Day 6...

We arrived in Kusadasi, Turkey. I had no expectations of what my day was going to like. I knew it was going to be hot, and we had an excursion. However, by the end Jason and I were in awe and loved our day in Turkey. In fact, this was our favorite day of the whole trip. I'll get into more of that later...

We got on the bus and drove about 20 minutes to a long winding road up a mountain that a bus should never be on. At the top of that hill was Mary's house (yes Mary mother of Jesus). The tour guide said that it is also believed that Mary Magdalen lived there as well. They both went there after Jesus' death, and lived there until they died. I looked at Jason with tears in my eyes. I love Mary Magdalen. I don't know much about the Bible but I do know her story. So I was pumped to get up there.

This was one of our first sites off of the bus. Bit much for a tourist spot if you ask this Canadian :)

Group of us waiting in line to see the house. Man do we ever look like tourists with our cameras, stickers to tell us what buses were on, and radios so that we could hear the tour guide.

This is the house... I can't even begin to explain to you the feeling inside the house. It was so peaceful, I'll never forget it. It felt like time stopped for a moment in there. Again, I can't explain it. It had a feeling unlike anything else I've ever experienced. It was an empty stone house with a sort of shrine in it.

On sight there was a spring, so everyone was filling up bottles of this "holy water" to bring back. We tried for Jason's mom but ours leaked so we ended up throwing it out on the ship.

This was a wall just past the water where it is believed that if you tie something on and make a wish it will come true. As you can see most people used tissues.

We then went down below (Mary's house is on top of that mountain you see in the background) to the ancient city of Ephesus. Just to give you some history here... Ephesus was the second largest city next to Rome when it was built in the 1st century BC. That's right I was walking on streets from before Christ people! Also they found Ephesus in the late 1800's and have been excavating it ever since. At this point they think that they only have 55% of the city uncovered, crazy eh? I have so many pictures and things I could tell you about this, but you're just going to have to go because it's well worth it. Here are some of my favorites...

One of the main streets. I was amazed at how smooth the roads were and the beautiful pillars that lined the streets. Jason and I were joking that all the people reminded us of Main Street USA in Disney. Yup, we're geeks.

Us (I know I know I'm looking hot in many ways here) in front of the Library. This structure was amazing, although it was hot we took the time to look at all the details. I have no idea how they did this stuff back then. In fact, I'm not even sure how they'd do it now.

There were a lot of stray cats. You could tel all of the Canadian and US folks because we were all trying to feed them, pet them, and give them water. Oh I forgot to mention it was 43 C this day in Turkey, and it wasn't even their summer weather yet. If I stopped to think about it I wanted to die, but I was so fascinated that I didn't really complain too much until we got back to the ship, and I realized how gross I was.

This my friends was AMAZING. It's the largest outdoor theatre in the ancient world that could seat 44 000 people. Apparently the acoustics are perfect and some modern day artists, like Elton John, have even done concerts there without electrical equipment. How the heck did they know how to do this back then???

Below is the street to wear the Mediterranean sea used to be...I say used to because it's further away than that now. I stood there looking down it thinking of all of the people that had travelled that street and still do today. People back then like Cleopatra, and Biblical dudes such as John, Mary, and Paul. Speaking of Paul, he was getting ready to preach in the coliseum above. However, he got run out of the city because just before he was about to preach a man, who owned the shop were the idols that the Ephesians worshipped were being made, told everyone in the audience that he was a fraud and to not believe him. I was standing where Paul once stood...this to me was insane! We really want to go on a Holy Land tour some time now. If I was impacted this much, and believe me I was, by standing somewhere where Paul had been...what would it be like to be where Jesus was? I can't even wrap my mind around that one!

Before we left Ephesus they had a cute little show about the Gladiator fights that used to be back then....Cleopatra was there and everything :)

After that it was off to a local restaurant for a traditional Turkish meal...yum, yum, yum. I ate so many yummy salads, kabobs, and hot dishes. In the photo above is the dessert section. I was pumped (you see Lindsay and I have determined that we have a separate stomach for desserts, didn't matter how full we were we were always able to get down some desert). I loaded up my plate, headed back to my table, put up with the comments from the peanut gallery at my table, took a bit from my first dessert, and quickly spit it back out. EVERYTHING HAD FREAKING GOAT'S MILK IN IT...and in case you're not guessing where I'm going...I HATE goat's milk. It's soooo gross. So much for dessert that day, I'm sure I compensated with a piece of something yummy on the ship though when we got back on.

After lunch the bus took as to a local rug making place where we learned a lot about Turkish rug making. It was amazing, and I was certainly wishing that we had the money to purchase one. Some day....

