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Friday, August 31, 2018
Wednesday, August 29, 2018
Day 12: Wed. Aug 29. Travel Home.
Right now I am sitting on the airplane writing my last post… for this vacation. We got up early to catch the car I arranged to the airport at 7:45 am. We are on American Airlines Flight 111 from Rome to Chicago. We took one of the oldest plane types on our flight out of New York, and now we take the newest, the Boeing 787 Dreamliner to Chicago. It is a 10.5 hour long, long flight. Luckily, when I checked us in yesterday it asked if we wanted a cash upgrade to business class and we splurged. It is making this return flight much, much more pleasant. A little bumpy, but at least enough room for my lanky body.
As I look back on the trip, I am more than anything happy that all went smoothly and safely. It was a successful first trip to Europe for Kory and though it was a crash course intense tour, we saw tons of amazing sights.
If I were to pick a few of my favorite things out from the trip it would be too hard, so here are memorable things that pop into my mind… Eze in France. Sagrada Familia and walking the passion tower in Barcelona. La Pedrera house in Barcelona. The enormity of things in Rome (Colosseum, Fountains, St. Peters.) The beauty of Florence. Seeing David. Eating Encemidas in Mallorca. Eating a Spanish lunch with our tour guide in Barcelona. Eating a nice dinner in Rome. Eating pizza at the restaurant in Florence. Eating almost everywhere on the cruise ship (steak, churrascaria, french bistro.) The thermal suite on the ship. The 80’s dance party on the ship. The amazing service on the ship. Getting to go to New York to start our trip and seeing four shows and hanging with Kory’s fam. Getting to fly on big planes.
I guess what I am saying is that I am easy to please… I like almost everything. This will be the start of many, many international adventures for Kory and me. I am so fortunate to have the opportunity to take amazing trips like this and have an amazing person to travel with.
That’s all for now. Thanks for reading.
Next up for me: Family trip with 16 Wilsons to Florida October 18th. Doing a three night Disney Cruise.
As I look back on the trip, I am more than anything happy that all went smoothly and safely. It was a successful first trip to Europe for Kory and though it was a crash course intense tour, we saw tons of amazing sights.
If I were to pick a few of my favorite things out from the trip it would be too hard, so here are memorable things that pop into my mind… Eze in France. Sagrada Familia and walking the passion tower in Barcelona. La Pedrera house in Barcelona. The enormity of things in Rome (Colosseum, Fountains, St. Peters.) The beauty of Florence. Seeing David. Eating Encemidas in Mallorca. Eating a Spanish lunch with our tour guide in Barcelona. Eating a nice dinner in Rome. Eating pizza at the restaurant in Florence. Eating almost everywhere on the cruise ship (steak, churrascaria, french bistro.) The thermal suite on the ship. The 80’s dance party on the ship. The amazing service on the ship. Getting to go to New York to start our trip and seeing four shows and hanging with Kory’s fam. Getting to fly on big planes.
I guess what I am saying is that I am easy to please… I like almost everything. This will be the start of many, many international adventures for Kory and me. I am so fortunate to have the opportunity to take amazing trips like this and have an amazing person to travel with.
That’s all for now. Thanks for reading.
Next up for me: Family trip with 16 Wilsons to Florida October 18th. Doing a three night Disney Cruise.
Day 11: Tues. Aug 28. The Amalfi Coast, Italy
Today was our last day and our last tour. We met our group at 8:10 am. This was the largest tour I had booked with 12 people on a mini-bus. It was also our first tour that had several kids… this really slows ya down because you got to get out the strollers, load the strollers, track the kids down, etc, etc. Also a few hours in Kory said “I am all sightseeing’d out.” I definitely agree. This was a rough tour day.
It started with driving about an hour along the Amalfi coast with views into the sea. I was getting car sick because you drive at the edge of mountains back and forth, back and forth along the very very edge almost ready to go over. I am also afraid of heights, which didn’t help matters. We finally got to the overlook of Positano and stopped for about ten minutes to take pictures. Then we turned around and drove back to Sorrento.
Our driver, Pasquale, dropped us off in Sorrento with basically no background or information. Not that I wanted him to be talking to us during the harrowing drive, but we didn’t know what we should do for three and a half hours. Kory mentioned at some point that he doesn’t understand the lawlessness of the roads, the scooters zipping everywhere, everyone driving for 5 to 100 miles an hour and then slam on the breaks, and yet traffic keeps moving everywhere we have been… Not at all like the U.S.
Anyways, back to Sorrento. We sat at a cafe and had breakfast. Kory was happy for the authentic cappuccino. I was happy to be sitting in the center square of the city people watching. We observed a little tourist train tour going around the streets, so we decided maybe that was the best way to see the city. It was 6 euros each for the half hour tour. It showed us that Sorrento is really quite small… around 19,000 population. But it has tons of tourists and tons of scheduled boat service to other islands and other places around the coast. If I came back, I would definitely do a tour by boat. After the train ride, we just walked around the streets for an hour and a half looking at shops and the sights by the sea. It was interesting because the beach is so far down the cliff-side that it really isn’t a beach. It is like individual places that build piers for sunbathing over the water.
From Sorrento, we had a two hour tour of Pompeii. To me it was the most interesting sight of the day, and so, so huge. We only scratched the surface of what is on display there, but it is interesting that you could really see an ancient city and how daily life existed and walk the nieghborhoods to see all the different houses, public places, squares and theatres. Enough of the remains exist that I can use my imagination to fill in the rest of the buildings. Definitely a visit I will remember.
After Pompeii and another nine hour touring day, we got back to the ship just after 5:30 pm. We made one last visit to the thermal spa and then had dinner at the Italian buffet for our last meal. Then it was onward to looking at the pictures they took all cruise and packing up all our luggage. Then we turned in fairly early to prepare for our travel home day.
It started with driving about an hour along the Amalfi coast with views into the sea. I was getting car sick because you drive at the edge of mountains back and forth, back and forth along the very very edge almost ready to go over. I am also afraid of heights, which didn’t help matters. We finally got to the overlook of Positano and stopped for about ten minutes to take pictures. Then we turned around and drove back to Sorrento.
Our driver, Pasquale, dropped us off in Sorrento with basically no background or information. Not that I wanted him to be talking to us during the harrowing drive, but we didn’t know what we should do for three and a half hours. Kory mentioned at some point that he doesn’t understand the lawlessness of the roads, the scooters zipping everywhere, everyone driving for 5 to 100 miles an hour and then slam on the breaks, and yet traffic keeps moving everywhere we have been… Not at all like the U.S.
Anyways, back to Sorrento. We sat at a cafe and had breakfast. Kory was happy for the authentic cappuccino. I was happy to be sitting in the center square of the city people watching. We observed a little tourist train tour going around the streets, so we decided maybe that was the best way to see the city. It was 6 euros each for the half hour tour. It showed us that Sorrento is really quite small… around 19,000 population. But it has tons of tourists and tons of scheduled boat service to other islands and other places around the coast. If I came back, I would definitely do a tour by boat. After the train ride, we just walked around the streets for an hour and a half looking at shops and the sights by the sea. It was interesting because the beach is so far down the cliff-side that it really isn’t a beach. It is like individual places that build piers for sunbathing over the water.
From Sorrento, we had a two hour tour of Pompeii. To me it was the most interesting sight of the day, and so, so huge. We only scratched the surface of what is on display there, but it is interesting that you could really see an ancient city and how daily life existed and walk the nieghborhoods to see all the different houses, public places, squares and theatres. Enough of the remains exist that I can use my imagination to fill in the rest of the buildings. Definitely a visit I will remember.
After Pompeii and another nine hour touring day, we got back to the ship just after 5:30 pm. We made one last visit to the thermal spa and then had dinner at the Italian buffet for our last meal. Then it was onward to looking at the pictures they took all cruise and packing up all our luggage. Then we turned in fairly early to prepare for our travel home day.
Day 10: Mon. Aug 27. Day at Sea
Today was a day at sea as we traveled across the Mediterranean from Barcelona to Naples. It was definitely a nice break from all the touring. We didn’t get up til about 9 am… one of two days we got to sleep in on the trip. We basically just bummed around for the day. Kory had a massage at the spa. I don’t like people touching me, so I gambled and lost $100 at the casino. We had some (too many,) drinks from our regular bartenders at the adult pool bar. They seem to want to make us shots… and Kory was letting them. He is usually my buffer to my no shot policy… But it’s vacation… so exceptions are made. It was fun sitting out there when our giant ship went right between Sardinia and Corsica. They are not too far apart and we were lest than a kilometer from shore, so it gave us some scenery.
