Day 14; Saturday, August 3, 2013  Venice

Venice was covered in dense fog as we approached the port; still we managed a few photos of our approach to this “City of Water”.  Venice is an old city, going back to late Roman times. It became a maritime power by the time of the Crusades. Evidence of it’s past wealth and power are everywhere, but no more so than in St. Mark’s Square, home to the Doge’s Palace and St. Mark’s Basilica.  

We left the ship by water taxi and were delivered to the docks where we were greeted by a strange group of young people engaged in what might have been “performance art”.  They were covered in colorful veils.  Soon after we arrived, the silently turned and walked away.  Later as we walked the back alley’s and four bridges to St. Mark’s Square, we encountered them again sitting silently in an outdoor restaurant.  Again, they rose silently and walked away.  Very strange.

We spent most of our day in St. Mark’s Square where pigeons enjoy tormenting the residents and tourists alike. Our excursion took us first to the Doge’s Palace which was the seat of government for centuries. It is an enormous 14th century Venetian gothic structure which held the courts, the prison, and the residence of the Doge.  We walked up the Golden Staircase - where the walls and ceilings were covered with intricate marble and gold mosaics.  We wandered through several waiting rooms that were used to receive foreign visitors and were decorated to demonstrate the power and glory of Venice.  There were massive rooms designed to hold government councils and the Venetian courts.  Condemned prisoners could be ushered out through hidden-panel doors and dark tunnels to the prison next door.  The lower levels of prison were especially dark, damp cold cells, grim places without benefit of sanitation or light and without hope of escape.  

Our guide provided information on several of the large wall frescos in the palace.  Most were painted by teams of highly skilled artists, but one of the teams seems to have had a little trouble making room for images of the important men appearing in the fresco.  The guide brought our attention to a panel in which a man was painted with only one leg - and that leg was painted on the wrong side of his body!  She also mentioned several famous paintings and sculptures that we would not see because Napoleon stole them from the city and never returned them.  Evidently, Venetians know how to hold a grudge.   It is also a little ironic since the Venetians were known as much for piracy as for trade.  The bones of St. Mark the Evangelist which are proudly kept in a silver casket at St. Mark’s Cathedral were stolen by the Venetians and secreted out of Alexandria, Egypt.  More on that particular “dead guy” later.

Venice was fiercely independent and resisted falling under the influence of other powers - including the Vatican States.  For centuries, Venice was aligned with the Byzantine Empire rather than the popes in Rome.  Wars were fought with the Turks and French as well as other Italian cities.

After the Doge’s Palace and the prison, we walked a short distance to one of Venice’s fine Murano glass factories to watch a demonstration of glass blowing and to tour the showrooms.  We saw some fine examples of Venetian glassware (all prohibitively expensive).  Besides, gold encrusted goblets and crystal chandeliers did not fit in our suitcases.

Venice is also a crowded and polluted city, but we couldn’t pass up the experience of a gondola ride along the canal.  We passed under the Rialto Bridge, which was built in 1591 and  remains one of the focal points of Venice.  Charles’ photographs from our ride will show beautiful flowers, water soaked landings, and one crazy tourist who stood in that stinking cesspool of a canal to snap photographs of the passing gondolas.

Our tour ended after the gondola ride, but we stayed l to visit St. Mark’s Basilica.  There are five domes, reflecting the Byzantine architectural influence in it’s construction.  Here there are 43,000 square feet of incredible mosaics from floor to ceiling, created from colorful marbles and gold... lot’s of gold!  I was struck by the enormous wealth and power of the church reflected by churches like St. Mark’s throughout Europe. The irony is that there are frequently beggars outside the churches.  Although it is also worth noting that often they “professional beggars” who work in teams and who are anything but hungry and poor.

Tomorrow morning we leave for home ….. we have had a wonderful cruise but are looking forward to seeing our family.