Lastly we had some free time to shop before we needed to get back on the ship. So Jason and I decided to head to a local market and buy some goodies. Jason had to purchase some Turkish Delight, I still don't know what it is. Would have made sense to buy ourselves a box so we could try it, but we didn't; he wanted it for his boss. Then we slowly made our way back to the ship with enough time to shower, and then sit out on our balcony to watch the ship pull away. We loved Turkey. I don't know if I'll ever go back, but I'm thankful that we were there and got to see it.

Next stop Athens.....good chance I won't be getting to this any time soon with the company I have coming from Virginia, but you never know. (PS- Blogger is really pissing me off with their picture uploading and spacing...it took me over 2 hours to do this one post today... so I apologize for the bad layout...I odn't know how to fix it)

Day 5...

This was a day at sea for us. I thought it was going to be the longest day ever, however it really was a lot of fun. I actually found myself having a hard time fitting in everything we wanted to do. Instead of going through the whole day, this post will be dedicated to pictures of the ship in general. For those of you that have never been on a cruise ship, the pictures don't do it justice. It was so weird to be walking around this huge structure realizing that we were floating along in the ocean.

theatre where we would watch a stage show every night....they had magicians, dancers, singers, etc.

never knew what type of critters were going to end up in room when we got back after supper

our ship...Royal Carribean's Navigator of the Sea...hold 3500 passengers and 2000 crew...it was beautiful

everything was always done just right...check out the carved watermelon

trivia became a daily ritual...for the most part we sucked...we never won but came close once thanks to Dee and Jason's useless knowledge of 50's-60's music :)

formal night...poor Dee was sick...if we go on a cruise again, which I'm sure we will, we will be skipping formal night....too much extra packing for this night and it wasn't anything special

this was our assistant waiter (can't remember his name) from Turkey and I LOVED him... he was so sweet...from the first time we were there he remembered what everyone drank and would automatically bring it to us every time



food food everywhere and I LOVED this as well...I was never hungry but learned how to eat more and more...it's been a bit of a problem since I got home and feel like I need to eat all the time now..you could go to the buffet, the dining room for a sit down meal, or the 24 hour cafe that had sandwiches, pizzas, and desserts. We switched it up a bit...but we usually ate supper in the dining room because it was so good, and who wouldn't want a 3 course meal every night for supper. We started realizing that you could order multiple appetizers, entrees, and desserts....so here is Dad and Dee with their 5 desserts...so funny! I'm not going to lie...I participated in ordering extra things as well...and it's all included!!!




the 3 story dining room... that reminded a bit too much of the Titanic movie for my liking

rock wall that Dad and Matt were brave enough to try...my dad rocked this sucker...quite impressive!

the royal promenade...basically felt like you were in a mall on a ship...weird

two hot folks on the cruise :)

yup it even had an ice skating rink...I was a little rusty but managed...

ice show that was awesome...I miss the icecapades

oh I almost forgot...room service was included as well...we did this on mornings were we had early excursions...it was yummy and fun to sit out on our deck and eat breakfast while we pulled into port

poolside fun

we had three rooms in a row....our balconies weren't joined, but all we had to do was stick our head around the corner and we'd see each other

view from glass elevator that transported us to whichever of the 14 floors we wanted

adult and children's pool area that had 2 pools and 2 hot tubs...there was an adult section as well that had another pool and hot tub

ha ha ha not so much...but he did enjoy himself in the casino

Sooooo much fun....makes me want to go back after going through all of these...some day...

Sorry it's taking me so long to post these...blogger takes forever to download pictures so I'm trying to get to it when I can...the next few days will be coming up...stay tuned for Turkey, Athens, Crete, and more Rome!

Day 4...

Found us in the largest island in the Mediterranean: Sicily, Italy (where the Godfather movies were filmed AND where the mafia originated). We docked at the island's largest city, Messina, and took an excursion to the largest active volcano in Europe. It was an exciting day that started as soon as the wake up call came. Our routine was I would answer the wake up call, get in the shower, and Jason would stumble out onto the patio and have a cigarette. I wasn't in the shower for longer than two minutes until I heard him saying "baby baby you've got to see this". I will never forget this moment he was like a kid on Christmas morning. We were fascinated many times on the cruise since we had never been on one before. Awakening to this sight and knowing we were about to go explore it was like Christmas morning.

This is Mount Etna. I still can't believe I saw a real, active volcano. The last time it erupted was just a couple of years ago. We drove a long, winding road up the mountain through beautiful villages. It looked how I pictured Italy to look in my mind; lots of terra cotta, shutters, flowers, wineries, I don't know hard to explain. In the picture below those aren't clouds, it's smoke from the lava....cool eh?

