Lazy Days!

After all the excitement of the weekend, Sunday in St Kitts was a pretty lazy day! We were the only ship in town, and with only 490 onboard, it was pretty quiet. We got off and did a short stroll around the “historic (read - shopping) district” but most shops were closed. One of the store clerks told us they are normally closed on Sunday as it is not normally a “ship day”. Well, judging by what we saw, they might as well have stayed closed because we don’t think they covered their costs!!! The remainder of the day was spent reading/snoozing around the pool, followed by dinner in The Dining Room. As luck would have it, we were once again seated with the mother/daughter we had been seated with on the first night. The daughter is also a travel agent and her Mom travels with her a lot, so the conversation was lively and interesting. As a bonus, the service was MUCH improved from our first two nights’ experience there!


Monday dawned bright and sunny (yet again) in Virgin Gorda, British Virgin Islands, the one place on this cruise we actually booked a shore excursion. The only thing to see on this island is “The Baths”, a volcanic rock formation/beach area about a ten minute ride from the tender pier. Monica was here with Bruce when we last cruised together in 2005 and thought it would be a nice beach opportunity. As you can see from the pictures, it is a very nice area and yes, that IS Larry in the water!!!! After a very lazy afternoon (see a pattern here?) we had dinner in the Italian Restaurant with Rosanna Da Ria, the Future Cruise Consultant onboard. We’re really not sure why we were invited to dine with her, beyond the fact we know her from Crystal, but it was a very pleasant evening of great food and conversation.

Sunset over Tortola - the colours lasted about 20 minutes after the sun went down

Tuesday, horror of horrors (!), dawned cloudy, with a hint of rain in the air! BUT, it was still very warm, so no harm done! We spent the day reading, knitting (Monica) and attending a cooking demo and Larry the Lecturer’s third lecture, Pirates & Buccaneers. Fortunately the skies cleared as the afternoon went on as last night was the “dining highlight” of the cruise, the Poolside BBQ. Silversea does this once every cruise and they truly do it right. They asked everyone to vacate the pool area by 4:00 and then turned the entire pool deck area into an “al fresco” restaurant. As you can see, the variety of food was excellent and it tasted as good as it looks!

Yes, that is a whole suckling pig... and it tasted great!



How's this for a paella pan?



Today is “packing day”, as we leave the ship tomorrow in Ft Lauderdale. The day dawned kind of grey and threatening, but the skies have cleared and as we type this, there is not a cloud in the sky, the wind is calm and the seas are flat. A perfect day! Silversea’s Food and Wine gurus, David Bilsland who is their culinary trainer and Lyn Farmer, a very well-known writer and lecturer on wines, led a cooking challenge where the chefs for the various dining venues on board did an ‘Iron Chef’ style cookoff, complete with surprise ingredients and guests to judge the final products.

 Too bad we’ve been stuck inside packing for part of the day, but it has to be done!

This afternoon marked the last of the guest lectures on board - Larry Klausner did his final talk on writing books or screenplays, and how to get into commercials.  As usual it was very interesting and gave those of us aspiring writers a lot of tips.  After the lecture, Larry, his wife Mary and both of us dropped by The Bar for a drink.  It was fortunate that Monica packed the current version of a project she's been working on because Larry gave it a quick look over and gave her some more tips on what needed to be changed, and how it would be dealt with by producers or directors.  Here's a photo of Larry, Monica and Mary at The Bar:



Tonight we dined in the Asian restaurant, completing our sampling of each and every place to eat onboard. We are staying at Pier 66 in Ft Lauderdale tomorrow and will be meeting Susan for a tour of the boat she is babysitting, followed by dinner. We fly home Friday and after 10 days of sunny and warm, we are NOT looking forward to the cold and snow. But, such is life!

One of the courses in our tasting menu at Seishin

The Dawn of a NEW Era!! (or, Monica Finally Retires!)

Not surprisingly, the Captain was correct and Friday found us anchored off St Bart’s. Since we had been there several times and seen and done all there was to see and do, our day had a rather lazy start. Until we decided to check e-mail………….


