" This "going into Europe" will not turn out to be the thrilling mutual exchange supposed.

It is more like nine middle - aged  couples with failing marriages meeting  in a darkened bedroom in a Brussels hotel for a group grope."   British social historian E.P.Thomson,1975,Sunday Times.

The Filipina was preening herself in the gym this morning again,

primping her plumage,strutting her not inconsiderable weaponry.
But this time there were no admirers,who would encourage her in her endeavours.
The gym was full of tired old men who in the final effort are trying to halt the march of  ravages of age
and remedy a lifelong abuse of the body by cigarettes,drink and the sitting room sofa,some throwing in the towel after the first 10 steps on the treadmill, some soldiering on,living in hope,for "hope springs eternal in the human breast" [Alexander Pope]

Yes, I did cruise in Latin America and the Caribbean

in the autumn of 2017 for 45 days.
We did dock for one day in  Costa Rica, but I cannot for the life of me  remember  where and I did not  devote a separate entry to the experience in my blog.But sometimes it is like that when I am too busy doing a multitude of things.
It is  poor and dirty country like all  Latin American countries  I have been to.
But then dirt is not the Latin American privilege, the ship I had sailed on for 45 days, Columbus,owned by Cruise and Maritime,  was a disgustingly kept  vessel,too, and I would  never set a foot on it ever  again.
My day in Puntarenas  is not over yet. I want to be fair in my final entry on the port.

Many people are under the impression only no-hopers come to entertain on a cruise ship.

How wrong they are!
We have had  a comedian Goronwy Thom,who had performed in the Palladium in front of the British royalty,Prince Harry,I think,and his wife.A gem of a performer.
Roy Walker, a stalwart of the British comedy scene,up there with the best of them.
Divas3 with their powerhouse voices came fresh from Las Vegas and sang for us two evenings.
Some people did not give the ventriloquist Lynn Trefzger a chance and left when she pulled out her animal dummies.I am glad I did not, though  I was sorely tempted, as the best,utterly hilarious end to the show, was well worth the wait. Not for nothing is she an award winning performer.
And when Tian Jiang's name appeared on the Daily  Programme,I had to double take,and no,I am not   telling those who do not know who he is,    who he is.   Please google his name and be amazed.
He performed for us two nights ago and will do so this evening,too.

So last night at dinner I wore my light blue 3/4 M&S jeans.

No-one said a thing,but judging by the look of one or to women, they met their Waterloo.One said something to her partner,he looked me up and down. I have no doubt  Marks & Spencer  was again the talk of the ship !
I fail to understand why any-one should object to them,when I pair them with an   antique top,high heels and a matching bag.
There are women who do not carry a handbag  with an evening dress,many men haven't been to a barber for months,some men and women smell and we  still have quite a long sail ahead of us.This is incomprehensible to me as water is free and all the toiletries are provided,items can easily be washed in the sink with a shampoo or a shower gel,I do it every day and there is a launderette with washers and driers,a good iron and a clean ironing board.There is no excuse to smell.English smell, Germans smell, other nationalities smell.
And what is it about the socks and the most awful sandals men put on, and their partners often have identical.Identical! And if only those, the tops and  shorts,too. On every ship.And still they mind my M&S jeans!

Today,27 January 2019,we are transitting the Panama Canal.

France began work  on the canal in 1881,but there were engineering problems  and high mortality due to disease,so the work was not completed.This was done by the US,who re-started the work in 1904 and 10 years later the canal was officially opened.
The canal is 48 miles long  and connects the Atlantic ocean and the Pacific ocean via  the Caribbean sea,enabling the ships to avoid the tricky Cape Horn, thus shorten the route  by more than half.
The Panamian government has been managing and operating  the canal since 1999.
At 14.25 I am going to have my photo taken by a ship's photographer on my balcony.Being photographed is for me worse than  having a root canal,so this is another momentous occasion I experience today! I am of the firm opinion,that unless a photo makes you look 10 years younger and 10 kg lighter, it has no business to be hoisted upon the world.And that is no easy task.

The final word on Aruba.

