First up on the list was the Peter and Paul Cathedral at the Peter and Paul Fortress.  This is the final resting place of all Russian tsars from Peter the Great through Nicholas II (whose remains, along with those of his family, were finally laid to rest in 1998).  It was pretty impressive, and it was neat to see the tombs of great historical figures such as Peter the Great and Catherine the Great.  There was a separate chapel dedicated to Nicholas II and his family, who were killed in 1918 by the Bolsheviks (a great book that contains information about the identification of their remains is The Romanovs: The Final Chapter). 

The second cathedral was the Church on the Spilled Blood, erected on the site where Tsar Alexander II was assassinated in 1881.  They have a shrine inside the church made of beautiful different marbles (red and green) that covers the original cobblestones where the tsar fell and they never cleaned his blood off, although over the years it has worn away.  The exterior of this church looks like St Basil’s in Moscow, with the characteristic colorful cupolas.  The inside was breathtaking – instead of paintings there were over 300 colorful mosaics.  And everywhere there was different colors of marble.  It was definitely worth the trip.

The last church was St Isaac’s Cathedral, which is the fourth largest domed church in the world.  It also had beautiful colored marble (red, green, blue, black) on the exterior and interior and also featured wonderful mosaics and gilded angels.  A fantastic view was to stand in the center of the church, and look upwards into the dome and to see all of the wonderful mosaic scenes and then at the very center of the dome was a dove.  Very lovely. 

I have to say that St Petersburg did not disappoint.  I wish we had been able to spend a little more time there and of course, I would like to return to Russia again to be able to see Moscow as well (and maybe take a trip on the Trans-Siberian railway as well).

But all of that aside, St Petersburg was a lovely city.  I didn’t realize that it was primarily set up on different islands in the Neva River (and other waterways as well) and that Peter the Great had originally envisioned making a Venice of the North, with canals and bridges.  My main regret is that the tours were so whirlwind and intense that we really didn’t get a chance to get any souvenirs in the whole trip! =(  Although Mo did get ripped off on a maryoshka doll.  We just weren’t given the time – we had 10 minutes at a souvenir shop to use the toilets and I was concerned we’d miss the bus, only to have to wait an additional 30 minutes for all passengers to return, so I could have actually gotten something, which was aggravating.  There was also an international economic forum taking place in town over the days we were there, and there were also a total of five cruise ships in port, so there was a lot of traffic and also a ton of people everywhere we went, which made things quite hectic.  It was also the warmest day of our trip (temperatures in the 70s) and they don’t use air conditioning in the museums, so due to the large crowds it was very hot.  Another thing in Russia is that you are allowed to take pictures in their monuments and museums, but you have to pay (around $3-$4 for regular cameras and $9 for video cameras).  However, we did go ahead and pay because of course we wanted to take pictures inside the places we were going to see.   

Our first stop was to Pushkin (Tsarskoe Selo), the former Tsarist village.  We went to one of the palaces there, the Catherine Palace, and it was absolutely magnificent.  It has been 10 years since I have been to Versailles so it’s hard to remember, but the Catherine Palace would definitely give it a run for its money.  The fantastic parquet floors by themselves were worth the trip, they were awesome and had different patterns in every room.  They also had restored the Amber Room (unfortunately, no pictures are allowed to be taken in this room).  It was made up of mosaics of amber and was amazing!  My descriptions of this palace would hardly do it justice so I will have to post pictures for all to see.

After the tour, we had a nice lunch at a restaurant at the Catherine Palace and then we were off to the Hermitage, which is a world-class art museum housed in 5 buildings and comprising over 3 million works of art.  One of these buildings is the former Winter Palace residence of the tsars and I have wanted to go here for so long, I was so excited!  It definitely rivaled Versailles and had a very similar room to the Hall of Mirrors (although I think I liked the room at the Winter Palace better because it seemed to be more open and full of light).  We didn’t have much time at the museum, just an hour and a half, so we were shown the high points of the museum’s collection.

That evening we had the opportunity to see a performance of Swan Lake at the Rimsky-Korsakov Theatre.  Although it was warm in the theatre (I had purchased a chocolate bar and by the end of the first act it was melted) the music was lovely and the dancing was beautiful.  And Mo managed to stay awake for the most part! =)

Then it was back to the ship, but the coolest part was that we were there during the time they call the “White Nights.”  Due to being so far north and it being almost the summer solstice, there is virtually no night.  We were leaving the theatre after 11 pm and it looked like it was 6 or 7 pm.  Sunset wasn’t until after midnight and sunrise was before 4 am.  Amazing!