Then we went to the hydrotherapy pool in the thermal suite for our daily visit before our only planned event of the day.
Our dinner plans were the Cirque dreams dinner and show. It was in the Spiegel “tent,” a two floor area with tables around a small ring in the center. There was only one option for dinner. First was a tomato/mozzarella plate, an entree of steak and shrimp and then a plate with three mini desserts. The entree was the best part. Then it was showtime. I was very impressed with the skill of the performers. There were definitely a couple things I hadn’t seen before and some I had, but with new twists. I couldn’t believe everything they were doing in the tiny space in the middle where they performed. It seemed like they were going to end up in the audience’s lap most of the time. My favorite acts were the slack wire, the guy that balanced stuff on a steak knife sticking out of his mouth and the roller skating duo.
After the show, we went to the Newlywed/Not so Newlywed game. This is a cruise staple and hilarious as usual. I was happy for Kory to see this because we hadn’t done any of the other corny cruise activities yet.
For the rest of the night, we just headed back up to the pool bar under the stars and ended our night there. It was a good relaxing day after five port days in a row.
Then we went to the hydrotherapy pool in the thermal suite for our daily visit before our only planned event of the day.
Our dinner plans were the Cirque dreams dinner and show. It was in the Spiegel “tent,” a two floor area with tables around a small ring in the center. There was only one option for dinner. First was a tomato/mozzarella plate, an entree of steak and shrimp and then a plate with three mini desserts. The entree was the best part. Then it was showtime. I was very impressed with the skill of the performers. There were definitely a couple things I hadn’t seen before and some I had, but with new twists. I couldn’t believe everything they were doing in the tiny space in the middle where they performed. It seemed like they were going to end up in the audience’s lap most of the time. My favorite acts were the slack wire, the guy that balanced stuff on a steak knife sticking out of his mouth and the roller skating duo.
After the show, we went to the Newlywed/Not so Newlywed game. This is a cruise staple and hilarious as usual. I was happy for Kory to see this because we hadn’t done any of the other corny cruise activities yet.
For the rest of the night, we just headed back up to the pool bar under the stars and ended our night there. It was a good relaxing day after five port days in a row.
Monday, August 27, 2018
Day 9: Sun. Aug 26. Barcelona
Today we toured one of my favorite, favorite cities, Barcelona. It was overcast all day and sprinkled for a couple minutes here and there, but it didn’t disrupt our adventures at all. One thing that was a little disappointing was that Kory wasn’t able to see how cool Las Ramblas or the shopping areas are because it was Sunday and by government law all the shops and stores are closed. Oh well, next time.
I had booked a private tour for the two of us because there were some places I wanted to stop at longer than others and things I really wanted Kory to see. I didn’t want to be at the mercy of a small group tour and having to keep to the schedule. We met our tour guide, Christian from Germany, at about 8:30 am. He had moved to Spain because that is where his wife is from. He was friendly and knowledgeable. Less of a crazy man than Renee in France.
The tour was an eight hour overview of the sights in Barcelona and it ended up focusing a lot on Gaudi (otherwise the options were seeing more monasteries.) We started the day from a viewpoint over the city on Mountjuic where Christian gave an overview and pointed out the different areas of the city, and how densely populated Barcelona is with 4.5 million people living in a small area.
From there, we saw lots of locations where the 1992 Olympics were held. Unlike other more recent cities where Olympic venues sit vacant after the games end, all the Olympic venues here are still in use. The Olymics were a major development engine and provided the motivation to lift many areas out of squalor. I also thought it was interesting that the main stadium had been built originally for the 1936 Olympics that never happened here, having gone instead to Hitler’s Germany. The Catalonian people wanted to have an alternate Olympics for all that weren’t invited to Germany, but this was when Franco came to power, and that idea was stomped out.
We passed by many other notable Barcelona sights… among them Camp Nou, the home of FC Barcelona, the futbol (soccer) team. It holds 110,000 people! Wow! We also saw Gaudi’s first architectural work, the Guell family “country” house. Everyone was saying Gaudi’s family came from poverty and was crazy, and why offer the money for him to design and build anything. The rich Guell family liked what they saw and gave him a chance at the same time he was commissioned to do Sagrada Familia.
As I am trying to fact check all this with Kory by the way, he says things only happened “long ago, really long ago and ancient,” so he doesn’t remember exact years. I think they said Gaudi was commissioned in 1893 for Sagrada Familia.
I hadn’t been for about 10 years to the Sagrada Familia area of Barcelona, and boy what a difference a decade makes. There is so much construction completed and they say it will be completely done in 2026, for the 100th anniversary of Gaudi’s death. The Nativity facade was the one Gaudi originally completed and I had seen that part before. The passion facade is new to me and was done by a Japanese artist and it is more stark and modern. There is one facade yet to be completed as well as many towers, including the tallest one, which will be 172.5 meters high, slightly shorter than the tallest mountain in the city, because nature will always come before man according to Gaudi.
Background information doesn’t give you a feeling of how special and unique the place is. Whereas Kory says he will remember foremost the enormity of St. Peter’s in the Vatican, I will remember the uniqueness of Sagrada Familia more. It is just such a stark contrast to all other church type places I’ve seen. All the sculptures and detail are on the outside. Once you get to the inside, it is like a forest, with the supports looking similar to tree trunks and the ceilings looking like the undersides of trees. The beautiful stained glass windows are blue and green hues in the east and reds and oranges in the west. It is just so beautiful inside. Simple, but beautiful.
From here we chose to go to another Gaudi project, la Padrera ("the quarry," because there was so much stone and dust.) It was a private project he did in the city center so it was starkly different than the “regular residences” around it. It had the usual nods to nature and an amazing rooftop that was influenced by the four forces of nature; earth, wind, water and fire. There were two arches on the rooftop that framed Sagrada Familia and the church on the top of the mountain out of town. Like everything, the arches served a purpose. What I really like about his projects are that they are like something out of Dr Seuss with no straight lines, but they are also very functional. There were internal ramps to the first underground parking garage as well as separate stairs to the private residence so the owners didn’t have to come in contact with the renters.
By now, it was about 1:30 and we went for lunch. Christian took us to a place he had never been before because his usual places were closed for Aug holiday, (like so many have been in Italy and Spain.) We didn’t catch the name of it, but the food was fantastic. For 15.50 Euro, you got a starter, entrée, dessert, beverage (Kory and I shared house wine… too much probably but it was so good.) I had ham and melon, and then Steak. Kory had Roquefort tortellini and his entrée was some kind of pounded fried chicken cordon blue. He had chocolate cake for dessert that was DELICIOUS (I’ll take his word for it, I didn’t have dessert.)
Last up was Parc Guell, which was a failed development that was intended to be a planned rural community for 60 homes and gardens. No one bought anything, so they converted it to a public park. It was interesting to see, but small. Here again Gaudi was before his time, planning three feet of sand as both a playground for the children as well as a natural filter for water because there was no practical way to get water up there at this time.
We also passed a few bullfighting rings, which is polarizing right now because Catalonia is not allowing bullfighting thought the Spanish government may force it as a Spanish cultural tradition. Also interesting that they speak their own language, more a dialect of French than Spanish. And though there have been efforts to secede, Christian and his wife believe they are going about it the wrong way.
After our eight hour tour, we got back on the ship, went to the thermal spa, and then to our dinner at Moderno Churrascaria. It is one of those restaurants where they keep bringing you meat, more meat, and even more meat. SOOOOOOO Good. I had seven different meats off the skewer. My favorite was bacon wrapped chicken, filet, and brown sugar pineapple. But all of it, including the pork, lamb, sausage and short ribs were good. Only thing I didn’t like was the signature sirloin… too chewy. We may have thought of staying out later before dinner, but we were exhausted after the big dinner and long day of touring so we went to bed at 9:30. All in all, an excellent Barcelona day!
I had booked a private tour for the two of us because there were some places I wanted to stop at longer than others and things I really wanted Kory to see. I didn’t want to be at the mercy of a small group tour and having to keep to the schedule. We met our tour guide, Christian from Germany, at about 8:30 am. He had moved to Spain because that is where his wife is from. He was friendly and knowledgeable. Less of a crazy man than Renee in France.
The tour was an eight hour overview of the sights in Barcelona and it ended up focusing a lot on Gaudi (otherwise the options were seeing more monasteries.) We started the day from a viewpoint over the city on Mountjuic where Christian gave an overview and pointed out the different areas of the city, and how densely populated Barcelona is with 4.5 million people living in a small area.