18 miles north of  Venezuela,the island had hit the  jackpot in its position to the Venezuelan oilfields.Two oil refineries were built  in 1929,one of them,Lago Oil, was at the time the largest refinery in the world,employing 8000 islanders.This and the tourism had afforded them  one of the highest standards of living in the West Indies.
In 1985  the refinery, due to the fallen demand worldwide,had closed, but re-opened in 1991.
You do not see anywhere  people begging or lying on the ground drunk.
Aruba has a daily supply of fresh fruit and vegetables from Venezuela, a Caribbean island can  rarely grow own, due to the  soil being washed out of every goodness a vegetable or fruit need to flourish.
Only  20 inches of rain annually, the cacti grow and multiply happily,not much of anything else.
Divi Divi trees [or  Watapana ] are unique to Aruba.Their branches bent  at right angles to the trunk by the trade winds.
Aruba has glorious clear waters,sandy beaches.
But it is flat, it has only three smallish hills, the largest  about 600 feet high,it does not have any greenery to speak of. If it had at least a fraction of the forests Costa Rica has,I would retire there like a shot.But I love the woods, sitting in the shade  under a tree. The smell of burning leaves is intoxicating to me.

That I would miss terribly.
 

The final word on Bermuda.

Having had time to reflect,I've decided to give the island another chance.When and for how long that will be I do not know,but another chance to impress me it will get.
I think all of us deserve a second chance in life, whatever the circumstances may be.
I did give the second chance to  Queen Elizabeth and now I know,that it is unlikely I would ever again set a foot on the ship again.But that is the way the cookie crumbles.
Bermuda is a large island and I have seen just a small part of it.And I liked very much what I saw, the picture postcard unforgettable vistas,clearest of the clear water.
Bermuda has  more shipwrecks  per square mile  than anywhere else on Earth and I would like to see at least one of them.
I would like to ride  a horse  from beach to beach.
I would like to try a beef-burger  at the Pickled Onion, in Hamilton, the capital.
Yes, I would like to give Bermudians  another try. People, who bury their dead  in the prime spot like the cemetery  they have established  on the way between the cruise port and Hamilton, deserve it.

Tomorrow,24 January,we are docking in Aruba,

one of the loveliest islands I have been to.And I cannot wait to repeat the experience.

Port Canaveral,20 January, 2019.

Port Canaveral will for ever remain in my memory as a place where I was finger-printed by the United States Customs and Border Protection authorities,as were the  other 2000 or so travellers.
The nightmare started at 7am, when I joined the already long queue,I was cleared at 12.35,there were still around 300 people behind me,

average age  good 70,many disabled, a large number walking with a stick or two, Zimmer frames, quite a lot in a wheelchair,tired,hungry,thirsty. Retired folk, we all had paid  a considerable amount of money to Cunard,an American company, to see this part of the world in  the winter sun.
How many of us  are  a threat to the US security?How many would  illegally seek employment in the country or attempt to remain there unlawfully?
Never in my entire life have I been treated in this manner  and I have been to 74 countries.
Cuba welcomed me with open arms,efficiently, with a smile.
Getting through the customs in St Petersburg, Russia,had been a breeze.
In America I am finger-printed like a common criminal.

At my sister's birthday celebration

last December,one of the guests,Miroslav,looked at me in horror,when I said I was sailing to Bermuda.Many ships have disappeared there,said he,it is the methane rising to the surface creating a vacuum and if a ship happens to be above,it sinks through the hole.And I was going to invite you to my 80th birthday party,he continued quietly, looking at me intensely with sorrow  one reserves for someone on a death bed.
Well,Bermuda came and went and I am here to tell the story be it different to the story I was going to tell.The high hopes of wonderful things  to do never came  to fruition,they all sank like the ships in the  Bermuda Triangle.The 24 shops in the Clockwater hall  never opened their doors to me,even the jewel in the island's crown,The National Museum, remained firmly closed.The Bermudians are keeping it all to themselves.They do not even allow the ships to stay until the dark,they have to depart in daylight, we had to leave  at 15.30.        Yes.      How preposterous is that.

Today,17/01/2019,I can add Bermuda to the 73 countries I have visited.

