Woke up late to an overcast but warm day. Brightened up later. After breakfast and my mile (3.2 laps of the Promenade Deck), I went to the cooking demonstration in Carmen's. The Executive Chef and the chef from Sindhu made various dishes.

While we're talking about food, here's how it works. Two main restaurants, grab and go place, buffet restaurant, three speciality restaurants, which basically means pay places. Breakfast from 06:30 to noon. Lunch from noon to 16:00. Afternoon tea from 15:00 to 16:45. Dinner from 18:00 to 23:00. Late night snacks from 22:30 to 1:00. Timings different in each of the 7 eating places. If you're still hungry, then there's 24 hour room service. Oh, and you get a chocolate on your bed at night, too. There are also two more crew places downstairs.

There are 105 chefs on board, three of whom are women. They get through 3,630 dozen eggs in a fortnight's cruise. As this sector is 28 or so nights, we hit new menus from about day 18. This is new territory for the galleys and so things may not be as smooth as before. I'll await the new menus with interest.

The food definitely seems better than last time. In 2013 every meal seemed to have parsnips, courgettes or squash included, none of which I'm fond of. Now they appear occasionally, but this time around it seems to be green beans as the ubiquitous vegetable. Since the last cruise they've dropped silver service in favour of plated meals. In my opinion it's an improvement. The food is hotter, service quicker and you don't get the odd situations like last time, such as having a curry and then when they brought round the vegetables, being offered a roast potato to go with it. You can always guarantee a decent curry on P&O as a lot of the crew and chefs are Indian.

Men still just slightly adrift in BoS, but some people are saying they may not continue with it on this leg, as it's not as much fun. No banter between the teams or between us and the staff. I'll give it another couple of days.

Weather much nicer in the pm, great for deck quoits and crosswording/reading on the back decks. I've discovered the secret of gold stickers. Drink a glass of red before the Individual Quiz. It worked last night and it worked tonight, but I won with a measly 14/20.

After dinner four of us sat by the Pennant Bar and enjoyed a quiet drink, listening to the waves. A few spots of light rain. We lost in the tie break in the Syndicate Quiz. Formal night tonight and we gain another hour in bed as the clocks go back. As I was returning to my cabin from drinking hot chocolate, I realised that it had been quite wet earlier.