Contiki 12 - Med Cruise 7.

Contiki Day 12: Med Cruise 7, Crete, Thursday September 15th, 2011.

So, technically, today is the last day of the cruise, as we have to get off tomorrow morning at like 630 am. We are in Crete, Knossos, where we can tour the famous Palace, where King Mynas and the myth of the Minotaur took place. Most of us declined the guided tour, as it was more of a city tour than anything. Lewis and I decided to go to the Palace on our own. Lewis had decided to fly back to Santorini, he had friends staying there for a few days and he wanted to join. It was a good idea, as the cruise was over and Santorini was definitively worth more time than just a rushed day.

So, we met up at 10, a bit of sleeping in was appreciated and Lewis needed to pack and whatnot. So we walked outside, around the town a little bit and then I got myself a very much needed caffeine Starbucks - Whipped Cream fix -Yummy! Then I went with Lewis to buy his plane ticket and then we grabbed  a cab to Knossos Palace. It was a bit sketchy, as we actually had to bargain a price with the guy, who was trying to get us to pay an outrageous price to wait for us while we were there and then take us back. No! We got a decent price just for a one way, finally. It was very far and took a while, and the area wasn't nice at all. I wasn't impressed so far, because I knew Crete was a beautiful place, and we only got to see the poor neighborhood. How glad I was not to be alone.

The site was actually very very beautiful. I know I keep going on and on about the views, but honestly, it was breathtaking. You can so understand why a big palace would be sitting right there. It's all about the location :) There was a tour of French people walking around at the same time we were there, so I was listening in and translating some of the facts to Lewis. Of course, being a mythology maniac myself, I already knew a lot. It was a very fun, relaxing day.

Taking a lot of different pictures  with Lewis, just walking around slowly, taking it all in. I was a bit disappointed that half the site was closed off and that there was no "real" labyrinth. Seems like it was even more of a Myth than I though of. But there was a lot of wall paintings with bulls, all colorful and impressive. And there was a roped off area that to me, looked like it could have been part of the maze, so I decided it was. Whatever, it made me happy lol.

After we were done, maybe like 2 hours later, we walked across the street to the souvenir shops. I love those. I bought plenty of stuff, met a nice vendor who was all excited I was from Canada, showed me his collection of money and a picture of him with our Premier Stephen Harper, when he was here vacationing a few years back. It was kinda funny.

Now we had to go back and try to get a cab back to the port. Sounds easier than it was. All the cabs were reserved for returning people. It was a real pain in the ass to get someone to call the company and get us a cab. We had to wait forever too. We finally got one, who tried to bargain a price, again. And then he took us on a very scary ride. His driving was insane, and he was taking through back streets and very very bad neighborhoods, and he took the long way. Honestly, I was very scared by the end of it. I wasn't sure he was actually taking us back, I thought we were going to get robbed.

But we made it back, and I had to say goodbye to Lewis, who had to leave soon. I decided to go back to town and walk around all the shops again. Bought more stuff, then came back to the ship for Tea time. Tea hour was the best, they'd set up this amazing buffet of small sandwiches and pastries, it was so delicious. Lounged for a bit by the pool, started packing my stuff, just relaxed.

We had another meeting, where we all sat around, took millions of pictures, exchanged email addresses, got our passport back and instructions for the next morning. We had to have our suitcases out of our rooms that night, so we needed to pack an overnight bag. Tricky, but it made sure our bags would be out by the time we were. We were getting a ride back to either the President Hotel in Athens, or Syngtama Square downtown.

We all went to dinner together, one last fancy event with lots to drink and then ended the night at the disco. Nothing special, but it was a tad more emotional, and pretty much everyone showed up. One last Contiki party :)

Contiki 11- Med Cruise 6.

Contiki Day 11: Med Cruise 6, Santorini, Wednesday September 14th, 2011.

Today is going to be a big day. Santorini. I was so looking forward to this island. I was up very very early, walking on the deck and taking pictures. I know vacation is usually a time to relax and sleep in, but not for me. I sleep-in every weekend I'm not working. Hell, I paid 3k to be on this trip, I was going to enjoy every minute of it. I guess that philosophy probably caught up with me, as I was very tired and a bit moody that morning.

