Find your passport and pack your bags - we're heading on a four-night writing cruise to the Bahamas!

Our ship, "The Sensation," embarks from Port Canaveral at 4:00 p.m. on Sunday, February 10, 2008. Boarding starts at approximately 1:00 p.m. Forget 'grabbing a bite to eat' beforehand - the buffet awaiting you is a banquet! We will meet together that evening to review our writing itinerary, but it will not interfere with our 6:00 p.m. dinner where we will have reserved tables. And it will not interfere with the late night show.

Monday morning we dock in Freeport and don't have to be back to the ship until mid-afternoon. I already have a writing prompt ready for that day - and it has nothing to do with staying on the ship or staying together as a group. You will be free to - and encouraged to - explore the unique shops and beaches and restaurants ashore. We will meet together that evening.

Tuesday we dock in Nassau where you will have the opportunity to purchase side-trips, such as to the island where Gilligan's Island, Flipper, and Blue Lagoon were filmed. (All Gilligan really had to do was tell Flipper his plight and all would have been solved). Again, I will leave you with an onshore writing prompt; however, since the ship does not leave port until the next morning, we will not meet together that evening so that you are free to stay out late if you wish.

Wednesday is a day at sea. We will meet for a couple of hours of writing and then don our bathing suits and head to the pool, the spa, the buffet, or a quiet place on the ship to write.

Thursday at 7:00 a.m. we arrive back at Port Canaveral.

I expect to have a mix of writers - those who want to write together from prompts and those who are working on longer projects and need time to write. I will meet with both groups.

And I expect to have writers who want their non-writer friends or partners to accompany them. See the enrollment form for the discounted price for non-writers.

Picture yourself relaxing in a hammock on Blue Lagoon Island, snorkeling amidst exotic fish, releasing your tension under the trained hands of a masseuse in the spa, eating a bit too much at the gourmet meals, returning to your cabin in the evening to find your covers turned down and a chocolate candy awaiting, and writing with others who share your passion for the craft.

Six miles off the coast of New Hampshire on a small island in the Isles of Shoals, you will forget your daily life and concentrate on drinking in the beauty around you. You will sit in a wicker rocker on a verandah that surrounds the 1920's hotel, rock in a wicker rocker while sipping on a lime rickey, stare at panoramic views of the ocean and allow your creativity to rise to the surface.

For the third consecutive year, our September retreat will be held on Star Island, a thirty minute ferry ride from a small boatyard in Rye, New Hampshire. The workshop leader will provide prompts that will open your mind to all sorts of possibilities. During the last two retreats, WriteLines writers have produced poems for publication, written numerous stories with the sea as a backdrop, started novels, and written stories long-forgotten about combat in World War II. As with all of our retreats, this is suitable for beginning, progressing, and professional writers.

Three buffet-style meals are served every day. The beds and rooms are spartan, yet comfortable. Showers depend upon the water supply. The terrain is rocky and uneven. It is an adventure you will talk about all year - until you attend next year and return home with new stories to tell.

Click on the enrollment form for cost and additional information.

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