From there, we saw lots of locations where the 1992 Olympics were held. Unlike other more recent cities where Olympic venues sit vacant after the games end, all the Olympic venues here are still in use. The Olymics were a major development engine and provided the motivation to lift many areas out of squalor. I also thought it was interesting that the main stadium had been built originally for the 1936 Olympics that never happened here, having gone instead to Hitler’s Germany. The Catalonian people wanted to have an alternate Olympics for all that weren’t invited to Germany, but this was when Franco came to power, and that idea was stomped out.
We passed by many other notable Barcelona sights… among them Camp Nou, the home of FC Barcelona, the futbol (soccer) team. It holds 110,000 people! Wow! We also saw Gaudi’s first architectural work, the Guell family “country” house. Everyone was saying Gaudi’s family came from poverty and was crazy, and why offer the money for him to design and build anything. The rich Guell family liked what they saw and gave him a chance at the same time he was commissioned to do Sagrada Familia.
As I am trying to fact check all this with Kory by the way, he says things only happened “long ago, really long ago and ancient,” so he doesn’t remember exact years. I think they said Gaudi was commissioned in 1893 for Sagrada Familia.
I hadn’t been for about 10 years to the Sagrada Familia area of Barcelona, and boy what a difference a decade makes. There is so much construction completed and they say it will be completely done in 2026, for the 100th anniversary of Gaudi’s death. The Nativity facade was the one Gaudi originally completed and I had seen that part before. The passion facade is new to me and was done by a Japanese artist and it is more stark and modern. There is one facade yet to be completed as well as many towers, including the tallest one, which will be 172.5 meters high, slightly shorter than the tallest mountain in the city, because nature will always come before man according to Gaudi.
Background information doesn’t give you a feeling of how special and unique the place is. Whereas Kory says he will remember foremost the enormity of St. Peter’s in the Vatican, I will remember the uniqueness of Sagrada Familia more. It is just such a stark contrast to all other church type places I’ve seen. All the sculptures and detail are on the outside. Once you get to the inside, it is like a forest, with the supports looking similar to tree trunks and the ceilings looking like the undersides of trees. The beautiful stained glass windows are blue and green hues in the east and reds and oranges in the west. It is just so beautiful inside. Simple, but beautiful.
From here we chose to go to another Gaudi project, la Padrera ("the quarry," because there was so much stone and dust.) It was a private project he did in the city center so it was starkly different than the “regular residences” around it. It had the usual nods to nature and an amazing rooftop that was influenced by the four forces of nature; earth, wind, water and fire. There were two arches on the rooftop that framed Sagrada Familia and the church on the top of the mountain out of town. Like everything, the arches served a purpose. What I really like about his projects are that they are like something out of Dr Seuss with no straight lines, but they are also very functional. There were internal ramps to the first underground parking garage as well as separate stairs to the private residence so the owners didn’t have to come in contact with the renters.
By now, it was about 1:30 and we went for lunch. Christian took us to a place he had never been before because his usual places were closed for Aug holiday, (like so many have been in Italy and Spain.) We didn’t catch the name of it, but the food was fantastic. For 15.50 Euro, you got a starter, entrée, dessert, beverage (Kory and I shared house wine… too much probably but it was so good.) I had ham and melon, and then Steak. Kory had Roquefort tortellini and his entrée was some kind of pounded fried chicken cordon blue. He had chocolate cake for dessert that was DELICIOUS (I’ll take his word for it, I didn’t have dessert.)
Last up was Parc Guell, which was a failed development that was intended to be a planned rural community for 60 homes and gardens. No one bought anything, so they converted it to a public park. It was interesting to see, but small. Here again Gaudi was before his time, planning three feet of sand as both a playground for the children as well as a natural filter for water because there was no practical way to get water up there at this time.
We also passed a few bullfighting rings, which is polarizing right now because Catalonia is not allowing bullfighting thought the Spanish government may force it as a Spanish cultural tradition. Also interesting that they speak their own language, more a dialect of French than Spanish. And though there have been efforts to secede, Christian and his wife believe they are going about it the wrong way.
After our eight hour tour, we got back on the ship, went to the thermal spa, and then to our dinner at Moderno Churrascaria. It is one of those restaurants where they keep bringing you meat, more meat, and even more meat. SOOOOOOO Good. I had seven different meats off the skewer. My favorite was bacon wrapped chicken, filet, and brown sugar pineapple. But all of it, including the pork, lamb, sausage and short ribs were good. Only thing I didn’t like was the signature sirloin… too chewy. We may have thought of staying out later before dinner, but we were exhausted after the big dinner and long day of touring so we went to bed at 9:30. All in all, an excellent Barcelona day!
Sunday, August 26, 2018
Day 8: Sat. Aug 25. Palma de Mallorca
As promised, today’s update will be short. We woke up at 9, but then dozed til around 10:30 to recover from the last few days. We got ready, had a little lunch at the buffet and then headed off the ship at about 1:30 pm.
This was the one port that I didn’t make any plans for. It looks like mostly a beach island in the Mediterranean with nothing too interesting as far as history or notable things to see. It was a mistake not having any plan at all. Kory will remember today as a death march in the heat. We walked about 3.5 miles in the three hours we were off the ship. It was a long walk along the water to get to any civilization. Then we were just looking for the local pastry that you can only get here, “Ensaimada.” It is basically a flattened cream puff like pastry, but without the cream. They did have with the cream in the middle so I got that. Kory got a caramelized cream and coconut topped one. You can get them with other flavors, or plain too. They were pretty tasty. Then we just wandered the narrow streets with tons of stores for a little bit before we cabbed it back to the ship.
We went to the spa and got passes for the Thermal Suite. It is a really cool area with saunas, relaxation showers, hot stone beds and a hydro therapy pool. The pool was the best part with a bunch of different areas to lay or sit with water jets blasting on you. We’ll probably hit this up again in the next few days.
Then it was off to dinner. We ate at one of the two main (and included) dining rooms for the first time. It was called “The Manhattan Room,” and was really huge. We got seated at a great table near the back of the ship. There were windows so we could watch Mallorca get smaller and smaller in the distance as we sailed away. Dinner tonight was fairly normal, nothing exciting. We both had the stuffed chicken. Then we went to the “Burn the Floor” show. It was excellent. Great dancing with all different styles and quick changes. Now off to bed before Barcelona tomorrow. So excited for Kory to see it!
This was the one port that I didn’t make any plans for. It looks like mostly a beach island in the Mediterranean with nothing too interesting as far as history or notable things to see. It was a mistake not having any plan at all. Kory will remember today as a death march in the heat. We walked about 3.5 miles in the three hours we were off the ship. It was a long walk along the water to get to any civilization. Then we were just looking for the local pastry that you can only get here, “Ensaimada.” It is basically a flattened cream puff like pastry, but without the cream. They did have with the cream in the middle so I got that. Kory got a caramelized cream and coconut topped one. You can get them with other flavors, or plain too. They were pretty tasty. Then we just wandered the narrow streets with tons of stores for a little bit before we cabbed it back to the ship.
We went to the spa and got passes for the Thermal Suite. It is a really cool area with saunas, relaxation showers, hot stone beds and a hydro therapy pool. The pool was the best part with a bunch of different areas to lay or sit with water jets blasting on you. We’ll probably hit this up again in the next few days.
Then it was off to dinner. We ate at one of the two main (and included) dining rooms for the first time. It was called “The Manhattan Room,” and was really huge. We got seated at a great table near the back of the ship. There were windows so we could watch Mallorca get smaller and smaller in the distance as we sailed away. Dinner tonight was fairly normal, nothing exciting. We both had the stuffed chicken. Then we went to the “Burn the Floor” show. It was excellent. Great dancing with all different styles and quick changes. Now off to bed before Barcelona tomorrow. So excited for Kory to see it!
Saturday, August 25, 2018
Day 7: Fri, Aug 24. The French Riviera
Another early morning! To get off the ship into Cannes we had to tender… which is annoying. They try to keep it organized but it is just a time eater and 10 step process. Complicating things for us was that we needed to meet up with our tour group that I found on Cruise Critic. The small group tours that I had found before the trip didn’t have enough people to make a go of it, so that is why I decided we would join this other one. Well, when we went down to the area where they organize groups to get off the ship it was absolute bedlam, with about 500 people all crammed in and trying to get through. We were almost through when we heard the ladies name behind us… so we did eventually find them. Thank goodness. Otherwise we would have been tourless! I guess that is a risk you take not going on ship excursions, but I can’t stand the huge bus tours.
Took about an hour for them to wrangle us from the ship, onto the boat, to shore and off the tender. Then we found our tour guides. The majority of this big group was going on a bus, but then eight extra people, us included, got our own van and guide. It worked out absolutely perfectly and couldn’t have went better! Which we learned later wasn’t the case on the big bus. So we lucked out again.
