Athens-to-Venice with J.D. and Cheryl

Our return to Columbus from Venice was mostly uneventful.  It took pretty much all day Friday, September 13 to get home, but we made it without loss of life or limb.  It started with a boat ride from the Lido Casino dock (yes, once again high tide prevented pickup at our hotel) for a 60 minute trip to the Venice airport.  There, we had a 2+ hour wait before our plane left for Munich but, once again, espresso calmed the nerves (I know, kind of an oxymoron, huh?). From Venice to Munich is about a one-hour flight, and we should have had about a 2 hour window to do all necessary business (e.g., clearing Customs), but our flight from Venice was delayed a bit more than an hour.  The woman behind us kept saying loudly, "We're never going to make our connection!", and since it was the same as ours (Munich to Washington DC), of course we were concerned.  So, when we landed we had about 40 minutes to get through what is about a 60 minute process . . . a moment of genuine ...

Our second day in Venice and I think it was our best day of the entire vacation, restoring our spirits from the less than thrilling experience of yesterday.  When we awoke, the weather forecast was for rain - a 90% chance - and that forebode another so-so day.  It, however, was not to be as the weather was rain-free and, occasionally, sunny right up until our last half hour in Venice.   The relative cool temperature (high 60s) and the threat of rain caused a conundrum as far as what to wear today.  Shorts and t-shirt?  Jeans and a sweatshirt?  Raincoat?  I opted for the percentages and took my rain coat, with jeans and a t-shirt.  The jeans were a nod to the online posting about dress code at St. Mark's Basilica which called for knees and shoulders to be covered and I'm all about honoring God so I abided by the rules.  Turned out to be a fortuitous decision because that last half hour and boat ride home were cold and rainy.   W...

The day started with disembarkation from the Viking Sea followed by a 90-minute boat ride from our dock to Porto De Chioggia.  It's been in the news lately about the major changes in Venice for handling tourists, including making cruise ships dock this far out from Venice to avoid maritime accidents and just better manage the traffic.  It wasn't bad, though, as we had a Viking guide narrating fun facts about Venice and the surrounding islands on the way in. We arrived on the island at our hotel (Hotel Excelsior) after another 20 minute ride to the heart of Venice, but the day's high tide prevented us from docking at the hotel itself; this resulted in about a 15 minute walk from where we could  dock to the lobby where we queued up.  Of course we were too early to check in (Noon vs. 3 p.m. check-in time), so first we had to go through a long line to get a Viking letter telling us about leaving on Friday, and then go to another long line to let them know we're here....

You can see Italy from the shores of this city in Slovenia, and tomorrow we'll be disembarking in one of its premier cities.  Actually, Venice has moved aggressively to curtail the cruise and tourist industry from massive mobs of people to manageable, and to do this we will be docking 1.5 hours away and taking private transportation to our hotel  But for today, we're in another of the relatively sleepy towns of Eastern Europe. Slovenia is one of the parts of the former Yugoslavia, and if you didn't know that, you'd realize it quickly when the first public square you encounter at the tour's beginning is named for Tito, the former Yugoslavian strongman.  Unlike the others we've seen, though, it was touched by disturbances when Yugoslavia fractured only for about 10 days in the beginning, more civil protests than anything and not like the war that tortured Croatia. What also made today different from the ones prior was the weather - it was simply spectacular.  Ther...

Our second day in Croatia, we docked this morning in Zadar, the former capital of independent Dalmatia that held great sway with Rome, Venice, and other empires.  Today, though, we didn't go to the old city but, instead, went about 75 miles away on a trip to the Dubrava Falconry Center and the Krka National Park.  The falconry center was particularly impressive.  Who remembers Marlon Perkins' Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom?   We saw it firsthand. The Dubrava Falconry Center was the home to injured birds of prey, including from as far away as the United States.  The first bird of prey we were shown was a great horned owl, and she ("Scar") was magnificent.  Some fun facts about her were that she can turn her head a full 270 degrees while humans can go only 180 degrees.  Females tend to be larger than males, and are adept hunters; she can see 20x better at night than during the day, and moves largely silently through the air.  Her vision is bino...

I learned some really important things today.  First, God has been quite good to me and Cheryl.  Being able to take this trip and get a professional massage is just one example of it.  I have always been somewhat of a skeptic about getting a massage, but then am reminded of the tale that Bob Hope had one every day of his life and he lived past 100!  We each had a lovely one-hour massage this afternoon . . . not sure I'm this limber very darned often. Our guide, Mota Second, we learned more about the 90s Balkan War perpetrated by Slobodan Milosevic of Serbia in a power grab for the countries of this region, including Croatia.  Our guide today, Mota, was caught up in the war as a 24-year old.  He told us as we entered the old city of Dubrovnik how a lot of it was destroyed in 1991 during the Serbian-Croatian war.  Remember, these people are essentially the same and speak largely the same language.   His legs shook and his voice was only a step ...

