Posted by admin0 on October 31st, 2006
We are once again at sea all day on our way from Barcelona to Cadiz, Spain. Unfortunately we will pass Gibraltar in the dark in the wee hours, they say we won’t be able to see it.
We had a great day in Barcelona. Took a tour in the morning which was a good thing, saw a lot of the city, great viewpoints, saw the Gaudi church, then went down into the old part of town, the gothic quarter, really cool, narrow winding streets, and the cathedral. Went to the Picasso museum, which is essentially a timeline from his school days until his death. Most of his better works are elsewhere and everywhere of course. It was good. Wanted to get to the Miro museum, but the line was horrendous.
Had a bit of lunch in the gothic quarter. We managed to avoid the pickpockets, apparently Barcelona is the pickpocketing capital of Europe according to Rick Steves, the Lonely Planet, and our on board Port Lecturer.
I am actually enjoying the time at sea. It is very relaxed. The cruise experience is not what we usually do, go someplace and kind of get immersed in it, but it is not bad to be pampered a bit, and the crew here really does that. The crew, except the managers and officers are almost all Indonesian, and great folks. Of course I don’t know what they really think of us.
Looking forward to Cadiz and Lisbon, and especially to home on Friday. Hope all goes well with everyone.
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Posted by admin0 on October 31st, 2006
We took a brief bus tour of Cadiz today. Neat little town, the old part is quite small with narrow streets, nice cathedral. Then the tour included a trip to the sherry making country about 40 km away, in Jerez (think “sherry”) de la Frontera. We saw how they make sherry and tasted about 4 different varieties. Some of the folks on the bus were quite happy.
Then we came back to the ship and tried to go to the local art museum, it was a very nice short walk from the ship, but unfortunately opened half an hour too late for us to get in and make it back to the ship for the 3:30 departure.
Looking forward to Lisbon, then home on Friday.
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Posted by admin0 on October 28th, 2006
Yesterday we visited Valletta, the capital city of the island state of Malta. It is beautiful and very interesting. It was the home of the Maltese Knights of St. John for hundreds of years. St. Paul shipwrecked there (and multiple other places) and decided he might as well give ‘em the message as long as he was there. Also home of the Maltese Cross, of course, and for Bogart fans, the Maltese Falcon.
Today we are at sea on the way to Civitavecchia, the port for Rome. We sailed through the straits of Messina between Sicily and Italian mainland, and then around Stromboli, a volcano which rises right out of the Tyrranean Sea. It is active and steaming, but there is a town there and many summer homes.
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Posted by admin0 on October 28th, 2006
We left Athens in the near-dark and woke up in Kusadasi, Turkey. Today we toured the ruins of ancient Ephesus, and saw the cathedral supposedly over the site of St. John’s burial, then visited the Virgin Mary’s supposed house.
Ephesus is very interesting and well worth the trip, it is a huge area they will be excavating for years. Saw the amphitheater where St. Paul tried to lecture to the Ephesians, but was arrested for his own good and sent out of town. He later addressed them in a letter.
In Kusadasi there are only cruise ships and merchants hawking everything. We went to a cruise line sponsored Turkish carpet demo, then they tried to sell us, of course. The carpets are beautiful and great quality, but we figured it would be useless to have a fine Turkish carpet with four dogs, especially with Echo.
Tomorrow is at sea, then Malta.
The ship is great, not too big, the food is great (too great). Docked next to us is a Princess line ship about twice the size of the Rotterdam, too big, I think. On the other side is a Windstar Cruises ship, very small, but large enough for comfort. I was jealous of them eating out on the deck. I think they are very expensive, but looks like a great way to travel.
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