Bouncing Around the Balkans: A trip 8 years in the making

Back in 2006, after I had finished doing my semester abroad in Madrid, my boyfriend at the time--Ryan--and I did the most cliché thing ever and spent two months backpacking through Europe. It was an amazing experience, and we landed in 10 different countries, using trains, ferries, buses, and bicycles to get around.
Because 2006 was in the Long Ago, before smartphones and laptops and data plans were really a thing, I spent a lot of my downtime in my homestay apartment absolutely devouring the Lonely Planet book Europe on a Shoestring. I highlighted, notated, and earmarked that book cover to cover, planning for the day Ryan and I would make our Grand Adventure. I plotted routes and made plans for hours and hours, figuring out the most cost-effective and time-effective ways to get to everywhere we wanted to go. Ryan and I both had our own countries we really wanted to see; his included Belgium, Germany, and Greece, mine included France, Italy, and Croatia.
I don't know how long I sat in my little room, trying to figure out how we could get to everywhere we wanted to go within the two-month limit on our Eurail passes (and leave the Schengen states before my student visa expired and forbade me from entering those countries again), spending time in the university's computer lab translating hydrofoil timetables from Croatian and Greek and Italian. After a while, though, it became evident that we would simply lose too much time keeping Croatia in the itinerary, and I had to let my little Balkan dream slip away.
Not to get all sad-sack and remorseful, because that trip was epic.

I mean, I got to see the largest bowl in Europe. EPIC!

But everything I'd read about Croatia and all the pictures I'd seen really stayed with me. It was described as being similar to the Czech Republic...full of cities rich in history and cheap beer that hadn't quite yet been fully developed into tourist havens the way that most Western European places had. I promised myself I'd get to Croatia some day and see what all the fuss was about.

CUT TO...

April 30, 2014

I couldn't stop smiling as I boarded my teeeeeny tiny plane. My breath caught in my throat as I woke up from a mini-nap, looked out the window, and saw the Adriatic coastline unfolding below me.

 

I also marveled at the simple deliciousness of airplane spinach pie and Croatian beer

When I was first booking this trip, I wanted to stay solely in Croatia, starting in Zagreb and working my way down to Split, Hvar, and finally Dubrovnik. The problems I encountered was the cost of one-way flights in and out of Croatia, and it came down to whether I would rough it and take buses and ferries back to Italy instead, or somehow make it full circle back to Zagreb and fly in and out of there. Again, time limits got to me, and I decided Dubrovnik would be my only Croatian city, but that I would use it as a jumping-off point for nearby Bosnia and Herzegovina and Montengro.

It had been a looooooooong journey from disembarking the Odyssey on the 29th...flying to Zurich, staying overnight in their super awesome dayrooms (i highly recommend!), losing my friggen phone charger on the plane, and navigating the buses and tiny cobblestone streets of Dubrovnik to finally make it to my hostel in the middle of the Old Town. After showering the travel dust off me, I was greeted in true Balkan style by the front desk girl and the other hostelers:

a honey-flavored rakija called"medica". Živjeli!

Pumped full of second-wind energy and Balkan hospitality, I wandered out into the breezy night to stretch my legs, get my bearings, and work up an appetite for dinner (that spinach pie was filling!). After elbowing through a few stragglers from the Aria cruise ship that had come in that morning, I left the Old Town through the Ploce Gate and just started climbing up and up and up. I went as far as I could go on foot, about halfway up the hill the funicular climbs, and was rewarded by a beautiful sunset and seeing the lights come on throughout the Old Town.

Having just come from being on a cruise ship for the last four months, where the majority of port days required me to be back on the ship by 4 or 5 in the afternoon, the simple pleasure of being able to see a sunset from land was really special for me. I was very much looking forward to a week's worth of land-based travel, and being able to take time exploring Dubrovnik and the surrounding areas at my own pace. I ate dinner at a Bosnian restaurant called Taj Mahal (still trying to figure that one out), and drank in the night air before turning in at my hostel.

