Day 11- A very soggy Cannes

It was a dark and stormy day in Cannes. We have been sleeping with our patio door open at night and, about 4:30 am, we had to get up and close it. The seas were so rough in the wind that the door was rolling open and closed on its tracks as the ship pitched from side to side. Happily, I have not yet been seasick, despite the fact that you have to walk "uphill" if you go from one side of the ship to the other. Along with the wind was a heavy rain, and temperatures in the low 50F/10C range. Not the best day we've had thus far.

Despite the weather, we decided to get off the ship as planned and try to see a little of the city. We had initially wanted to go to Nice, which is the next city over from Cannes (about 35km/20 miles away). Unfortunately, this region has been having routine transit strikes, and we were cautioned not to take public transportation out of the port city should a strike happen during the day and leave us stranded. For this reason we decided to stick to the transportation we were born with.

Cannes is a tender port, so we were up early to get in to the first group of passengers to board the tender boats at 7:30 am. Initially, we were told that the tenders were open-topped, but when we boarded we found ours to be the lifeboat-style that we are used to, which have a roof and kept us nice and dry on the 15-minute, somewhat bouncy, ride to shore. The perk of being dry during the tender was promptly negated the instant we stepped foot on the French shore. The rain turned our umbrellas inside-out within seconds, so we turned up our collars and shouldered on. We ducked out of the rain under the portico of a nearby hotel to look at the map and get our bearings. Good thing the map we had was laminated!

Within a few minutes, we had located ourselves and our first destination, and were ready to set out again. As we were folding the map, a small group of passengers from the ship approached us and asked us if we spoke English. "Oui" - I said with a big grin. Sadly, my French humor was lost on them. They asked us for directions and then spent the next 5 minutes arguing with us about the area on the map that represented the location where we were standing. Really? Why ask us if you think we more lost than you are? Finally, we suggested that they head off in the direction they thought "town" was (which was wrong), and we set off in the right direction.

Within 10 minutes we had sloshed along our per-determined path directly to the Forville Market - my "must do" for Cannes. The Forville Market is a large, covered area that houses a daily "farmer's" market. Amongst the vast tables of some of the most beautiful produce I had ever seen were also flowers, cases of cheeses, fresh and cured meats, charcuteries (terrines, pates, etc.) in lovely aged crocks, eggs, fish so fresh they were still wiggling, shellfish, vats of olives and oily tapenades, sun-dried tomatoes and cloves of garlic bathed in olive oil, anchovies, loose teas, spices, and lavender honey. It was exactly what I picture heaven must look like. I assure you all that, if I lived in Cannes, I would only leave there to run home and cook before promptly returning. Here are some photos, but they will not do the display justice for you can't touch or smell the items through the blog...

Mushrooms - a dozen or more different types!

Flowers

Teas & spices

Charcuterie (inside the crocks and also inside the pig's head)

Cured sausages


Produce


Olives, tapenades and pastes (anchovie, garlic and tomato)

After purchasing the woefully small number of items that will endure the trip back home, we left the market. I may have cried a little when we stepped out the door. Fortunately, my spirits were quickly revived for, across the street from the Market, were numerous boulangeries, or bakeries. Hooray - heaven added on a wing! Large round crusty loaves of breads, baguettes, croissant, tarts, and other pastries were a feast for they eyes. AND for the tummy as we each enjoyed a treat. A buttery, flaky, melt-in-your-mouth croissant for me (because you can't come to France and not eat croissant), and a chocolate "twist" for Andrew, which was croissant dough wrapped around dark chocolate pieces. Totally worth the hours in the gym we'll suffer later!

Us with our pastries - note the rain gear!

Completely drenched and having fulfilled our primary missions for France (namely, find the Market and eat bread), we headed a back in the direction of the ship. On the way, we passed the marina, so decided to walk along the rows of yachts. There is some serious money in this town! Private yachts with 4 or 5 levels were the norm, all of them sleek and modern with gleaming teak decks. We did see one for sale, but couldn't find anyone to make an offer on it. Guess we'll have to save that purchase for another trip.