On opening Monica’s e-mail, the first thing we found was one from the accountant telling us that Paul and his accountant were disputing some issues. To us, it looked like there “was trouble ahead”. Something we really thought had been put behind us last Friday! While responding to that e-mail, one arrived from the lawyer; “Paul wants to close today. Please call me ASAP!” Okay, so now we are totally confused by these apparently contradictory e-mails, but we had brought a cell phone with us ”just in case”. Problem is that apparently St Bart’s is the only island in the Caribbean with a cell system that is incompatible with most of North America! No signal! Guess we have to go ashore. Unfortunately St Bart’s is a “tender” port (no dock), so “ashore” is a 20 minute boat ride away! After finally getting into town and searching high and low for a phone, we made the call and were advised that all was well and the closing of the deal was set for that afternoon. After a brief stroll around town, we headed back to the ship and spent a rather relaxing afternoon by the pool with our new friends Larry and Mary. All the while wondering what was happening back home!

Our dinner reservation at Stars, the jazz supper club, was at 9:15, so after a very late lunch we headed back to the cabin, opened up e-mail and found “Promark - Closed” in the subject line of the e-mail from our lawyer. We think the huge sighs of relief actually generated a wind warning in the harbour at St Bart’s!!!!!!!!! Needless to say, the celebration of Monica’s birthday started right there and then!!!!!!!!

We returned to our cabin after dinner to find Evelyn, our Butler, had decorated it with balloons, a birthday cake and cards from herself and the Captain wishing Monica a Happy Birthday. Seems like everyone wanted to start the celebration early!

Saturday morning in St John’s, Antigua. HAPPY BIRTHDAY MONICA!!!!!!!!!

Monica’s day started with a bang! (No, not that! Get your minds out of the gutter!) When we first met Hyperion Knight (at dinner on Monday) and he found out Monica played, he offered to give her a private lesson. When we bumped into him at dinner Friday evening he reminded her of his promise, so Monica’s birthday started with a private lesson from an international concert pianist! On a baby grand piano, no less! How does one top that?? One doesn’t, so the rest of the day was spent lazing about the ship and spending two hours in the whirlpool chatting with Larry the Lecturer and solving all the problems of the cruise industry in particular (he used to be a Cruise Director) and the world in general.

Monica’s birthday dinner was in the French restaurant, where they serve a different themed “Table D’Hotel” meal every evening, that is, a complete six-course meal, from appetizers to dessert, with no ordering required. Monica decided to pass on the six matching wines!!!! The tables were situated fairly close together and we were beside an older couple from the Ft Lauderdale area. You can’t help but chat in that situation and it came out that the husband was a real “(well-done) meat and potatoes” man who was not a fan of anything exotic. The theme for dinner was “The Best of Burgundy” and included veal tartar, which is minced raw veal, escargot in mushroom caps and VERY rare filet. The conversation went something like this:

(The veal)

What is this?
It’s veal.
But what is it?
Just eat it dear.
Why was it served cold?
It was raw, dear.
(Silence)

(The escargot)

What is this?
It’s mushrooms.
Yes, but what’s in the mushrooms?
Butter. Just eat it dear.
What did I just eat?
Snails, dear.
(Silence)

(With the VERY RARE beef)

What is this, ham????????


Actually he was pretty good-natured about it all and we had a very pleasant evening. By the way, he DID eat everything on each of his various plates, including dessert.  Here's what that looked like:

We finished dinner just in time to get to the theatre for Hyperion’s second and last show, which was great - and even better since Monica could see how he incorporates the tips he gave her in his playing. We ended up with two of his CDs, both autographed.

All in all, a pleasant day made better by the Birthday e-mails from home - even the ones that included the pictures of the snow in Burlington and descriptions of the weather up north. Huntsville even made ‘The Canadian’, the shipboard news sheet, talking about the amount of snow and the dangerous driving conditions. Amazing how much warmer the weather felt knowing it was cold and windy back home!!!

The Freedom 51 Tour!

Although this cruise was booked long ago, with the Promark deal (finally) getting done last Friday, what better way to describe the first cruise of Monica’s “retirement”!