Our guide was Renee from Holland who speaks six languages and has been living in Nice for 22 years. He was THE BEST guide I can remember. He talked non-stop about interesting things, threw in his own hilarious commentary and just overall read and interacted with our crazy group well. The other six people on our tour were travelling together from Pittsburgh, so since Kory has family in that area, we were instant friends. One lady was taking pictures with her terrible towel everywhere which was hilarious. She says she takes it on all trips to pose with.
This tour, unlike the others we have taken so far, was more of a panoramic drive along the entire beautiful coast line with just a few stops along the way. It was actually a nice break from walking for hours on end like the last few days. It has been unbelievably hot the entire trip… which is better than cold or rainy, but that takes a lot out of you.
We started driving from Cannes, which I thought was a much larger city. It has a population of only 90,000 and they have beautiful sand beaches. It is naturally rocky, so they import sand from Spain. All of the rest of the beaches we would pass had dark pebbles leading into the water. Cannes is famous for the film festival of course, so we heard about that and saw where they show the films and where Elton John has his charity ball every year.
We continued driving and got to Nice, with the second busiest airport in France. It was interesting because they built it on reclaimed land in the water, and planes look like they are going to land right in the sea. Nice is also the fifth biggest city in France. We had a stop at the flower market. They had the flower vendors first, and then it was more of a farmers market with fruits, vegetables, oils and spices. It was so French… or what I imagined it should be. I have been to Paris several times and I enjoyed this area much more than the dirty, overpopulated, metropolitan city. We got some olive oils to take back home. We also bought some almond croissants from a vendor and they were delicious ! ! ! I haven’t eaten many croissants at home, but I would every day here. And they were only 1 Euro a piece.
After spending some time wandering Nice, we continued on to Eze, a little mid evil city along the coast. This was definitely the most unexpected place of the trip. It was absolutely gorgeous, built in the 15th century with lots of little paths between leading up to the top of the mountain. When we hit the lottery, we will come live here! It is so small and peaceful… No cars. There are two hotels with about 10 rooms each and they have to hump the bags up the mountain to get them to your room… So cool!
We then continued to our last stop on the coast, Monaco. I have seen it in so many movies that it was almost surreal to be there in person. It is like Disney World. It looks almost fake because everything is kept so pristine. It almost seemed like something from a storybook. Renee said there is no crime because there are cameras and police everywhere. Along our drive he talked all about how Grace Kelly made Monaco the place to be and the whole story of how it is a principality, and the prince must continue the bloodline or the area will go to France. The royal family owns everything. Casinos, hotels, car dealerships, beach club, yacht club, banks… everything. He gave all the gossip on the Royal family. It was also crazy to see the absolute extreme lavishness of everything there. Kids sit around waiting for the best cars to drive by to take pictures of them. And there were also half a billion dollar yachts sitting in the port. Just all so out of my world.
We then headed back to the ship after a day of seeing the fabulous coast… some day French Riviera… some day. After we win the lottery, we’ll be back. Among our awesome tour guide Renee’s funny observations:
• Grace Kelly was a bitch
• Russian prostitutes are everywhere (in Monaco)
• At night… all the cats are grey
• Once you’ve seen one boob, you’ve seen them all
• The French are never happy… They have 31 days of paid time off a year, get a 12 euro coupon for lunch each day, and work 35 hours a week and they still think that’s terrible
• … and tons more …
Back on the ship, we headed back to Shakers Martini Bar to continue making our way through the martini list and combine and edit our photos for the day. Then we briefly stopped by the art auction, but nothing was our abstract style and we had to get to our French dinner at “Le Bistro.” We had a fantastic waitress and the dinner was good. Another nummy steak (peppercorn,) for me and jumbo shrimp for Kory. We also had some fancy champagne to start the meal, so I was feeling real, real French. Then we made our way back upstairs because they were going to have the Glow party up on deck, but the boat was really really rocking and rolling so it got moved inside. We had a drink up there, and then took one down to the Glow thing inside. Needless to say that we didn’t stay long because it wasn’t as awesome as the 80’s deck party.
We get to sleep in tomorrow … HOORAY!!! We don’t get to Mallorca until 1 pm. We don’t have anything planned, so it will be a much smaller post tomorrow!
Took about an hour for them to wrangle us from the ship, onto the boat, to shore and off the tender. Then we found our tour guides. The majority of this big group was going on a bus, but then eight extra people, us included, got our own van and guide. It worked out absolutely perfectly and couldn’t have went better! Which we learned later wasn’t the case on the big bus. So we lucked out again.
Our guide was Renee from Holland who speaks six languages and has been living in Nice for 22 years. He was THE BEST guide I can remember. He talked non-stop about interesting things, threw in his own hilarious commentary and just overall read and interacted with our crazy group well. The other six people on our tour were travelling together from Pittsburgh, so since Kory has family in that area, we were instant friends. One lady was taking pictures with her terrible towel everywhere which was hilarious. She says she takes it on all trips to pose with.
This tour, unlike the others we have taken so far, was more of a panoramic drive along the entire beautiful coast line with just a few stops along the way. It was actually a nice break from walking for hours on end like the last few days. It has been unbelievably hot the entire trip… which is better than cold or rainy, but that takes a lot out of you.
We started driving from Cannes, which I thought was a much larger city. It has a population of only 90,000 and they have beautiful sand beaches. It is naturally rocky, so they import sand from Spain. All of the rest of the beaches we would pass had dark pebbles leading into the water. Cannes is famous for the film festival of course, so we heard about that and saw where they show the films and where Elton John has his charity ball every year.
We continued driving and got to Nice, with the second busiest airport in France. It was interesting because they built it on reclaimed land in the water, and planes look like they are going to land right in the sea. Nice is also the fifth biggest city in France. We had a stop at the flower market. They had the flower vendors first, and then it was more of a farmers market with fruits, vegetables, oils and spices. It was so French… or what I imagined it should be. I have been to Paris several times and I enjoyed this area much more than the dirty, overpopulated, metropolitan city. We got some olive oils to take back home. We also bought some almond croissants from a vendor and they were delicious ! ! ! I haven’t eaten many croissants at home, but I would every day here. And they were only 1 Euro a piece.
After spending some time wandering Nice, we continued on to Eze, a little mid evil city along the coast. This was definitely the most unexpected place of the trip. It was absolutely gorgeous, built in the 15th century with lots of little paths between leading up to the top of the mountain. When we hit the lottery, we will come live here! It is so small and peaceful… No cars. There are two hotels with about 10 rooms each and they have to hump the bags up the mountain to get them to your room… So cool!
We then continued to our last stop on the coast, Monaco. I have seen it in so many movies that it was almost surreal to be there in person. It is like Disney World. It looks almost fake because everything is kept so pristine. It almost seemed like something from a storybook. Renee said there is no crime because there are cameras and police everywhere. Along our drive he talked all about how Grace Kelly made Monaco the place to be and the whole story of how it is a principality, and the prince must continue the bloodline or the area will go to France. The royal family owns everything. Casinos, hotels, car dealerships, beach club, yacht club, banks… everything. He gave all the gossip on the Royal family. It was also crazy to see the absolute extreme lavishness of everything there. Kids sit around waiting for the best cars to drive by to take pictures of them. And there were also half a billion dollar yachts sitting in the port. Just all so out of my world.
We then headed back to the ship after a day of seeing the fabulous coast… some day French Riviera… some day. After we win the lottery, we’ll be back. Among our awesome tour guide Renee’s funny observations:
• Grace Kelly was a bitch
• Russian prostitutes are everywhere (in Monaco)
• At night… all the cats are grey
• Once you’ve seen one boob, you’ve seen them all
• The French are never happy… They have 31 days of paid time off a year, get a 12 euro coupon for lunch each day, and work 35 hours a week and they still think that’s terrible
• … and tons more …
Back on the ship, we headed back to Shakers Martini Bar to continue making our way through the martini list and combine and edit our photos for the day. Then we briefly stopped by the art auction, but nothing was our abstract style and we had to get to our French dinner at “Le Bistro.” We had a fantastic waitress and the dinner was good. Another nummy steak (peppercorn,) for me and jumbo shrimp for Kory. We also had some fancy champagne to start the meal, so I was feeling real, real French. Then we made our way back upstairs because they were going to have the Glow party up on deck, but the boat was really really rocking and rolling so it got moved inside. We had a drink up there, and then took one down to the Glow thing inside. Needless to say that we didn’t stay long because it wasn’t as awesome as the 80’s deck party.
We get to sleep in tomorrow … HOORAY!!! We don’t get to Mallorca until 1 pm. We don’t have anything planned, so it will be a much smaller post tomorrow!
