Ålborg, Denmark - Thursday

07-09: Ålborg, Denmark. We slept in. We weren’t getting off anyway. We ate lunch at the grill because it was nice, sunny, and warm. We played cards there for a little while, then back to the cabin. Stuart had a much-needed nap and I worked on this blog and photos. The show was a repeat for us so we skipped it. Of course, everything is a repeat because we are doing the same cruise in the opposite direction. We had a nice dinner in the Dining Room with a really tasty piece of blueberry pie to share for dessert. Cards and bed after that.

Copenhagen, Denmark - Wednesday

07-08: Copenhagen, Denmark. We had a long and busy day today. I hope I can remember everything we did! We didn’t take the ship’s shuttle because we wanted to save the walking for Tivoli Gardens. Stuart has been there before but I had not. We took a Bolt to the entrance and quite quickly we purchased tickets and we were inside. It looked so crowded we thought we would be waiting for some time, but they are very organized. Tivoli Gardens is a fun place just to walk around. There are lakes, ponds, beautiful flowers everywhere, 40+ dining choices, shows several times a day, and even peacocks walking freely about. There are scads of rides for all ages. If you choose to ride rides you can buy 1 ticket or get a pass for all the rides. We didn’t have a chance to see any shows today. It seems like week days they have them later in the day, and we had to be back to the ship. We did have a delicious lunch and a separate stop for a glass of wine among the flowers. There is a Lego store right by one of the entrances of the gardens. We stopped in there because I wanted to get something only found in Denmark, birthplace of the Lego! What a cute shop with some fun things! We caught another Bolt back to the ship. We had just 30 minutes to refresh before our next cooking class.

Tonight we are cooking Mediterranean tonight. Tonight the class only has 6 people. One cook was a sweet lady with dementia, so she was no real help. The other 5 of us had a lot of prep work to do. We made ravioli (pasta was premade and cut), tomato sauce, fennel and white bean salad, and lastly swordfish steaks. Everything was so good! The fish had a white wine sauce with lemon and saffron. I made sure to get that recipe along with the all of the others. The pastry chef made us a stunning dessert. What each person was served was enough food for 2 people. Our instructions were given by Chef Joseph again. He is such a nice man. In 2 days, he leaves the ship for a break, but he is going to be back on this ship or another.

Warnemünde, Germany - Tuesday

07-07: Warnemünde, Germany. It is cold and wet again today. We had such a nice time when we were here before, what a difference this stop is. Stuart gives another presentation tonight so we just stayed onboard. Even if he didn’t speak, it would have been no fun go get off in the rain. After his presentation we went to dinner. Tonight they had German sausage and all the extras to go with them. The soft pretzels were good! Actually, all of the dishes were good and there were several kinds of German sausage to choose from. We had to rush to the theater to watch the movie Hamilton showing tonight. There is no show as most onboard took the 12-hour excursion to Berlin. We have both been in the past and it was great, but a really long day. The movie was just okay, so we left after an hour. A lot of Rap music and rather hard to understand and keep up. We played some cards to finish off the day.

Bornholm, Ronne (Denmark Island) - Monday

07-06: Bornholm, Ronne (Island in Denmark): Another day with pouring rain. This second cruise is so much different than the first. Of course, it is all repeat ports for us, but also the weather is the opposite from what it was on our first stop. We had such an enjoyable time when visiting this island before. Today we were going to find a coin shop, but it was less than inviting to go out – we stayed in! We sent some time researching and checking things for our 2027 Africa Trip. It was also very cold throughout the ship so we stayed in our cabin all afternoon doing that and watching some TV. They really don’t have activities during the day. This is a “Thinking Man’s Cruise” and I guess everyone is thinking all afternoon. Anyway, the real fun was dinner time. We took another cooking class on the ship. We really had fun before and this time was also great. We had a French menu this time. The starter was a fish stew – so amazing. It had a white, creamy broth with Monk fish, mussels, scallops, and prawns. Garnish for this stew was 3 additional mussels with lemon zest and chives. It was a meal in itself. So delicious. I am so glad we have the recipe. The next course was filet mignon. First Stuart and I made the chorizo salsa. That consisted of the diced chorizo fried until somewhat crispy (for me it was too crispy) with cherry tomatoes, shallots, chives, parsley, white balsamic, olive oil, zest and juice of one lemon, with salt and pepper to taste. Later the beef was seared in the leftover oil from the chorizo and some of that was also spooned over the steak as part of the garnish. The filet was served on a bed of the salsa, topped with a goat cheese and fennel fondue. It was okay considering I don’t care for goat cheese. With all the fennel and other things added to it, it didn’t taste much like goat cheese anyway. There were several other garnishes added to the beef dish but I am not sure of all of them. Dessert was provided by the pasty chef. Tonight it was Bailey’s Chocolate Mousse. It was very good also, but didn’t taste the Bailey’s in it. We are stuffed! All of this was served with a white and then a red wine paired to go well with the dinner, and it did! A few card games listening to the piano player Lisa and then off to bed.