Have you ever been invited to a dinner with the Captain of your ship and Archbishop Desmond Tutu? Well, we have!! It is 11:45pm, or 23:45 ship time, and we just returned from our "Captain's Dinner." It was so much fun! Every faculty, staff, and lifelong learner has an opportunity to attend a Captain's Dinner during the voyage and we were invited to the very first one. No "cafeteria" food for us tonight! A cocktail hour began at 7:30pm, in the Glazer Lounge (which is at the front of the ship on the top deck of the ship). We had appetizers there and then we were escorted to the main dining room where we were treated like kings and queens. There were a total of four tables and about 20 people that were invited to this first dinner. I would tell you what the menu entailed but it would just make you jealous.

Stefan, the Hotel Director, was the officer at our table. He is from Germany and works three months and then has three months off. He now lives in Thailand with his wife and children who are 6 years and 2 years - he misses them very much. We also had a couple that were Lifelong Learners and have travelled with SAS 10 times. They have brought 5 of their grandchildren with them over the years, one of whom is a student this semester... WOW!

We are getting ready for Spain - we arrive tomorrow! Nancy is a trip leader for the Cádiz City Orientation and Geno is the leader of one of our trips that we are very excited about: two night/three day guided trip to Sevilla, Granada and Córdoba. If we lead a trip we receive a nice discount on the trip so we have signed up to lead as many trips as they will let us.

After this evening's final time change, we will have lost five hours since we left Norfolk, VA. So, that means our friends on the East Coast will be five hours behind us and our friends on the West Coast will be 8 hours behind us. Luckily, while we are in both Spain and Morocco, we will be in the same time zone for 12 days. What a treat!

Fun Facts:

-yesterday on the ship, we used approximately 54 gallons of water per person

-the ship's crew quarters has it's own computer lab