Monday, September 22

And a Happy Elephant Appreciation Day to you all! Jill and I celebrated by wearing our EAP buttons all day. Jill passed out peanuts in the shell to all who asked her about hers. This evening at dinner I distributed packets of Virginia peanuts to all at our table along with our waiter, assistant waiter and head waiter. For those who don’t know, Elephant Appreciation Day, September 22, was begun about 15 years ago to celebrate all the good things that elephants have done forr humans over the ages.

I had a relatively busy day. 10:00 a.m. I heard an interesting lecture about “exotic” fabrics from around the world. 11:00 a.m. brought another interesting lecture about Imperial Russian Alaska and the sea otter fur trade. (Dr. Jay Wolfe will be a lecturer for the entire cruise. He’s an expert in history and a frequent commentator for The History Channel. He’s a wonderful speaker who makes history come alive with great stories.) 12:00 was time for Team Trivia (our team didn’t win, but we did better than yesterday) and 1:00 p.m. was the first session of Watercolor Instruction.

Tuesday, September 23

Well, today we have a bit more “ocean motion”...not enough to be a bother, but enough to feel like we’re at sea. Fairly lazy day but I did make it to Team Trivia and Watercolors. I also atended a reunion meeting of passengers from last year’s Grand South America and Antarctica cruise. I knew I’d seen several familiar faces this year, but it seems like there are 49 of us on board! Not all came to the “reunion,” but many did. Of course the first thing we did was swap stories about the big wave in Drake’s Passage!