Friday, August 24, 2018
Day 6: Thur. Aug 23. Florence and Pisa.
Today we got up bright and early to get off the ship at 7 am for our small group tour of eight people to Florence and Pisa. It took about an hour or so to get from the Livonia cruise port to Florence. Our first stop was Michelangelo Plaza where we overlooked the city of Florence. It was breathtaking. I don’t take that term lightly. It was so beautiful looking down and seeing the river, the basilica and all the other beautiful buildings and settings. This is how the Italy of my imagination looks.
This is also where we saw streets getting blocked off and screeching cars below. Through the day there were many other areas blocked and helicopters flying around above. We came to discover Michael Bay is filming his new romantic comedy in Florence… Just kidding… His new Netflix action series Six Underground.
From the Plaza we made our way down into the city and met our guide for a two hour walking tour of Florence. Our guide was good, a no-nonsense Italian woman that reminds me of Aunt Peggy. She talked a little about Florence in general before we went to see “David.” It really is an impressive sculpture when you are standing in front of it in person. This is another case where I didn’t really understand it’s scale and how big it is. Also standing close it is absolutely crazy to me how intricate David is. I don’t have an artistic bone in my body so I really was in awe of it.
From here we walked down the streets and made our way to the Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore which has the famous red cupola and Giotto’s Bell Tower right next to it. Right across the street was the “Baptisere” which is the oldest religious building still standing in Florence. Again, awe at these buildings that are so so beautiful and so so old. There had to be in excess of 100 life size sculptures on the church and bell tower, each one would be amazing in their own right, but they are just .01% of sculptures, paintings, stonework and everything else that makes up this area.
We then saw some other old structures that survived the war, from the old tower houses to the Ponte Vecchio (the old bridge.) The bridge was cool looking and now houses all the gold vendors. We also heard extensively about the history of the Medicis. They were a banking family that rose to prominence in the first half of the 15th century and funded much of Italy’s Renaissance activity. They had the Cappelle Medicee (Medici Castle) built as well as private passageways between the various buildings of the Uffizi, which includes the oldest art museum. Of this part of the tour, my favorite was the bridge with the vendors on it. There were buildings on both sides with all the gold vendors and it just looked so Italy from the river’s edge.
Following our two hour tour, we were cut loose to wander for two hours. Out guide had pointed out a good area to eat that had more local restaurants and wasn’t so touristy, and she also showed us where one of the oldest gelato places was, (that she considers the best.) We had pizza at Il Grande Nutti… I had spicy sausage (so good,) and Kory had a Fiorentina pizza with thin salami, peppers and some other Mediterranean toppings like olives or something… so his was way more authentic. Then we made our way to Festival del Gelato and got the first Gelato of my life. I am boring so I just got caramel and vanilla and Kory got dark chocolate and caramel for his flavors. They were both good. I am not a sweets eater generally, but I think as far as deserts go, they were pretty tasty.
After we wandered a bit more we met back up with our driver and went to Pisa. Not much doing in Pisa, except for the leaning tower. I think once you get the obligatory picture there is not much else exciting to do in this area. I am happy we went, but don’t need to go back again.
We were back to port just a couple minutes after 4 pm, but had to wait a little over an hour to get back on the Epic because they had to move her from where she was parked in the morning over to a different dock because other traffic had to get through. Our driver said he had never seen that happen. He was a funny nice fellow… didn’t speak much English but was like an uber driver… offering water, wipes, sanitizer, candy, and ended the tour by giving us Florence magnets.
We went back on the ship and headed to the Shakers Martini Bar. We are going to make our way through this list of martinis before the end of the cruise, I know that! Citrus Gem, French Raspberry, Apple Blossom, Le Fizz, Lavendar Patch, Peach Nectar, Aviation, Basil Cucumber Twist, Rum Caske and a few more……… Sooooooo goooooood.
Then we went to the 7 pm show… “Priscilla, Queen of the Dessert,” one of our faves! It was so well done for a cruise ship… probably the best cruise ship show I have seen. Makes me excited for the other shows we are going to see.
For dinner, everything looked pretty packed, so we sat at the noodle bar and watched the chefs make our noodles, spring rolls and pot stickers. It was a fine dinner, nothing spectacular, but good. Then we went to the top deck for the 80’s dance part at the Spice2o adult outdoor area. There are some friendly bartenders here that remember us from last night. After a few more drinks we hit the dance floor and danced til midnight. Dancing while we were sailing to the next port was a super time and for those keeping count, ended an 18 hour day. SO MUCH FUN… More updates coming… 8 am tour in the French Riviera tomorrow!
This is also where we saw streets getting blocked off and screeching cars below. Through the day there were many other areas blocked and helicopters flying around above. We came to discover Michael Bay is filming his new romantic comedy in Florence… Just kidding… His new Netflix action series Six Underground.
From the Plaza we made our way down into the city and met our guide for a two hour walking tour of Florence. Our guide was good, a no-nonsense Italian woman that reminds me of Aunt Peggy. She talked a little about Florence in general before we went to see “David.” It really is an impressive sculpture when you are standing in front of it in person. This is another case where I didn’t really understand it’s scale and how big it is. Also standing close it is absolutely crazy to me how intricate David is. I don’t have an artistic bone in my body so I really was in awe of it.
From here we walked down the streets and made our way to the Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore which has the famous red cupola and Giotto’s Bell Tower right next to it. Right across the street was the “Baptisere” which is the oldest religious building still standing in Florence. Again, awe at these buildings that are so so beautiful and so so old. There had to be in excess of 100 life size sculptures on the church and bell tower, each one would be amazing in their own right, but they are just .01% of sculptures, paintings, stonework and everything else that makes up this area.
We then saw some other old structures that survived the war, from the old tower houses to the Ponte Vecchio (the old bridge.) The bridge was cool looking and now houses all the gold vendors. We also heard extensively about the history of the Medicis. They were a banking family that rose to prominence in the first half of the 15th century and funded much of Italy’s Renaissance activity. They had the Cappelle Medicee (Medici Castle) built as well as private passageways between the various buildings of the Uffizi, which includes the oldest art museum. Of this part of the tour, my favorite was the bridge with the vendors on it. There were buildings on both sides with all the gold vendors and it just looked so Italy from the river’s edge.
Following our two hour tour, we were cut loose to wander for two hours. Out guide had pointed out a good area to eat that had more local restaurants and wasn’t so touristy, and she also showed us where one of the oldest gelato places was, (that she considers the best.) We had pizza at Il Grande Nutti… I had spicy sausage (so good,) and Kory had a Fiorentina pizza with thin salami, peppers and some other Mediterranean toppings like olives or something… so his was way more authentic. Then we made our way to Festival del Gelato and got the first Gelato of my life. I am boring so I just got caramel and vanilla and Kory got dark chocolate and caramel for his flavors. They were both good. I am not a sweets eater generally, but I think as far as deserts go, they were pretty tasty.
After we wandered a bit more we met back up with our driver and went to Pisa. Not much doing in Pisa, except for the leaning tower. I think once you get the obligatory picture there is not much else exciting to do in this area. I am happy we went, but don’t need to go back again.
We were back to port just a couple minutes after 4 pm, but had to wait a little over an hour to get back on the Epic because they had to move her from where she was parked in the morning over to a different dock because other traffic had to get through. Our driver said he had never seen that happen. He was a funny nice fellow… didn’t speak much English but was like an uber driver… offering water, wipes, sanitizer, candy, and ended the tour by giving us Florence magnets.
We went back on the ship and headed to the Shakers Martini Bar. We are going to make our way through this list of martinis before the end of the cruise, I know that! Citrus Gem, French Raspberry, Apple Blossom, Le Fizz, Lavendar Patch, Peach Nectar, Aviation, Basil Cucumber Twist, Rum Caske and a few more……… Sooooooo goooooood.
Then we went to the 7 pm show… “Priscilla, Queen of the Dessert,” one of our faves! It was so well done for a cruise ship… probably the best cruise ship show I have seen. Makes me excited for the other shows we are going to see.
For dinner, everything looked pretty packed, so we sat at the noodle bar and watched the chefs make our noodles, spring rolls and pot stickers. It was a fine dinner, nothing spectacular, but good. Then we went to the top deck for the 80’s dance part at the Spice2o adult outdoor area. There are some friendly bartenders here that remember us from last night. After a few more drinks we hit the dance floor and danced til midnight. Dancing while we were sailing to the next port was a super time and for those keeping count, ended an 18 hour day. SO MUCH FUN… More updates coming… 8 am tour in the French Riviera tomorrow!
