European Vacation - Malta (Days 12-15)

Here it is - the last installment of our Mediterranean cruise. Just in time for us to go on our next vacation! We are planning a two week trip to Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium and France. If you’ve been to any of these places and have suggestions, send them our way.

Malta – and lots of time on the boat (Days 12-15)

 The two days at sea following our stop in Istanbul were boring, at best. Our cruise was designed for old people and partiers. We are neither. All the fun stuff we wanted to do started after 11 pm – right when we were ready to call it a night. Oh well, I read a lot and Chris kept himself busy with ping-pong tournaments and art auctions.

Needless to say, we were happy when we finally arrived in Malta! We decided to walk around Valletta, see the one big highlight, St. John’s Co-Cathedral, and then go from there. The city of Valletta, and much of the rest of Malta, is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Settlement of the island has been traced back as far as 5000 BC. The island has been ruled by everyone from the Phoenicians and Greeks in ancient times to the British as late as the 1960’s. During the time of the Crusades, the island was ruled by the Knights of Malta. It was during this time that many of the island’s historical sites were constructed. Another random historical fact – Malta was one of the most heavily bombed locations all of Europe during World War II. You would never be able to tell by looking at the cities today.

We were finally graced with nice weather, so we were eager to get out and soak up the sun while we could. Our tour of medieval Valletta started with a walk, up and out of the beautiful harbor (the most scenic of all our dock locations – Istanbul was a close second). We wandered through the World War II memorial gardens located at the top of the old city walls, and then worked our way toward the center or town, passing through picturesque shopping streets. We ended our walk at St. John’s Co-Cathedral. The Cathedral is the “main event” in the city of Valletta. The Cathedral was constructed by the Order of the Knights of St. John (the Knights of Malta) and completed in 1577. The exterior of the church is simple and unassuming, blending nicely into the adjacent buildings. The interior of the building is another story all together! The interior of the Cathedral was decorated over many years and is a wonderful example of the style of the High Baroque era (translation: fancy decorations on every available surface, and the more gold the better). The main sanctuary of the church features an arched ceiling covered in murals depicting the life of St. John. Along the side of the sanctuary are a series of 8 chapels dedicated to the home countries of the various knights in the Order. The chapels are home to elaborate altars, more paintings, and huge monuments to the Grand Masters of the Order. There is some sort of carving, decoration, or painting on every surface. Even the floor is covered in tombstones (no dead people under them though – thank goodness). The tombstones are all marble inlays and depict notable events from a knight’s life. It’s hard to comprehend the level of skill required to make something as detailed as these tombstones. Every flower petal and knife blade was cut from a separate piece of marble and pieced together to form the tombstone.

The Cathedral is also home to the artist Caravaggio’s most well known painting – Beheading of St. John the Baptist, a collection of Flemish tapestries (each 20’x20’ at a minimum), and a collection of illuminated choral books (these are large song books with fancy painted letters at the beginning of each song). The choral books were my favorite. The decorations on each page were beautifully painted in bright colors and accented with real gold. It was amazing to see paper that had lasted and really not faded at all for 500 years. Unfortunately for all of you, none of the areas outside the main sanctuary allowed photographs.

After we left the Cathedral, we made a loop around the city along the huge fortress walls. We noticed that the architecture was very similar to the cities on our island, with one exception. All the buildings in Valetta were the color of the stone from which they were built, while the buildings on our island are painted a variety of bright colors. We learned later that the buildings were left their original stone color because it made it harder to tell where the walls ended and city started, so the city looked more fortified from out at sea. Clever!

We finished our walk around Valletta right at lunch time, so we grabbed a sandwich and headed for the sightseeing bus stop. The island has two bus services that run routes around the island and narrate the history of the various sites as you pass. We opted for a bus that took us around most of the northern half of the island. We didn’t have time to get off the bus at any of the stops, but we enjoyed getting out of the cities and into the countryside. The only challenge was picture taking. We took lots of pictures of trees and poles that jumped into our frame at the last second as we sped by on the bus! The best part of the bus tour was the drive along the northern coast. The water was almost aqua colored and the waves really crashed along the rocky coast. We made it back to the boat just as night began to fall, and when the boat left the harbor, we were treated to a beautiful night-time view of the Valletta harbor.

Our last full day on the boat was spent reading, packing, and taking pictures. The waves were HUGE on the last night. Even on a 2,000+ passenger cruise ship, we could feel the front of the boat rise out of the water and slam back down on the other side of each wave. It was rather unsettling and enough to make me a little sea sick (first time all trip!). The captain’s report indicated the waves we were crashing through had over 15’ swells. Thankfully, by the time we work up the next morning, we were docked safely in Barcelona!

A few more subway and train rides to the airport, followed by a very boring few hours in the Lisbon Airport terminal and we were back to home sweet home.

European Vacation - Istanbul (Day 9-11)

What is this… an update? It’s only been 3 ½ weeks, but what a 3 ½ weeks it’s been. We found out on February 21st that Chris was possibly going to be assigned to a year-long tour in Afghanistan (three months of training and 9 months in country) as part of a Provincial Reconstruction Team (PRT). At about the same time, another tasking came into the CE squadron that they were unable to fill due to an injury. Chris volunteered for this 6 month assignment in Iraq. Both assignments required him to leave around the second week in March, so he ran around like a chicken with his head cut off trying to get all the doctor’s clearances and other deployment requirements taken care of so he could spend his last week at home with me.

