Last Day of QM2/ Chu Mu takes on Land

I am writing to you from the Reid's Palace Hotel in Madeira. Ain't bad. We are on cliffs over looking the Ocean, with port wine as far as the eye can see.

But I will have to tell you about the last night on the ol ship.. it was the happiest ever, (usually the last night we fall into mini Teutonic depressions) due to us laughing at Chu Mu. We had the usual round of toasts and Crepes and put the children to bed. As we walked out of their room for a last walk around the deck, we heard music coming from our favorite bar far down the hall. And the reason it was notable was because, after many nights of talking about my father and his absence, we hear none other than Scott Joplin drifting towards us, compelling me to rush over to it. I will have to look up which song it was, but it was a slow, sad, lovely one. For the non initiated, Charles Adams Brigham loved Scott Joplin, and played it on 8 track tapes in his big American cars when we went for evening drives on summer vacation. For his children it is the soundtrack to, if not his soul, then much of his personality.
Writing about it now of course it doesn't seem significant, but it was then. Nearly crushed me...because it was so clear he had something to say about missing out, or how much orange juice goes into Crepes Suzette..who knows. But I am fairly certain he wants to say hello.

Anyway, back to london. Charlie was ecstatic to see Andrew and talked his ear off, at least until we saw Peter, and then Charlie, Peter and Frederick were inseparable until we left for Switzerland. They do not leave his Mary Poppins like side..their little faces as close to his as possible, spouting anything they can that might make him laugh as hard as he makes them laugh.
Best part was I learned that not only is master charlie a great foodie in the making, but he smells the roses. Literally. I will post pictures of his nose crammed into every rose, lilac bush, rosemary bud he saw. At one point Frederick was hugging a missile and Charlie was grinding up rosemary to show me how it increased the smell. Good news is a bit of this rubbed of on F, who asked me to buy him a rose so he could carry it around smelling it.
The next edition will be devoted to Charlie hitting, and conquering Switzerland. Truly a sight to see. The Wehlens fell head over heels in love with him. (I believe he might be in the will). They noted he is energetic, but they find him utterly charming. Eva described the misstep that landed him in the emergency room (more on that later) as a cruel and unjust turn of fate. She even took a stab at blaming Frederick for not protecting Charlie from the bench that he was jumping on. At one point Eva was looking at the children playing outside the window of the restaurant we were in and said: He must give his mother a lot of joy. (long pause)
And a lot of worry.
Yes I said, yes he does.

Below are Frederick's thoughts:
Hello again! The last day on the boat was very sad. All I could think of was how sad it was to be leaving this magnificent liner. All we did that day was play ping pong and eat. Anyway, in London we saw Peter and he started yelling to me and Charlie(This is Frederick speaking, sorry for the inconvenience!)when he opened the door to his office. Now, Switzerland: the Alps in the background and small hills and lakes in the foreground. Sadly, trying to conquer this incredible land injured him. This meant he could go no further in his quest to attack the ten meter board.
Though I, went off the 7.5 meter, nobody even went up to the ten because of Charlie's injury.
The story of Chu Mu's deep gash went like this: We were in the kids changing room and no one else was with us because they were all in there respective changing rooms. We were jumping around from bench to bench at the Erlicon( a swimming pool with a ten meter board). Suddenly I heard a yelp from behind me and I turned around to see Charlie sitting on the bench. He had a deep gash in his knee. He looked a it and screamed so loud that the whole pool could hear it. I called Andrew. When he came in he just sat there. My mother came in. A few minutes later some pool attendants came in. They said it was deep and that he had to go to the hospital. When they asked him what had happened he said that he slammed his knee on one of the stone benches.
They bandaged him and called my father. He came 5 minutes later and brought us to the emergency room where Charlie got 2 stitches. He is not allowed to swim for 3 days.