Things did not get off to a flying start for us. Air Canada couldn’t find our reservation in their system!!!! After a couple of phone calls and a bit of computer black magic, we did finally get checked in and at 10:05 we were comfortably seated on the plane. Which is when the problems started! Flight time was 10:35 and at 11:00, as we were still sitting at the gate, the pilot finally told us we were waiting for the last wheelchairs to be loaded. This actually wasn’t much of a surprise, as we were the youngest people on the plane. By at least two or three decades!!!!! Finally we pushed back. And waited. And waited. And waited some more. After almost 20 minutes, the pilot announced we had “computer problems” and would have to return to the gate. The problem was fixed fairly quickly, but by then the pilot was out of flying hours for the day and had to be replaced. So we waited. And waited. And waited some more! Our 10:35 flight finally left the ground at 12:45! Fortunately the ship’s sailing was also delayed (see a pattern here?) by the various inspections a ship has to go through on its first US port stop, so no harm done in the end.

This is our first sailing with Silversea and it is different. First off, the ship, at 36,000GRT, is smaller that anything we have sailed on since our third cruise on RCI 15 years ago. It is also laid out in a rather unusual way, with all of the cabins in the front half of the ship and all of the facilities (Dining Room, bars, show lounge) in the back half of the ship. We have gotten “lost” a couple of times, but we are learning. Our cabin is bigger than we are used to on Crystal, but it is long and narrow, meaning we occasionally get in each other’s way. Again, we are learning.



Silver Spirit at Grand Turk

 One thing that is definitely different is the “make up” of the passengers. The luxury lines, almost by definition, attract an older crowd and we are used to being among the “younger set”, but this one is a little more extreme. It used to be said of Holland America that their passengers were ‘the newly wed and nearly dead”, well this may not be Holland, but we certainly have a very large contingent of the “nearly dead”!!! The ship carries 540 guest and we are close to, if not, full. Of those, we would guess about 400 would be in the 75+ range, with the rest spread out across the spectrum all the way down to the ONE child we have seen at the pool. We’re inclined think Silversea should rename this ship “God’s Waiting Room”!!!


The biggest difference so far has been the food and the service in the main dining room. First, it is open seating, meaning no set time, table or dining companions. The portions are on the “trendy small size”, meaning you almost have to order two of everything, and the selection is much more limited than we are used to, which strikes us as unusual for a luxury line. What has really struck us, though, is the really, really poor service! We had a three and a half hour meal on Monday, and it wasn’t by choice! Fortunately we had a great table, with one of the lecturers and his wife and the concert pianist, Hyperion Knight. Conversation was lively and a lot of fun. Good thing, given how long we were there. We would like to report things were better the second night, but our Moms taught us to never tell a lie! Larry had an opportunity this morning to talk to the Hotel Manager (who’s door is always open) about our impressions. He was very thankful for the feedback, so we shall see what happens.

The first formal night - and Larry's chocolate dessert, complete with Chocolate 'Mouse'!

The cruise itself has been pleasant so far. The weather has been a mix of sun, clouds and showers with enough sun that we are both just a bit sunburned. Yesterday was our first port stop, in Grand Turk. Cunard’s Queen Mary 2 and her 3000 guests were also there, making it a very busy day! As we had been there before, and there isn’t a lot there, we spent most of the day at the pool on the ship. (Hence the sunburn!).

On the Panorama Lounge deck - lots of space and some really big lounges!

One of the things we like to do onboard is “people watch” and the age demographic has made for some interesting observations. For instance, the main bar, which is called, oddly enough, “The Bar”, is closest to the main Dining Room and as a result is packed with “seniors” every night until the Dining Room opens at 7:00 at which point it quite literally empties. At one of the lectures on Tuesday an older gentleman “whispered” to his wife “my new hearing aids work really well”. We know this because he “whispered” it loud enough, twice, for everyone in the theatre to hear it! Which brings us to yesterday on the dock at Grand Turk. Every ship has a “bull nose”, the rounded snout at the front which is there to lessen water resistance and smooth out the ride. As we were walking back to the ship a gentleman going the other way, in answer to his wife’s question we assume, announced in a loud, very authoritative voice, “That’s the ice breaker!”.