A week later (Feb 28th), we found out that Chris’ Wing Commander had denied his request to volunteer to go to Iraq. He would be forced to spend a year in Afghanistan. The Wing Commander gave no reason for his denial, but he did give both of us a really fantastic place to channel our anger over the entire situation. Chris’ squadron and group commanders were very upset over the outcome, as was the head civil engineer for all of the AF in Europe. None of them had the power to keep Chris from going, but they all promised their help in making sure we got where we wanted to go for our next assignment.

We made the most of our time for the next two weeks and got ready for Chris to leave on March 15th. About 12 hours before Chris was scheduled to leave, we got a phone call telling us his tasking was cancelled. We had no idea why, but neither of us really cared! Chris happened to find this article on the internet about two days later (Karzai Speech).  We don’t know for sure that this is why his tasking was cancelled, but I kind of want to send President Karzai a thank-you card anyway! He is still on the hook to deploy sometime this summer, but it will likely be a more normal-length 6 month tasking.

Now that life has returned to normal after that lovely emotional roller coaster, I figured it was time to get back to blogging, wrap up our vacation, and get on to what’s been happening on the island!

Istanbul (Day 9, 10 & 11)

Figuring out what to do in Istanbul proved to be a bit of a challenge. We only had a couple pages in one of our guide books devoted to Turkey, and the information desk for the ship only gave out maps and directions that pointed you to their “preferred retailers” - super helpful. We decided to book a boat-provided tour for our second day in the city and just venture out on our own the first day, since we wouldn’t be arriving until afternoon. Turns out we probably should have skipped the guided tour because all the attractions in Istanbul were within a few blocks of each other. Oh well, live and learn.

The first afternoon, we took the train/metro from the cruise ship dock to the Grand Bazaar. The Bazaar is the largest covered market in the world and was first established in 1455. It covers about 60 streets and has over 400 vendors. It’s packed and crazy (one sign said they average between a quarter and half a million visitors a day)! You can buy anything in this place, but the most popular items are scarves, carpets, and ceramic plates and bowls. We spent a lot of time wondering around and trying to figure out what we wanted to buy. We got a couple scarves, apple tea, some ceramic tiles, and a couple other random items. I am a terrible bargainer, but I tried! Once we were all shopped out, we took the train back to the ship for dinner. The dinner menu in the main dining room looked delicious, so we got dressed up and had a “fancy” dinner. Chris’ roast duck was amazing… my seafood pasta not so much. Dessert more than made up for it, as usual! That night we were treated to a performance by a local folk band, a troop of folk dancers, and a hilarious belly dancer. She was very talented, but the best part was when she made a guy from the “I have way too much money” seats come up on stage with her and try to follow her directions. So funny!

“The day of thousand pictures” (it was really only 709, but that’s more than a picture a minute for 10 hours) began on a tour bus with our Turskish tour guide rambling off the short version of Byzantium/Constantinople/Istanbul’s history. The guides in Turkey are pretty amazing. Only licensed guides are allowed to give tours, and to get licensed, you must have a degree in history, art history, etc. and pass licensing tests. Much more reliable than the guys dressed up like gladiators in Rome!

The first stop on the tour was the Hippodrome of Constantine. This area was constructed in about 200 AD as an arena for chariot races. Today, it’s a large park home to a number of obelisks and other monuments from throughout Istanbul’s history. Immediately adjacent to the Hippodrome is the Blue Mosque (correctly known as the Sultan Ahmed Mosque), constructed between 1609 and 1616. Because this is still an active mosque, we were required to remove our shoes before entering. I wasn’t required to wear a head scarf, because we didn’t go during prayer time. However, I ended up wearing my scarf as a head scarf later in the day because they are warm and it was COLD!! The inside of the building was almost completely covered in hand-painted tiles. The nickname “Blue Mosque” comes from the color of these tiles. This building ended up being my favorite of the day. Even though the Aya Sofya is more historically and culturally significant, the Blue Mosque is in better condition and maintains a much more peaceful atmosphere. The tile work and elaborate Arabic script decorating the interior are beautiful and unlike anything I’ve seen before. I especially liked the huge chandeliers hung from the ceiling. Before electricity, the mosque was lit by oil lamps in these chandeliers. My only complaint – the building smelled like feet. Good thing it was a cold day. I can’t imagine what it must smell like in the heat of the summer.

Next, we took a drive from the European side of Istanbul, over the Bosphorus River, over to the Asian side of the city. It was interesting to get out of the old city and see some of the more modern parts. It was also nice to sit down and rest for a little while, as we still had most of a very long day ahead of us. On our way back to the old part of the city, our bus was trapped on a narrow road because someone had parked illegally. In less than 5 minutes, a tow truck was there to take care of the car so we could get through. Talk about efficient!

