EGYPT | Sunday, 28 Nov 2021 | Views [215]
AGAINST ALL ODDS WE ARE IN EGYPT. Virtuosa didn’t run aground in the Suez Canal. The passenger mutiny never came to fruition and we weren’t boarded by pirates. So despite the fact that we docked in Dubai not Abu Dhabi, we managed to make ... Read more >
EGYPT | Saturday, 27 Nov 2021 | Photo Gallery
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OMAN | Tuesday, 23 Nov 2021 | Views [199]
FIFTEEN YEARS AGO TO THE DAY we celebrated Thanksgiving in Muscat. Coincidence? Anyway, here we are again—our first terra firma since Cyprus—and much appreciated.
Corniche in Muscat
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EGYPT | Thursday, 18 Nov 2021 | Views [213]
ON THURSDAY SAUDI ARABIA SLIPPED BY unseen on the starboard side but our disappointment remained on-board. I guess our regular appearance at Guest Services had some impact—not only did they refund the money for the tour of Jeddah, they gave us ... Read more >
EGYPT | Thursday, 18 Nov 2021 | Photo Gallery
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EGYPT | Tuesday, 16 Nov 2021 | Views [218]
WE HAVE BEEN DAWDLING ALONG hardly making a ripple in the sea. Evidently there is a rigid schedule for transiting the Suez Canal and it makes no sense to arrive early. Something woke me in the early hours and when I looked outside I realized the lights ... Read more >
EGYPT | Monday, 15 Nov 2021 | Photo Gallery
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CYPRUS | Sunday, 14 Nov 2021 | Views [195]
PAPHOS WAS A REAL DISAPPOINTMENT TODAY, unlike when we visited in 2015. One of the reasons we seldom return to a place we really enjoyed in the past is because it’s not likely to be as good the second time. But with our stop in Saudi Arabia canceled ... Read more >
GREECE | Saturday, 13 Nov 2021 | Views [191]
WE FIRST ATTEMPTED TO VISIT RHODES from Turkey in 2006 or thereabouts but it was wintertime and the ferries weren’t running, or maybe they were just avoiding Greece. Turkey and Greece have that kind of relationship.
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GREECE | Friday, 12 Nov 2021 | Views [215]
PIRAEUS IS THE BUSIEST PORT I have ever seen. And I guess it has been so for a few thousand years when Phoenician triremes vied with Roman galleys and Venetian traders for docking space. Today it’s container ships, tugs, passenger and RORO ferries, ... Read more >
ITALY | Wednesday, 10 Nov 2021 | Views [212]
EVERY CRUISE LINE HAS ITS OWN FLAVOR and Covid has turned everything upside down and all around. In addition to the cruise room/charge card that every cruise line uses, this time we have a bracelet that functions as a Covid-tracker in case someone on ... Read more >
ITALY | Monday, 8 Nov 2021 | Views [224]
I THINK I MADE A BIG MISTAKE. The Virtuosa hasn’t even left port and there’s talk of mutiny. Some of the passengers boarded in Barcelona so they’ve had more time to pile up grievances. They skipped Marseilles entirely and couldn’... Read more >
GREECE | Monday, 8 Nov 2021 | Photo Gallery
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ITALY | Sunday, 7 Nov 2021 | Views [334]
TIVOLI GARDENS IS AN AMUSEMENT PARK in Copenhagen. The garden at Villa d’ Este in Tivoli, Italy is, in a word, AMAZING! Despite the gloomy weather forecast—they haven’t been right all week—and fighting with the ticket machine, ... Read more >
ITALY | Saturday, 6 Nov 2021 | Views [223]
IT SEEMED LIKE THE ROMAN GODS had conspired to keep us from visiting Ostia Antica. It was closed in 2012 due to snowy weather the first time we tried. Yesterday we again took the metro and a train to the site only to learn tickets were available only ... Read more >
ITALY | Friday, 5 Nov 2021 | Views [205]
LEGEND SAYS IF YOU THROW A COIN in the Trevi Fountain—right hand over left shoulder for best reults—you will return to Rome. We certainly got our euro’s worth—this is our fourth visit!
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ITALY | Friday, 5 Nov 2021 | Photo Gallery
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ITALY | Tuesday, 2 Nov 2021 | Views [294]
FROM OUR 2012 JOURNAL ENTRY after our first visit to Pompeii— If you lived in Pompeii, August 24 in the year 79 AD would have been a good day to be out of town. Around noon, Mt. Vesuvius began pouring tons of ash into the sky. It had been ... Read more >
ITALY | Sunday, 31 Oct 2021 | Views [207]
IF YOU WERE A ROMAN IN POMPEII, August 24 in the year 79 AD would have been a good day to be out of town. That’s because a 79 AD eruption of Mt. Vesuvius, only ten kilometers away, initially covered Pompeii with three-meters of ash. The pyroclastic ... Read more >
ITALY | Saturday, 30 Oct 2021 | Views [186]
PAESTUM, THE CITY FORMERLY KNOWN as Poseidonia, was a thriving Greek port in the 6 th Century BCE—the Romans changed its name when they took over in 273 BCE. When the river silted up creating a malarial swamp, Paestum suffered from increasingly ... Read more >
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