Day 3 and 4

Due to the wagging tail of Storm Aileen we had an unexpected sea day when we should have been to Copenhagen. It was sad not to revisit this beautiful medieval city but much better to be safe than sorry, so we spent the day in a lazy way, reading, writing and consuming food. Along with those occupations I attended a couple of very interesting lectures. The first was a general talk covering all sorts of aspects of The Baltic Sea. It covered geology, geography, culture and history. I learnt quite a good deal about this part of the world which for most of last century has been somewhat closed to the world being part of the USSR. 

I even heard talk about small countries the size of Paradise which were previously unknown to me. Only one small state still belongs to Russia and that is decidedly walled, gated and probably has a lid in an effort to keep nosy foreigners out. It's name is Kaliningrad. 

Later in the day we had another lecture about the life and works of Carl Faberge - this was obviously to tie in with our St Petersburg visit and although not delivered with quite the panache other lectures have been, it was none the less very interesting with slides of the most incredibly beautiful artefacts which would dazzle the most jaded of eyes and hearts. 

Immediately after that we remained in the theatre to watch a film - the all new Dad’s Army. What a great movie it was, witty, slapstick, clever, poignant and true to the venerable old series of half a century ago. Indeed the vicar was the original vicar who, in view of his now great age, played a cameo role. It was very touching to see him in character. The only other ‘remainer’ was Ian Lavender who moved from the ‘stupid boy’ of the original series to playing a rather snooty and golf loving Brigadier. The new twist was the introduction of Elizabeth Mainwaring and her gallant troupe of ATS girls. They were splendid and with Alison Steadman as the redoubtable Mrs Fox it worked like a charm. With cast including Bill Nighy, Tom Courtney, Michael Gambon and the aforesaid Alison Steadman, how could it fail !

Quite entertained and totally relaxed we finished the day with another lovely dinner, and I must say they have now realised my need for a Carbohydrate Free meal ! Hurrah, I was thus brought my delicious and delicately cooked halibut with a positive basket load of green vegetables - it was tricky trying to explain I can eat those veggies which grow above ground !!

We dock at Warnemunde tomorrow, the port for Berlin, which is in fact three hours away, but some intrepid folk are making that journey ! We will potter off the ship after lunch into this ancient and beautiful small town which used to be in East Germany.

Over and out sir………….stupid boy !