After the walk through the Old Town, we went to the Kadriorg Palace, built by Peter the Great for his wife Catherine (hence, Kadriorg).  It was a nice summer residence that had been beautifully restored and lovely grounds.  This tour was only a half day and so we had some time when returning to the ship to shop around the little tourist market set up at the port and to have a cloudberry (had never heard of it before) crepe.  It was quite delicious.  We even filled out a survey that tourism workers were distributing around the port about what we thought of Estonia and how they can make it better to have people come, as they are a small country but would like to have tourists come in to help support their economy.  Perhaps someday I will get the chance to return and spend more time there because I think it would be worthwhile.

One of my favorite moments of this day was when we were back on the ship and we were talking about being in Russia the next day and Mo says to me, “Are we going to have to move?”  Of course we are, we’re going to another country!

We got a taxi over to the port, and although it was only about 20 minutes or so away, the trip cost $80!  I don’t think I’m ever going to complain about gas prices in the US again (until the next time I go to the pump, that is, ha).  Then we had to fill out a health form before checking in.  Unfortunately, Mo had GI problems our last night/morning in London and she was honest on the form.  Then we thought they weren’t going to let us on the ship (that would figure).  Luckily, we were allowed on, but Mo was supposed to be “quarantined” in the room for 24 hours, totally sucky (although I was allowed to leave).  At least our room on this ship is significantly bigger than on the last ship, although we once again have an interior room on the 9th deck.  This one has some extra space (which is good, because now we have the luggage with us) and also a couch in addition to the two beds.

The first night was pretty uneventful, just sleeping to try and catch up on the rest we haven’t really had since we got to this continent.  The next day, the boat docked in Warnemunde, Germany, and we were taking an excursion called Berlin & Time at Leisure.  This entailed taking a 2.5 hour train ride to Berlin (another opportunity for sleep catch-up).  Once in Berlin, we got on a bus to take a sight-seeing tour of the city.  The weather was okay, there was a brief downpour (luckily while we were on the bus) and then cloudy patches interspersed with sun.  We saw the Brandenburg Gate, the Reichstag, Checkpoint Charlie, and Postdamer Platz.  Then we got three hours free time in Berlin.  A high point for me was a tourist trap in which you paid 2.5 euro and got seven stamps in your passport representing the stamps you would have had to have received to enter East Germany (for those of you who remember that such a country once existed).  I didn’t care about being trapped though because I’m all about getting those stamps in my little blue book!  We went around trying to find some “authentic” German food and believe it or not, had a bit of trouble.  We saw Subway, Mexican, Asian, Italian, Australian (complete with kangaroo burgers), and finally a German place where we got some delicious spaetzle and apple strudel for dessert.  Then back on the train and home to the cruise (more sleeping).

From there we were off to Canterbury, of Chaucer fame.  A nice little city and then of course we got to see the magnificent Canterbury Cathedral, seat of the Archbishop of Canterbury, who is the head of the Anglican church.  Being a Sunday, we had a window of opportunity for visiting between services, and it was quite nice.  There were lovely stained glass windows and just knowing that people stood in that building a thousand years ago was amazing.  And to realize that it escaped the bombings of WWII is an even greater thing to imagine.  Up until this point in the day, we had managed to escape the 70% chance of rain and it was merely overcast and cool. 

Our last major stop was Dover, for a brief look at the famous white cliffs and Dover Castle sitting majestically on the hill above the cliffs.  The composition of the sky was just right so that we could see France off in the distance 20 miles or so away.  This was just a photo op stop, but I did go down to the water to be able to say I’ve touched the English Channel!  Then we had the hour and forty minute ride to Greenwich to catch the boat down the Thames back into London.  Unfortunately by this time it was raining, but we had thought ahead and brought our umbrellas with us. 

For dinner we had arranged to meet my Dad and Anne for dinner at Gordon Ramsay’s at Claridge’s.  They had a three course prix fixe option (or a six small course option, which Dad had) and it was very delicious.  My appetizer was a Thai lobster ravioli, the entrée was a fricassee of sea bass, salmon, and tiger prawn with vegetables and a crayfish bisque sauce, and dessert was a chocolate mousse with grilled mango and yogurt sherbet.  Yummy.  And of course the in-between palate cleansers, all very wonderful.  And the staff there was very courteous and just wonderful (of course, being such a fancy place, one would expect this I suppose).   

The downer is that this is our last night in London,  and I am sad to leave (other than things truly are quite expensive here and we have an unfavorable exchange rate on top of this).  London is one of my favorite cities and actually a place I could live.  Tomorrow we have a morning flight to Copenhagen and then will be embarking on our cruise.  No time for seeing Copenhagen on this end of the cruise (we will be having a tour on the way back), but on Tuesday we will be visiting Berlin, which will be a first for both Mo and me.  Stay tuned for more exciting accounts of our adventures.