We slogged our way back to the tender area, and were back on the ship about 20 minutes later; drenched, but pleased with our short time on shore. Since we needed a second shower anyway, we opted to hit the gym first. It was good to get in a nice long run after several days without any exercise other than walking around ports. I think I managed to burn off about 1/2 of my croissant in my almost 6-mile run!

After the gym and showers, we did a load of laundry and then grabbed a bite of lunch. We then spent the afternoon relaxing in the cabin - me, reading; Andrew, napping. While wandering around the ship, we noticed a wine bar that does sampling flights, so we went there for a drink before dinner. We tried to have dinner in the dining room (French theme tonight, appropriately). Unfortunately, by the time we finished at the wine bar we had missed the first round of seating. We waited about an hour for a table, but finally had to go up to the buffet about 7:45 pm, so that we could make the 8:30 show.

Us at the wine bar. Don't tell Andrew his eyes are closed. He doesn't look at the blog so won't ever know!

As for the show, we have basically stopped going to the performances on the cruise ships because we find they are not to our taste. The primarily consist of musical Vegas-style shows, which we don't love. Tonight, however, they had a hypnotist on board so we went and found it to be entertaining. Now it's time to hit the hay. We have another port tomorrow, Barcelona. We have scheduled a 5-hour tour with a guide on a WWII German motorcycle with side car. Stay tuned for photos!

Day 10 - Florence/Pisa

Florence today - my favorite Italian city! I love Florence because it is small and easy to get around. The people there are friendly, and it’s the perfect city to just wander. Also, it’s in Tuscany…need I say more? The weather today was less than ideal (totally overcast, rain showers off and on, and about 60F/15C), but we bundled up and still had a lovely time.

The Ruby docks in Livorno, which is about 100 km from Florence, and about 25km from Pisa. We left the ship right when we docked & cleared immigration at 7 am. It was still dark, windy and cold and, like Civitavecchia, you cannot walk out of the port due to safety and security issues. The port does provide a shuttle to the bus stop at a small cost, but it does not start running until 8 am, and we were really hoping to be on the 8 am train to Florence. Because it was still very early and not many people were getting off the ship yet, we managed to convince one of the taxis waiting to take us to the train station for €25 ($35 US). Typically, the cabs are looking to take people on tours for the whole day, so they do not want short trips for small fares. We were also lucky to happen upon 2 other couples leaving the ship early who happily agreed to share the cab with us, reducing the cost/person significantly. About 15 minutes later we arrived at the train station, bought our tickets to Florence (we managed to make the 7:45 am train!), and were on our way. The trains here are very convenient and inexpensive, although not as fast as you might expect because they do stop rather frequently. The 100 km trip to Florence took 95 minutes, and cost €13 (about $18) each for a return trip. I had a book on my iPod and Andrew enjoyed the scenery. In what seemed like no time at all, we were at Santa Maria Novella station in the center of Florence.

From the train station, it was a only a short walk to the Duomo & Baptistry. As I mentioned previously, it was raining a little and quite cold so we ducked in to a little café along the way. We did not bring umbrellas today as the forecast was for sun, 67F/18C, and no chance of rain. Someone missed the mark on that one! Oh well, it was a great excuse to get in one last cappuccino. I will really miss those little cups of caffeinated delight now that we are leaving Italy! When the worst of the shower passed, we went over to the famous Duomo and Baptistry to take a few photos.

Duomo & Baptistry

The Accademia, which houses Michaelangelo’s David, and the Uffizi Gallery, which holds many works of art by the great Italian Renaissance Artists (Raphael, Titian, Michaelangelo & Botticelli) are both closed on Mondays, along with several other museums. We knew that in advance, however, so we were prepared to see other things and will just make sure our next trip is on a Tuesday!

Our next stop was the Santa Croche Church, the burial site of Galileo and Michelangelo, among other notable Italians. Andrew was particularly interested to see Galileo’s crypt and there were some wonderful works of art in the chapel. Check out the giant doors to get inside!

Galileo's crypt

In between our planned stops we meandered down the streets, wandering in to churches we encountered along the way and looking at the amazing paintings, sculpture and architecture.

Finally, we walked up the hill to the Piazzale Michelangelo, which boasts the best view of the city. Good thing it was a nice cool day, as it was quite a climb. The view, however, was obviously worthy of the effort!