DAY 2--Dubrovnik, Dubrovnik, Dubrovnik
The One Thing You Must Do in Dubrovnik is walk the medieval stone walls that enclose the Old Town, so that's what I did on my only full day in the city. I started in the early afternoon, under a drizzly sky. There were still quite a lot of crusie ship tourists on the walls with me, but nothing like the clusterf*ck that apparently plagues the city in the summer, when up to FIVE cruise ships can be docked there in a single day. The rain also kept some people from the walls, I imagine, so I was able to move without too much trouble. Once again I was grateful for not having to rush to see this beautiful city, because I must have spent a good three hours on the walls, taking pictures, marveling at the scenery. It was one of the most breathtaking things I've ever seen.

but still, I mean...

 I also had the time to stop and listen to a folk quintet who had set up shop in a stone archway that perfectly amplified their stunning voices.  I must had stayed there for a good half an hour, just enjoying their incredible harmonies. During one of their breaks, I whistled to the singer to get his attention, and I threw a paper airplane I'd made from a 20-kuna note down to their basket. it was a tragic failure, as the money-plane flew out about a foot and then drifted down the wall in a slowly depressing spiral. He picked up the note from the soggy flagstones, thanked me, we all had a good laugh, and I mosey'd along to bury my embarrassment in a chocolate ice cream bar.

After wandering Old Town for a bit, I decided to get my tickets in line for my trips to Bosnia and Montenegro. At the main bus station, I was laughingly told that it was impossible to book a bus for a day trip to Kotor (Montenegro), and that I would have to book a tour group for that back in town. Again, having spent quite a lot of time on tourist buses over the last four months, I was NOT pleased to hear the news, so I decided to postpone my Montenegro trip until after my overnight in Mostar (in Bosnia). So i booked the bus for Mostar for the next morning (at 8am. ugh) and decided to walk back to Old Town, about 20 minutes away.

The sun was starting to come out, and I was strolling along the road by the sea cliffs, when all of a sudden...

no, it is not dead.

 This sweet little kitty was just napping away in the sun, and I had an overwhelming urge to join it.
So I did.

I petted this sweet little thing on the head, she woke up, stretched a little, looked me up and down, decided I was clearly her soul sister, and crawled right into my lap and went back to napping. I was in absolute bliss. I sat there for I don't know how long, garnering looks from passers-by that ranged from confusion to "AAAAAAWWWW!!!"...even had a few people snap pictures of me and the kitty. I named her Moon River, since we were clearly "two drifters off to see the world". It was so peaceful to just sit there enjoying the sunshine with this little stray, but then it was time to go. In true kitty fashion, she looked at me one last time, and scampered off into the bushes. We are temporary creatures, Moon River and I.

The walk back also included a gate that had been peppered with locks left by lovers and families.

I ended my day in Dubrovnik with what I thought would be a late-night, quiet dinner at a small Italian joint in Old Town. It ended up being a semi-raucous evening at a small Italian joint in Old Town after a gaggle of Belgian bikers decided they were going to join me for dinner. To my credit, I spent most of the night conversing in French, which I hadn't really used since I was in Quebec back in August. To their credit, they popped a bottle of champagne, so maybe they were just drunk and humoring me.

so there's Jean-Luc, Didier, Other Luc, Young Luc...and...I'm pretty sure someone was named "Phillipe"....

This, I would come to realize, was going to be pretty standard for my time in the Balkans. I never made it through one meal completely alone. The Croatians/Bosnians/Montenegrans are way to sociable to allow that to happen!

