2009 European cruise

We made it home and it only took us 23 hours from the time we left Athens until we pulled into our drive. It was a great trip but "there's no place like home". We flew from Athens to Madrid, to Miami, to Orlando. Ugh! I won't bore you with the pictures of the laundry stacked to the ceiling but it was worth it. Now, we just need to get all this laundry done, they grass mowed which has been growing for 3 weeks, and plan our next adventure. I'm afraid it won't be quite so extravagant but maybe we can come up with something really great for next year. We'll see.

Hope you enjoyed our travels!

P.S. I can't figure out why the hotels in Europe don't give you wash cloths.

We pulled into Athens around 6am and since this was the end of the line, we weren't in any great rush to get off the ship. We had packed everything up last night and set it out to be taken to the cruise terminal so we would just pick up the luggage there. We had arranged for a driver to pick us up to take us to the hotel because we had read and heard some horror stories about the Greek cab drivers. Worked out great - zipped to the hotel, dropped off the luggage and headed out to explore.

Athens is a wondrous place. Any description or pictures really can't do it justice. You really have to be there to just take it all in, really realize how incredibly old these ruins are. It's amazing that this stuff could be built 4000 years ago and still be around. And the fact that they could be built at all with what tools they would have had. I will just post some pictures so you get the idea. So we did the exploration of Athens. There are just so many of these ruins.

We wanted to do an island hopper on the second day that takes you to three of the greek islands but after checking the schedule and seeing it left at 7am and returned at 7pm, we had to be up at 3am to get ready to leave for the airport, so decided this wasn't the time to do that. Maybe next time. We had to be at the airport at 5am and it was a 45 minute drive, so we had a very early start to come home.
Veiw of Athens from Acropolis

Theater of Dionysus Eleuthereus

Temple of Athena Nike

Sactuary of Pandiom

Parthenon

Head of Triton 150 A.D.

Burial of Girl 1000 B.C.

This is one of the prettiest ports we have pulled into. Usually, the ports have a lot of industrial stuff all around but this was as you would imagine a city on the Mediterranean. Since its habitation dates back originally to 3000 BC, you can imagine the historical artifacts and buildings found here. We had found some information online before leaving on our cruise about a prehistoric temple unearthed in the late 1800’s. It has been preserved and a limited number of people are allowed to tour it daily. We were fortunate enough to get tickets online for the day we would be here so off we went once we had docked. We decided we would try out their city bus system since it goes all over the island and had read it was really the best way to get around. We took the bus from the cruise port into the city center of Valletta where we needed to switch busses to go to Paolo to visit the Hypogeum, the underground temple. Seems easy enough, right? Well, our tour was at a specified time and we had about an hour to find it. The bus station at the city center was a mad house. The busses look very much like old school busses. It was easy enough to figure out which bus to get on but there were no time tables to let you know how often the busses run or how long it would take to get to where we needed to be. Shortly after taking off on the bus, we figured out you pretty much have to know where you are going because there are no signs to let you know when to get off or where to get off. After finding a local on the bus who spoke English, but didn’t know where the place was we were looking for, he found another man who knew where the Temple was, so, the man would tell him when we needed to get off and he would tell us and stop the bus for us to do so. As it turns out, he was sending us to the wrong place, but once we got off the bus, we would ask the shop owners along the street where to go. We made it with time to spare. I was looking for this big open area with ruins all around but it turned out to be something of a storefront with HYPOGEUM across the door. Once inside, we find out this building has been built over the first layer of the temple to help preserve it since it is in the middle of this huge city. The temple was discovered in 1897 when a man, digging a cistern, broke through the ceiling of one of the chambers. It was soon discovered there are actually 3 levels with several chambers built on each level. It is estimated to have been built between 5000 and 6000 years ago using flint and animal horns as tools. That is truly amazing since it is all rock. It is believed to have been used as burial chambers with burial rites being performed in the large center chambers. Standing in these center chambers, you have the feeling of being inside a “regular” temple with the columns and ornate shelving along the walls with the domed ceilings. Some symbols on the walls in the deeper chambers have been preserved.

Following the tour of the hypogeum, we head out in search of a bus stop to take us back to Valletta to catch another bus to the Mdina, “Old Town”. All busses leave/return to Valletta. I think we have this figured out now so without too much trouble, we go back and switch busses to head out in a different direction. The Mdina is perched on a rocky outcrop with spectacular views in the geographical center of the island. It is a truly “walled city”, the entire city being surrounded by a wall. It consists of several squares with narrow, cobblestone streets leading out from the squares. Mdina has been a functioning city for over 3000 years and continues to have residences maintained inside the walls. The Mdina Cathedral is on one of the larger squares and like all the European cathedrals, is lavishly ornate.

We headed back to the ship to find we were just in time to catch some the “stongest man in the world” competition going on down by the Grand Harbour. At this particular time, they were pulling a semi truck across the parking lot. Pretty impressive but doesn’t hold your attention for very long.

Tomorrow – a day at sea which will give us time to pack up and get ready to debark. I can’t believe this is almost over, although, I will admit, I am ready to go home. This has been unbelievable but I miss everyone and it will be interesting to see what has been going on in the world since we really don’t get very much news. We still have Athens to go and are looking forward to that.

Okay, this is Africa and I can tell you, IT ISN’T ANYTHING LIKE BUSH GARDENS! Actually, we did have some camels meet us at the port and that made me feel like I was at Bush Gardens but, it was pretty much downhill from there. I’m glad we stopped here because we got a feeling for their culture and living conditions but I have no desire to ever go back.