St Paul’s Cathedral was lovely and we had a nice tour inside.  An interesting tidbit I learned was that the dome is covered in lead – an interesting choice.  My favorite story was that it escaped nearly unscathed during the Blitz in 1940, although almost everything else around it was destroyed and a bomb was dropped on the front steps, but did not explode!  They later defused it and blew it up in a remote area and it blew a hole 80 feet wide!  Lucky for the church it did not blow up there. 

I was very excited to go the Tower of London because we didn’t get to go on our last trip and we got to see the Crown Jewels which was very awesome!  We also got to see where many famous people were imprisoned and lost their heads.   Apparently there were 72,000 people executed during the 38 year reign of Henry VIII – crazy.  We had taken a boat ride down the Thames to get to the Tower and while we were waiting we saw part of an air show that was a portion of the celebration of the Queen’s birthday, very neat.  Also yesterday was Prince Philip’s 90th birthday, so an interesting time to be in London. 

After the Tower we had lunch with the tour group and met some interesting people from Argentina and throughout the US.  Then we went to the Household Cavalry Museum and saw the guards on their horses and had the opportunity to try on some of their uniforms (there’s a funny picture of me in one that I might post later).  On the way back to the bus, we were sidetracked by a bicycling regiment of naked people!  Mostly men, but some women too.  A few had on undergarments, but most were fully in the buff and riding bikes.  Definitely a moment that makes for an interesting dinner conversation later!  Then we had photo ops at Buckingham Palace and Westminster Abbey and then over to the London Eye.

I was super excited to be going on the London Eye because it just seemed like it would be fantastic, and it was!  At first, the line was so long that we were worried about it, but the line moved steadily and we made it to the front of the line in less than half an hour.  It’s amazing how many people go on it – apparently 33 million since it opened in 2000.  The crazy thing is that when the gondolas come back around they do not stop the wheel for loading and unloading (unless you are in a wheelchair).  You just have to hurry up and cram into the pod on the way up, and hurriedly exit on the way down.  The entire trip is about 30 minutes and it is a spectacular view of London, absolutely awesome!  Particularly today since a storm was rolling in and made for dramatic looking skies.  You can’t hardly even tell that you’re moving, although I did have some fleeting thoughts about what would happen if the thing were to collapse – but I quickly put those out of my mind. 

Afterwards we made it to Waterloo Station and made our foray into taking the public transportation by taking a bus to Victoria Station, which is fairly close to our hotel.  Then we had a meal and back home to the hotel to get some rest before tomorrow’s big tour to Leeds Castle, Canterbury Cathedral, Dover, and Greenwich and then our fancy dinner at one of Gordon Ramsay’s restaurants.  Stay tuned for future updates.

Then on to Chicago O’Hare, where it was about 2 degrees in the airport.  Or at least cold enough that I finally couldn’t stand it any more and was forced to spend $15 for a blanket for myself and $20 on a sweatshirt for Mo.  We were scheduled to be there for 2 hours, but another 1.5 hours was tacked on because of the storming.  Then, after we boarded, another 1.5 hours was spent on the plane before we took off.  We were supposed to have a 6 hour layover in New York – plenty of time to get from LaGuardia to JFK in time to check in at least two hours early for our international flight.  But as the minutes ticked away on the tarmac in Chicago, I was starting to get panicked – although not as panicked as I was standing in Standiford Field and hearing “door closing in 2 minutes, please report to the gate immediately.”

Finally we made it to New York and – what a relief – our luggage was there.  However, Mo had left her claim tickets on the plane and they didn’t want to let us out of the baggage area without them.  Finally, she was able to show her ID and we stepped outside into the sweltering 95 degree weather.  We got a cab over to JFK and even had time to grab a little food before having to make it through security.  Things were starting to look up, especially when we boarded on time.  But then we sat.  And sat.  And sat.  It was raining outside and apparently the weather was pretty bad, so we waited on the tarmac for three hours.  I was definitely panicked at this point as I realized it would be physically impossible to make it to Dublin before our connecting flight left.  But those thoughts were quickly erased as the awful turbulence and thoughts of potential death replaced them.