DAY 3-I Discover a Deep Passion for Burek

So it turns out that I was lucky to not go to Kotor on the day I had originally planned to go, because my new Canadian friend Josh from the hostel in Dubrovnik had also booked his bus to Mostar for this day. And, by sheer coinciendence, we had booked the same hostel there as well!

inadvertent travel buddies are the best kind

We made it to Mostar and only got lost a couple of times on our way to Hostel Majda, where Majda herself greeted us and another Danish backpacker from our bus with coffee, iced tea, and slices of what I can only describe as Bosnian tiramisu. After decorating our all-important name tags for our bunk beds, Majda pulled out maps of the areas and proceeded to give us the greatest breakdown of what to see/do/eat in Mostar. I'm talking, tiny hole-in-the-wall burek joints, the sneakiest and best way to see the Old Bridge (Stari Most), great bakeries, the works. The energy and detail she gave us was surprising, but again, it was just par for the course in the Balkans. You could tell how passionate she was about her home town and BiH in general (BiH is the abbreviation for "Bosne i Hercegovine"). She spoke about her memories of the war in the 90s, and admitted that even people like her who actually lived through it couldn't really tell you the why and the how of it all. I also got from her--and it would be solidified later, when I went to Montenegro--that a lot of people from the Balkans are appreciative of young travelers like us who have clearly gone out of their way to eplore this part of the world. I mean, what American really says to themselves, "You know? I think I'm going to take my summer holiday in Serbia this year!" And especially considering all the work and healing energy that has gone into renovating the areas devastated by the war, I got the impression that they really wanted to show us what a truly beautiful country they have. I absolutely agreed. I was definitely in a more touristy city of BiH, but it got into my blood the way that India did a few months ago--I have to go back.

Shameless sucking up to Haris...it certainly doesn't hurt that I'll have my own personal Bosnian to show me around...

Josh and I set off to see the sights, and essentially just wandered and ate and wandered and ate some more. It was marvelous.

Stari Most

Josh and I, from the top of the cafe roof we were advised to climb up for the best (free) view in Mostar. Majda was RIGHT.

On the far side of the Bridge. The bridge was completely destroyed in 1993, and was rebuilt in the original style, using rocks salvaged from the river, in 2004.

destroyed building on the former front line. Chilling, being between two new buildings.

This cemetery was filled with casualties from the war in the 90s. This guy was my age when he died, and he was one of the older ones in this place.

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We returned to our hostel well-fed, full of cheap wine and pomegranate rakija, and very very tired. Josh stayed on in Mostar for another day and took an amazing trip hosted by Majda's brother Bata, then continued his travels through BiH and into Albania. You meet the most fantastic people hosteling!

I left Mostar early the next morning and arrived in Dubrovnik in time to book my trip to Montenegro for the next day. After discovering that every tour bus available (I scoured at least 6 different companies in town) would only spend about an hour in Kotor and about 3 hours in nearby Budva (which I had been told was not worth that much time), I was soooooooooooooooooorely tempted to just rent a car and do the trip myself, on my own time. It was about the same price, but what made me switch back to the tour bus was that I absolutely despise driving, and I was not 100% confident about my abilities to get through the border checkpoint on my own, without a local's knowledge of exactly how to do it. That, and I could also picture myself stranded in Montenegro, totally lost, mispronouncing the names of every street and highway I attempted to find. So I sucked it up, negotiated the price down, and booked my tour bus for the next day. After that, I just strolled Old Town Dubrovnik a bit for the evening, got some AMAZING gelato (better than Italy! OH SNAP!), ending at a cliffside bar for a glass of graševina before bed.

DAY 4--I Get a Serbian Grandpa


 After waking up at some ungodly hour of the morning (6), I grabbed some coffee and Croatian pastry or indeterminate filling and hopped on my 12-person bus to Montenegro. I got my passport stamped many many times, which made the delays at the border well worthwhile. Our first stop was a quick photo break to take in the Bay of Kotor, which we would be circumnavigating.

 

It was a chilly day, and the cloud topping the mountains were really spectacular.

We then made it to the city of Kotor, where I was shocked, amused, and more than slightly annoyed to find...

The Seabourn Sojourn!

Apparently, Seabourn was just NOT DONE with me, yet. It wasn't the ship I had just come from, but one of its sister ships, with the same size and dimensions. I just can't quit you, Seabourn...

