Of the 7 ports we visit on this cruise around the British Isles,  Liverpool has never been on my "must-see" short list.  In Ireland I was excited to visit Dublin because  of my interest in its great literary history. In Scotland, I am looking forward to going back to Edinburgh partly for sentimental reasons - a wonderful visit there with my then-fiance more than 40 years ago; and also because of the spectacular city-scape with Edinburgh Castle looming over the town. Glasgow holds family interest because that's where one of my grandmothers came from.   But Liverpool to me evoked images of grey buildings under grey skies, and apart from the fact that it was the birthplace of the Beatles, I knew very little about it.

While Karen got ready for dinner, I heard the start of the missed sailing story from her perspective, as well as the key saga. When Karen first boarded she was given a key to another cabin - that was number one. Then when the confusion about who was rooming with whom was sorted out she got a key to our cabin. However it did not open the door so  she went to the Purser and had the key reactivated. We joked about a keycard jinx on our cabin.  Little did we know.

Since the first port of call for the Queen Victoria was Cherbourg in France, the clocks were set forward an hour at midnight on Thursday. When I woke around 7 am I was feeling quite weary. Five nights of less than 6 hours sleep does have a compounding effect.

The first thing that struck me on walking into the welcome cocktail party, was that apart from Wendy, how many of the other dancers I knew from my previous cruises with Dancers At Sea.  From my first West coast Wine Tasting and Dance Cruise, there was Raoul, one of the hosts, and guests Nancy, Dean, Bruce, Dr. Bill, Ginny and Bill. On the Labour Weekend Getaway Dance Cruise I met Bill C, one of the dance hosts. From the South-East Asia Dance Cruise there were Helene and Jeanie, and from the Eastern Caribbean New Year Dance Cruise there were host, Gordy, fellow guests Karen R and Karen D, Harlan and Peggy, and Robert, one of our terrific dance professionals.