Thursday, August 23, 2018
Day 5: Wed. Aug 22. Vatican City and Boarding the Cruise
Today we were up bright and early to meet our early entry tour of the Vatican. It started at 7:30 am at the Vatican Museums. Our guide was Chad from Colorado. He has lived in Rome for 13 years studying fine art. He gave us about 30 min of background information on the Sistene Chapal and a zillion different interesting facts, anecdotes and things to look for. I am very happy for this, or I really wouldn’t have know what I was looking at. My favorite story was that all winged birds were considered messangers of the gods/foretellers of the truth… even chickens. Seeds would be thrown in front of chickens before battle, and if the chickens ate it, that meant you would be lucky in battle and win. If they didn’t eat it, you were sure to lose, so they wouldn’t start the battle. One leader threw some seed down and the chickens didn’t eat it… He got impatient and said if they won’t eat, let them drink and he went into battle anyway. He suffered a blistering defeat and learned the lesson… Heed the chickens!
Anyways, back to the Vatican museums and the Sistine chapel. The Sistine chapel is one of those places where you just stand in awe of almost perfectly preserved artwork from another age. It really is something when you are standing in the middle of the room surrounded by all this art and storytelling. It was also nice to be there early before the hoards of people came, like later in the day when we passed through again. It struck me how popular the Creation of Adam section is, iconic really, when that is only one teeny tiny part of the overall work… and to me there were much more interesting parts of it. I liked the last judgement wall and the good vs evil story in that.
We also wandered around the Vatican Museums for a bit, and man are they massive!!! One could probably spend a week in there and not see it all. We saw a little of everything. Tapestries strung with gold that took five – six years to make (each!) Lots of sculptures and portraits. And many, many other trinkets. I found it interesting how Egyptian influenced many of the areas, exhibits and settings were.
From there we went right to St. Peter’s Basilica. The place is absolutely massive. It was another case of me seeing it in movies and on tv and not really understanding the scale of it. As a building project I can’t imagine how it was designed and built. I looked at Kory at one point and said that it seems like there are about two dozen little churches inside. It really made me feel small… Which I guess is probably the idea. There were some beautiful sculptures and I really liked the detail in almost the entire building.
That was enough church for me for one day… so then we wandered around the area a little, walked through some parks and then headed back to the hotel to head out for the cruise ship.
I had prearranged a transfer with Stefano’s Rome Cabs that I found on trip advisor. Our driver was right on time, spoke no English and got us to the port in about an hour.
Check in didn’t take more than about a half hour and then we were on the ship. I was sooooooo excited ! ! ! We have a nice big balcony room… #8187.
We spent the late afternoon wandering the ship and getting our bearings. It is the largest ship I have been on, with around 4,500 passangers and 1,700 crew members. Then we sat at the bar in Spice H2O., the adult pool deck area, drinking Bahama Mamas and Moscow Mules and it REALLY felt like we were on vacation! We spent our time there going through our Rome photos and deleting bad ones, editing good ones and then it was time for sail away. We are sitting on our balcony with the soothing sound of waves hitting the ship as the sun sets. This is the life!
Anyways, back to the Vatican museums and the Sistine chapel. The Sistine chapel is one of those places where you just stand in awe of almost perfectly preserved artwork from another age. It really is something when you are standing in the middle of the room surrounded by all this art and storytelling. It was also nice to be there early before the hoards of people came, like later in the day when we passed through again. It struck me how popular the Creation of Adam section is, iconic really, when that is only one teeny tiny part of the overall work… and to me there were much more interesting parts of it. I liked the last judgement wall and the good vs evil story in that.
We also wandered around the Vatican Museums for a bit, and man are they massive!!! One could probably spend a week in there and not see it all. We saw a little of everything. Tapestries strung with gold that took five – six years to make (each!) Lots of sculptures and portraits. And many, many other trinkets. I found it interesting how Egyptian influenced many of the areas, exhibits and settings were.
From there we went right to St. Peter’s Basilica. The place is absolutely massive. It was another case of me seeing it in movies and on tv and not really understanding the scale of it. As a building project I can’t imagine how it was designed and built. I looked at Kory at one point and said that it seems like there are about two dozen little churches inside. It really made me feel small… Which I guess is probably the idea. There were some beautiful sculptures and I really liked the detail in almost the entire building.
That was enough church for me for one day… so then we wandered around the area a little, walked through some parks and then headed back to the hotel to head out for the cruise ship.
I had prearranged a transfer with Stefano’s Rome Cabs that I found on trip advisor. Our driver was right on time, spoke no English and got us to the port in about an hour.
Check in didn’t take more than about a half hour and then we were on the ship. I was sooooooo excited ! ! ! We have a nice big balcony room… #8187.
We spent the late afternoon wandering the ship and getting our bearings. It is the largest ship I have been on, with around 4,500 passangers and 1,700 crew members. Then we sat at the bar in Spice H2O., the adult pool deck area, drinking Bahama Mamas and Moscow Mules and it REALLY felt like we were on vacation! We spent our time there going through our Rome photos and deleting bad ones, editing good ones and then it was time for sail away. We are sitting on our balcony with the soothing sound of waves hitting the ship as the sun sets. This is the life!
Tuesday, August 21, 2018
Day 3: Mon. Aug 20. Travel Day into Day 4: Tues. Aug 20 Rome Marathon Sightseeing
I am writing this from a state of complete exhaustion. We have been up for a day and a half, having just napped a little on the plane. Excuse any errors as I fired this post off before bed.
Monday in New York was a low key day. We had farewell bagels at a local place with Kory's family. New York bagels... I could probably eat four in one sitting because I am a carb monster. So good.
Then we wandered around the Lower East side for a few hours, making it up to the Flat Iron building, which we love and have over our bed. We figured we better walk for a while since we were going to be sitting on the plane for a long time. We had late check out at 2 since I am Holiday Inn elite from the nights I have to spend at the fabulous Holiday Inn Express Oshkosh for work... That finally paid off in some way at least!
We returned from our walk at 2 exactly, got an Uber and headed to JFK. The Uber cost about $60 and took around 45 min. Definitely the most expensive Uber I have taken, but worth it so we didn't have to hump our bags around the train.
At JFK, check in went smooth at the British Airways counter... the nice guy waived Kory's second bag $100 fee, so that was swell of him. We got through security in a couple minutes and had two hours to kill. We got okay salads and overpriced Aloha Mules at an airport restaurant ($18 each... yikes!) Then we checked out the Alaska Lounge since my AmEx card gets us in there... It was a super cool trendy setting and peaceful, but the food options (not that we were hungry,) left something to be desired. But a good place to charge our phones.
We boarded our flight at 5:45 pm. We were in BA World Traveler Plus which = Premium Economy. It was it's own separate little cabin, which was cool. We got boarding champagne and I don't know that a whole lot else was different other than we had nice big chairs with a footrest and bigger screen... which is sweet for a tall guy like me. The six hour flight went without incident and we arrived in London at 6:30 am. A two hour layover was perfect to get to our connecting flight to Rome, which was without incident. It was 2.5 hours long and we got to Rome at noon. I had an airport transfer set up since a cab or a private driver is the same fixed cost.
We checked into the "Le Meridian Visconti Rome" at about 1:30. We got an upgraded room with my AmEx benefit of Starwood Gold Status. The room was super trendy and fairly large for a major metropoliatan area hotel (about twice the size of our NY hotel.) Also got a great travel agent discount here and picked it because it was near the Vatican.
We were exhausted and knew that we had to keep going or we would be down for the count wanting sleep so we ordered a taxi on the mytaxi app... I read about it before departure since Lyft doesn't exist here and Uber has a small and expensive presence. It worked perfect. I love technology. Our cab showed up immediately and he took us over to the Colosseum.
The Colosseum is really a sight to behold. I had seen it in travel videos and whatnot, but standing under it you really feel the size of it and the history it holds. Really quite crazy how it was built, how long it has been there and all the history throughout the ages that happened where I was standing.
I am briefly going to say that we then spent about three hours walking and hit the Roman Forum, Pantheon, Trevi Fountain and Spanish steps. You will forgive me if I wait to talk about those because I am beat and need some sleep.
We just got back from dinner at a little place near our hotel. I had delicious orecchiette pasta with broccoli and sausage, and some really good desert... I don't know what it was. I don't think Kory's lasagna was anything out of the ordinary, but he really loved his Tiramisu desert... and we both loved the bottle of 9 Euro table wine... Can't beat that price, and it was delicious.
Going to get some beauty sleep now since we have to be at the Vatican at 7 am for our early entry tour... More adventures to come.
Monday in New York was a low key day. We had farewell bagels at a local place with Kory's family. New York bagels... I could probably eat four in one sitting because I am a carb monster. So good.