Unfortunately, our driver desperately wanted to move our tour group along, because we had gotten through the border ahead of the bigger tour buses (holding sometimes 30-40 people), and he wanted to make sure we got back to the border before them as well. I understood the urgency, but I had heard a lot about Kotor, and I really wanted to see as much of it as I could.

I am such a sucker for medieval stone buildings, apparently.

 I took a quick turn around the city and proceeded to climb as much of the winding battlements as I could in the short time I had left. Pro Tip: If anyone tells you that an hour is plenty of time to "see Kotor", they are full of crap.

climbing the old battlements is tough work!

I had just enough time to stop in for a quick beer at a local pub in town (how could I say no to a sign that said "Pivo : €;1,20"? It turns out I picked the saltiest, most Elks-Lodge-esque pub in the city, as it was populated by nothing but crusty old men old enough to be my grandfather. I ordered a beer and went outside to drink it, under the confused stares of EVERYONE IN THE BAR. I sat at a table across from another bar patron, who decided that under no circumstances was I going to drink alone, and he asked to join me. I agreed, we chatted, and I had the most enjoyable, heart-warming, Balkan-tastic experience I had in my whole journey.
His name was Vladi, he was from Serbia originally, and he had studied jazz saxophone in Paris as a young man. He was warm, kind, funny, and full of stories. He left for a second to get us a shot of maraska, a sort of bitter cherry rakija. He taught me to drink the maraska and chase it with beer, he told me I looked "200% Serbian" and was shocked to hear that none of my ancestors came from this region, and we took my absolute, hands-down favorite picture of my whole trip.

Deda Vladi

I had to run off to catch the bus, but I couldn't have asked for a better way to leave the city.

Our next and last stop was Budva, a resort city that has been developed (read: "taken over by") rich Russians in recent years. Apparently, if you contribute 500,000 euro to Montenegran development, you get automatic citizenship. Go figure.
I had some tasty stew in Budva and wandered the medieval city and the shoreline a bit. It was a beautiful place, but I wish I could have swapped the amount of time there with the amount of time in Kotor.

still, though. very lovely.

Then it was home again, home again, jiggedy jig. We did, in fact, make it to the border before the big buses, and didn't have to wait too too long to get through the checkpoints. I finished my night with another late-night meal and a lot of packing to get my life together before heading out to the airport the following day.

DAY 5--Doviđenja!

My last view of Dubrovnik

Six flights, a bus, and two days later, I was home.



I hope you've enjoyed my wee jaunt around the Balkans. I know I certainly did.


So now I've got one more day in CA left before I fly back out to meet up with my cast and embark the Prinsendam in Amsterdam. Three more months of this contract, cruising around the Baltic and the UK, singing, eating, adventuring, hiking (I hope!), seeing the Northern Lights (I REALLY REALLY hope!), and ample WiFi. More posts to come, so stay tuned!!

Lots of ljubav (love) to you and yours!

39 ports in 12 countries

Whoa.
OK.
So.
I did NOT keep up with this blog as well as I had intended.
But I had a reeeeeeeeally good reason, I promise. Several, actually:

1. Many of the places I visited once we left Australia/New Zealand were not heavily populated, much less so with cafes offering WiFi.
2. The WiFi on the ship is expensive and very slow.
3. In 99% of the ports since my last blog post, we docked only once.
4. I love you all, but if it's a choice between sitting in a cafe blogging or trekking through the streets of Rangoon, I'm sorry, but Burma wins.
5. I am extremely lazy.
 
So, with that combination of factors (truthfully, leaning heavily on #5), I did not submit a post for the last three itineraries; or, for those of you who count in days instead of ports like us wacky ship people do, that's over two months ago.
Again, my apologies.

But I have some cool stories! Read on!

I'll break it down by cruise, and try to leave out the mundane bits. 
Oh, and I went to the Balkans for a week, I'll throw in a dash of that too. 

