Didn't set an alarm this morning and therefore didn't stir till about ten to nine. Unheard of! Our cabin is so quiet and as it has no window, once we put the light out, it's a blackout. So, great sleep.

Had a quick breakfast and then scuttled off to bridge. Our last lesson before Valparaiso. Our usual partners didn't arrive and we ended up playing in a four with two of the instructors. That was a bit scary. Plus we were learning how to bid and play slams which is a scary thing in itself - basically you are saying you are going to take 12 or 13 of the available tricks (there are only 13 in total). And then, Bob and I ended up playing every contract because the instructor partnership had no need to practise. It was tense but good, like a lesson within a lesson. Still so much is a mystery to me. "Look at your hand and work out how many tricks you can win"….. I don't know!!! It seems to depend on so many variables…. Anyway…. Onwards……

It was sunny but very windy today, about a force 7 and the Pacific was white-capped. However, because we were going with the wind, the ship hardly moved. We sat out for a bit, as if sheltered from the wind it was really pleasant. Neither of us felt like lunch after a late breakfast so we went up to the Crow's Nest lounge to bag our seats for art. I went off and had an enjoyable tussle with the so-called Internet Manager about the way they calculate time used when we are online. She was hopeless (in so very many ways) and I will have to take it up with the Hotel Manager at Reception. LOL.

Our art lesson was a scene from the Magellan Straits consisting of islands and rocks in front of a sunset and we were using a technique for rocks where you paint two different coloured layers of paint on top of each other and then use the corner of a credit card to kind of swirl/scrape to make rock and crevice shapes through the wet paint. Being left-handed, I needed to be shown this a few times…… Afterwards, I had a go at a second painting, one we missed when we were passing through the fjords and didn't go to art class. This is of two penguins on a pile of pebbles and rocks with cliffs, sea and sky in the background. I had to use the credit card technique again to make the pebbles and it was a lot better that time. We have another exhibition in two days so we must have a look at what we've done so far and decide what to inflict, I mean, show to people.

Tonight at dinner we were seated next to the professional dance instructors. A very nice couple from Bournemouth, although it must be said, older than me, and in the case of the gentleman, very corpulent indeed. I cannot quite imagine him jiving or doing the energetic dances, although he told me that their speciality was the Argentinian Tango. I am now determined to go along as soon as we graduate to afternoon bridge, thus freeing the morning. It is only right that we spread the challenge of our (lack of) abilities as widely as possible. LOL. Bob is worried about all the flicking that I will have to do between his legs and in preparation has already begun to adopt a wary eyed, defensive crouch….. The dance bloke said I wouldn't be allowed to do any flicking for quite some time. Damn.

Jan has asked me for more descriptions of our fellow passengers…… now, most are perfectly lovely, very interesting people, so I suspect that what is required is more updates on the more oddball of our shipboard companions…. Scarcely a day goes by without some new gaffe from the Drunken Lady. We were sad to have missed her performance with the ventriloquist the other night (we went to the early show) when apparently after much heckling on her part, she was taken to task by the Monkey Dummy who said various things to her (cheered on by the audience) that most of the crew would probably love to be able to get away with. Most nights after 8pm she is escorted around by a crew member, which she clearly adores in a very "Ooooh, young man… manner", but it is probably to safeguard her from falling overboard or something.

Tomorrow we are ashore in Puerto Montt.