October 18 – Dubrovnik, Croatia
Posted on October 20, 2008
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Today we walked the fortress wall of Dubrovnik, and man did it have a lot of steps. It reminded me of the Great Wall of China except the wall was very narrow, just barely enough room for two people to walk side by side. We took a little break at one of the areas so that Ollie could have a snack. There was an area that made good seats so he started out sitting down and then he decided to lay down on his stomach and put his feet in the air and ate his apple. The rest of our time here we just walked around the shops and stuff.
Dinner this evening was interesting. Ollie practically inhaled his food so he was pretty much done before I even finished my soup. So after I finished eating my soup Bri and I took turns walking Ollie and eating our next course. After my second or third time up with Ollie the Maître D asked me if I had finished eating my dinner and I said Ollie had but not me so he took Ollie and said, “Go eat, he’ll be fine here”. We were all a bit nervous leaving Ollie there only because we all know how quickly Ollie can get into something. But he had a great time and the Maitre D thanked me for leaving Ollie with him, he enjoyed it.
October 17 – Sea Day between Rome and Croatia
Posted on October 20, 2008
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Judy and I had made appointments for a massage today. I decided to get a Hot Stone Massage, and if you’ve never had one you need to it was the best massage I think I’ve ever had. They use the hot stones to help loosen up your muscles and relax you as the massage warm oil all over and work out the tension. It was the best 75 minutes of the day.
October 16 – Rome, Italy
Posted on October 20, 2008
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Wow, we are halfway through our tip now. I’m not really ready to go home but I do miss Fredy. I would love to go back to Rome for a week or two sometime and really get to spend some time looking at everything. There is so much to see there and we were there for such a short period of time that we spent most of our time running from place to place snapping pictures everywhere but didn’t really get to explore or take in the beauty of everything. My favorite part of the day was probably when we took a break for lunch and relaxed for a little bit and Ollie walked around the block a couple of times when we were done eating.
October 15 – Messina (Sicily), Italy
Posted on October 20, 2008
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Our tour bus took us into Taormina, which is a beautiful town. Bri even said that he would come back and spend some time here. There was a little girl on our tour, Kate, and Ollie immediately clung to here so whenever we were all together as a group and walking Ollie took her hand on one side and mine on the other. It was too cute. I can’t remember how old she said she was, I think either 7 or 8. I think we were able to get a picture of Ollie playing in the dirt at the Greco-Roman theater. After the theater we went walking on our own and stopped and got a gelato, Ollie ate his very first cone. One of the things I remember most when we were walking through the town was the smell of flowers everywhere. Above the shops were homes and everyone had their balcony full of plants and flowers that smelled up the streets, it was wonderful.
October 14 – Valletta, Malta
Posted on October 20, 2008
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Gary and Judy have been here before so we decided to just do a self guided tour around the city. I was a nice leisurely day. I enjoyed walking around and looking at the architecture of the buildings and the streets. The town had narrow brick streets and there where horse carrying carriages and when they galloped through the streets was like something you would see in a movie or read about in a book, very picturesque. We were able to witness an interesting sight as we were exiting the city; one car was exiting as one car was trying to enter the city, and as I mentioned before the city had very narrow streets so needless to say the car that was trying to enter had to back up through a crowd of people. It took here about 10 minutes I guess because it was so crowded.
Ollie is a character
Posted on October 20, 2008
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He has been doing something at dinner that is kind of funny and the waiters have been getting kind of a kick out of it. Whenever someone comes to the table to fill our water or take our order or anything before we’ve gotten our food, he points his index finger up and says, “Chicken. Fries. Umm, Soup”. Not necessarily in that order or all at once but it’s pretty funny. Thankfully the staff seems to think so too, I think mainly because a lot of them of children around Ollie’s age.
October 13 – Gabes, Tunisia
Posted on October 20, 2008
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Not really a whole lot to put for today, the best part of today was a 45 minute camel ride in the Sahara Desert. This would be mine and Ollie’s 2nd camel ride, and he loved it. The only time he complained was when he dropped his sticker and he wanted to get off to get it but he got over it quickly. One of the souvenirs we got here was a sand rose, I am not sure how the sand roses are made but they are very interesting looking.
October 11 – Santorini, Greece
Posted on October 20, 2008
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A very beautiful island. The first town we visited was Oia (eee ya), we were able to get some beautiful pictures there We went to a wine tasting and from a local vineyard. The first 2 that we tried were ok but then we were able to try the dessert wines which were very good. The red dessert wine wasn’t too sweet really almost like purple grape juice, but the white dessert wine was so thick it was almost an apricot color and was super sweet and smelled like a faint bourbon or cognac. Our tour of the city ended with a choice of a cable car ride, a donkey ride, or walking down to the bottom. I wanted to walk down so Bri being the supportive hubby walked down with me carrying the back pack and Ollie who slept the entire way down. Gary and Judy took the cable car down and said it took those about 1.5 minutes to get to the bottom.
This is also the island where “The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants” was filmed. There were a couple of spots that I think I recognized from the movie.
October 10 – Kusadasi, Turkey
Posted on October 20, 2008
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We started our tour at Mary’s house where she spent her last days, located on the top of a mountain. We were able to walk through the house and then just outside see the shrine for her. They have fountains of Holy Water for people to drink from and bring wellness and supposedly add years to your life. Our next stop was the remains from the ancient city of Ephesus. We got a picture of Ollie playing in the dirt and handing us olives with the stadium/theater in the background. The marble street that we walked on as we toured through the city was all original. We went to a museum that Ollie and I just skimmed through but just outside was a drink stand and some shops so Bri got a cup of freshly squeezed orange juice, it was very good. From here we visited the tomb site of St. John and Ollie found a black cat to love on. We enjoyed a sit down lunch with Turkish dancers. After lunch we went to the Bazaar and went to a rug making demonstration where we found a rug that we liked and decided to buy if possibly for Bri’s office. They one that I really loved, but it was way expensive, but very beautiful and unique. Each weaver is only allowed to work for 3 hours a day to preserve their eyes, rest their neck and back and most importantly minimize mistakes.
October 9 – Rhodes, Greece
Posted on October 20, 2008
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We had a very nice guide, Katerina, and started our tour off driving to the Acropolis of Lindos. The tour bus dropped us off at the “square” which was basically a tree with a brick square around it, and then we got on the public transportation bus to go to the beginning of our walk. We walked through the shops that in the walkway going up to the Acropolis. The path is hand laid of small stones that are white/light gray and black and are set on their side rather than flat down. They use the black stones to create designs along the pathway. From the bottom to the top we walked up 300 steps. The area had several local kittens just hanging out, I even saw one hanging out in a trash can eating some food and got a picture of it. When we finished the line for the bus ride back to the top was so long, so I was able to talk the guys into walking up the hill to the tour bus, it was actually a nice walk and it didn’t really take us that long. However when we did get on the bus and Bri took the backpack off his back was so wet from sweating that it looked like he had taken a shower in his clothes but only where the back pack was.
We walked through the Palace of the Grand Masters that was built by the knights of the order of St. John. It was very cool to walk through and see the mosaic tiling that had been brought in. Somehow when the tiles were laid in the design they were put in place on a sheet of some kind and when they were brought into the palace they were able to be rolled up in one piece to preserve the design and then laid into the floors of the Palace.