Allez!

I just realized that my last blog post was made from Cairns, and there were still three ports left in that cruise  before we landed in Bali:
Larantuka, Flores, Indonesia: There's not a whole lot to report from there, except for the fact that I touched Indonesian soil for the first time. I got off the tender, walked for maybe an hour, bought an ice cream, and went back to the ship. Larantuka is a jumping-off point for the inland jungles, so those of us who couldn't escort a tour just made do. I don't reccomend it.
Komodo Island, Indonesia: Now THIS was an experience. Due to time constraints, only passengers and crew on pre-arranged tours could tender into this island, which is entirely developed by the national park service. Luckily, our awesome crew pursers had arranged for a crew-only tour of Komodo National Park to see the dragons!

a motley crew

It was pretty incredible to get to be so close to these massive lizards, especially considering our only defense was severla locals with big sticks. I'm not even joking.

The sound of these bad boys hissing and challenging each other was a guttural cacophony I won't soon forget. Also, their drool is super gross and loaded with bacteria. Like, kill-you-pretty-quickly bacteria. Again, only dudes with sticks as protection. Glad I wore my running shoes that day!

Lembar, Lombok Island, Indonesia: I escorted a tour here that went to some really beautiful Hindu temples and some local craft markets. It was pretty heavily commercialized, as we got bombarded by vendors at every stop, but I had some really tasty coffee from the nearby island of Sumatra, so that was worth the price of admission right there.

also, getting greeted by THESE dancing queens!

 And speaking of dancing queens, that brings us right up to...

Atlantis Charter: Bali-Singapore, 10 days

 If you've ever wondered what it's like to share your home and workplace with 300 fabulous gay men (and 4 fabulous lesbians), all the while cruising Southeast Asia and drinking faaaaaaaar too much champagne, well...I can tell ya.
IT'S AWESOME.

The Speedos-per-square-foot ratio was ideal.

I wish I had more photos from this particular leg of my adventures, but I was too busy doing almost nothing and just soaking up all the lovliness. As Atlantis brought along primarily their own entertainment (and even some staff!), we as a cast only performed two shows in the entire ten days of the cruise. The rest of the time, we were asked to "socialize with the guests", a task which I normally did not particularly look forward to. For these 10 days, I was in hog heaven. I barely had to lift a finger before someone would compliment me on my shoes, and five minutes later we're laughing uproariously and telling dirty secrets. This was a HUGE change from the usual passengers on the Odyssey, and I have to admit that I went through some major withdrawls when we switched back to normal life in Singapore.
This cruise stopped in Surabaya, Semarang (both on Java island, Indonesia), Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia), and an overnight in Phuket (Thailand). In the midst of all that, we crossed the equator...which any seafarer can tell you, is a big deal to do while on a ship. We held the "Queen Neptune" ceremony out by the pool...I won't go into the gory details, but it involved a lot of shenanigans, fake blood, a dead fish, and a lot of sequins.

so, standard Thursday.

I also got to co-host the "Newlywed Game" with the resident comedian and all-around rockstar Brad Loekle. I got to make all the off-color jokes I wanted, all the while dressed to the nines. I felt right at home.
As for the ports, Kuala Lumpur was an interesting place to be, even though we couldn't actually go up the Petronus Towers (they booked solid! Didn't know that was a thing!). We got there about a week after the airplane went down, and there were a lot of billboards and messages of solidarity and support for the passengers and their families posted all over the city. I can't read Malay, but I picked up enough to see that everyone was really trying to remain positive and hopeful. It would be interesting to go back there now and see what has changed.
The overnight in Phuket was sort of a bust, as it was the night before the big national elections, and a law had been put in place outlawing the sale of liquor past midnight. We worked around it, but all the bars closed down around that time, and it was an early night. We did, however, get to see a spectacular disaster called the "Simon Cabaret", a glittery mess of a ladyboy show. The theme song is still stuck in my head to this day.

