourable 13 out of 16, but still no cigar.

    

Mid-Atlantic

 

Borealis Sunday 7th May 2023

 

The sky is grey and overcast and the sea is likewise grey with a moderate swell. With little joy we proceed to our destined home through a foretaste of English dampness and dullness. Yet it is not cold. On the Observation Deck there is a strong sea breeze, seeking to negate the milder warmth of the nid-Atlantic. As the ship gently rolls, so do its passengers. In the corridors, walking along the length of the upstairs buffet, trying to find a seat in the library, chatting and viewing presents to buy in the shops, we would all fail a police request to walk a straight line. You see it most at the poolside where the water splashes backwards and forwards exaggerating the sway of the waves 10 decks below. When it came to lunch Albina was tying bravely to carry her onion soup, splashing about like a mini pool, towards our table, much to the gentle amusement of the staff, until one came forward like a true knight and offered to carry it for her.

 

I managed to attend a morning lecture about the blue riband competition announced year after tear between passenger vessels in crossing the Atlantic. It was interesting enough for me to hear most of it before my narcolepsy took over again, and I was eventually woken by the audience clapping. The one truly interesting fact I picked up from that lecture was the story of the ss Sirius which made the crossing the late 1840s after burning part of the furniture and the wooden structure of the ship, when the coal ran out. Was this what prompted Verne to describe Phileas Fogg's crossing of the Atlantic in the luckless "Henrietta"?

 

I ran into Sammee at the staircase. I congratulated her for arranging with Buckingham Palace to have the Coronation held on May 6th. just so she could help complete enough diversions to engage us all during the long crossing of the Atlantic. She took in the joke and agreed that she had it all sorted "with her friend Charles", but she was particularly proud to have arranged with the BBC to show the 2 hour Coronation Concert at 6pm in the Neptune Theatre. She was keeping her fingers crossed that the link with the BBC would work so far from the nearest land. I remain amazed at her skill in organizing events, large and small, with such flair and imagination over such a long cruise. I told her she could figure as the heroine of my cruise blog if it gets published. "Don't forget to email me with it when it's published," she called out as she rushed away.

 

I managed to sit out one more lecture, this time on the Azores, I slept through some of that too, though , the legend of the lake with two colours sounded beguiling. Apparently two frustrated lovers, a princess and a shepherd boy, one green eyed and the other blue, were forbidden by the king to marry and cried their hearts out in the waters filling the crater. 

 

We had a disappointment when a rotating globe we wanted to buy as a present for a relative, six copies of which had been on display in one of the ship's shopping outlets since February, had all disappeared when Albina finally decided to buy one.

 

The Guest Services staff gave me the link to make telephone calls from our cabin telephone. If only I had asked for that earlier. It meant that I was finally able to call British Airways and to clear away the technical obstruction to reaching our BA staff travel account. It also meant that, nearer the day, I will be able to contact ROL Cruise by phone to check the arrangements for the limousine due to take us home from Southampton Dock next Saturday.

 

We decided to watch the BBC channel with the Coronation Concert together in the cabin, rather than me seeing it on my own in the theatre. I was disappointed at first at the lack of top billing British artists who had agreed to come forward, but Lionel Ritchie, Katy Perry and Take That eventually made up for that, and because of the amateur enthusiasm of so many choirs from around the UK and even the Commonwealth, being invited to take part it felt like a truly inclusive occasion. Once it was dark the drone lighting in the sky and the castle backdrop for a sound and light show kindled the magic that will make this concert so memorable. An extraordinary beautiful and original concept was the stage performance of a couple of stage actors and a couple of ballet dancers playing the part of the lovers simultaneously backed by the live orchestral music of West Side Story was an extraordinarily beautiful and original innovation.

 

Our quiz team were together again scoring 14 out of 16. Runners up yet again but no longer frustrated, as we had achieved our goal of three victories.

 

I had just remembered at the last minute to move our watches once more hour forward again. We are now only two hours different from London time.

Coronation Day

 Borealis Saturday 6th May 2023

We were woken up at 7.30 with a breakfast tray for Albina, even though she had ordered it for 9.30. We were then both asleep. I guessed that the staff were simply keen to watch the coronation ceremony at 11am, which effectively for us was starting at 8am in our "suspended in mid-Atlantic" time zone. I switched on the TV and soon we were both immersed in the pageantry and futile beauty of it all. Irrelevant to our daily lives perhaps, yet a necessary part of what gives the UK that sense of stability. 