Shortly after 9am the customs official cleared the ship ready for disembarkation and I joined the long,long queue to leave.I hate taking an organized  tour at the best of times and  would never do so after sailing for 7 days,when all I want to do is walk,walk,walk and do my own thing in general.We docked in the port  at the former  Royal Naval Dockyard,as the island has been  officially a British territory since 1684,even though the name  Bermuda has been given by a Spanish sea captain Juan de Bermudez,who came across the islands  in 1503 ["The Bermudas" consist of around 138 islands.], but the Spanish never claimed the territory as they thought the islands were haunted.But the Brits were made of sterner stuff.
Yes, after 7 days without seeing a dry land,  I was ready for Bermuda,but Bermuda was not ready for me.Is it a Sunday,thought I for a split second, when deserted streets,bar a few taxi drivers, and closed shops,bar "The Pharmacy", welcomed me.
Even s solitary worker on a sloping  roof good 30 m high [ no harness, nothing to make him safe],was resting spread-eagle.I have not seen a sight quite like it and burst out laughing,reaching for my phone to take a picture.Alas, he heard me, stirred and sat up startled.Seeing the phone in my hands he began frantically scurrying about, almost sliding down.Feeling concerned for his safety I shouted-sorry-and put the phone away giving him a wave.He waved back and smiled.
The islanders must be very rich, when they do not consider almost 2000 people  worthy of opening their doors to.
So I decided to walk in the direction of the capital, Hamilton.
I passed Westgate Correctional facility.Utterly divine setting.Does any offender ever want to leave such a prestigious address? Gloria Estefan,who rents out her Miami home for $75,000 a month, would be proud to own a house there.
A small  cluster of tiny houses further along,called Victoria village, was obviously a home of the born and bread Bermudians.
A beautiful woman  sitting on the miniature terrace smiled broadly when I said good morning, beaming.
Be careful,now,the sun is going to get strong today, she said,put on your hat.Thank you, I will.
Yes, it was a good, good morning.I only wish I had my right foot to match. It has been hurting me for a while now and then.It could be an inflammation,as the internet has suggested.So I hopped along another good 2km, until I could hop no longer and turned back stopping at a ramshackle bus stop.The $3 ride was at times hair-raising,the driver taking the bends as if we were catching the last shuttle from the Moon to Earth.
There was not a single place open that served coffee in the Dockyard.Limping I returned to my cabin and a sun-lit balcony and yes, I shed all my clothes and  for 10 glorious  minutes  I  soaked the sun.

And talking about short, dumpy and drab.

This morning in the gym a short but certainly not dumpy or drab  Filipino woman gave on a treadmill a masterclass how to attract a man.Preening,swaying, throwing her arms about the way a gay man dances when on a prowl,her side glances checking out who is watching.I was.Transfixed.In awe of this performance worthy of an Oscar.
Last night the woman and a man were standing in the lobby.He leaning on a stick, ugly, badly groomed, badly dressed.She almost pretty, heavily made - up,skirt slit almost to the waist on both sides, cleavage almost to the waist baring her almost flat chest.Not a glance between them, not a smile.Then without a word the man walked towards the lifts.Without a word the woman followed.It must be a very lonely world they had retreated to.

Last night Mr Roy Walker gave a masterclass how jokes are delivered.

Yes,the comedian I saw 3 years ago,is back.Mr Walker did not seem a day older.His suit did.And it seemed to have shrunk.But his shoes were my kind of shoes,brown leather, from a distance looked like Chelsea brogues.He did sing the Viagra song to the delighted participation of the audience. Mr Tom Jones, your Delilah has a lot to answer for.And yes, the Clinton joke was also there.The President visited Ireland.100 women were asked if they would ever sleep with him. 99 of them said never again.Just as funny now as three years ago.It is the way you say it, Mr Walker!The difference between the erotic and the kinky?When you stroke the naked body of your beloved with a feather it is erotic,if you use the whole chicken...

What a waste of time and money building the Hadrian's Wall to keep the Scots coming to England.All they had to do was to make a small charge.[the way he said it was hilarious, but I do not recall the exact words now, just the jest of the joke.]
This morning I was having breakfast in the Lido restaurant when Mr Walker and his wife walked in.He resplendent in a bright top, she... well,I do not know what he spends his money on, but it is not on his short, dumpy and drab better half.

No,the Huawei tablet is not for the faint-hearted

The intention was to replace it with a Samsung S 3 tablet to match the Ssmsung S 7,I think it is,telephone,given to me by my sister,but as John Lewis was closed on Boxing day (they offer a 3 year guarantee),am stuck with the Huawei.Oh,it is a lovely little thing a 3 year old can use,and does! So why can't I, you may ask.Well,I would like either a lighter (in weight) version of my Toshiba chromebook,or something to equal the Samsung phone.