We did, however, make it to Dublin in one piece, and Aer Lingus efficiently already had new boarding passes printed out to hand to us and to usher to the front of the line to make the plane that was just about to leave, so we only ended up making to Heathrow about an hour later than scheduled.  We made it without incident to our hotel (although I relented and we got a 60 pound cab ride to the hotel instead of attempting to take the Tube).  We stored our luggage there as it was too early for check-in, and then found a pay phone to call the tour company about our tour to Stonehenge which was leaving in less than an hour.  We found out it was only about a 15 minute walk from where we were and started off, only to be doused with rain.  Forced to duck in a store and shell out 25 pounds for two umbrellas, I was just silently praying that Mo wouldn’t catch pneumonia and die.  We made it to the tour office by Victoria station and Mo bought another sweatshirt to wear in place of her sopping wet one from Chicago (if you happen to be regifted these sweatshirts, you should at least know they have an interesting backstory!) . 

Then it was off to Stonehenge, about a 2 hour bus drive away.  Which was a good thing because I had a hard time sleeping on the plane for some reason and it allowed me to catch up on rest.  Then we saw the famous stones, and they looked as they did when we saw them 10 years ago.  But it was still cool.  And then another 2 hour nap on the way back.  Then dinner at a bar & grill at Victoria Station, which was good and back to the hotel.  Although even at this point, I still feel a day behind!

As you have read below, there were some blips on our dream vacation.  But what’s a dream vacation if you don’t have stories to tell, right?  So I thought I’d give my overall thoughts on the cruise itself, apart from the issues that Delta Airlines caused.

I had never been on a cruise before and wasn’t sure what to expect.  Many of the people I know have been on cruises, and they have mixed opinions of them – some have liked them and some haven’t.  Also, most of them have gone to the Caribbean (totally different from the Mediterranean) and the length of the cruise has been much shorter.  I have to say that I liked the cruise, and it was also a good way to see many different places in a short amount of time.  The last time I had been in Europe (2001), we had seen several countries in just over two weeks, but we were constantly running to catch trains and trying to find a place to eat (where the people probably didn’t speak English) and worrying about how we were going to get to places and where we were going to stay.  We also spent some of our sleeping time on trains and one night even on the floor of a train station on the Swiss-Italian border!

The cruise solved all of these issues.  We never had to worry about how we were going to get to our next destination, where we were going to eat, or if we’d get to sleep in a bed.  All of that was taken care of by the cruise.  We went on the cheap and had an interior stateroom, which was small and without a window, but it was fine and suited its purpose – to provide a bed to sleep in and a bathroom to use.  I thought the food was pretty good, although my only complaint in this area was that it was very stressful to try to get breakfast in the morning on the days that we were in going on excursions at port, because there were so many others doing the same thing at the same time.

We decided to book all of our excursions through the cruise line to ensure that we would be back on time, etc and they were all great.  The tour guides all spoke English and were very knowledgable.  The included lunches were all good, and we got to see many wonderful places and learn a lot about them at the same time.  The buses were clean and the drivers were all very good.  The cruise line was also good about accomodating unexpected issues, such as the closure of the road between Alexandria and Cairo.  They put together an afternoon excursion to Alexandria on the fly, and automatically booked us on the Cairo tour for the next day and delayed the leaving time so that everyone who wanted to see Cairo and the pyramids could.

The staff aboard the Norwegian Jade was also very friendly and helpful.  We were allowed to wash our few clothes that we did have for free because our luggage was stuck in Barcelona, and they made attempts to try and get our luggage before the end of the trip, although that didn’t work out.  The stewards in our area were friendly and our room was always clean.  Everyone was always smiling and greeted you when they saw you.  I really enjoyed the freestyle cruising concept.  We could eat when we wanted and weren’t obligated to sit in a specific location.  And it was nice that the environment was casual when it turned out that we didn’t have any luggage – wearing tshirts everywhere was perfectly acceptable!

Only issues (and these were minor) – as I said before, it was stressful to try and get breakfast in the morning because it was so crowded.  We had to wake up two hours before the meeting time for our excursions to make sure we could take a shower and get down there and not have to inhale our breakfast in five minutes.  Finding a seat was also an issue, although we always did find one in the end.  On sea days, I had an issue with the large gap in times the restaurants were closed between breakfast and lunch.  If you wanted food between 1030 and noon, you didn’t have very many options.  This was frustrating if you had slept in because it left you very limited.  Not the end of the world though.

I would highly recommend taking a Mediterranean cruise to be able to see all of these lovely areas in a relaxing way over a short period of time.  I would also recommend Norwegian Cruise Lines, I really liked their ship and services and would cruise with them again.