We did a ship’s tour because we had heard it was best to stay with a group and not try to go out on your own. Tunis is the capital city and a huge place. It really just stretches as far as the eye can see. We rode the tour bus into the center of Tunis to the souk, or bazaar in Medina which is the “old town”. It is a vast conglomeration of rug weavers, gold merchants, spice shops and souvenir (aka junk) shops which according to the brochures, “captures the essence of the city, right down to its thickly intoxicating air”. Well said, because the whole city is pretty much like that. You must remember that this is a Muslim/Arabic country and if you are there – you definitely don’t forget it. You rarely see women out and about, no women working in any of the shops and the Muslim men really don’t even acknowledge the women unless they are trying to sell you something of course. . I must first describe this souk in more detail in order for you to get the true feel of it. You enter into what appears to be a courtyard with shops all around the perimeter; but, as you leave the courtyard, you travel through a labyrinth of very narrow, enclosed walkways with shops on either side. Not only do you have all the people in there who are “shopping” but you have the merchants standing outside their doorways trying to pull you in. The guide had told us we could go off on our own and shop but we just didn’t feel comfortable doing that. So, we let him lead us through the souk to the rug merchant (must have been his brother-in-law) for our first stop. (At this point, we didn’t dare leave because we couldn’t have found our way out) This was really strange; everyone was led up these winding stairs to the top floor of the rug merchant where we sat on benches around the perimeter of the room (probably about 30 of us). At that point, orders were taken for some kind of African mint tea or Turkish coffee. We reluctantly sampled a taste of each, both being VERY sweet; in fact, the coffee was almost syrupy. Back to the rugs – the rug merchant comes out and tells all about the craftsmanship and materials of the rugs and then he has his underlings to start bringing out the rugs and rolling them out in the middle of the room. They seemed to be having a disagreement on what rugs to bring out when and I thought they were going to have a knock down, drag out fight right there. But, they worked it out, rolled out about 40 rugs and then proceeded to try and drum up some buyers. The cheapest price I heard was $250 and that was for a small bedside rug. Don’t think anyone bought.

After that, our guide led us down through the maze to a souvenir shop where he said we could browse around for about an hour, then he took off. Bob and I were finished browsing in about 2 minutes so we just stood around for the rest of the time. After about 75 minutes, the guide shows up again to the grand applause of everyone because we were more than ready to go. He leads us out to the little square we first came into and handed us over to the gold merchants. (Like you would really buy any “gold” from these people?) Bob and I decided to take our chances and go look for our bus. WHAT AN ORDEAL!

Finally, the guide decided it was time to move on. We headed to Sidi Bou Said which is supposedly the nicer area around Tunis and I guess it is because that is where the king or whatever he is has his palace. We drove by the ruins of Carthage ,which really weren’t that impressive, and headed up to Sidi Bou Said which was touted in the cruise propaganda as an “artist’s village” set high on a cliff overlooking the Gulf of Tunis, with pretty blue and white sugar cubed houses scattered across the hillside. Okay, I’ll grant the houses were like sugar cubes and they were blue and white, and it was on a hill. I missed the artist’s village and the pretty part. I do have to admit it was on a hill and the view from up there was incredible (pics to follow). In fact, you really couldn’t tell how dirty everything was from up there so it was quite nice.

I did forget to mention all the mosques everywhere and we were there on Friday, their holy day. It gave you a very eerie feeling when the chants would begin for all good muslims to head to the mosque for prayer. We drove by one of the largest mosques in Tunis just as they were exiting from their prayers and it was amazing to see all the men (some women) leaving the mosque.

Back on ship, and glad of it. Will definitely put a comment for the cruise line to reconsider this stop. We really haven’t spoken to anyone who truly enjoyed the stop in Tunis. Well, I can say I’ve been there.

Tomorrow – Valletta, Malta

Well, we passed through the Strait of Gibraltar last night around 2:30AM. Thank you Bob for waking me up to see that. Actually, all you could see was the lights on Gibraltar but I was really wanting to see the Rock of Gibraltar; don’t ask me why, I’ve just heard of it. Too bad it wasn’t during the day because the strait is only like 4 miles wide, Spain on one side and Morocco on the other. Anyway, that put us into the Mediterranean Sea. So, we started out in the North Sea, passed through the English Channel into the Atlantic Ocean and now we are in the Mediterranean. One interesting tidbit I learned, there is no real tide fluctuation in the Mediterranean. I didn’t find out why but will look that up when I get home. What a great geography lesson because before, I never would have been able to tell you exactly where these countries were or what these bodies of water were. I figure I just need to do a world tour so I will be better informed on these things!

Malaga is the 5th largest city in Spain with about half a million inhabitants. Being known as Picasso’s birthplace, of course you find a huge Picasso Museum here. Well, compared to a lot of the previous stops, this was a very modern and metropolitan area. Malaga has one of the largest bullrings in Spain but we didn’t get by there, unfortunately. I think the guide said it seats close to 37,000 people.

After doing a panoramic tour of the city, we headed out to Marbella down the coast. Best known for its beach areas and high priced items, we were just there to take it all in. We drove by the palace of the Saudi Arabian prince which was very interesting as it sits atop a hill in Marbella overlooking the Mediterranean and it is designed to look like the White House. (Hmmm, dreams of being President??) We stopped at the port in Marbella, Port Banus, and walked around the marina checking out all the yachts! Oh my gosh – will try to get some pics on here when the internet is faster – this is definitely where the rich and famous come to cruise the Mediterranean. The yacht belonging to the King of Saudi Arabia These yachts are actually like small cruise ships. Now that would be the life! I could definitely live on one of these “boats” but I couldn’t afford the marina fees, much less any of the other expenses. Unbelievable.

Back to ship and setting sail for Africa – that seems kinda weird for some reason. We will have a day at sea tomorrow and arrive in Tunis, Tunisia early on Friday.
More to come.