"SIIIIIIIIIIIMON.....SIIIIIIIIIIIIMON..."

 One final thing I wanted to mention about this cruise...The finale of our "big" show (ROCK AT THE OPERA) is a five-part harmony arrangement of "The Prayer" (originally a duet between Celine Dion and Andrea Bocelli). It's always a lovely song to sing, and I always find some couple in the audience to connect with, but this particular show really got to me. It really threw the whole charter cruise into perspective and almost made me lose it in the middle of the song. The whole song is about asking for protection and guidance, but when I sang the lines "Lead us to the place, guide us with your grace/ To a place where we'll be safe", and I looked out into the audience and saw all these wonderful people who had come on a cruise designed specifically for them, so that they WOULD be safe...this prayer had been answered for them. I wanted to hug every last one of them, and my heart broke for all my gays at home who have to hide all or part of who they are because they are NOT in a safe place. I also almost lost it on "We hope each soul will find/Another soul to love"...it's hard enough to be a straight girl attempting to find love, even in a society that supports my choice. To have to add another layer on top of that, of oppression and fear and bigotry...I can never empathize with that struggle, only sympathize, but I can honestly say that that song is forever changed for me, and I send out that Prayer every time.

love.

OK. Moving on.

like, REALLY moving.

Pentultimate Cruise:  Singapore-Mumbai, 16 days

We back into the normal swing of things in Singapore. This has to be the one port that I was really looking forward to, and was very disappointed. It's a beautiful place, incredibly clean (especially in comparison to the places we'd just been in), very modernized, and chock full of WiFi (again, sorry.), but it was toooo clean/modern/efficient for me. I felt very out of place amongst the high-rise shopping malls selling Versace and Cartier. Give me crumbly stone streets, questionable street food, or at least a little rust, please! I did, however, have a Singapore Sling at The Long Bar in the Raffles Hotel, where it was invented over 100 years ago. So there's that.
We went on to Langkawai, a resort island in Malaysia not unlike Hamilton Island in Australia was. Certainly less developed than Hamilton, but the same sense of resort luxury. I lounged on the beach, got my feet nibbled by tiny fish in a spa, and bought some questionable soup-in-a-cup. It was a lovely day.

with lovely ladies!

Next up was our return to Phuket, which I finally got to see in the daytime. I went into the town itself with Meredith and Theo, and just browsed through the markets and side streets for a few hours, before heading back to a resort hotel near the port to swim in the pool and drink cocktails in the sun. Also, a lovely day.
The highlight of this cruise for me, however, was our three days docked in Yangon (formerly Rangoon), Myanmar (formerly Burma). This country only recently opened itself up to tourism after being closed off for over 60 years, and it was an absolute headrush to be there. I didn't know a whole lot about the country's history before I got there, but I soaked up as much as I could over the three days. We were docked about an hour outside the city, which meant a lot of broken negotiating with semi-shady taxi drivers to even start to get where we wanted to go, but after that unpleasantness was over, we pulled into the city and were greeted by the sights of huge golden pagodas reaching up into the sky, busy streets filled with people still wearing the traditional longyi (sarongs)--men and women both! Many also wore the traditional sunscreen, which was a pale yellow paste they rubbed on their cheeks and sometimes also their foreheads and chins. It was a bizarre sight, but the sheer number of people who still dressed that way was pretty incredible.

speaking of incredible...

This is Shwedagon Pagoda, a massive complex in the middle of Yangon. This main stuppa--built 2600 years ago, by the by--apparently houses 8 strands of hair from Gautama Buddah. We got an impromptu tour from a former Bugghist monk, who showed us the proper way to pray at the altars dedicated to the days of week.

I prayed at Sunday's altar

 The bummer of this port was that a 10pm curfew was put on every crew member, an edict issued by the government of Myanmar. I made the most of my time there, but it would have been nice to see what sort of nightlife Yangon had to offer.
The second day, Anthony and I ventured into Yangon again, stopping at the huge market and then to the huge lake in the center of town, where the floating Karaweik Palace provided a beautiful setting for the sunset.