We were getting off at 8am, and we had to line up and take those little boat shuttles to bring us to the island. It was pretty great to sit on top of this boat and watch the scenery for 10-15 min. (Although it did take forever until we finally got to go.) We have to take a bus and go take a tour of the Island, and a visit to the Village of Oia. It was included with our Contiki Tour. I'm not going to go on and on and on about the scenery's, it was breathtaking, yes, but you've all seen pictures before, the tall volcanic island with all the white houses with the blue domes. It's featured in every movie and on every postcard. This village has a lot of movies filmed there too, think the Sisterhood of the Travelling pants, the scene with the donkeys :)

This spot was just marvelous, it was a picture-perfect moment everywhere we turned. We were given some time to walk around this enchanting city and do some shopping after the tour. I am not quite sure what I did wrong this morning, I was a bit moody, but I was basically told I should spend the day alone by the girls I usually hung out with. I felt like I was in High School again. We had time in this village, then we were being driven back to the top of the Island, different village and we had the rest of the day off. Most of the group wanted to take a cruise in a pirate boat later on, and go see some volcanic rocks from up-close. I really wanted to do this, the other girls didn't want to, and I might have said something wrong, I really don't know. Oh well, it stung, but it wasn't the end of the world. And it was so beautiful and peaceful, I wasn't going to let it ruin my day. I walked around with other people, bought a lot of souvenirs, paintings included and discovered my favorite snack ever, peanuts covered in honey and then sesame seeds. Oh it was so good!

So, after that, we were left at the other village, Thira, where we had 3 choices, take the Cable Car down (We had a free ticket) or walk down, about an hour-long walk in stairs (with my foot? No Thank you!) or take the donkey ride for a few euros. Well, I absolutely wanted to take the donkey ride, but going up, no way I had the balls doing that going down. The Cable Car was going to be scary enough as it is. (And it so was.) It was shortly before Lunch and I decided to go back to the ship and grab some buffet there, before coming back and doing the Pirate thing. I broke off from the rest of the group, everyone was pretty much going their own way anyways. The Cable Car was absolutely terrifying, especially when you don't like heights, but it was a once in a lifetime thing, and it was beautiful. I couldn't take enough pictures of the view.

Grabbed some food on the ship, then found out the shuttle boats were not running for 2 hours, Lunch break so I took a nap in my room; I was feeling sorry for myself at that point and I wanted to shake out of my funk. Because of this, I completely missed out on the Pirate Ship cruise, so that was disappointing. So I finally went back after my nap and my shower, took the boat back and then decided to try the Donkey ride on top of the island. Well, it would have been great to have people I knew with me, I could have had my picture taken on the donkey. There was only a couple with me. It was a fantastically hilarious experience! I laughed so much, I got scared, I got hurt, it was awesome! It's one hell of an experience. My donkey was crazy, he wanted to be the first in line so he was running up and cutting other donkeys off and hugging the walls. (I have videos.) I wasn't really able to take good pictures, as you have to be using both hands to hold yourself steady, but still, best time ever, even by myself. After that, I spent a long time shopping around and ended up sitting at a table by the view and I watched the sunset with a nice glass of wine and a very yummy gyros. Aaaaah.

Went back to the ship on one of the last shuttles and then I had to change, we had a Contiki Cocktail Party/Hour scheduled at the Disco. They opened early for us, since we missed the captain's Cocktail yesterday, we wanted something special. It didn't turn out so great. I won't go into too much details, but a lot of the group was on "rowdy" and rude behavior, throwing peanuts around and being very demanding to the staff, who were doing us a favor after all. But the drinks went down very fast and then we went straight to dinner as a group, using 3 big tables. lot of wine was consumed again, and a very late night was had by most of us. I went to see the last showing of the Mama Mia presentation by the crew, and it was very fun!!!

Of course, I had to make a fool of myself at Karaoke at the Disco after that ;) Nah, I wasn't so bad, I love singing. It was a nice icebreaker I guess, as I got the whole thing going! Ended the night at the Sports Bar and Casino, as per usual and that was it. Another very nice day with Contiki :)

Contiki Day 10: Med Cruise 5 (Part 2.)

Contiki Day 10: Med Cruise 5, Patmos (AM) and Kusadasi (PM) Tuesday September 13th, 2011.

Part 2. Kusadasi, The House of Virgin Mary and The Ephesus.

So, after a nice shower and a change of clothes, I headed back to the poolside for some buffet lunch (I did not have the patience to wait for the special) and a nice iced coffee. I was way too excited to stand still for too long. A few hours later, it was time to meet again for the arrival at Kusadasi. (We had boarded back this morning at 1030 and we were getting off at 230pm.)