What in this modern era is the value of the monarchy? Perhaps three things. It makes the UK noticed world wide as a soap opera immersed in history, which is a key element of its soft power, even when its real power is so diminished. Along with the English language, Brtish fashion, British music and the BBC this makes Britain a key cultural yardstick for the world, similar to the status of Greece in the Roman World, or Paris in the Fin de Siecle. Secondly, it can safely reflect and even relish the diversification of religions and cultures in the UK without undermining the white population's occasionally fragile sense of security. The swaying gospel singers, dressed in white, certainly made a positive impact, as did the young chorister on behalf of the "children of the Kingdom of God". Thirdly, it protects us from the glorification of our politicians, where even a self-important bumptious leader like Thatcher, or Blair, or Johnson, know they only play second fiddle in the hierarchy. Apart from that the coronation gives our country the chance to look at itself in the mirror as a nation, and despite our problems and divisions, we feel self confident enough not to spit at our own image. The organization of the event was faultless in that understated British way. Yet it must be said that the king looked tired and anxious before his coronation. He was obviously pleased at its progress, judging by his smile. As for Camilla, despite this being her triumph she looked terrified, especially with the crown. At least Charles and Camilla remembered not to raise theit heads to watch the flypast. The massive thousands who came to share in the coronation moment were certainly recorded with a proper British spectacle and a proper British downpour. The coronation does start a new era, whether you call it Carolean or not, it merely illustrates that a new era is already here, where Charles is protector of many faiths, where girls and boys sing in the choir together, where those with different pigmentation of skin are now among the privileged of this land.The contradictions of a hereditary monarchy in a parliamentary democracy are not resolved by this coronation, but they are recognized and confirmed. For now. 

The coronation has affected today's programme of entertainment on the vessel with a commemorative party at the poolside from 12 noon and a Coronation Day Street Fayre from 2pm. Albina was not feeling well, but insisted that I go. To maintain British colours I put on the blue shorts I have been wearing for the last few days, with the white shirt I put on for the White Party and a red bow tie, topped with my red fez from the Egyptian night. Wierd but aptly festive. 

The Poolside had been transformed into a medieval fair with masses of stalls promoting different departments of the vessel presenting different challenges. To take them up you needed to buy tokens with real money. I bought £20 worth with my key card and tried them out at various stalls. I tried to guess the weight of one teddy, find out how many teddies were hidden in a box on another stall, put photographic images on pillows and mugs, bid for services in the spa, play a lottery with the hope of winning another cruise, or bid to buy a signed map of the world showing the route of our cruise. Or I could play human fruit machines, with 3 staff members behind a curtain, presenting a row of fruit at the roll of a drum. There were stalls with sailors' knots, with images of animals made of bath towels (from the housekeeping staff), with darts thrown at balloons, with plastic quoits to be thrown over wine bottles, with a wooden target for putting a golf ball. One brave staff member had volunteered to be a victim of a sponsored wax job, and his legs were certainly hairy. Also there were stalls selling clothes donated by other passengers, or simply left lying about in the ship and unclaimed. There was also a stall selling arty products from the pottery and drawing classes. Finally, you could pose alongside a life size cardboard model of King Charles in naval uniform. It was an impressive array of activities both silly and informative, but the key thing is that some 800 or so people participated in a true fun evening commemorating the big event of the day and with the proceeds going to the charity Heart 2 Heart. .  

It was not however the only world event of that day. The Labour Party consolidated its victory by declaring its readiness to rule, and Iga Swiatek was defeated again by Belorussian player Aryna Sabalenka. At this rate Sabalenka could overtake Swiatek for points and become the new no. 1. Now that would be depressing.

When I returned to the cabin I brought down some sandwiches to Albina from the high tea buffet. Albina seemed to be feeling a little better, as she looked at reruns of the coronation, commenting in particular on the characters she did not like, Camilla, Andrew and Harry. She exulted in the relegation of the last two to the third row in the Abbey, and looked critically at every aspect of Camilla's progress. Albina was a fan of Diana, and she belongs to the unforgiving. 

Despite the festivities it was a dull overcast day. The glass roof of the poolside was restored in anticipation of rain that evening, although Captain Stoica remained optimistic that the weather would be better when we reach Ponta Delgada in the Azores on Tuesday.   

I went to the British Rock Royalty concert put on by the Borealis Theatre Company at the Neptune Theatre. We were handed Union Jacks on our way in and many were still wearing their red, white and blue coronation Street Fayre costumes. While we waited for the show, Elgar's Pomp and Circumstance was played on the loudspeker. The audience were in a patriotic frenzy cheering and waving their flags. When the show actually began with popular songs of the 60s the atmosphere calmed down while the Theatre Company put on their usual lively show with their unforgettable choreography, costumes and lighting. At the end of the show Sammee urged everyone to stand up to the National Anthem, just as we used do incinemas in the 1950s. Sammee also announced that the proceeds from the Coronation Day Street Fayre totalled £5266.30, which if added to the £950 collected so far on this cruise for Heart 2 Heart, would cover the cost of 4 new defibrillators. 

None of my colleagues turned up at 10 for the General Knowledge Quiz, so I returned to our cabin.