Because of the dismal weather (too cold to eat gelato) and the fact that many sites were closed today, we finished up in Florence about 1 pm. Because we still had a few hours we got back on the train toward Livorno and got off in Pisa. We weren’t planning to get off in Pisa, so we did not have a map. Never mind - after about 15 minutes and a lot of charades, we figured out which city bus to get on to find the famous Leaning Tower of Pisa. It’s obviously not called that in Italian, but if you lean yourself slightly to the side any local will roll their eyes and point you in the right direction (if only to be rid of you!). We found the Torre (we learned that was the name later) easily, took the requisite photo of Andrew holding it up, before it was time to head back to Livorno.

Back on the ship about 5:30 pm, we headed almost immediately to the dining room as we were starving! Andrew had grilled tiger shrimp and I had rack of veal. Now we’re back in the cabin for the evening relaxing after a string of busy days. We’ll certainly be ready for a sea day, but we’ll have to wait for that. Tomorrow is Cannes/Nice, and Wednesday is Barcelona. After that we have a day at sea to reach Portugal.

Day 9 - Roma

As they say, Rome wasn’t built in a day. Sadly, we couldn’t see it all in a day either but we did make a pretty nice dent in our list.

Because we docked in Civitadeccia, which is about an hour train ride from Rome, we opted to use one of the ship’s excursions to get us to the city. We walked off the ship right at 8 am, when we were cleared by customs. From the ship, we boarded a bus that took us out of the dock area (which is secure so you can’t walk in it) to a train that is used exclusively by cruise ship passengers. It was a cute little 4 car train that looked like it was from the late 60’s or early 70’s. It was very comfortable, despite its age, and we had a pleasant 60-minute ride in to Rome.

We got off the bus about a 10-minute walk from the Vatican City, where they were getting ready for a 10 am mass. After the 10 am mass, the Pope comes to the window of his residence on Sundays and waves at everyone. The piazza there was packed like Bono was going to appear! We cleverly decided to come back to see the Vatican after the crowds had cleared this afternoon.

We jumped on the bus and, in no time at all, we were at the stop for the Trevi Fountain. Legend says that if you throw a coin over your shoulder in to the fountain, you will return to Rome someday. Worked for me last time I was here, so we did it again!

From Trevi, we set of on foot to see the Capuchin Crypt. This is a small 4-room crypt in a little church where the skeletons of more than 4,000 monks from all over the world have been configured in to artful designs. Fascinating! We were not allowed to take photos in the crypts, because it is considered a burial site, so you’ll have to Google it to see for yourself.

Back on the bus to the main Rome Metro station to buy a Roma pass. This pass gives you access for 3 days to all the public transportation (which is cheap to start with). More importantly, however, it allows you free access to some of the major attractions and there is a special “no wait” line at the Coliseum for Roma pass holders. The main Metro station is only 3-stops from the Coliseum, which is a good thing because I think most of Rome was in our same car! We were among the last on to the car, and Andrew had to lean forward in to the car so that his backpack didn’t get closed in the door.

As we came up the stairs from the underground Metro platform, the Coliseum came in to view. Though I have seen it before, you can’t help but catch your breath. Built about 2000 years ago, it could hold as many as 50,000 Romans to watch the gladiators battle exotic animals (and each other) to the death. We were happy to skip the very, very long line with our Roma passes, and we were inside in less than 10 minutes. We wandered around, took a few photos and wondered at the architecture and the fact that it’s still standing after 2 millennia.

Across the street from the Coliseum is the Forum and Palatine Hill. We walked up Palatine Hill, but the line at the Forum was too long and our time was limited so we only took a few photos from outside the gates. Next time!

With only about 2.5 hours left in our day, it was time to jump on the bus back to the Vatican, which is its own county – the smallest county in the world, in fact. Here’s a photo of Andrew standing with one foot in Italy and one in the Vatican.

Inside the Vatican, the crowds had thinned in the piazza considerably. There was still a long line to get in to St. Peter’s Basilica, but it appeared to be moving quite smoothly so we jumped in. About 35 minutes later we had cleared the metal detectors (don’t want any heathens trying to get the Pope!) and headed in to the Basilica. St. Peter’s is considered the most important Catholic church in the world and is the burial site of many of the previous Popes. It also houses many great works of art, including Michelangelo’s The Pieta.