The 'ice breaker' with the Queen Mary 2 in the background

Last night we had a very nice dinner at Hot Rocks, one of five reservations-required restaurants onboard. This is something new on a ship (although we have experienced it in the Stone Grill Restaurant in Toronto) in that it is located outside, on the Sun Deck above the pool, and you “cook your own entrée”. You order from a selection of meat and fish and it is brought to you raw, on a slab of lava rock heated to 1800F that you cook it on!!! It’s actually a lot of fun and as you can see from the pictures, you don’t go hungry! This is one of the most popular restaurants on the ship and we may try it again if we can get a reservation.

Dinner at 'Hot Rocks'

Today we are at sea on our way to we know not where. The itinerary says Antigua, one of the lecturers said Antigua, but at his Noon update, the Captain said St Barts. Since he is “driving the bus” as it were, we have to assume the Captain is right. Guess we’ll find out when we get there in the morning!

Sea Time and Messina

After the rush of the previous seven days, it was nice to see two and a half days of down time, broken only by the 2:00PM arrival in Messina, Sicily leaving at 8:00PM.


Sunday’s day at sea was truly a do-nothing day. Larry had the beginning of a cold working on him and the pool deck wasn’t particularly comfortable as we were motoring at full out 20 knots into a 25 knot wind. As mentioned in the last post, if you didn’t grab a seat around the Solarium pool VERY early in the morning, you weren’t getting one!

It did get a little brighter in the afternoon, just in time for the Belly-Flop Contest. No, we didn’t go - been there, seen enough of them. Sometimes we wonder if people eat as much as they do just so they can gain enough weight to make the biggest splash in the contest. We, on the other hand, had lunch at Johnny Rockets, a “burger bar” set up like a 50’s-era diner (yes, it is part of the Johnny Rockets restaurant chain from the US). The burgers were good, as were the fries, onion rings and the vanilla shakes. This was followed by Norm’s B-Day cake, which we finally got around to having, on the Ortofsky’s terrace. The rest of the day was filled with “high intensity loafing about”!

That evening we finally got to the Ice Show. Considering the size of the rink (about one-third of a standard hockey rink), with 10 skaters on the ice, they put on a really good performance. And since we were seated in the priority area (courtesy of Norm and Barb’s Suite Gold Cards) we had a nice close-up view.

Yesterday morning dawned cloudy and a bit cool. At least by the standards of previous days. We were scheduled to arrive in Messina at 2:00PM, meaning more high intensity loafing about. The most strenuous thing we did all morning was have breakfast! As we are ‘Diamond Crown and Anchor Society Members’, we had been invited to a ‘cocktail party’ with the captain on the Peek-a-Boo Bridge prior to arrival. By the time we got there, almost all of the other Diamond members on board were already ahead of us and filling the walkway up to the bridge (did somebody say “complimentary cocktails”?). We didn’t really think it was worth it for a very brief ‘meet and greet’ with Captain Erick, so we spent the time lounging on our verandah - again.

High intensity loafing on the terrace, with Italy in the background

We arrived in Messina to a brighter afternoon and went all the way forward (yes, on this ship you can go all the way to the point of the bow) to watch the arrival. The captain actually turned the ship around 180 degrees in the harbour before taking us in to the pier.

Doing the 180 in the harbour in Messina - statue of Mary welcomes sailors

Of course, there was a delay in clearing the ship (we are back in Italy, you know) so we were close to a half-hour late getting off on our tour to Taormina. Just as we were heading out to the buses, it was announced that our departure was being put off for an extra half hour to compensate for the delay. Not that it would be any huge issue as the trip to Civitavecchia isn’t really all that far and we wouldn’t have to rush to get there.