Day 14; Saturday August 3, 2013 Venice

Day 14; Saturday August 3, 2013 Venice
Link to Day 14 Venice Photographs

Day 13; Friday, August 2, 2013 Another Day “At Sea”

Day 13; Friday, August 2, 2013 “At Sea”

The day provided another opportunity to catch up on the blog notes and do some laundry.  Tomorrow we will arrive in Venice, but essentially the packing needs to begin today so our bags can be ready for disembarkation early Sunday.  We will start our day at 3:30 am and arrive home about 8:00 pm if everything falls into place.  Given a 6 hour time difference to begin with, it be a very long day.  

The experience has been exceptional.  The crew aboard The Ruby Princess has been attentive, courteous and professional.   The food has been well prepared, well presented and abundant.   The chamber orchestra, band, pianist, and other musicians who play in the lounges and ship’s plaza have all been first-rate musicians.  We’ve enjoyed some fine entertainment in the evenings. Our own stateroom steward, Noel has been on top of things throughout the trip. We couldn’t have asked for more.

The sea today was calm, a deep blue, and smooth as glass.  The sun was warm but there was a gentle breeze.  It really was a perfect day for reading poolside.  I am reading the Fall of Giants, which Erin and Jake introduced to us last summer and Charles has been reading the second book in that same trilogy.  We spent hours at the smaller adult-only pools fore and aft.  The big center-ship pools were full of jumping, splashing, busy children.  We were looking for a bit more relaxed atmosphere.  

It was “formal night” aboard ship last night; most of the passengers dressed for the dinner.  Charles enjoyed the lobster while I had the pheasant.  Very nice!  We have enjoyed different table-companions every night, meeting people from al over the world, and engaging in wonderful conversation. We were surrounded by different customs, cultures and languages. A benefit of the “anytime, any where” dinner option that we chose.  

Tomorrow we dock in Venice for another full day of sightseeing and shopping.  Perhaps we’ll get a little nap in the afternoon and then back home on Sunday.  We are missing our kids and grandkids.

Day 12; Thursday, August 1, 2013 Dubrovnik

Day 12; Thursday, August 1, 2013  Dubrovnik
Link to Day 12 Dubrovnik Photographs 

We gained an hour overnight with the time change and had a leisurely & civilized breakfast in the dining room instead of the buffet.  Dubrovnik is known as “The Pearl of the Adriatic” and the old town is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.   The Pile Gate, a 15th century rampart, brings you into the old town which has cobblestone streets and magnificent stone walls that are as much as 20 feet thick in places.  Once inside the old city, there is a large 15th century fountain.  We learned that in the Middle Ages, anyone entering the old city was required to wash their hands and feet here to prevent disease.  There is also a bell tower with two bronze bell ringers fashioned to look like 15th century soldiers.

The first stop on our walking tour was the Franciscan monastery just inside the walls.  It houses the world’s oldest pharmacy and a wonderful museum.  Several 15th and 16th century artifacts reflect that St. Blaise is Dubrovnik’s patron.  There are silver and gold reliquaries displaying bones from many saints as well as some exceptional painting.  One wall of the monastery features a glassed over hole made by a shell that is lodged in the opposite wall.  Few buildings in Dubrovnik escaped the war in 1991; the reconstruction has carefully preserved these memorials to that conflict.

Dubrovnik is filled with Catholic churches. We visited the cathedral as well as an old Dominican church and the Jesuit church of St. Ignatius Loyola.  Each is beautifully decorated and quite unique.

In 1637 there was a catastrophic earthquake and fire in the old town.  Civic leaders made an impassioned plea for everyone to remain in the city and rebuild.  Most surprisingly, long before the American Revolution, they determined that the renewed city should be a model of democracy.

As we wandered the old town, live music could be heard coming from the innumerable restaurants that spill out into the open plazas.  You can sit, have a drink, order a light meal, and listen to very fine musicians.  We did just that, enjoying a cold local beer, a tall bottle of water, and a Greek salad before continuing our tour.  