Then we wandered around the Lower East side for a few hours, making it up to the Flat Iron building, which we love and have over our bed. We figured we better walk for a while since we were going to be sitting on the plane for a long time. We had late check out at 2 since I am Holiday Inn elite from the nights I have to spend at the fabulous Holiday Inn Express Oshkosh for work... That finally paid off in some way at least!
We returned from our walk at 2 exactly, got an Uber and headed to JFK. The Uber cost about $60 and took around 45 min. Definitely the most expensive Uber I have taken, but worth it so we didn't have to hump our bags around the train.
At JFK, check in went smooth at the British Airways counter... the nice guy waived Kory's second bag $100 fee, so that was swell of him. We got through security in a couple minutes and had two hours to kill. We got okay salads and overpriced Aloha Mules at an airport restaurant ($18 each... yikes!) Then we checked out the Alaska Lounge since my AmEx card gets us in there... It was a super cool trendy setting and peaceful, but the food options (not that we were hungry,) left something to be desired. But a good place to charge our phones.
We boarded our flight at 5:45 pm. We were in BA World Traveler Plus which = Premium Economy. It was it's own separate little cabin, which was cool. We got boarding champagne and I don't know that a whole lot else was different other than we had nice big chairs with a footrest and bigger screen... which is sweet for a tall guy like me. The six hour flight went without incident and we arrived in London at 6:30 am. A two hour layover was perfect to get to our connecting flight to Rome, which was without incident. It was 2.5 hours long and we got to Rome at noon. I had an airport transfer set up since a cab or a private driver is the same fixed cost.
We checked into the "Le Meridian Visconti Rome" at about 1:30. We got an upgraded room with my AmEx benefit of Starwood Gold Status. The room was super trendy and fairly large for a major metropoliatan area hotel (about twice the size of our NY hotel.) Also got a great travel agent discount here and picked it because it was near the Vatican.
We were exhausted and knew that we had to keep going or we would be down for the count wanting sleep so we ordered a taxi on the mytaxi app... I read about it before departure since Lyft doesn't exist here and Uber has a small and expensive presence. It worked perfect. I love technology. Our cab showed up immediately and he took us over to the Colosseum.
The Colosseum is really a sight to behold. I had seen it in travel videos and whatnot, but standing under it you really feel the size of it and the history it holds. Really quite crazy how it was built, how long it has been there and all the history throughout the ages that happened where I was standing.
I am briefly going to say that we then spent about three hours walking and hit the Roman Forum, Pantheon, Trevi Fountain and Spanish steps. You will forgive me if I wait to talk about those because I am beat and need some sleep.
We just got back from dinner at a little place near our hotel. I had delicious orecchiette pasta with broccoli and sausage, and some really good desert... I don't know what it was. I don't think Kory's lasagna was anything out of the ordinary, but he really loved his Tiramisu desert... and we both loved the bottle of 9 Euro table wine... Can't beat that price, and it was delicious.
Going to get some beauty sleep now since we have to be at the Vatican at 7 am for our early entry tour... More adventures to come.
Monday, August 20, 2018
Day 2: Sun. Aug 19. Harry Potter Day
The activity today was the catalyst for the whole rest of the trip. When I saw that Harry Potter and the Cursed Child was going to open on Broadway... I knew Kory had to go! I tried to enter the Ticketmaster Verified Fan presale before Christmas, but alas, I did not get any tickets when I tried for that. In January, normal tickets went on sale and I battled Ticketmaster for tickets, (which I have much experience with... stupid Ticketmaster.) I was searching all different days and times to try and find when there were available tickets. I found some availability and bought tickets for this date... a long long time before the show opened or we would be going... I am so impatient. I hated that I would have to wait seven months!
Harry Potter day started with breakfast near our hotel at the Recovery Diner. I had their specialty hash which was three eggs over corned beef hash in some sauce with pico on top of it. It was pretty good... and unique.
From there, we caught the Subway up to Times Square and the show. Part 1 was at 2 pm and Part 2 started at 7:30 pm. The Lyric theater is absolutely beautiful and newly remodeled just for this show. They had a slick efficient operation that is like Disney. Everything everywhere themed, bar options in several places, a little store you could go in and buy snacks, people in the theater that would bring you concessions and merchandise that changed based on what had happened in the show. It was all very well done.
I won't say too much about the show... Their whole spiel is #KeepTheSecrets. Suffice to say, it was about six hours total of Harry Potter awesomeness. We had 5th row aisle seats which were awesome. It was cool seeing everything up close. The special effects, acting, story, set, just everything was amazing. I have never seen something quite like it. I love how different plays and musicals can be. It was an engaging experience. They definitely won't be able to tour this show. It is so immersive and normal theaters won't be able to support what they do here. It annoyed me before that it was two shows and two spots on our schedule, but it was totally worth it.
Between shows we ate at O'Donoghue's Bar... Fish and Chips. It was perfectly serviceable. Nothing amazing, but good for an in-between show meal. Then we went to Hershey's World where they had a little area where you could buy giant S'mores. S'mores are my second favorite desert, after Cannoli... so I have now had my two favorite deserts and the rest of vacation we will eat all Kory's favorites... I promise. The S'mores were okay... Their "gourmet" graham crackers weren't very graham flavored... It was still fun though. Then we headed back for the second part of the show.
All in all, a great Harry Potter adventure day. Now, onward to a quiet day in New York before flying out tonight.
Harry Potter day started with breakfast near our hotel at the Recovery Diner. I had their specialty hash which was three eggs over corned beef hash in some sauce with pico on top of it. It was pretty good... and unique.
From there, we caught the Subway up to Times Square and the show. Part 1 was at 2 pm and Part 2 started at 7:30 pm. The Lyric theater is absolutely beautiful and newly remodeled just for this show. They had a slick efficient operation that is like Disney. Everything everywhere themed, bar options in several places, a little store you could go in and buy snacks, people in the theater that would bring you concessions and merchandise that changed based on what had happened in the show. It was all very well done.
I won't say too much about the show... Their whole spiel is #KeepTheSecrets. Suffice to say, it was about six hours total of Harry Potter awesomeness. We had 5th row aisle seats which were awesome. It was cool seeing everything up close. The special effects, acting, story, set, just everything was amazing. I have never seen something quite like it. I love how different plays and musicals can be. It was an engaging experience. They definitely won't be able to tour this show. It is so immersive and normal theaters won't be able to support what they do here. It annoyed me before that it was two shows and two spots on our schedule, but it was totally worth it.
Between shows we ate at O'Donoghue's Bar... Fish and Chips. It was perfectly serviceable. Nothing amazing, but good for an in-between show meal. Then we went to Hershey's World where they had a little area where you could buy giant S'mores. S'mores are my second favorite desert, after Cannoli... so I have now had my two favorite deserts and the rest of vacation we will eat all Kory's favorites... I promise. The S'mores were okay... Their "gourmet" graham crackers weren't very graham flavored... It was still fun though. Then we headed back for the second part of the show.
All in all, a great Harry Potter adventure day. Now, onward to a quiet day in New York before flying out tonight.
Sunday, August 19, 2018
Day 1: Sat. Aug 18th. Objects in motion remain in motion
Well, as expected I only slept three hours, 11 pm-2 am because I was so excited. Kory never has any trouble sleeping EVER. We were ready for Mom and Dad to pick us up at 6 am without incident... Well, there was the small bump of Kory deciding he was going to leave his Big Bertha bag behind and use his medium sized bag... It was packed full, but not overweight. I started carrying it down the stairs and the strap started ripping... I think (hope!) that the bag can make it through the trip without further incident!
Security is always a breeze at the Madison airport and the Delta flight was smooth and quick to New York taking about an hour and 45 min. We had our bags and were in our Uber to our hotel at about 10:30 am.
We are staying at the Holiday Inn Lower East side because it is just a couple blocks away from Kory's niece and her husband, and I got a travel agent rate. It is perfectly adequate. A smallish room like I would expect in New York but recently updated and looking nice. Kory noticed that their shower tile is the same as what we put in our new new lower level bathroom last year... So we have the same style as a Holiday Inn decorator I guess?
We were debating what we wanted to do until our dinner and show plans. As Kory and I have discovered... we don't sit still on vacation. We like to be constantly moving and doing things.
(Side story: When I used to come to NYC with my sister Maggie or bestie David, we would always leave time in our schedule to enter show lotteries, see something crazy off Broadway or just do something else unplanned. This usually involved having to sit outside theaters to get standing room tickets, or showing up at Box Offices and asking how cheap we could get in. This has evolved into most shows having digital lotteries. I have won a couple in the past (Hamilton in Chicago!) but no such luck for the few I entered this time.)