So, off to Taormina we went - all 17 busloads of us. The weather clouded over again just as we arrived and started our brief tour of the town. As we had been there before, we didn’t really need the tour, but the information on the churches and the Greco-Roman Theatre would be useful for Norm, Barb and Mitch. Of course, part way through the tour it started to drizzle. It never turned into a heavy rain, but it was enough to put a real damper (!) on the day. Rather than strolling through the town, we stopped at a restaurant and had coffee, Sicilian pizza and cannoli, which one of our previous tour guides had suggested we shouldn’t miss while in Sicily. Here are a few photos - if you scroll back down through the blog archive you might find the entries and photos from our previous visit…

Taorrmina up high and its seaside from the autostrada

The theatre in the rain

The view toward Mt. Etna, lost in the clouds and rain

The rain didn’t help Larry’s cold any (and a hot toddy was obviously out of the question!) so after a short stop at the Windjammer Café for dinner, we headed back to our stateroom and watched the coastlines of Sicily and the Italian mainland as we motored our way north through the Strait of Messina heading for Rome.

Today is our last sea day and our last day on the ship. We found out from Guest Relations last night that we will be one of eight ships in Civitavecchia tomorrow morning, meaning the port, and more importantly, the airport, will be an unmitigated zoo! We also found out we are scheduled to disembark from the ship at 7:00AM, so Larry is trying to contact our shore operator to get our pick up moved up to 7:30 instead of the 8:00 already scheduled. This means getting up and out before the sun rises, which will be incredibly hard for Mitchell, but such is life!

This is our last post on this edition of Travels with Larry and Monica. We hope you have enjoyed the ride-along.

Alexandria

We left Alexandria last evening and are now on our way to Messina, Sicily, our last port stop. It is a distance of just under 1000 miles so we will be at sea until about 2:00PM Monday afternoon.

Before we start on yesterday, a few thoughts about the ship. At 138,000 GRT, Navigator is almost twice the size of both the Crystal ships and at about 3500 passengers, it carries 3.5 times as many people! Needless to say, there are some differences, both positive and negative. On the plus side, our Junior Suite cabin, at just over 350 SF is bigger than the Penthouse cabins on Crystal, and because we are facing aft, we have an enormous balcony. The room and balcony pale by comparison to Norm and Barb’s suite directly below us, but is more than sufficient for our needs. It also comes with both a kettle and coffee maker, which we have used regularly for “afternoon tea”. Actually, as I type this the coffeemaker has just finished my morning cup and Monica is enjoying her tea “on the terrace” as the sun rises! The food has been uniformly good and the service, while spotty at times, has been good, with gusts up to excellent. On the down side, cruising with 3500 of “your closest friends” (excluding the Ortofskys of course) is wearing, as there is almost nowhere you can escape the crowds and it seems it is always noisy. The design of the main public areas, like the Royal Promenade which runs down the center of the ship, seems to funnel people toward “choke points” at both ends, so it seems like you are always having to “elbow your way through crowds” to get any place! We also miss the sea day lectures/presentations that Crystal does and if you have not staked out your spot at the pool by 8:00AM, forget it. For all that, as long as we don’t make comparisons (which are really unfair), this cruise is quite pleasant and the five of us have been having a great time.

On to Alexandria. While this is our third time here, we have actually seen very little of the city itself, with Cairo and the Pyramids being the “main attraction”. Fortunately our guide, Islam, lives in Alexandria and was eager to show us what his city has to offer. As we didn’t need the entire day, we met Islam and our driver at a rather civilized 10:15 for our tour.

Until about 500 AD Alexandria was the capital city of Egypt and while many of its ancient sites have been destroyed by catastrophes, man-made and natural, the Antiquities Authority has located and preserved the major ruins. Our first stop was at the principal attraction, Pompey’s Pillar. This is located atop the ruins of a temple complex built for Cleopatra in the first century AD. The pillar itself was the highest point in Alexandria and is, in fact, the official symbol of the city. It gets its name from a legend that claimed the ashes of the Roman General Pompey were placed atop the pillar to protect them from his enemy, Julius Ceasar. Islam told us that its actual name, used by the locals, is Amud El-Sawari, which loosely translates as “the flag pole” and that was, in fact, its purpose in ancient Alexandria. The temple complex has been mostly excavated and contains a series of underground vaults, about 30 metres deep, two of which we were able to explore. The first, The Sanctuary, contains a replica of the god Osiris, to whom the temple was dedicated. Unfortunately the lights were out so we couldn’t get a picture, and the statue looked rather spooky as you could only sense its outlines in the dark! The second, larger chamber, is lined with niches of similar size and shape all along its length. Archeologists think it may have been used by Cleopatra to store and protect scrolls and manuscripts from the great Alexandria Library, which had been damaged by a first fire (as opposed to the one years that was deliberately set to destroy it) at about that time.

