All at sea.

There is nothing quite like it - flying out of a dank and miserable and cold Birmingham and landing in a warm and sunny Palma.  And it was warm indeed - we were soon divesting ourselves of the layers of clothing needed when we left home early that morning.

The super efficient cruise organisation took over once again and very soon we found ourselves in our cabin, just along the corridor from where Caroline and I were - except we had a window !  A real proper window, not just a teeny port hole.  It made such a difference with the sunshine pouring in.  We quickly unpacked and trotted off to lunch.

Generally I would say the average age is even older this time - there are a lot of groups of older (70+) women travelling together, mostly widows we found out, and it was with such a group we were seated at lunch.  It didnt take long for Martin, the silver tongued lounge lizard, to have them giggling and twittering and fluttering their eyelashes.  So this was the start of what has been dubbed 'Martins Harem' - and its been added to greatly since then.  I think he sees the start of a new career here as ships giggalo.  They all seem to adore him for some reason, at least 4 of them have started knitting jumpers for him !

The food is as excellent as ever, Martins eyes lit up when he saw the rhubarb crumble and custard - honestly, you would think I never fed him at home the way he attacked it, greatly encouraged by his harem who love to see a man eat apparently - yes, but at this rate girls youll need to increase the size of those jumpers !

After lunch I gave him a quick tour of the ship, pointing out the gym on the way, then we settled down for a nice lazy afternoon in the sunshine.

Palma is such a pretty port with its castle on the hill and cathedral all lit up in the evening - and the boats !  Honestly, millions of pounds worth of sea going vessels moored up, although you rarely see anyone onboard.

Bingo remains the highlight of the evenings entertainment for many of the passengers but having learnt my lesson last time we steered well clear of it - I didnt want to fall foul of the 'Bingo Mafia' again.  Instead we decided to try out the casino - where Martin promptly lost 50 Euros in record time on the roulette wheel.

The first day is spent at sea - eating and sunbathing mainly.  The weather was gorgeous, not too hot but perfect for lying around reading.  Martin disappeared to the gym for a couple of hours and pronounced it adequate for his purposes, then settled down with his growing harem for afternoon tea and gossip. 

I started reading a book aptly entitled 'How to Murder your Husband'...