September 16th - 23rd
CRUISIN' the Mediterranean!
Before we left Canada and began our European adventures, Jenna's mom gave us the idea of a Mediterranean cruise. We had checked out different itineraries, schedules, and prices to see if anything fit with our tentative trip plans. We did not find a cruise that worked before our trip, but as we were travelling we continued to search the companies to see if there was a cruise that would fit within our budget. When we were in Paris, we finally found a 7 night Mediterranean cruise that left from Rome and returned from Rome, while exploring countries that we were not going to be able to explore otherwise! This ended up being a very exciting spin to our trip, and being pampered for one week after 7 weeks of backpacking was fantastic! This cruise takes us to Sicily, Italy; Ephesus, Turkey; Athens, Greece; and Crete, Greece!
When we were heading from Rome to the cruise port we had to take a train about 45 minutes outside of the city. We could see the cruise ship from the train station so we got our packs and started walking. We walked past a spot where a lot of travellers were waiting for a shuttle bus to take them to the ship, but the line looked so long that we thought we would continue walking! Little did we know, the ship was very far away and basically the road was not meant for walking! But we made it...this is us walking towards the ship for the first time!! Possibly the only people who have ever walked the whole way to the port, lol!
Royal Caribbean Cruise - Navigator of the Seas
Our ship name was Navigator of the Seas. We had 3100 passengers on board, with 1200 employees! The ship can hold up to 3500 passengers. And yes, there are enough lifeboats for all of the passengers and employees...we crunched the numbers! The picture on the right is the Royal Promenade...basically a 3-storey high shopping mall.
When we got on the ship, the Windjammer was open which is basically a buffet that is open from early morning til late evening! We were sooo hungry and excited that we did not have to eat baguettes!
So very excited about a variety of food!
Sun set from the ship
Safety First!
Messina/Taormina, Italy (Sicily)
The next day was our first port day where we docked at Messina, Italy. We toured around the local area and then took the train to a cute town, Taormina. Not knowing that this town was up the mountain from the train station we began to walk until we realized that we were never going to make it in time to get back, so we hitchhiked! Thank goodness for a kind lady who picked us up because it was a long ways up the mountain!
Taormina
Leaving the port in Messina, Italy
Cruising Day!
The cruise ship had to sail all the way to Ephesus, Turkey, which took a full night and day, so today was a cruising day! We were excited to spend a full day on the boat because there is so much to do!! The sun was shining so we took advantage of the pool deck where there was various music and entertainment. But we were also very active!
There is unlimited ice cream! yum!
We went rock climbing on the Mediterranean Sea...the highest point on the ship!
We joined a Ping Pong tournament! We did not win but had a lot of fun. Steven got pretty far when winning his first two games, but there were some really good contestants!
We even played BINGO because the grand prize was upgrading to a the Supreme Balcony room, a little better than our interior room with no window. It was really hard waking up in the morning when it was pitch black in the room!
This evening there was a formal dress code in the dining room for dinner. Eek! Unfortunately we have been backpacking for 7 weeks at this point and did not bring fancy clothes. Jenna brought some casual dresses and Steven brought a tie, but when we looked at the pictures on the boat of what this 'formal' night looks like, people actually wear TUXEDOS!! Oh man! Luckily we stopped in at a store during our first port day in Messina, Italy and bought a dress, shoes and a suit jacket.
We fit in a little better now! The fanciest we dressed on our whole European trip!
Ephesus, Turkey
Turkey! A country that we never even thought we would get near on this trip! This is the furthest east we will get on our adventures through Europe. Ephesus has so much history and so many ruins to discover. If anyone wants an interesting way of learning about the history of Rome and Ephesus in the early 1st century Jenna suggests that you read the series The Mark of the Lion by Francine Rivers, it is a christian fiction novel, but has so much historical information and is set in a time before Ephesus and Rome become Christian cities. Anyways, our ship ports in a town called Kusadasi, and we take a city bus to Ephesus.