 After our trip to Asia, we drove to the Aya Sofya (Hagia Sophia in English). This building is considered the 8th wonder of the world by many historians. It was the largest cathedral in the world for almost 1,000 years and is one of the finest examples of Byzantine architecture anywhere. Originally constructed as an Eastern Orthodox basilica in 360 AD, it was converted to a mosque in 1453 when the Ottoman Turks conquered Constantinople, and finally to a museum in 1931 when the Ottoman Empire gave way to the Republic of Turkey. The original dome has been damaged and rebuilt many times since its initial construction. Today, the 182 ft tall dome is almost round, but not quite! The decoration on the inside of the building was an interesting blend of both Christian and Islamic iconography. Christian mosaics of Mary, Jesus, and many others were plastered over when the building became a mosque. The plaster was decorated in a traditional Islamic style. The plaster has since been removed in some places to reveal the original mosaics. One on the most prominent features in the church was a mosaic of Mary and Jesus flanked by four large, round panels displaying the words for God and Mohamed in Arabic. Another interesting part of the building was the door thresholds – odd I know. Most of the thresholds in the building were made of stone. Over thousands of years, people passing through the doors have worn down the thresholds and created rounded holes on either side. We saw evidence of this in many of the buildings throughout our travels, but they were most prominent in the Aya Sofya.

The next stop on our tour was the Topkapi Palace. The palace was home to the Ottoman Sultans from 1465 to 1856. The palace compound is made up of a series of walled courtyards and was once home to the court system and the national mint in addition to the Sultans’ personal buildings. Today, the various buildings house collections from the national treasury, including two giant 5-foot tall gold candle sticks and a 60-some carat diamond. There are also small museums showing collections of Sultans’ clothing, royal portraits, and Ottoman armor and weapons. One building housed an exhibit on the history of Islam and included relics such as Moses’ staff (I’m back to doubting the authenticity of claims!). Unfortunately for all of you, cameras weren’t allowed in any of the buildings in the palace compound, so you’ll have to make do with your imaginations.

Our final “educational” stop of the day was the Istanbul Archaeology Museum. We only had an hour to go through three buildings worth of exhibits. Thankfully, our tour guide directed us to the most interesting exhibits before he turned us loose. We walked through an impressive collection of sculptures (that you were actually allowed to take pictures of – finally!). Chris had fun posing with them. He’s such a goof. Then, we walked through an exhibit of sarcophagi (large, carved, stone tombs) including the Alexander Sarcophagus. Thought to have been carved in about 300 BC, the scenes on the sarcophagus depict events from the life of Alexander the Great, but he was not buried in it. The detail on of the carvings was incredible, and the original paint colors could still be seen in many places – amazing! Two other interesting exhibits included mosaics from the Ishtar Gate of ancient Babylon and the oldest known peace treaty. The treaty was etched into a clay tablet about the size of a deck of cards!

The last stop on the tour was the Spice Market. This was supposedly the “locals” market, where the Grand Bazaar catered mostly to tourists. I beg to differ… I think the Spice Market was mostly tourists. They did have an incredible selection of spices, dried fruit, and Turkish delights (candy with dried fruit and nuts). We had seen Turkish delights being sold all over Turkey, but hadn’t tried any yet. It was a good thing we waited until the last day because they were amazing, and we wouldn’t have wanted to eat anything else!

The next morning, we took off on our two-day cruise to Malta. We passed through several narrow straights along the Sea of Marmara including one location less than 1km wide. We also passed within sight of several Greek isles before we hit the open sea.

European Vacation - Izmir (Day 8)

Izmir/Ephesus (Day 8)

Our first (and what we thought at the time would be our only) morning in Turkey started out in the ship’s auditorium waiting for our tour group to be called. We decided when we booked the cruise that the sights we wanted to see in Izmir weren’t actually in Izmir, and, with no public transportation to our desired destination, we were stuck on one of the ship’s shore excursions. Yippy! Can you tell I wasn’t thrilled with the idea of being part of a tour group? There’s always one person in the group that makes trouble for everyone else. When one guy got on the bus with a cane, I thought we were done for. Surprisingly, that guy could really move, and we spent more time waiting for people to shop than we did waiting for him to catch up. Another thing that really helped our tour was the radio headsets we were given to wear. Our tour guide had a microphone and we each had a headset. We could wander away from him to see what we really wanted, but we weren’t worried about getting lost.

Once the 25 or so members of our tour group boarded the bus, we headed out of Izmir and south toward the House of the Virgin Mary. The Turkish countryside was very green with lots of orchards and other agricultural fields. Not at all what we expected when we envisioned Turkey. We also didn’t anticipate pouring rain, but that’s what we got… all day long.

The House of the Virgin Mary left a little to be desired, especially from the authenticity standpoint. No one could provide me with any sort of historical reference to Mary actually living in this house – not even when I asked directly. I guess when the Pope says something, everyone just kind of goes along with it?? Only about 2 feet of the original foundation of the house remains, but the building has been restored to reflect its condition at the time of Mary’s inhabitation. The house itself was made up of 4 rooms – an entry way, a living space, and two other smaller connected rooms. All together the house was maybe 300 square feet. Today, the living area is used for daily mass and one of the smaller rooms houses the altar. There is also a natural spring that provides authentic holy water next to the house. We filled up a water bottle, because, why not!

Everyone took a little time to shop at the stores near the exit of the site, before we loaded back onto the bus and headed to the city of Ephesus. A quick history of Ephesus… the city was first settled around 6000 BC and grew to one of the largest cities in the world under both Greek and Roman rule, peaking around 200 AD. It was once home to the Temple of Artemis (one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World). St. Paul’s visits to the city are recorded in the book of Acts, and the book of Ephesians includes his letters to the people of Ephesus during his imprisonment in Rome. Today, Ephesus is one of the most well-preserved ancient cities in the Mediterranean. As you’ll see, well-preserved is a relative term.