The next stop on our tour, after a rather hair-raising drive through downtown, was the Roman Theatre. A word about traffic. Lines on the road are merely suggestion. At one point in our travels a section of road with four clearly marked lanes contained EIGHT lanes of traffic!!! The Roman Theatre is located in almost the exact center of the city. The site had once been a French and then British colonial fort dating to the mid-1800’s. In the early 60’s the local government cleared the site in preparation for building public housing. The Antiquities Authority, which is a very powerful government body, decided they had best “survey” the site first and, needless to say, the housing was never built! As you can see from the pictures, the site is a good 30 feet below ground level, and unlike some ruins that have been excavated and then rebuilt from the pieces discovered, Islam told us this site was unearthed intact as we see it today and is still a “working” dig. They believe that if they were to knock down all of the surrounding buildings and tear up the roads (which obviously won’t happen) that they would find most of “downtown” ancient Alexandria! As it is, the plan is to excavate the sloped sides all around the site in the next few years.

While the entire site is not open to the public, the highlight is the amphitheatre in the foreground of the picture. All of the seats are numbered with Greek characters and it is believed it was used primarily for political debates. The fascinating feature of the acoustics is what Islam called the “echo spot”, a stone set in the center of the floor. If you stand on the spot and speak while facing the center of the seating area your voice echoes back at you as if broadcast from a bank of speakers. What is interesting is that someone standing beside you, as Larry was as we each tried it, does not get the effect at all.


Barb standing on the 'echo spot' in the theatre



Our next stop was lunch at an Egyptian-Italian restaurant called Portofino on the Corniche (the main roadway along the bay) across from the water. The irony here is that we had wanted to get a reservation at the Portofino Restaurant on the ship for that evening, but there weren’t any available at the times we wanted. So, we still managed to eat at a Portofino - it just wasn’t the one we had expected. The food was excellent (take a look at Barb’s plate) and the meal allowed us to talk more to Islam. It turns out that he has some cousins who live in Edmonton of all places. Talk about a climate shock!

After lunch, we continued along to the Gardens in what had been the Palace of King Faroukh until he was forced by the army to abdicate in the 1950s. The original palace is under the control of the military and is no longer open, but a smaller ‘guest’ palace is now a five-star hotel. The whole area is very beautiful and open to anyone to visit for a very small fee.

Our last stops were the Alexandria Library and Fort Qait Bey. The library was built in the 1990s on the site of the original library and is one of the largest in the world in terms of usable floor space. One of the remarkable things about the library is that the lighting is all natural indirect. The design of the sloping roof allows the direct light to reflect into the windows from the side. In this way, none of the artifacts or books are damaged by harsh light. Fort Qait Bey is the site of the original Alexandria Lighthouse which was destroyed by an earthquake. It was considered one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World because of its sheer size (as tall as the Great Pyramid) and its varied architecture. The light itself was a fire that could, it is said, guide ships into Alexandria from as far as 150 miles out at sea. Islam told us that most of the ruins of the lighthouse rest on the seabed around the fort and the Antiquities Authority is investigating the idea of an “underwater museum” to display them.

Once we got back to the ship, it was relax time and dinner in the Dining Room for the first time since Wednesday. Our tablemates were happy to see us return. Last night we regained the hour we lost after Naples letting us catch up on our sleep at least a little bit. The weather forecast for today isn’t too great, so we imagine that the choice spots at the pools will go quickly. Good thing we’ve got our lounge chairs and a nice spot out of the wind on our own verandah.

Barb and Mitchell and the 'Triple Threat Chocolate' dessert

Cairo

While all of this trip has been a “highlight” for Norm, Barb (especially Barb!) and Mitchell, today was THE highlight, Cairo and the Pyramids! It was also our second “private tour” experience, this one booked through a company named, appropriately enough, Ramses Tours. After the usual post-breakfast bathroom delays, we rolled out at 8:00AM to find our guide waiting for us and off we went. Our guide this morning (and for tomorrow in Alexandria as well, was a personable young man named Islam (as in the religion) and while we didn’t actually learn too much about his background, he certainly knew his Ancient Egyptian history!