Other photos inside/outside the Basilica…

Finally, it was time to walk back to the train station and head back to Civitavecchia – whew! Once back on the ship we hit the buffet for dinner, as we were too tired to change for dinner. Now we’re back in the cabin getting organized for our day tomorrow – in my favorite Italian city, Florence!

Day 8 - Napoli (Naples)

Welcome to Naples - 3rd largest city in Italy! Naples is different in that it is much less of a tourist location, and more of a big city. Crossing the street here is like being Frogger! We got off the ship right at 8 am and grabbed the train to the Ercolano (Herculaneum). We opted to do the Ercolano instead of Pompeii, as several sources say it is better preserved (thanks to a geothermal bubble that formed during the eruption of Vesuvius), and it is also much smaller than Pompeii so easier to do in one day.

We found our way to the train station, without incident, and were on our way...

Andrew on the train.

We arrived at Ercolano and were immediately impressed by the sight of it. Vesuvius erupted in 79 AD, and the city was actually established in the 6th century BC. The ruins were then discovered under the current city of Naples in about 1700. The excavation began shortly afterwards. Photos will do more justice than my words...

The original sea side. The arches are where boats would dock. They found hundreds of skeletons in this area - likely people thought they could escape the ash in the tunnels.

One of the streets.

An early "Cantina". The vessels would have held wine.

Many of the homes still have visible paintings and murals on the walls.


The entrance to a home.

One of the fountains which provided drinking water.

We're not sure what this area was but there were beautiful mosaic tiles on the floor and what looked like a small swimming pool on the opposite end. Maybe one of the bath areas?


The town grinder for grains.


The town store.

Tile mosaics - amazing colors still!

Us

After Ercolano, we were hungry so stopped for pizza...

Naples is the birth place of pizza - here's our buffalo mozzarella pizza cooking! Yum!

Last stop was the National Archeological Museum, where all the artifacts from Pompeii are housed. Again, amazing. Surviving items included pottery, glass, statues, and mosaics.

Mosaic on columns

Paintings from the walls of a home.

A casket

And now we're back at the port using the high-speed wi-fi (at a cost of 3 euro for the day - bargain!) to post. We'll board the ship shortly and will sail away in about 2 hours. Tomorrow morning we'll wake up in Roma!

Day 7 - Sea Day

Well, we are officially at the 1 week mark of our trip - with more than 2 weeks still to go! Today was our first sea day, and we were definitely ready for a nice relaxing day. We started our morning with an "ultimate balcony breakfast" courtesy of Ed & Michelle - thanks you two! This meal, delivered to your room, consists of more food than two people could eat in a week, let alone in one meal (see photo). What we were able to eat was delicious, but we had to save the champagne to enjoy another day!



After breakfast, we headed off to a Zumba! class they were offering. What a hoot! I'm officially sure that neither Andrew or I have any Latin roots, but we sure had a good time flailing around with all the old ladies who also showed up. The class was only 30 minutes long so we headed off to the gym for a good hour afterwards.

By the time we finished at the gym and showered, it was time for lunch! Today the ship was offering a British pub themed lunch in one of the bars on the ship. Andrew had fish & chips with mushy peas and I had Ploughman's lunch, which is pate, smoked meat, cheese and Branston pickles on a crusty roll. I fell in love with Branston pickles when I was in Australia so was very excited to be reunited with them again!

After lunch, we headed to the main theatre to hear a lecture on the history of Naples and Rome, our next two stops. It was very interesting and made us even more excited for the sites we are about to see! From there, we went back to the the room with two hours to spare until dinner. Andrew had a little nap and I washed out our gym clothes in the sink and hung them out on the balcony to dry. We are officially hillbilly cruisers, but I knew that rope we packed would come in handy for something! You can take the girl off the farm...