Our tour of Ephesus started at the “top” of the city in the Upper Agora. This area included the Odeon (small theatre) and the Prytaneion. These areas were important to the daily government of Ephesus. Access to the Upper Agora was limited to government officials and other members of the city’s ruling class. The coolest thing we saw in this area was the clay water pipe system. These pipes used to carry water from the city’s aqueducts to individual buildings. Just think, if you live in an older US city, your water probably travels through nearly identical pipes to get to your house. I guess when the Romans get something right, it sticks around for a while.

We moved from the Upper Agora to the Street of Curetes and the Lower Agora through the Gate of Hercules. This gate was built too narrow for chariots – confining them to the Upper Agora. All along the Street of Curetes are the ruins of market shops and stalls. During the city’s peak, this street was illuminated and housed all the shopping your Roman heart could desire. There is also a separate, raised area of the Street of Curetes decorated in a detailed mosaic pattern. This area was for the rich folks –no mixing with the commoners. In addition to the market stalls, the Street of Curetes was home to the Temple of Hadrian and the public toilets. The tradition of shaking with your right hand originated for sanitation reasons in this type of public toilet. Please don’t make me explain why.

At the bottom of the Street of Curetes is the Library of Celsus. The front façade of the library is quite well preserved (again it’s relative). It is easy to imagine what the inside of the building would have looked like filled with scrolls. The building was oriented to the sun and designed with a double wall system to take advantage of natural light and reduce the humidity inside. Roman engineering strikes again. Just past the Library of Celsus, on the Marble Road (nice name), was the Grand Theatre. It was here that St. Paul gave sermons to the citizens of Ephesus during his time in the city. It’s a little surreal to think about sitting in the audience of the theatre listening to someone like Paul.

We piled back into the bus to ride to a nice buffet lunch at a local hotel – because I hadn’t eaten like a pig for a week now. The meal was good, but dessert included real baklava. Soooooo good! I’m hungry just thinking about it (that could also be because it’s dinner time here). After lunch, we headed to a local carpet making factory. There, we learned how they remove the silk fibers from silk worm cocoons (by boiling them). We then saw weavers making the famous Turkish carpets. We learned that hand-tied carpets look darker from one direction than the other, while machine-tied carpets look the same from every direction. We also learned that hand-tied carpets are beautiful and expensive. We bought a really small one, and it’s our favorite souvenir. We counted (and then multiplied) the knots on our carpet and figured our 3’x4’ rug has over 50,000 individual knots. Crazy!

We made it back to the boat just in time for them to take off from the dock. Once everyone was inside and we were pulling away (ie: no escape), they announced that we would not be going to Egypt because tanks were rolling into Cairo’s central square and all the tourist sites had been closed down. Amazing what can happen in 12 hours, as everything was still relatively calm when we left the boat that morning. We were understandably upset at our awesome timing, but, after watching the news, completely agreed with the boat’s decision to re-route to Istanbul. Nothing like changing vacation plans on the fly especially with almost no cell service, phone calls at $5.95/min and internet as low as $0.75/min! Did I mention that cruising feels a little like a racket? I did manage to get a text message to Dad before we got too far away from land, so I guess it all worked out okay.

European Vaction - Athens (Day 6 & 7)

On the boat again – Day 6:

Day 6 started with a sail through the Strait of Messina. This is the strait between the main “boot” of Italy and the island of Sicily. We were close enough to see the shores of both places from our balcony. We were supposed to be able to see land for a little over an hour, so being the stubborn person than I am, I insisted on eating breakfast on our balcony. It was cold out, so we ended up in our coats with towels for blankets. It was worth it! The rest of our day at sea was filled with wandering around the boat and reading books I had saved to my iTouch (thank you Amazon for the Kindle app). Chris played in a ping-pong tournament. The prize was a Norwegian Cruise line pen, but he lost to a guy who was willing to dive on the ground after the ball! We finished up the night with dinner at the Italian restaurant followed by a magic show. Our waiter for dinner suggested that we get a pizza to share, along with our meals. We never even touched the pizza, so we took it back to our room for snack time later. The magic show was entertaining, but I know Chris enjoyed it much more than I did. My brain works too hard to figure out the trick instead of being properly amazed!

Athens:

We floated into Pireas at about 10am, and by 10:30am we had started the 20 minute walk from the boat to the Pireas metro station. Upon arriving at the metro station, we found out there are no actual underground trains in Athens, only light-rail type above-ground trains. We asked later and found out this was because every time they try to dig somewhere in Athens they run into ancient ruins! The archeologists shut everything down until they are finished excavating. If they just pave over the top of the old stuff, no one stops their work!

We got off the metro right at the base of the Acropolis, so we thought. We ended up having to walk almost all the way around the base of the hill to get to the official entrance to the park. Oh well, it was the first nice day we’d seen in a while. I think it go up to somewhere in the 50s! We arrived at about the same time as all the tour groups from the boat, so we opted to wander around a few less well-known sights before heading up the see the Parthenon. A walk around the middle of the hill led us to the Herodes Atticus Theatre (2nd century AD) and the Theatre of Dionysus (4th century BC). The seating areas in the Herodes Atticus Theatre have been restored and the theatre is now used for concerts during the summer. I’m thinking that marble would be even more uncomfortable to sit on than wooden bleachers! Next, we walked through a couple of the workshop areas that were used by the craftsmen during construction of various buildings on the Acropolis. Finally, we walked around the “back” side of the Acropolis for some spectacular views of the city. Near the Acropolis the houses are built right into the hill. No need for that 4th wall, just use the rock that’s already there!