The day began with a woman calling "Cheryl, Cheryl" as we disembarked the boat and headed up the street toward our group tour meeting point in Kotor.  Yesterday on our way back to the boat from our morning in Corfu, we had a decent length to traverse from the port station to get back to the boat.  On the way, Cheryl saw an older man sitting on a bollard (the post ships use to tie up) with his wife standing guard by him, each with walking sticks. He looked very sickly.  She explained that she was a nurse and asked if she could help him.  He told her he needed help making it to the ship.  She offered to get a wheelchair, and we sped up the remaining distance back to the ship.  Unfortunately, the cruise line (Viking) couldn't attend to him off the boat - call the ambulance was their advice - and he eventually moved with Cheryl's help holding him under his arm before finally reaching the boat. The Viking Sea docked in Kotor This morning, his wife saw Cher...

Sunrise en route to Corfu We awoke early today to a beautiful sunrise.  Our last stop in Greece, Corfu (K erkyra), was today and it was completely charming.  Corfu  is an  island in the Ionian Sea , and  forms the margin of the nation's northwestern frontier with Albania.  For people of our era, t he 1981 James Bond movie For Your Eyes Only  has a number of scenes filmed in Corfu. The Old Town of Corfu city is a UNESCO World Heritage site.  The old city's architectural character is strongly influenced by the Venetian style, coming as it did under Venetian rule for a long period; its small and ancient side streets, and the old buildings' trademark arches are said to be particularly reminiscent of Venice.  We'll let you know if this is so after we visit Venice as our last stop on this cruise. The first part of our day was a 30 minute coastal tour by boat.  The primary focus was four caves along the ocean in Paleokastrita.  The Bl...

Anyone with a healthcare bac kground recognizes the pneumonic  "On old Olympus' Towering Tops, a French and German viewed some hops"  a s a way to remember the 12 cranial nerves. Those nerves are, in order, olfactory, optic, oculomotor, trochlear, trigeminal, abducens, facial, auditory, glossopharyngeal, vagus, sensory (accessory), and hypoglossal. Our blog isn't meant to be an anatomy lesson but I couldn't help but think of this when we traversed to Olympia, the ruined ancient sanctuary, home of the ancient Olympic games, and former site of a massive Statue of Zeus which had been ranked as one of the Seven Wonders of the World.   Coming off the 2024 Olympic G ames in Paris, it was a wonderful glimpse into their origin.   The first Olympic festival was organized on the site in the 8th century BC – with tradition dating the first games at 776 BC.  Gradually, the site increased in size with a wide collection of religious buildings (e.g., the Temple of Ze...

Things really picked up today with our overnight sail from Athens to dock in Santorini about 8 a.m.  We slept in (still sleeping off that 7 hour difference), had a late breakfast, and headed by tender (a small ferry for people) from the Viking Sea to the island of Santorini, one of the Cyclades. Santorini (Thera to the Greeks) lies in the southern Aegean Sea, about 120 miles southwest from the mainland.  It is the large st island of a small circular group of 5 islands formed by the Santorini caldera ("cooking pot" of volcanos).  T he population is a mere 15,000 year round, but it reminded me of my days of living in Sandusky when the Cedar Point crowd swells the numbers greatly in the summer.  Last summer in Santorini there were about 3M visitors from cruise ships, up to 20,000+ per day! There are a number of villages and towns on the island of Santorini.  Our main objective was Oja, also known as Pano Meria.  It is considered the most picturesque village ...

Our first full day on Tuesday saw us in Athens, and my summation of it is that it is a lot like Cleveland - big, sprawling, urban (4M of Greece's 11M people) - but with tons of graffiti.  That apparently came during the economic downturn of 2008 when there were massive demonstrations downtown, and it remains in place for the most part. Our best view of the Acropolis Our start to the day was a little rocky as I ass/u/med that the Viking Ocean  cruising was a copy of the Viking River  cruising.  It isn't.  I had registered for some optional tours for a few of the days and ass/u/med that the "included" tours meant to just show up and you were on them.  That wasn't the case but Guest Services bailed us out by registering them for us.  Now we're good to go for one tour per day for each of the next two weeks.  I'm not good with disruptions to my plan but we got it straightened out with the ever present help of Viking staff. I should've read the tour des...

We're here - Athens, Greece - a world away from Columbus, Ohio and, arguably, the most arduous flight experience since 1998 and going to China.  The first two segments were simple:  Columbus to Washington Dulles, then DC to Montreal, Canada.  Here it got a little more difficult as we had to navigate the large Montreal airport to baggage claim to learn that our luggage (we thought we had to pick up and re-check) was actually transferred automatically for an international flight. It isn't often that my recent past health history catches up with me, but on this day it did.  I was simply worn out by the time we got it all sorted out and navigated our way to our new gate.  I did manage, with the help of Melatonin, to crash out for five hours in a wonderful first class seat on the 8 hour flight from Montreal to Athens, and was feeling somewhat refreshed by the time we landed at 10 a.m. in Athens (7 hours ahead of Columbus, Ohio). We found the Viking representatives fr...