Tonight was our first formal night, so we took some extra time to get ready before heading to dinner at 5:30 pm. We like to eat relatively early so we don't have to go to bed stuffed! Dinner on the ship is a leisurely process and usually takes about 90 minutes. Tonight, Andrew had halibut and I had Cornish game hen. The food on this ship is fine, so far, but not any better than Carnival, and maybe even a little worse. Fortunately, the sheer volume tricks people in to thinking otherwise!

After dinner we had some photos taken by one of the onboard photographers. That is the first time we have done this on one of our cruises. They will be ready tomorrow, so we'll let you know how they turned out. Some of the poses were a little cheesy for our preference, but hopefully one or two will turn out nice. We also had one of our fellow passengers take a photo with our camera, which you can see here...





Finally, we capped the evening off with the Captain's Party. This is an event that they have on every ship on the first sea day where the Captain introduces himself and his senior officers/staff. They serve free champagne and appetizers and it's fun to wander around and see everyone all dressed up. Because Princess is a more formal cruise line AND this is a transatlantic cruise, people are very dressed up - most men in tuxes and most women in evening gowns.



Now, we're back in the room getting organized for our stop in Naples in the morning. Looks like it might be rainy but we packed umbrellas and will see Pompeii no matter what!

Update to sail-away

We've just returned from the muster drill and the captain has announced that we're on our way! Wind has dropped below 30 knots (about 35 mph or 55 km/hr), so it's safe to move. I suspect we'll make up the time we've lost during the night and tomorrow, and still arrive in Naples as scheduled.

Day 6- Leaving Venice

Today was our last day in Venice - we were scheduled to "shove off" at 1 pm. Currently, however, it's 2:35 pm and we're still in port. The captain reports that it is too windy for the ship to safely leave the harbor. I think it might have something to do with the fact that the water here is very shallow and they have dredged "paths" in to the harbor that are deep enough for the large ships to dock. The wind may be too strong to stay in the deep area easily.

So, until then, I'll post! We have had a pretty slow day, so far. We were up just after 6 am, had a bowl of cereal and a banana, and were ready to hit the gym when it opened at 7 am. As I've said on other trips, you have to be there right when the gym opens, or it becomes very crowded and you have to wait until later in the morning or early evening to get on to the machines. Andrew did the elliptical and I did a 4.5 mile run on the treadmill. Then we did about 40 minutes of weights. We both agreed that it felt good to get back the gym after almost a week off!

After the gym we decided we needed to make a quick run to the Co-op grocery store to get a couple of bottles of wine to have on board. At 9 am it was pouring rain and so windy that, all around, umbrellas were "popping". We bundled up and trudged off. A short ride on the people mover and then the vaporetto and we were standing in front of a lovely selection of 3 Euro bottles of wine (about $4.20) - I love Italy! Choosing two, we moved toward the register. On the way, we happened past the detergent area, and thought we should pick up a bottle of laundry soap there, rather than buy it in the launderette on the ship. Buying something like laundry soap in a non-English speaking country is a challenge. We've noted that items that would be purchased by tourists are often labeled in English, as well as Italian. Not so with the laundry detergent, however. We chose a bottle that had a picture of a towel on it (others had shirts, which we thought a closer match, but were too big for our use) and we'll hope for the best!

We then made our way back to the ship, where we arrived completely dripping wet (yes, we had an umbrella but, as I said, it was too windy to use it most of the time). We congratulated ourselves on deciding to shower AFTER we got back, rather than before!

Once we were showered and dressed, it was almost 11:30 am, and were were ready for lunch! We trotted up to the buffet, and had big salads and Andrew had fish and I had chicken. Yum! From lunch, we wandered the ship a bit. It's fairly similar to the other ships we've been on, however Princess ships are much more "elegant" in their color scheme than the Carnival ships. We then headed back to the cabin with the plan that we would watch the sail-away from our balcony. We're still waiting for that to happen! On the upside, I got in a quick nap!

Oh, gotta run! It's time for the muster drill. We have to get our lifejackets and head up to our "muster station" where we would go if there was an abandon ship order. The drills are mandatory on cruise ships and, they come looking for you if you don't check in at your station. If we ever get out of Venice, we'll have a full day at sea before reaching Naples on Saturday morning. Tonight will just be dinner in the dining room for the first time, maybe followed by some time in the piano bar.