After leaving the Falklands we had a couple of days at sea again. This is an opportunity to read, attend lectures, and, of course, eat. One of the events we went to see was the crew talent show. There were some excellent singers and dancers, including a break dancer. Then there was a cooking demonstration and the introduction of all of the chefs, waiters, butchers, pastry chefs, and hostesses. Then we were invited to tour the galley.

All of the food preparation for the entire ship takes place in this cavernous galley, including butchering, main courses, and all of the baking and pastry preparation.

After touring the galley, we were ready to eat, again.

The following morning Alan went on a tour of Montevideo, Uruguay and a trip out of town to go to a winery for wine tasting and a cooking lesson.

Uruguay Legislation Building

We then headed north into wine country and after 45 minutes arrived at the Pizzorno Family Estates. What followed was the typical tour of the winery and wine tasting with the addition of a cooking lesson. We made empanadas, again, and alfajores, the Argentine and Uruguayan traditional sandwich cookies. We piped dulce de leche onto a somewhat fragile cookie and added a second cookie to the top. Very difficult, not. I actually liked the wine and bought a bottle. It was a blend of Tannat, an Uruguayan grape and Merlot.

We had to have our suitcases outside our cabin early in the evening, so we had just what we would wear and carry with us for the trip home left in the room when we went down for a final dinner.

We were dropped at the Buenos Aires airport 10 hours before our flight, so we couldn’t even drop our suitcases until 4 hours before the flight. As usual at the end of a trip, we both had severe colds/bronchitis and so the wait at the airport, with nowhere to sit, masked, was interminable. Finally we checked in, got through security and were able to relax a little in the Admiral’s Club until boarding time. The flight to Miami wasn’t too bad, but we arrived at 5 AM. Then customs, which was painless, and transfer to a flight to Dallas and then on to Albuquerque. A total of 36 hours after leaving the ship, we arrived home, tired and sick, but with many good memories of the trip.