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Okay, this is not about Executive Summary: It was great (great art,
great food, etc.), but we’re happy to be back in Our flight was from This was the first cruise of the season for the
Oceanic, which accounted for the discount fares that attracted the Rays, and
subsequently us, to this particular cruise.
(Ken and Elsie Ray is a couple we met at church here who gave us the
very idea of a cruise. Their grandson,
Josh, a fine young man, accompanied them, as he has for some 15 overseas
trips the last eight years or so!
Their experience and friendship were a real boon to us on this
adventure). The cruise line, its crew,
and most of the passengers are Spanish, so that helped make things
interesting. We never got an exact
count, but there were about 1200 passengers, 64 cooks and 500 crew members
from 36 countries. First night was interesting, also, in that our
cabin was under one of the bar/discos and we were entertained loudly with
salsa music and dancing until about 2:00 am.
We thought, Oh, no, is this what you mean by discount cruising, but
the next day we asked to move to another cabin and there was a vacancy where
they could move us. And, hey, after a
while we kind of enjoyed the relative quiet of the engine room – just
kidding. |
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This map shows our rough-cut diamond-shaped
route. Barcelona is in NE Spain, from
whence we sailed to the ports serving Nice/Monte Carlo, France; Florence,
Rome, and Naples, Italy; and Tunis, Tunisia, then back to B. At each port we boarded buses for transport
to the cities. |
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At each stop you have option of paying for
guided tour or going “on-your-own.” At
the first stop we opted for Nice/Eze guided tour, which meant we skipped the
principality of In Nice, we visited a Catholic chapel, a perfume
museum, and a Russian Orthodox church, and we explored a bit of down town,
including the flower market. That’s
the Nice harbor and flower market below.
The Russian court liked to come to the |
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We arrived in Eze, pronounced ezz, not easy, in
late afternoon. It was cold, and the shops were closing, but I enjoyed
exploring the narrow paths up, down, and around the shops, residences,
hotels, and church. |
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Wednesday was Florence. The Rays had been in Florence before and
they led us on a city tour. We started
at the piazza in front of the Duomo cathedral. That’s our party below striding
purposefully across the piazza – I’m sure Susie is known throughout Italy as
the red-hat lady -- bound for the museum, a few blocks away, that houses
Michelangelo’s famous statue of David.
They don’t allow pictures, and as this is a family-oriented organ,
pardon the expression, I won’t show you David. Almost as memorable as himself are the
postcards and underwear being hawked outside the museum. Next stop was the Basilica of Santa Croce, built
beginning in 1294, the largest Franciscan church in the world, it says
here. This is a really special place,
not only for its artwork, but it is the burial place of Galileo,
Michelangelo, and Machiavelli, and other renowned Italian artists and
luminaries. Fantastic! Unfortunately, preservation-work scaffolding
blocked our view of Galileo’s tomb, but just being at the site where he and
the other such giants repose was awe-inspiring. We subsequently toured the Florence Science
Museum and saw Galileo’s finger! I
don’t know the story behind that, sad to say.
In the museum there was a tour of American kids and we heard a
fascinating lecture from their instructor on some of Galileo’s scientific
experiments, demonstrated on reproductions of some of the devices he created
for their purpose. The Science Museum is located near the Arno
River, which flows through Florence.
The picture below looks almost like some of the great paintings you
would see in an art museum. The other
major flowing body you see in Florence and other Italian cities are motor
scooters. They’re everywhere and they
move like a swarm of bees, flowing between already cramped lanes of auto
traffic, darting in and out. You
expect crashes and curses, but we didn’t see or hear any, and somehow it all
seems to work. The scooters swerve and
stop when they need to and drivers seem to willingly give them a gap to duck
into when a seam closes up. |
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After the Science Museum we returned to the Duomo, toured it and Josh and I climbed to the top – 463 steps – for a panoramic view. Here’s the proof. The large church at the left is Santa Croce. Susie didn’t climb the dome, but I think she was there earlier. To the right are a couple of statues seen in the
Santa Croce’s courtyard. |
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Meanwhile, back on board it was time to eat. It’s always time to eat on a cruise ship. We were proud of our restraint because we only went to one midnight buffet. At dinner, you have assigned tables and we expected to be seated with the Rays, but the first night that wasn’t the set-up. The Rays were seated with another couple, who quickly turned out to be grand company, while we sat and ate by ourselves quite a while until the assigned couple showed up. She was the rep for our tour agency and her husband was traveling also. They said we could move if we wanted to, but we didn’t think we should. Next night, same situation, so we moved over to the Rays table – which had enough room for two more. The other couple was the Smiths, from Houston. They were great company and we enjoyed the two hour dinner every night. As Americans, we were assigned the early sitting, 8:00, while most of the Europeans ate at the more fashionable 10:15. To be continued. Cheers. Susie and Rob |
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