Turkey's city buses!
Columns! We decided not to put ALL 200 pictures of columns that we took on the blog!
This was once a main street in front of the senate's palace
Ephesus is about a 10 minute drive to the Mediterranean Sea now, but it was once a Port city, which means that the water was right down the street. The area is known to have many earthquakes and eventually tore the city apart, and most of these ruins were found 7 feet underground. There are still archeologists working in areas of Ephesus to find more pieces. I wonder how many pieces of a column you have to find before it is no longer exciting to find a piece of a column?
The men's washroom...Steven's happy place! lol
Quite impressive! It was the library at the end of the main street.
A re-enactment of the Gladiator games.
The Great Theatre, where the apostle Paul once spoke!
Ruins and the theatre in a distance.
The Turkish Flag
The Turkish Eye...it is suppose to bring good luck
Turkish Tea!
Turkey is quite well known in their hand woven rugs!
From the ship, saying good bye to Turkey!
Athens, Greece
Up until this point we have not chosen to pay for excursions and tours from the ship, because, well we are pretty good at touring ourselves, and they are quite expensive. But we were told that there was a strike in Athen's public transit system for the day that we were suppose to be there, and the place where our ship docked was about a 20 minute drive from Athens, so we decided to pay for a guided tour of Athens. Our guide was pretty good! We asked him a lot about the architects and architecture of the structures, and found out that he had his bachelor degree in Architecture, so he threw in a lot more information in his typical talk in the tour for us!
At the Panathenaic Stadium used for track and field in the Olympics. It can hold up to 60,000 people. It was built back for the olympics in 330 BC, and was used up until the present! It is made of all marble!
Next we went up to the Acropolis, which means the highest part of the city, and checked out the Parthenon.
The Parthenon. They are working on restoring parts of it, but refuse to restore it completely because they feel that in this generation they will only restore a portion and leave it to the next generation to decide whether or not they choose to restore it any further.
Looking out over Athens
We were back to the ship in the afternoon and decided to learn how to play Shuffleboard!
Pretty good form for beginners! Steven is actually quite good at Shuffleboard...he might even consider going professional, lol!
Next up...mini-golf!!! Seriously this ship has everything! Although Steven won in shuffleboard, Jenna took the lead in mini golf!
Good-bye to Athens...off to Crete, Greece!
Might as well go Ice Skating on the Mediterranean!
Crete, Greece
Crete is a gorgeous island south of Greece. A place that we really only got a snapshot of and would love to come back to!
A lovely hibiscus flower!
The light house
Figuring out the time by the sun!
Steven's first time ever trying Greek coffee...it is much different if you have ever tried it!
So many places along the Mediterranean there are shops that offer a foot massage/fish that eat the dead skin off of your feet! We have both been tempted to try it, but have not yet and we saw a whole school of fish that looked like the same kind as in those shops, so Steven decided to stick his foot in the water to see if they would start nibbling....unfortunately they didn't!
Our last day with our feet in the Mediterranean on this trip!
Relaxing on the ship!
Last Cruising Day!
The cruise ship is heading back to Rome. We are enjoying our last day on the ship with the sun!
A few shots from the ship as we head back through the boot of Italy.
The wake of the ship
This was our last dinner on the ship...we loved our waiter, Ali, and assistant waiter, Keshan. All of the staff on the boat were just exceptional!
We actually made some friends!! Two couples at our table were so great! The one couple was from Ireland, Brandon and Maria, and the other couple was from New Zealand, Tony and Tammy.
Back in Rome
This past week was amazing. We love cruising! It is such a safe way to travel for the young and old and there is so much to do on the ship! We were so thankful for a relaxing week of getting pampered!
We are so sad to leave the ship and all of its fun, games, and food, but also excited to be on our own again! Now we train waaaay up to Austria! Salzburg here we come!