We <3 Myanmar!

On the third day, we sailed at about 2pm, so I went into town early by myself, and just wandered and wandered and wandered. I had bought myself a longyi the day before, and decided to wear it out in the city--I got stopped many times by locals complimenting me on it! Or, at least I think they did...?
We then had four days at sea. Ugh.
In the meantime, I "worked" as a "model" for both our resident jeweler, Rodney Rahmani, of Brilliant Stars jewelery.

wearing jewelry worth more than my life. Like, WAY more than my life.

 I was also tapped to be the guinea pig for a sari-wrapping demonstration hosted by Gita, the wife of an Indian ambassador sailing with us. I had only worn a sari once before, and it had been expertly )and quickly) wrapped by the mother of a friend, so I never really learned how the whole process went down.

ambiguously ethnic for the win!

 Well, I can know say that I learned it, and it inspired me to buy saris for myself when we docked in Mumbai. I absolutely love them!

pow!

pow!

 

Before dire cabin fever set in, we finally docked in our first Indian port, Kochi (formerly Cochin). We had a show that day, so we only had a few hours to spend in port, which we spent at a resort hotel, in the pool. I know, I know, you sense a theme. It was a very relaxing day, and I can now honestly say I ate Indian food in India. So there.
Next day was in Mangalore, and I escorted yet another tour:

Cashew factory

all-ladies choir at a Hindu temple

We made it back to the ship just as a huge monsoon rolled in...watching the port get peppered with warm rain for an hour, seeing the oil derricks lit up by lightning...it was pretty magical. India, I realized, was starting to get into my blood. And not in a life-threatening-pathogen kind of way.
Finally, we made it Mumbai (formerly Bombay), and I have to say that this is a place I HAVE TO get back to some day. I escorted a tour in the morning, which was essentially an introduction to the city. We went to the Prince of Wales Museum, stopped off at the Gateway to India and the Taj Mahal hotel (which smelled overwhelmingly of jasmine, rose, sandalwood, and violet. I wish I could have bottled that smell), and the Dobi Ghat outdoor laundry.

This city was so vibrant, and loud, and just overall spectacular...I'm bummed I only got a few hours to myself to explore it after my tour, but I know I'll be back someday. I'm not done with you yet, India.


Final Final Cruise: Mumbai-Rome, 19 days

Sadly, my camera's lens decided to start malfunctioning on me during this cruise, so all the pictures I have are only from my phone. The resolution isn't great, but it's not too terrible either.

We started our cruise with four sea days. Originally, we were slated to dock in Dubai, but for some reason, that got pulled form the itinerary a few months before.
We arrived in the port of Salalah, Oman, which--for your movie buffs out there--is where Cpt. Phillips began his ill-fated sea voyage. We, luckily, did not run into any Somali pirates, though we did get a few suspsicious-looking approaches while we sailed through the Red Sea. We got a few armed guards on at this port who stayed with us until Israel, so at least we knew our security had been upped. The port, however, was pretty incredible. Because of landing cards and bus transits, we couldn't get off the ship until well into the afternoon. I got a taxi with Anthony and Meredith and we made it into town right in the hottest part of the day. We saw the sultan's palace, the markets, bought deliciousness at a local halwa shop, a huge and beautiful new mosque comissioned by the Sultan Qaboos, and finally ended up at a giant camel farm, where we shared tea and broken English with the merchants. It was a strange and beautiful day, surrounded by sand and blinding sun. For a country I never thought I'd visit, it was a wonderful experience.

so serene.