The downside to touring Cairo from Alexandria is the three hour drive each way. But, while the tour buses must travel in convoy with a police escort, individual tour vans like the one we were in are free to come and go as they wish. The result is our drive to Cairo was about two and half hours (with a “pee break”) vs the three plus in the convoys.

The biggest advantage to a private tour is flexibility. There were in excess of 60 buses lined up outside the ship for the tours this morning and almost all of them were headed to Cairo in general and the Pyramids in particular. Knowing this from our trip two years ago, Larry suggested to Islam that we do the tour in reverse order, the Egyptian Museum first, then lunch and the Pyramids. While both sites were still crowded, the size of the crowds at each was significantly less than the last time we were here. As an aside, the other advantage is that when Islam asked, after leaving the Pyramids, if we wanted to go to a bazaar to shop, we told him to head for the ship. Try doing that on a bus full of tourists!

Mitchell in particular can now say that he’s been somewhere that NONE of us (including Larry and Monica) has ever been before - he’s been inside a real pyramid! There were optional ‘tours’ to go inside either the Great Pyramid or Khafre’s Pyramid. Since we didn’t have the time to wait for Mitch to make the apparently quite lengthy and strenuous trip into the Great Pyramid, he did the 15 minute tour of Khafre’s Pyramid. He said there wasn’t really much to see, but it was worth it for the experience.

This is a trip that is better seen than read about, so we will let the pictures do the talking from here……….

The Hard Rock Cafe (our guide Islam on the right and his 'trainee')

Oh, and did we mention the camel ride included with our tour?????

 
 

 
And after all that....we got back to the ship at about 7:45 and managed to get dinner in the Windjammer Cafe just before all those other buses returned.
 

Kusadasi - Introduction to Turkey

Sunrise over Kusadasi on Wednesday morning

Today was a day of firsts: our first visit to Turkey and our first experience with a privately booked excursion. As you can see from the picture, the first part started out well.

The attraction of Kusadasi is its proximity to the ruins at Ephesus, where history says Mary and several of the Apostles fled after the events of Easter to escape persecution. Many people have suggested to us in the past that private excursions are better than ship-sponsored excursions - just you, a guide, a driver and your own vehicle - so Larry had booked us one through a company recommended by friends from Crystal. Promptly at 8:30 we walked out of the terminal to find our guide waiting to take us to our bus. This is definitely the way to take a tour! A ten passenger Mercedes mini-bus for the five of us, with lots of room for Mitch to sleep on the way to the ruins! Too bad it was only a 15 minute drive!

Our guide, Mehmet, was a historian by training and a real pro as a guide. The advantage of a private tour is flexibility, as we soon found out. On the drive over Mehmet told us we were one of five ships “in town” (with about 10,000 passengers between them) that day and he would adjust the route “on the fly” depending on crowds. A ship’s tour has to follow the route. Period. One of our planned visits was the Virgin Mary House and a call by Mehmet confirmed most of the buses had not yet arrived, so that became our first stop.

According to the New Testament, the Apostle John brought Mary to Ephesus after Christ’s ascension. The story goes that years ago a German nun had some ‘visionary dreams’ where she saw the location of the house Mary came to live in. An archaeological examination found evidence that there was a house there, and what now stands is a reconstruction of the building, which has become a shrine for pilgrims.

Common legend has it that if you take seven sips from one of the springs outside, that your sins for the last seven years will be forgiven. This only works for seven years, though - Mehmet pointed out that extra sips will NOT get you retroactive forgiveness beyond seven years. You can also leave wishes written on small pieces of paper tied to a wall near the house - sort of the Christian equivalent to the Western Wall in Jerusalem.

Our next stop was to be Ephesus itself, but on the way out, the wisdom of a private tour was confirmed. Over 50 full-sized tour buses packed every inch of the four parking lots and were lined up past the entrance to get in!