Once the crowds had died down a little, we took our turn on the top of the Acropolis, admiring the Parthenon, Erchtheion, and more panoramic city views. While, the Coliseum was somewhat smaller than we expected, the size and grandeur of the Parthenon left nothing to be desired. The structure was constructed around 440 BC as a temple to the goddess Athena. The statue of her that was once housed here is considered one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. Currently, there is restoration work being done on the Parthenon to repair structural damage to help stabilize the remaining portions of the building. It was interesting to see the crisp, intricate carvings of the restored stone next to the original carvings. Some of the original carvings have been worn down over time, but some are just as clear as they were the day they were carved. We were also impressed by the sheer size and weight of the stone used to construct the building. We had a hard time just walking up the hill; I can imagine trying to pull all that stone up the hill with us!

The next stop on the agenda was the Parthenon Museum. This museum came highly recommended by a friend of ours whose family is originally from Greece. She was nice enough to give us the inside scoop on the things we really needed to see while we were in town. Finding the Parthenon Museum was a challenge to say the least… might I suggest a few signs?? We did eventually stumble across it, and I certainly thought it was worth the confusion. Chris would disagree – he wasn’t feeling well (head cold) and was tired of walking! The museum houses most of the artifacts that have been removed from the Parthenon and is surrounded by on-going archeological digs. Working your way through the museum leads you on a journey through a history of the settlement and construction of the Acropolis. The collection includes statue, after statue, after statue – most of them even still have their heads and hands attached! The most impressive collection in the museum is the 525ft long Parthenon Frieze. The Frieze once wrapped around the interior of the Parthenon and depicts a feast processional ending in twelve Greek gods, including Zeus. Approximately half of this frieze is made up the much-disputed Elgin Marbles removed from the Parthenon in the early 1800’s and now housed at the British Museum. The Elgin Marbles are displayed as plaster casts in Athens, along with a very “PR” friendly sign indicating that the British took what belongs to Greece and won’t give it back.

At this point, we were museumed out and in need of a pharmacy (the only place to buy any medication of any kind in Europe). We followed the GPS to the Monesteraki shopping area. The narrow, stone streets were lined with shops mostly selling touristy stuff. However, there were a few unique shops among the group that were fun to walk through. We settled on a small replica vase from one of the shops as our souvenir from Athens. Following another of our friend’s suggestions, we had late afternoon snack at a popular restaurant called O Thanasis. We ordered the chicken sovlaki, a large piece of pita bread covered with roasted chicken pieces, lettuce, onions, and tomatoes. It was a wonderful way to end our day!

On our way to the metro stop, we finally found two pharmacies, but both of them were closed. We discovered that if we thought back to our engineering classes and kind of squinted we could translate most of the Greek letters into the more familiar Latin letters, but we still couldn’t figure out the location of the nearest open pharmacy… no medicine for us! We gave up and took the metro back to the boat before it got too dark. We didn’t feel totally comfortable around the dock area at night – just a little too shady for our tastes. We topped the night off with dinner in one of the dining rooms and a Motown-themed show put on by some of the ship’s performers.

European Vacation - Rome (Day 4 & 5)

Ready for days 4 and 5? Here you go…

Day 4 of our trip was spent on the cruise ship traveling from Barcelona to Rome with nothing to see but water in every direction. We had breakfast in the Garden Café, a cafeteria-style buffet area where you could get food for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. This was followed by wondering around the ship until lunch time. For lunch, we ate in the Grand Pacific, one of the main dining rooms. They served sandwiches, salads, and other “lunch” type items. The food was good, but the service was SLOW! This was the only day we ate lunch in a dining room for that reason. After lunch, we went to a presentation by Dan the Art Man. Dan was the head art auctioneer on our ship (they sell art, like really expensive, seriously collectable art on cruise ships – it’s a strange). His presentation was like taking Art History 101 in an hour. He was a great speaker, and we ended up spending a lot of our free time on the boat listening to his subsequent presentations and attending art auctions (we liked watching rich people spend ridiculous amounts of money). That evening, we had dinner at one of the themed restaurants on the ship. We opted for Mexican – something we hadn’t eaten in a long time. My chocolate caramel torte for dessert was the best part! We finished up the evening with a show in the ship’s theatre. This evening’s show was a pair of popular British singers. The duo was fun to listen to and had several very good songs.

Rome:

We woke up bright and early for our landing in Civitavecchia, Italy. We were supposed to be able to get off the boat at 9am, but having never done the cruise thing before, we had no idea how long it would take once we were allowed off. To our surprise, we had gotten off the boat, out of the port, and walked to the train station all before 9 am! We just missed the 8:59 train to Rome though, so we had to wait about 40 minutes for the next one. When the train finally arrived, we rode, standing, on a packed train for about an hour before we arrived in Rome – I guess we hit rush hour!