The closer we got to the top the more we were seeing remnants of past eruptions. There was lava rock everywhere. Thinking of what this must have looked like at some point glowing red from an eruption scared me. I couldn't imagine the horror that people face when a volcano is erupting and they need to evacuate. Made me wonder why on earth this people would live so close to this constant threat.

By the time we got to the top it was raining and cold. The bus took us to a local cafe where we had cannolis (hard to explain, but it's a yummy Italian dessert with a crisp outer shell stuffed with cream and pistachios), some type of juice, and almond wine (smelled awesome, tasted horrible). Then we went to a crater that formed from an eruption; basically the pressure from the lava was so intense that it busted up through the ground in this spot behind dad, Lindsay, and I.

We then got back on the bus and drove through some beautiful spots. We were back at another point in the ocean (probably about a 45 minutes drive from the volcano), because they wanted to show us how far the lava has travelled in past eruptions. Yup, that's lava rock from lava hardening due to cooling from the ocean. It was all so fascinating. I feel like I'm not doing it justice by typing it here, you'll just have to go :)

After our 7 hour adventure we found ourselves tired, and back on the ship for a night of adventures. It always began with stuffing ourselves, participating in the nightly trivia, heading to the live show in the theatre, and then some late night dessert and possible gambling at the casino before we hit the sack.

Next stop...Our FAVORITE spot: Turkey!

Day 3....

...involved exploring around the hotel with Matt and Lindsay - since I had gone to bed so early the night before - and relaxing at the hotel pool while we waited for the bus to come get us to take us to the cruise ship (Civitavecchia is Rome's port and it's about an hour away).

Boy do I look like a tourist or what?? I actually had slipped on some nasty, green unknown gunk on the side of the road and it was all over my foot and sandal. I sanitized it as soon as I got back to the hotel in the pool thought so no worries :)By the time we got on the boat (more pics of the boat another day), after going through security (quite the impressive system they have there I must say, Lindsay took a picture but they made her erase it), we went to our rooms, hit the buffet (a definite necessity, I was wayyyy too excited about this), and then got up to the top deck by 5:00 pm in order to see the boat pull away. Crap I just realized I typing boat. It's SHIP not boat - a worker corrected me on this one day - my bad!

Day 2...

Ah the Rome airport, no air conditioning, old, and sketchy customs (by sketchy I mean we stood in line, handed a grumpy guy our passport through a glass window, he stamped it, and gave it back to us without asking one question - guess they aren't worried about homeland security threats, I'm so used to the US airports now...sheesh). We then found the driver holding the sign that said "Wilson", and we were on our way to the hotel. Our driver was going about 150 km (not exaggerating either), knew very little English, and thankfully didn't notice the glances we were all giving each other as we weaved through narrow streets feeling like we were cheating death we each turn that we survived. We checked into our rooms, freshened up, and then went on a mission to get something to eat because we were starving. Above: Hotel Jolly Villa Carpegna

Below: Both hotels that we stayed at in Rome had showers like this; no curtains just a glass door that didn't move. It was weird and Jason and I kept getting water on the floor, but weren't sure how not to. Also our bathrooms were equipped with badays. Everything in me wanted to try this, but I didn't. In fact I'm sad to report that neither one of us worked up the guts to do it, as I type this I'm wishing I would have went with the whole "when in Rome" theory :)

This is Piazza Navona. Rome is filled with squares or courtyards that are beautiful! I think we all said "wow" when we turned the corner and entered the Piazza. The worker at the hotel told us that this would be a good place to grab a cab to to find something to eat, and she was right. We HAD to get some pizza, since were in the place were pizza was started. My father was not impressed, he wanted the American thick crust that he was used to, and made it his mission to find this before he left Rome; he failed. We tried to get some funky ones. Prosciutto (dry cured ham that you see on top of these pizzas) was everyone in Rome, and we loved it. Yes that's boiled eggs that you see on the second pizza, who would have thought!

After being out for a couple of hours everyone was tired, so we headed back to the hotel. Some, okay everyone but the Constables, went out exploring shops and stores by the hotel. Jason and I went to bed. That's right we went to bed at 7:00 pm and didn't wake up until 7:00 am the next morning when we got the wake up call. Ha ha ha the wake up calls. I can still hear the recordings of this chippy woman saying "Bueno..." and then a bunch of other stuff I didn't understand so I'd just hang up and grumpily stumble to the shower. Off to the boat tomorrow.....