I told Kory that one option would be to go enter the in-person lottery to "Once on This Island," a show that we saw perform on the Tony awards and that ended up winning "Best Revival of a Musical." He said, "Well we're here in New York, lets do it." So we took the subway up to the theater district. It took about a half hour hotel to theater. It is easy getting up there, but we found out it is more difficult coming back because of station closures for weekend maintenance. AND it is was about 90 degrees outside, so it was about a billion degrees in the stations.
We entered the lottery and both our names got picked. They had quite a few tickets, and the price was a higher than other lotteries I have entered ($59,) but that was still way better than the price we would have paid for the seats we ended up in, $189 fourth row seats.
We ate a quick lunch on the patio at Mother Burger because we hadn't eaten anything the whole day yet. It was delicious (I am sure almost anything would have been,) but the real highlight was the "Red Flower," our half frozen Sangria, half frozen Mimosa drink.
We made our way back to the show, and let me tell ya, it was AMAZING. I will remember it forever. It was a theater in the round, the center was set up mostly with sandy ground (that the first row was sitting in!) And there was an entrance/exit for the performers splashing through a water area. The story was kind of like a Disney story of the girl from the poor part of the island falling in love with a boy from the rich side. The gods save her after an accident and she asks them to save the boy later in the story. It was very original, the music was fantastic, the staging was inventive and the performers were excellent. I am so so happy that we had an opportunity to experience this show. Last thing I will mention is that there is a goat in the show! A real GOAT! Never have seen that before.
After the matinee, we got back to our hotel by the circuitous Subway route, freshened up and went to meet up with Kory's niece and husband. They have an awesome apartment and we went up and drank wine and looked at the views from their roof top terrace. Then we headed out to dinner in little Italy.
They had made reservations at Paesanos, which was funny because of how close in name it is to Paisan's in Madison. This one had been around a little bit longer since 1911. It was perfect to have dinner in that quaint little place. The food, wine and company were all great.
I had to have Cannoli from a bakery selling them on the street because it is my favorite desert ever... Nom Nom Nom! Then we got an Uber that took about 45 min to get us back to the theater area and the Mean Girls Musical.
Anyone around my age has seen the Tina Fey Mean Girls movie... and it is in constant TBS rotation now. It was so so so fun going with Kory's niece for her first Broadway show. She LOVES Mean Girls and the show was so funny. We had great seats in the front row of the mezzanine and our view of the screens and performers couldn't have been better. This is not high art here... It is just a super fun, super high energy show with excellent young performers. And the entire original cast was there, so that is fun when I can go back and listen to the songs I like on the cast recording and know that is who I saw in person.
After the show we took another long Uber ride all over the place to get back to the hotel and CRASH. I feel like we have been here for a couple days already... but it had only been an action packed 13 hours. If the first day is any indication of how this vacation is going to progress, I am ecstatic! Now off for another day of adventure and a day of Harry Potter!
Security is always a breeze at the Madison airport and the Delta flight was smooth and quick to New York taking about an hour and 45 min. We had our bags and were in our Uber to our hotel at about 10:30 am.
We are staying at the Holiday Inn Lower East side because it is just a couple blocks away from Kory's niece and her husband, and I got a travel agent rate. It is perfectly adequate. A smallish room like I would expect in New York but recently updated and looking nice. Kory noticed that their shower tile is the same as what we put in our new new lower level bathroom last year... So we have the same style as a Holiday Inn decorator I guess?
We were debating what we wanted to do until our dinner and show plans. As Kory and I have discovered... we don't sit still on vacation. We like to be constantly moving and doing things.
(Side story: When I used to come to NYC with my sister Maggie or bestie David, we would always leave time in our schedule to enter show lotteries, see something crazy off Broadway or just do something else unplanned. This usually involved having to sit outside theaters to get standing room tickets, or showing up at Box Offices and asking how cheap we could get in. This has evolved into most shows having digital lotteries. I have won a couple in the past (Hamilton in Chicago!) but no such luck for the few I entered this time.)
I told Kory that one option would be to go enter the in-person lottery to "Once on This Island," a show that we saw perform on the Tony awards and that ended up winning "Best Revival of a Musical." He said, "Well we're here in New York, lets do it." So we took the subway up to the theater district. It took about a half hour hotel to theater. It is easy getting up there, but we found out it is more difficult coming back because of station closures for weekend maintenance. AND it is was about 90 degrees outside, so it was about a billion degrees in the stations.
We entered the lottery and both our names got picked. They had quite a few tickets, and the price was a higher than other lotteries I have entered ($59,) but that was still way better than the price we would have paid for the seats we ended up in, $189 fourth row seats.
We ate a quick lunch on the patio at Mother Burger because we hadn't eaten anything the whole day yet. It was delicious (I am sure almost anything would have been,) but the real highlight was the "Red Flower," our half frozen Sangria, half frozen Mimosa drink.
We made our way back to the show, and let me tell ya, it was AMAZING. I will remember it forever. It was a theater in the round, the center was set up mostly with sandy ground (that the first row was sitting in!) And there was an entrance/exit for the performers splashing through a water area. The story was kind of like a Disney story of the girl from the poor part of the island falling in love with a boy from the rich side. The gods save her after an accident and she asks them to save the boy later in the story. It was very original, the music was fantastic, the staging was inventive and the performers were excellent. I am so so happy that we had an opportunity to experience this show. Last thing I will mention is that there is a goat in the show! A real GOAT! Never have seen that before.
After the matinee, we got back to our hotel by the circuitous Subway route, freshened up and went to meet up with Kory's niece and husband. They have an awesome apartment and we went up and drank wine and looked at the views from their roof top terrace. Then we headed out to dinner in little Italy.
They had made reservations at Paesanos, which was funny because of how close in name it is to Paisan's in Madison. This one had been around a little bit longer since 1911. It was perfect to have dinner in that quaint little place. The food, wine and company were all great.
I had to have Cannoli from a bakery selling them on the street because it is my favorite desert ever... Nom Nom Nom! Then we got an Uber that took about 45 min to get us back to the theater area and the Mean Girls Musical.
Anyone around my age has seen the Tina Fey Mean Girls movie... and it is in constant TBS rotation now. It was so so so fun going with Kory's niece for her first Broadway show. She LOVES Mean Girls and the show was so funny. We had great seats in the front row of the mezzanine and our view of the screens and performers couldn't have been better. This is not high art here... It is just a super fun, super high energy show with excellent young performers. And the entire original cast was there, so that is fun when I can go back and listen to the songs I like on the cast recording and know that is who I saw in person.
After the show we took another long Uber ride all over the place to get back to the hotel and CRASH. I feel like we have been here for a couple days already... but it had only been an action packed 13 hours. If the first day is any indication of how this vacation is going to progress, I am ecstatic! Now off for another day of adventure and a day of Harry Potter!
Friday, August 17, 2018
Picking this up eight years later...
I am going to start using this blog to record my travels... I got a $100 prime day deal on a little chrome book that I am going to take along with me, so hopefully I will be able to update just about every day. I have a couple trips coming up for the remainder of the year.
The adventure that starts tomorrow I am super pumped about! Kory and I are going on our longest trip eva! It is his first time out of North America and his first time on a cruise. But first, to New York!
The story goes that Kory is a big Harry Potter fan... I love it too, but not as much as he does! When I found out that the two part play, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, was coming to Broadway, I knew we had to go. In January tickets went on sale and I battled Ticketmaster for half a day and got us tickets for this Sunday, August 18th. I told Kory, "Well, we will be in New York, that's pretty close to Europe, we should just continue on..." And since he loves me, he entertained the thought and let me plan plan away. We are going to spend two nights in New York, then an overnight flight and night in Rome, and then on a seven night Norwegian Epic cruise around the Mediterranean. Should be a blast... I have been counting down the days and now it is finally here.
Stay tuned for our adventures...
The adventure that starts tomorrow I am super pumped about! Kory and I are going on our longest trip eva! It is his first time out of North America and his first time on a cruise. But first, to New York!
The story goes that Kory is a big Harry Potter fan... I love it too, but not as much as he does! When I found out that the two part play, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, was coming to Broadway, I knew we had to go. In January tickets went on sale and I battled Ticketmaster for half a day and got us tickets for this Sunday, August 18th. I told Kory, "Well, we will be in New York, that's pretty close to Europe, we should just continue on..." And since he loves me, he entertained the thought and let me plan plan away. We are going to spend two nights in New York, then an overnight flight and night in Rome, and then on a seven night Norwegian Epic cruise around the Mediterranean. Should be a blast... I have been counting down the days and now it is finally here.
Stay tuned for our adventures...
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