There had been 2 different tours offered to us, The Ephesus and the House of the Virgin Mary and The Ephesus. There wasn't a big time difference to have both, and it was 3 or 5 euros more to do the combined tour. I'm not a very religious person, but I figured that for the price, I'd go. I was very surprised to see that quite a few people skipped the tour entirely (OK it was all optionals, as you had to pay extra, but, wow.) and even the ones that did go, picked The Ephesus on it's own. There was only a few of us on the combined tour again. But it was OK, we were once again mixed with the people from, the morning. We hopped on a bus, picked a nice guide up and went on our way the the House of the Virgin Mary. Of course, it was sitting at the top of a mountain, with a breathtaking view.

At first, I wasn't really touched by the story (That John the Baptist and the Virgin Mary had come here into hiding) but then I saw a lot of emotional people and it kinda got to me. Once again, we had to line up, in silence, this was Holy Ground, cannot talk inside the House, no pictures. Lots of people crying, I got caught up in the moment and teared up a little too. I bought, well put money in a wooden box, to take a candle, which I brought outside where they had a beautiful display with a lot of candles all lit up, for prayers and loved ones. That's where I cried a tiny bit, when I lit my candle and took a picture of it. (It was for both my Grandmas, my Grandpa and my aunt.) I also ended up buying a few Virgin Mary medallions. I was very glad I chose to go, it ended up being a very lovely moment.

Next stop, The Ephesus! I was SO excited! I'm pretty sure I annoyed a lot of people on the way over, but I honestly didn't care. For over 10 years I had wanted to go to this site, I was going to enjoy every second of it. *Now, it was a very amazing visit, although the site is way too massive to get to see everything in such a short time, so we missed on a lot of stuff. Especially MY favorite, the only standing column from the Temple of Artemis. We didn't go there and it was really sad.*

For one of the first times ever, I barely paid any attention to the guide. From what I overheard, he was very interesting, but I wanted to see everything and walk everywhere, I didn't have time to stand around, listening. It just made it perfect for Lewis and I to take a million pictures back and forth. It was great! We would run all over, look it everything, pose, click then switch places and cameras and then it all over again. I was so giddy. And we were so lucky, we were experiencing something that almost never happens; a near sandstorm. The wind was so crazy, it was impossible to keep your hat on. So it felt like it wasn't quite 42 degrees out!

There was so much to see and take in. Lots of the original structures were still there, and even everywhere on the ground, the rocks, you could find treasures. It was very slippery to walk down the slopes, with the original "roads" rocks and marbles. As clumsy as I am, I had to be careful. Thankfully, my foot barely hurt anymore, so I took the opportunity to go back and forth everywhere. There were stray cats everywhere. You could hear them meow, it was a bit sad. I wanted to feed them all, and give them water and pet them. I got to pet a few kitties, they were so used to people they were very friendly. I even gave some water to one of them, from a nook in a big rock.

Soon after that we started seeing the big library in the background and better preserved structures. It is really, really something to be standing next to and touching stone buildings that have been there for close to 3,000 years. And that library was absolutely huge. It was so incredible to be standing there and getting all this history. I will never ever forget that day. And I had such a good time with Lewis, exploring everywhere and coming up with pictures ideas.

After the Library, I walked by myself a bit further up, and sat on the side of what looked like a main street and on each side used to be hundreds of pillars/columns. Not much was left, of course, but I just sat there, under the sun, imagining what it was like back then. I didn't even realize I had tears running down my face. I just felt like I was home, I was feeling so privileged to be there.

Eventually, the visit was over, way quicker than I expected, we slowly went back to the bus, stopping at all the shops on the way. The vendors were very aggressive and intimidating. We were given a short time to shop. I took advantage of it, as I wanted a lot of souvenirs. I was now an expert at haggling, so I got a lot of stuff for way cheaper than the asking price. Then we went back to town, close to port where a lot of my Contiki group had met to go to a Turkish bath. Now, I understand that this is a really awesome experience, very relaxing and whatnot, but it's not something I'd be comfortable doing. I can barely tolerate a massage, don't like saunas, so I knew this wasn't for me. I walked around the shops with a few girls instead, getting some more souvenirs, as this was our last stop in Turkey.

Back to the ship at close to 8pm, we realized we were missing on the Captain's Cocktail. I had been originally interested in attending, wearing a fancy dress and all, but there just wasn't enough time. I was so dusty, all I wanted was a shower. Most of us still decided to wear fancy clothes and go to the last seating at the restaurant. Lots of wine, lots of fun, lots of stories. It was another great night. And as usual, went to to disco for a bit, had a few drinks, then back to the Sports Bar, more drinks and some casino. My regular little vacation routine, it rocked.

Next stop, Santorini!