We probably should have toured the city walls before noon, but we were enjoying our leisurely exploration of the harbor, museums, residential areas, and churches.  After lunch, we paid for tickets to climb up the stone stairway to the ramparts of the city wall. It was approaching 95 degrees and there were hundreds of steep stone steps to be climbed up and down as we circled the entire town.  That certainly challenged my poor knees and feet, but the view was breath-taking!  Part of the old city wall is used for the filming of “Game of Thrones”.   We watched as several swimmers dove from the cliffs into the clear blue sea below.  There are several spots along the wall where one can stop for a cold drink or a snack, but we carried our own water on this trip.

By the time we had circled the whole town and climbed up to the high fortress-keep that dominates the town, we were hot and stiff.  The descent down the worn stone steps was “exciting”.  We caught one of the ship’s shuttle busses and quickly returned through the new part of Dubrovnik to the Ruby Princess.  A shower, a swim, a hot-tub, and then a lovely dinner filled out the day.  The sunset was spectacular as we departed for Venice.

Day 11; Wednesday, July 31, 2013 Corfu

Day 11; Wednesday, July 31, 2013  Corfu
Link to Day 11 Corfu Photographs 

We arrived at the picturesque island of Corfu early Wednesday morning.  Throughout this vacation we have visited ancient ruins.  With Corfu, we moved forward though the centuries to the Renaissance and more modern eras.  Corfu saw settlement by Roman, Venetians, Turks, French, British, Austrian, and German overlords who influenced its culture and transformed this Ionian Greek island into a vacation paradise.  This island is prime real estate, not only for it’s beauty, but also for it’s strategic value.  Napolean stationed troops on the island.  They were replaced by the British who returned the island to Greece as a gift when the first king of Greece was crowned in the 1800’s.  Prince Philip of England was born on Corfu; he is a member of the Greek royal family that was deposed in the 20th century.  Corfu’s strong Venetian influence shows up especially in the architecture of buildings near the fortress that guards the harbor entrance.  There are many restaurants and shops surrounding the British contribution to the island, administrative buildings and a fine cricket pitch.

The hills are dotted with olive groves, oranges, kumquats, grapes, and various nut trees.  Much of our day was spent in the countryside.  Olive trees live for hundreds, sometimes thousands of years.  Corfu boasts massive ancient olive trees that twist and stretch out of rocky hillsides.  The terrain is mountainous and green.  There were times when we could look west to Greece, east to Albania (which was 2 miles from Corfu across the Ionian Sea), and down sheer cliffs to our likely descent into the ocean.  The streets are impossible to believe, narrow, winding, frightening, “two-way” roads not wide enough for a goat much less the huge buses that carry tourists!  Our bus driver must have been half mountain goat, half magician.

Our tour from the port took us to the Achilleion Palace built between 1889 and 1892 for the Empress of Austria (and Queen of Hungry) Elizabeth wife of Franz Joseph. Corfu was her favorite place to escape in the summers, and she had a passionate interest in Greek History and Art.  Elizabeth was particularly drawn to the stories of Achilles and named her home away from home for him.  She was smart, accomplished, elegant, beautiful, fiercely independent and would have fit right in with our daughters!

Atop one mountain, commanding the heights over a beautiful bay, was a converted fort that is now an Orthodox Monastery of the Virgin Mary.  We visited the ancient basilica with its glorius icons and then a small museum that helps support the monks.  Charles bought several small copies of famous icons for use with his students.  Despite the many tourists, this was a place of prayer and reflection for the monks.  The gardens and cells of the monks were guarded by cats, cats, and more cats.  Charles now has the sniffles; he’s blaming the cats that seemed to be everywhere!

The view from Paleokastrista, the “rock fortress” along the high, mountainous ridge of the island’s backbone was magnificent.  The height of these mountains is perhaps equal to the Smokey Mountains, but the rocky inclines and winding paths rival some of Colorado’s best.

We had a lovely lunch at a restaurant overlooking Old Corfu before descending back towards the old town for a little shopping.  Olive wood products, local wine and olive oil, and some nice leather goods can be found among the usual tourist souvenirs.  I now have one suitcase filled with gifts & souvenirs!