Our first day cruising was a full day at sea. Slept till ten then up two decks for breakfast. After that it was over to Carole and LeVerne's to see what they had planned for the rest of the day and tomorrow in Copenhagen. For Copenhagen tomorrow, seven of us decided to tour on our own, with Denise joining her pre-booked tour. We agreed to meet at 2:00 over lunch to discuss our plans further.

        

I will mention at this point that a little game was agreed to last night at dinner. As what we are on is obviously a ship, the definition being that a boat can fit onto a ship, but a ship cannot fit onto a boat, every time someone said the "B" word (boat) rather than the "S" word (ship) you had to put a dollar in the pot. I said the B word three times in ten minutes so I was already a major contributor. To simplify things I left 10 bucks with Carole to cover me off for the rest of the day, or at least the remainder of the morning.

Meanwhile, my rental tux was delivered to our stateroom late in the morning and fit rather well, except for the two shirts that were quite tight in the neck. I mentioned this to our stateroom attendant Alexander who immediately took them away to be exchanged for a larger neck size. He came back within the hour with new shirts, but still too small. By 3:00, he was finally able to source the right size. No problem now for our formal dinner tonight in the dining room.

Lee, Laverne and Carole trooped off to bingo at 4:15. Lee won a coin purse and a pen, Carole won $70 and Laverne got squat. Meanwhile, I met up with Denise and Bruce and chatted with them for an hour or so across from the onboard Russian Matryoshka (nesting dolls) and the Faberge Egg exhibit.

Wandered back to our cabin around 5:30 p.m. and watched the northern coast of Denmark slide by on the starboard side as we left the North Sea and entered Skaggerak Strait which leads down to Kattegat Bay and Copenhagen. While I was leaning on the rail of our balcony looking out over the sea, a whale surfaced twice a couple of hundred meters astern of the ship. While I didn't have time to snap a photo, I have included a representative illustration of the event. Quite exciting to see.

      

This was our first formal night for dinner. All the ladies were dressed to the nines and the four gentlemen in our group all sported the latest in formal cruisewear, rental tuxedos. We met in our stateroom before going down for dinner to have a glass of wine and make sure us guys had all the different pieces of our tuxes matched to the appropriate parts of our bodies. Sorted it all out, took some pics, then down to the dining room.

      
    

For a bunch of rubes from western Canada, everyone was looking pretty sharp at table 611 this night, eh!

      

After dinner most of us hit the Celebrity Theatre for the Captains reception and a show, A Taste of Broadway. Entertaining hour and a half. Lee and I drifted back to our stateroom just after midnight, and off to bed by 1:00 a.m.