Our first stop after arriving in Rome was the Coliseum. This was the one place in Rome I insisted on seeing, so we decided it was a good place to start. When we walked up the stairs out of the metro station, the first thing we saw was the Coliseum. Guess there was no way to get lost now! We bought our tickets, picked up an audio guide, and went inside. The Coliseum was everything we expected from a historical perspective, but we thought it would be much larger. Don’t get me wrong, it was an amazing feat of construction considering the time at which it was built (~80 AD), but in our heads, it was so much bigger! We took pictures and listened to the gruesome history of the gladiatorial games on our audio guides while we wondered around. It was fascinating to see the complex system of rooms, hallways and elevators under the floor of the Coliseum. It must have been quite impressive to see entire sets of scenery and wild animals appear out of nowhere during the games. Another interesting feature was the box seats for prominent members of society including the Emperor and government officials. The stone front of each box was carved with the official’s name. When they were no longer in office, their name was removed and their replacement’s name was added. The names we could see today were those of the last officials in office before the games were stopped.

After the Coliseum, we walked to the entrance of the Palatine Hill. The Palatine Hill was the site of the first settlement in Rome and was later home to Rome’s emperors. Most of the structures that once dominated the hill are little more than foundations and rubble. However, illustrations on information boards throughout the site help you envision what an over-the-top place this must have been in its day. We walked along the ancient stone streets in the shade of what Chris called the “Cloud Trees”. Yes, I looked up their real name when we gone home. They are called Stone Pines. My favorite spots on the Palatine Hill were the Stadium of Domitian and the House of Augustus (it’s the only building that is still kind of standing). We were also able to catch a small glimpse of the dome of St. Peter’s Basilica – we would only have one more sighting as we sped by on the train later.

Next up was the Roman Forum. The Roman Forum was the center of Roman government and religion for nearly 1000 years between 500 BC and 500 AD. We started with an overview from the top of the Palatine Hill then wound our way through the ruins of the Forum with the aid of our trusty Rick Steves’ travel guide. We were very thankful for the clearly narrated directions, historical insights, and maps – lots of maps! I also have his guide books to thank for most of the historical information you’re reading right now.

First up was the Arch of Titus, commissioned to celebrate the victory of Rome over Judea in ~70 AD. Next, we saw Constantine’s Basilica. The arches still standing today are the remains of the side hall. The ceiling of the central hall was another 50 feet higher. Walking down the Via Sacra (the central road through the Forum), we passed the Temple of Romulus (complete with original bronze doors) and the Temple of Antoninus Pius and Faustina. The slice marks on the tops of the second temple’s columns were caused when rope and vinegar were used to try to cut the columns down for scrap.

Near the central square of the Forum, we found the Temple of Julius Caesar. It was on this spot that Caesar was cremated after his assassination in 44 BC. The dedication of the temple made Caesar the first Roman to be considered a god. Around the corner was the House of the Vestal Virgins. The women who lived here were responsible for maintaining the fire in the adjacent Temple of Vesta. It was believed that as long as the fire burned Rome would not fall… guess that didn’t work out quite as planned.  We finished up our walk through the Forum with a stop at the Curis or Senate building. This is the most complete building left in the Forum, and it’s easy to imagine senators meeting in the building to debate the issues of the day. The original marble floors as well as some early frescos can still be seen in the building. Currently, several statues and carved reliefs of scenes from the height of the Forum also call this building home.

We left the Forum and walked toward the Pantheon. On the way, we passed the Capital Hill and a huge white building known as the Victor Emmanuel Monument. From here we followed Chris’ handheld GPS for directions. This little piece of technology came in handy on many occasions and made us feel a lot better about exploring knowing, if worst came to worst, we could always find our way back to the boat using the GPS. While walking, we learned that crossing streets in Rome is one giant game of Frogger. Cars are supposed to stop at red lights, and typically do, but scooters are not required to stop, and typically don’t! Needless to say, we found locals and ran across the street whenever they dared.

We made it to the Pantheon but approached from the back. It’s kind of a run-down looking brick building from the back, but once we walked around to the front, we were sufficiently impressed! The columns that support the front of the building are each one solid piece; shipped in from Egypt. The dome of the building is constructed of concrete and gets thinner toward the top. The dome is 142 ft wide (the largest in Europe for many, many years). The floor and walls of the circular church are covered in brightly-colored marble; statues and frescos decorate also the walls. There is a large sky light in the top of the dome. I imagine it could get a little soggy if you sat in the wrong place during a rain storm!  The Pantheon is unique in that it is the only building in Rome that has been continuously used since its construction in 120 AD. It is for this reason, and the fact that it eventually became a church dedicated to Christian martyrs, that it wasn’t destroyed or picked apart for parts over the last 2000 years. We marveled over this amazing feat of ancient Roman engineering for a while before deciding it was lunch time, and when in Rome…. It’s time for pizza. We had classic margarita and slightly more adventurous spinach, mushroom, and roasted pepper pizza. Then, we found ourselves some Gelato – yummy!

At this point, it was time to start heading for the nearest metro station so we could make it back to the train station on time. We had had several bumps along the road with Rome’s metro system already, so we didn’t want to take any chances on being late. Also, unlike Barcelona, Rome’s metro stations are fewer and much farther between. We took a nice scenic walk (thanks again Rick Steves) past several interesting sites including a couple palaces turned modern government buildings to the Trevi Fountain and finally to the Spanish Steps, where the metro station was located. The Trevi Fountain looked exactly like it does in every movie you’ve ever seen, except we saw it during the day, and the movies always show it at night. The hand-carved detail on all the statues and decorations was quite impressive. The Spanish Steps were not nearly as impressive. Oh well, you can’t win them all.