After leaving Crete, we had two days at sea on the boat.  New Year’s Day passed unremarkably and it was almost as though we hadn’t left 2009 behind, as it still felt the same.  January 2nd was killer though, and not in a good way.  The boat was rocking something fierce, and I spent the total of my day either sleeping, or cursing Poseidon while at the porcelain throne.  Not pleasant.  Luckily when I woke up on the 3rd I was feeling much better, and after bidding adieu to the Norwegian Jade, we boarded a bus to drive through Barcelona and up to Montserrat, which is located outside of the city.  The name literally means “serrated mountain” and it was very beautiful up there.  There is a centuries old monestary up there (still active) and we had the chance to look around and also to attend part of the mass in the lovely church, as it was a Sunday.  Not that we were following that much, as the service was in Catalan, but it was still a nice experience.

From there we were taken to the airport, where we were finally reunited with our bags, which had been patiently waiting two weeks for our return to Barcelona.  Although I do wish we had had the luggage while on the trip, at least our bags weren’t lost forever and we didn’t have to purchase a new suitcase to cart home the accumulation of tshirts we had made during the trip.  We took a taxi to our hotel and then went walking along the street to find some food and hopefully to do some shopping.  Well, one out of two ain’t bad.  We got some food.  Didn’t really see anywhere to buy any gifts, which was unfortunate. Then back to the hotel for some TV watching, although we were limited by language barriers to CNN and professional darts.

It was up early to make it to the airport, and I slept the entire flight to Amsterdam, so it went by quickly.  I was able to buy up some last minute souvenirs there, since Spain was such a disappointment in this area.  Then off to wait in a queue to get to another queue.  The first line at the gate was to get our passports scanned and answer several questions regarding our activities and luggage packing history.  Then into line number 2.  The second line was to go there the security check.  First our carry on bags went through the scanner and we passed through the metal detector.  Then they went through our bags by hand, very thoroughly and we got a full body rub-down (not a pat down).  As a result of the extra security, we left from Amsterdam about an hour late, but this did not impact our travel plans.  It does make me sad that because of a few crazies it is a hassle to see the world, but I’d rather be safe than sorry.

We had a nice plane on the flight from Amsterdam to Detroit with our own personal video, so I passed the time by watching three movies.  Then it was, miraculously, a quick pass through customs and on to more waiting for our flight to Louisville, which was delayed by an additional hour.  By the time I got home, it had been 24 hours since we had left the hotel in Barcelona for the airport.  I hated to be back to reality and having to go to work the next day, but it is always good to be home.  And my kitties missed me. =)

Δεν ελπίζω τίποτα. Δε φοβούμαι τίποτα. Είμαι λεύτερος.

I hope for nothing. I fear nothing. I am free.  ~Nikos Kazantzakis, Cretan Writer

Crete is only one of the thousands of Greek islands in the Mediterranean Sea, but it is the largest, and the fifth largest island in the Mediterranean (after Sicily, Sardinia, Cyprus, and Corsica).  We docked in Iraklion, which is the capital of the island and then took a short bus ride to Knossos, which was the site of a palace of the Minoan civilization.  The ruins of the palace date back four thousand years, and is the birthplace of the legend of the minotaur and the labyrinth.  For those of you unfamiliar with this myth, I will attempt to paraphrase it for you.  King Minos was the ruler, and his wife fell in love with a bull and had a child with the bull, which was half man and half bull.  This creature was called the minotaur.  The King had a labyrinth built to house this creature, and every year Athens had to send seven young men and seven young women to be fed to the minotaur in repayment for killing King Minos’ son.  The prince of Athens, Thesus, volunteered to be a part of the expedition in the hopes that he could kill the minotaur.  His father, King Aegeos, did not want him to go, but agreed to let him go in the end and told him that if he made it out, to change the sails of the ship from black to white.  When Theseus made it to Knossos he caught the eye of the princess Ariadne, who helped him by giving him a sword and a ball of thread.  With the thread he was able to follow his path back out of the labyrinth once he had killed the minotaur.  He then abducted Ariadne and later abandoned her on another island.  In his excitement, he forgot to change the sails on his ship, and when his father, who had been watching everyday for his return, saw the sails were black (which meant Theseus was dead), plunged himself in despair into the sea, which is now called the Aegean Sea after him.  Isn’t Greek mythology fun?

The ruins of Knossos were amazing to see, since they date back even 1500 years before the Parthenon.  This civilization even had a sewage system and pipes for getting water into their city!  Does anyone else think that we’ve gotten dumber over time?  After leaving Knossos, we went to a palce called Arolithos, which is like a hotel that has been made in the style of a Minoan village.  We had a nice snack there of tomatoes, cucumber, and different cheeses.  I have never been a fan of feta cheese, but the feta cheese we had here was wonderful.  We then got back to the ship rather early, but decided just to hang out on the top deck and have some ice cream rather than try to see more of Crete on our own.  The weather was in the upper 70s and it was hard to believe it was the last day of the year!