Ephesus was a trading city along the Silk Road and existed from 1400BC to 700AD, reaching its peak in about 200AD. Mehmet explained that the ruins were first discovered, quite by accident, in the 1930’s by a British company building a railroad. He told us that “discovered” really wasn’t the best way to describe it as the location was well-known, just no one had ever excavated it. Unlike Pompeii or other ancient cities, Ephesus was not “destroyed”. Rather, it was abandoned when the bay it was located on became completely silted in. While it had originally been a “harbour town” it is now some 15 miles inland from the Med. Over time Mother Nature had reclaimed the site, sort of like what would happen “if you didn’t dust your TV for 1300 years” was the way he put it.

By the time we arrived the buses that had not gone to the Mary House had arrived at Ephesus, so the crowds were just a little bit crazy. Which is a bit like saying The Great Flood was a scattered shower! The city was built into a hill and the picture below was taken from about a third of the way down. It shows the Celsus Library, the principal ruin, and a small portion of the “The Flood” of tourists!

While many of the best pieces were plundered (mostly by the Brits during their excavations) there are still numerous of them - temple friezes and columns, particularly - that have been dedicated to many of the Greek and Roman gods, such as Hercules and Nike (goddess of victory - so now you know where the brand name comes from!!). Oddly enough, her statue had no ‘swoosh’ symbol, nor did we see ‘Just Do It’ carved anywhere on the stone.

The best preserved part of the site is the ‘terrace houses’ which were first excavated in the late 1960s. These were the homes of wealthy (the Forest Hill of Ephesus) as evidenced by their immense size and the many ornate frescoes and mosaic floors they contained. After the site was first excavated, it was quickly decided that the site had to be protected from “the elements” or the artwork would be lost. As a result an enormous steel-framed canopy covers the entire area and a series of stairs and catwalks give you a great vantage point for taking pictures.

After exiting the terrace house our last stop was the Great Theatre. In its time in could hold as many as 50,000 people and it is said that St Paul and other of the Apostles preached there. It is still used today for concerts with the likes of Yanni, Elton John and Zamfir performing. The “lower bowl” can easily accommodate 20,000 people according to Mehmet, who has attended concerts there, and the acoustics are such that microphones are not required.

We now pause for lunch in a small town at 1500 feet elevation. This town, Srenice, actually dates back to 700AD, and many of the houses now standing are around 150 years old. Lunch was in a restaurant that had been a school house, and included salad, plates of ‘mezzes’ or small appetizers, and a mixed grill of chicken and lamb skewers and a Turkish specialty pumpkin dessert.

Norm and Mehmet at lunch.  Looks appetizing, doesn't it?

After lunch, and a brief stop at the Ephesus Museum, Mehmet told us our last stop would be a “Turkish carpet demonstration”. Now this was not on our tour agenda and caused Larry some amusement as he had been told to expect this as these so called “spontaneous” suggestions from guides happen on EVERY tour in Kusadasi. Ours was visit to Topkapi, the best Turkish Carpet House in town and, to be fair, it was an interesting stop. We were given a demonstration of the silk production process, from cocoon to thread to rug, as the pictures show.

The age old silk-spinning process, now becoming a dying art.

This was followed by “the flying carpet” demonstration, otherwise known as “the hard sell”!! First they get you comfortable, get you a nice drink or cup of apple tea, and then proceed to roll out rug after rug for your inspection. There had to be at least 30 rugs rolled out and even our “host” had to duck under the low ceiling beams by the time it was done as he was standing on at least eight inches of carpets! While they tried very hard to sell Norm and Barb floor rugs, in the end Monica bought a small 100% silk piece to use as a wall hanging. After thanking Mehmet for a great day we returned to the ship.

We didn't really know what to expect of Turkey, perhaps something a bit more like Saudi Arabia? What we got was a very European country that is incredibly clean and very orderly. What we especially like are their tourist "truth in advertising" laws.........

Tomorrow is our second sea day (and a chance to finally catch up on our sleep) and is also Norm’s 55th birthday. He now qualifies for Senior’s Rates on most cruiselines!!!!!