Anthony (singer), Sayid (camel merchant)

We had six days (SIX. DAYS.) at sea following Oman. The only things that stand out for me were the Crew Tug-o-War presented for the guests (galley team won), wherein I floated in the jacuzzi wearing a mermaid costume for two hours, and going through the Suez Canal on Easter morning. Having done the Panama Canal a few times, it was interesting to experience another big-deal canal, in a completely different part of the world. I much prefer Suez, since it has much more shallow embankments, where you can actually see the surrounding areas, which were surprisingly green, despite being in the middle of a desert. There was a big sign painted on one bank that said "Welcome to Egypt", the closest I'll be to actually stepping foot in Egypt, I'm sure, for quite some time. What was bizarre was once we got through the end of the canal and entered the Mediterranean Sea, the water got significantly choppier and the temperature dropped a good 10 degrees. And so ended any more Deck 11 tanning afternoons for me!

Our first port was Haifa, Israel, where I escorted a really long and amazing tour. We went to several historical sites, including the baptismal center of the Jordan River, as well as the hotly disputed Golan Heights, from which you could see Israel, Syria, and Jordan, all converging on the Sea of Galilee. What was really incredible to me was seeing these hugely Biblically significant cities (Migdal--home of Mary Magdalene, Tiberius) in the modern world, being totally developed into resort towns. You can visit the place where Jesus walked on water, then have some decent sushi and a daquiri at the patio bar across the beach. Just mind-blowing. We also visited Capernaum, home of St. Peter, and temporary home of Jesus when he was expelled from Nazareth. Standing on the 2000-year-old marble floors, somewhere a solo trumpeter played "When the Saints Go Marching In" and "Amazing Grace", while the wind blew a breeze from the Sea of Galilee, not 100 yards away. I'm not religious by any stretch of the imagination, but historically speaking, this was a very moving experience.

Ahdod was our next port, which is a jumping-off point for Jerusalem. We had a show that day, so I didn't have enough time to make it into the Holy City, perhaps the biggest disappointment of this entire contract. Some day....some day.
We hit three ports in Greece, one of which I spent on the ship doing In Port Manning, one I spent escorting a tour, visiting a monastery and eating very tasty mezze at a local taberna, and one I spent traipsing around in a light rain with a very attractive Bosnian lad named Haris.

Corfu

I very much enjoyed those last three weeks of my contract...

We were then supposed to dock in Sorrento, Italy, but because the current was too strong for the tender boats there, we diverted to Napoli (Naples), where I wandered around the beautiful old streets and ate a pizza bigger than my head.

So, it was a good day.

Then finally finally finally we docked in Civitavecchia, the port for Rome, and the absolute end of our contract aboard the Seabourn Odyssey. I admit I was a little tearful to see the old girl for the last time as our shuttle bus to the airport pulled away and she was lost from view, but I had such a grand adventure ahead of me, I didn't have a whole lot of time to be sad. I dropped off one big bag at the storage at Fiumucino airport and proceeded to wait for four hours before I could even check in to my flight(s) to Dubrovnik. You'd think that being the biggest airport hub servicing Rome, that FCO would be more accommodating, but there were no publicly available power outlets (I fenagled my own at a check-in terminal), weirdly lax security, and only one bar in the entire international terminal serving hard liquor. The savages!!
I made it onto my flights, survived a night in the day rooms at Zurich airport, and landed in Dubrovnik, Croatia, the next day.

Which, sadly, is where I need to end this blog post because I am getting majorly distracted and exhausted! I promise I'll post about my Balkan Adventures soon (before I embark the Prinsendam in 11 days!), but for now, I hope you've enjoyed this peek into the last three cruises aboard the Odyssey. We've traveled through 6 time zones, 10 countries, and a whole lot of piecemeal notes I left myself about my eventual blog post about this whole time.

As I write this, I am lounging on the couch at my brother David's house in Sacramento. I'm in California for a little under two more weeks, and then I get flown out with my cast to Amsterdam to board the Prinsendam for Holland America Line. We'll be sailing the Baltic for three months. There will be much more reliable and plentiful WiFi up there, so maybe I won't wait two months to get some news out to ya!

Lots of love to you all, and until next time....

Not a bad way to spend four months.