Having checked off everything we were going to see for the day, we hopped on the metro and headed for the train. The train ride back to the boat was much nicer than the ride there… mostly because we had seats! Check out the video in the pictures side show for a glimpse of the Italian countryside from the train.

I’m sure you’re probably asking… what about St. Peter’s and the Vatican? Isn’t that a big part of Rome? Yes it is, but we only had roughly 5 hours in Rome, so we had to pick one side or the other so to speak. We picked ancient Rome this time, but we’ll be back to see the Vatican and everything else we missed!

European Vacation - Barcelona (Day 2 and 3)

All right, readers… here are days two and three. This ended up being really long (16k words), so pull up a comfy chair!

Barcelona:

We started our first real day in Barcelona with a quick breakfast at our hotel (two thumbs up for free 24-hour buffet!) before heading to the metro (subway) station a few blocks away. The information in our guide book said the metro was the fastest and cheapest way to get around Barcelona. They were right! We got a metro map from our hotel and a 10-ride card at the station and never looked back.

Our first stop of the day was the Sagrada Familia (Sacred Family) church. Upon arrival, we realized that we had a problem. One Saturday a month is a free entrance day, and this was one of those Saturdays. We knew this going in but never anticipated that the line would wind around the church and up and down the street for a block in every direction. By noon, messages were being displayed in the metro stations indicating that no more tickets would be given out that day (the church closes at 6pm). So, we decided to swap around some of our plans and try again the next day.

We hopped back on the metro and headed for the Ribera district and the Picasso Museum. We wondered through the neighborhood past small boutique shops and cafes before stumbling upon the entrance to the museum. It’s not well marked, nor is it in a very obvious location. The museum was a comprehensive look at the work of Pablo Picasso from his first days in a Barcelona art school at age 12, all the way through his death in 1973. The works of art are amazing, and it’s fascinating to see how he progressed from very realistic portraits to the crazy colors and shapes for which he is most well-known.

After the Picasso Museum, we walked farther into the Ribera district toward the Church of Santa Maria del Mar. This church was built by wealthy shipping merchants in the mid 1300’s. The columns in this church were inspirational to Gaudi’s design of the columns in the Sagrada Familia Church.

By this time, we needed lunch, so we took the metro back to the hotel for some food. We started our afternoon with a leisurely stroll down Las Ramblas. And by leisurely, I mean as slowly as we could stand to go considering it was FREEZING outside. We had been watching the weather forecast for about two weeks prior to our trip. Sixty degree temperatures were forecast for the majority of the trip. Imagine our surprise when it was only 38 degrees in Barcelona! Anyway, back to Las Ramblas…

Las Ramblas is a street with a large pedestrian area in between two roads. The pedestrian area is home to a variety of street shops selling everything from post cards to flowers to pet birds. There were also a large variety of street performers along the way. One particularly notable performer was painted completely silver and was seated on a toilet up on a platform. All sorts of ridiculous bathroom humor followed when someone put a Euro in his bucket. We ended our walk down Las Ramblas with a stop at the Christopher Columbus statue.

From the bottom of Las Ramblas, we took the metro to the Montjuic Funicular. The Funicular was basically like riding a metro car up the first hill on a roller coaster! Thankfully, there was no terrifying drop at the end of this trip. From the Funicular, we took a cable car the final distance to the very top of Montjuic. Why did we go to all this effort to get to the top of this particular hill? To see a castle, of course! The castle was built in the 1700’s to keep an eye on the pesky Catalonians, as they had a tendency to revolt from time to time.  We walked around the castle for a while, found some big cannons for Chris to take pictures by, and then took the cable car back down to lower ground.

The next stop on our list was the Catalan Art Museum, housed in the former National Palace. The museum is home to what were told is a, “world-class collection of Romanesque art.” We have no idea what that means, so we’ll take Mr. Rick Steves at his word! As impressive as the art collection was, and it really did have some beautiful works of art, the palace building itself was equally impressive both inside and out.

By this part of our day, we were exhausted and had very, very tired feet, so we took a break inside the museum to wait for the Magic Fountains in Placa d’ Espanya to come to life. The light show at the fountains was set to music, and was really fun to watch. We rounded out our evening as the only patrons in the museum’s restaurant. Apparently, 7:30pm is too early for the Spanish to even think about eating dinner, but we were starving!! The restaurant overlooked the fountains, so we watched the second show of the evening while we ate.

Day two started with a second attempt at the Sagrada Familia, but first we had to have a little fun on the metro. As you can see from the picture, our attempt at out-smarting the system was thoroughly thwarted. However, all our efforts to get inside the Sagrada Familia were well worth it! The exterior of the building is massive and overpowering, but the interior of the building almost seems to float away from you. The entire building is truly breathtaking.

Here’s a little history of the Sagrada Familia because I think it’s interesting and because you’ll read whatever I write: The design of the Sagrada Familia Church is credited to the renowned Modernista architect Antoni Gaudi. He began his work on the project in 1883 and continued until his death in 1926. Prior to his death, work was competed (or nearly so) on only one of the three major façades of the church – the Nativity façade. In addition to the Nativity façade, the final plans call for two additional facades, the Passion façade and the Glory façade. Each of these facades will be marked by four bell towers (330-feet hight) dedicated to the twelve apostles. Four additional, central towers will be dedicated to Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. The church will be crowned by a 400-foot tower dedicated to Mary, and a 550-foot tower dedicated to Jesus. At the present time, only the Nativity and Passion facades are complete. It is estimated to take another 25 years or more to complete the construction.

Okay, back to our trip… We started at the Passion façade, because that’s where they sell the tickets (logical place to start, I know). The Passion façade is a depiction of the Stations of the Cross, although in a form and at a scale unlike anything I’ve ever seen. Each hand-carved figure is sunken, hallow, and haunting. We entered the church through massive bronze doors inscribed with words from the New Testament and proceeded to an elevator which took us up into one of the Passion bell towers. Then we climbed a stair case just wide enough for one person (and a relatively thin person at that) up higher into the tower. The views of the city and the on-going construction of the church were amazing. We also got to see the detailed mosaic work present on each of the towers – no paint on this building – all the color is mosaic tile. We (meaning Chris) thought it would be fun to take the stairs all the way down to the tower. What no one told me was that about half the stairs were a crazy spiral stair case with no rail in the center. Needless to say, I was glued to the outer wall the whole way down!

After coming back down to earth, we entered the interior of the church. Breathtaking. The columns in the building are design to look like trees, and they really do. It’s like you’re standing in a forest with the trees lifting the roof above your head. Natural light filters in from hundreds of windows around the church furthering the canopy effect. We wandered around in awe for over an hour trying and failing to capture the sheer magnitude of the space on film. It is really something you have to experience in person to truly appreciate.  The video here shows most of the interior space and includes music that was being performed while we were there.

Next, we headed outside again to the Nativity façade. In complete contrast to the simple, clean lines of the Passion façade, every inch of the Nativity façade is covered in decoration of some kind. Various scenes from the birth and early life of Jesus are depicted here. However, it’s the “blank” space that makes the building come to life. Seriously, it looks like the building is going to come alive and eat you for lunch! It reminded both Chris and me of a sea creature from Pirates of the Caribbean – creepy! Our tour finished with a look into at the history of the building’s construction in basement of the church.

We rounded out our afternoon with a metro ride to the Casa Mila (an apartment complex designed by Gaudi) and the Block of Discord (another building designed by Gaudi and two buildings designed in response by his competitors). And, since neither of us had had a decent hamburger and french fries since we moved to Lajes, we stopped at the Hard Rock Café for lunch before grabbing our bags and heading to the cruise ship. We spent the rest of the evening participating in a safety drill, unpacking our bags (hurray for only having to do this once!), and figuring out the layout of the ship.

European Vacation - Day 1

Let the posting of vacation pictures begin! We ended our trip with 3,027 pictures and over 3 hours of video. After sorting through all the pictures and deleting the 579 that were duplicates or just plain bad, we ended up with 2,448 usable pictures. As you can imagine, it’s going to take me a while to get them sorted down to a number you can all stand to page through! I will take it one day and/or location at a time starting from the beginning (because that’s usually the best place to start). So…. here’s day one!

Lajes, Lisbon, and Barcelona:

We started our travels the tiny Lajes airport. From the moment we stepped into the airport, I was in love with the way European’s travel. There was no one trying to check in 17 oversized bags, the customer service people were friendly and polite (probable because no one was yelling at them), there was no charge for checking a bag, when a meal was served on the flight, no one complained because their sandwich included some ingredient they didn’t like, and everyone’s carry-on bag fit neatly into the overhead bin. In short, people were happy and cooperative, and in return the flight attendants were pleasant and helpful. It was wonderful. And, to top it off, they disembarked the planes from both the front and the back door. Talk about efficient!

We arrived in Lisbon after our 2-1/2 hour flight from Lajes and caught a bus downtown to try to pass the time during our six hour layover. We got off the bus and wondered through the city’s Baxia district toward the Paraca do Comercia. The Paraca do Comercia is one of two main squares in the city and is situated on the waterfront of the Tejo River.

Next, we walked east into the oldest part of the city which is home to the Se (cathedral), the oldest church in Lisbon, and the Castelo de Sao Jorge. The walk to these two sights was completely uphill - a very steep hill. We got to the top of the hill and to the Castelo de Sao Jorge only realize we didn’t really have time to go into the castle and should start heading back to the bus stop. We found a staircase in between two buildings to go down most of the hill rather than trying to walk down on the streets.

We stopped along the way and bought what smelled like a really delicious bag of roasted nuts from a street vendor. They were gross – tasted like sawdust! So, we settled for sandwiches from a small café along the main pedestrian street in the downtown area. We hopped back on the bus to the airport and onto our plane to Barcelona.

Upon arriving in Barcelona, we took the bus to the Palaca de Catalunya and walked the block from there to our hotel – The Hotel Continental Barcelona. We had been warned that the hotel had an interesting interior decorating scheme. That was an understatement. Our room was pink from top to bottom, walls, chair covers, bedding, ceiling, and air conditioning unit included. The view from our balcony was right down on to Las Ramblas (a description of this unique space will show up in tomorrow’s information), but it was freezing outside, so we didn’t spend much time admiring the view before we headed to bed.