One last day at sea

For one final day, we got to soak in the ambiance of the ship and relax before the last real day of our vacation tomorrow. I planned to sleep in, but Sarah had other designs. She booked a seaweed wrap and hot stone massage for 08:00. Not the time I would have chosen, but she came back relaxed and refreshed, and I was up and showered by the time she did. The day consisted of a number of smaller events:

• The ship held its one and only "fancy" brunch, which seemed to consist entirely of transplanting the foods served in the buffet for breakfast and lunch to nicer serving stations (think fruit carvings, etc.) in the main dining room.
• We competed in a number of different trivia sessions, none of which we won. Dustin did, however, give Sarah a medal which he had promised on Monday night in order to get her to dance, as well as free t-shirts, presumably so we would stop badgering him. I'll let you in on something...it didn't work.
• Gazing into the ocean from our balcony, we noticed that the water was quite likely the calmest ocean we have ever seen.
• A long session occured where we scribbled on brochures with future cruise itineraries trying to decide whether we were interested in booking another cruise, as they provide substantial incentives for booking your next cruise while onboard.

After the various activities of the day, we headed back to the room and got dressed for the ship's second and final formal night. Carol and Denise (who we are set to do our Naples excursion with) invited us, along with Nick, Fontaine, Danny, and Athena, to their balcony for a bottle of champagne before dinner. This was our opportunity to see "how the other side lives" on the cruise ship, as they were booked into a Celebrity Suite (the 3rd largest stateroom on the ship). The stateroom is as large as two regular staterooms with a separate bedroom and living room, large bathroom, and a balcony about five times the size of a regular balcony. Quite an impressive room, but not one I think I would ever book, even if I could afford it. We chatted for a bit, then left for dinner.

When we first got on board, we booked dinner for this night in Murano, the most highly regarded of the three specialty restaurants on the ship. We found out the next day that Nick and Fontaine had booked Murano for the same night, so the four of us had dinner together. The French cuisine was unique and inspired. The goat cheese soufflé in particular (which I had eaten on a previous cruise) was outstanding. I also had a very good lamb entree and Sarah had a steak entree. Sarah had some type of crepe dessert which was impressively prepared tableside. While the food was very good, both of us agreed that it was our least favorite of the three speciality restaurants.


I know that this was a short post, but the day really didn't consist of a large amount of events, just fun and relaxation. Tomorrow, for one final time, will be an action packed post from Sarah describing our trip to Naples and nearby areas.

Between Two Continents

Today represented our last day of relaxation before five straight days in port. We took full advantage of the opportunity to relax, recharge our batteries, and enjoy good food. After taking in breakfast, we headed to the Solarium to read a bit, before we headed to a shipboard lecture on the spice trade by a retired horticulturalist. I do not want to belabor the point, but suffice to say that we much preferred the other lecturer on board. We headed to lunch, where we ran into Nick and Fontaine.


After lunch, the four of us headed to team trivia. The theme of this set was movie quotes, and after a tiebreaker round, we were declared the winners. Our prize? Celebrity room key lanyards. Obviously, the budget for trivia prizes is not significant. The same lounge was set to host Name That Tune about half an hour later, so we hung around. Unfortunately, the results for this game were not as kind to us. The theme was deceased musicians and we performed decidedly poorly. Afterwards, I popped into the shipboard hot glass show for a few minutes. This was fascinating, and I hope to stay longer for a show on our last sea day next week.

Next up was the main event of the cruising day: sailing through the Dardanelles. This strait connects the Aegean Sea to the Sea of Marmara, and the eastern side is Asia, while the western side is Europe, even though both sides are a part of Turkey. The picture to the left shows the European side in the foreground and to the left, with the Asian side in the background and to the right. There are also a number of war memorials from a number of different countries here (not pictured). For an hour or so, we wandered to different vantage points on the ship to check out the strait and its villages and scenery. Then we headed back to the room to prepare for dinner.


For dinner, we headed to the second of three specialty restaurants on the ship, this one being Tuscan Grille, an Italian steakhouse. I am thoroughly convinced that we picked the perfect day to eat in this restaurant, as it has its windows on the aft of the ship. With our table right by the window, we were able to watch both Europe and Asia pass us by as we left the Dardanelles and headed into the Sea of Marmara. For an appetizer, I had the Calimari Fritto Misto (best calamari I have ever eaten) and Sarah had the Saffron Risotto Croquettes, which she enjoyed. We both had Bufala Mozzarella and Tomato Caprese Salads, which were excellent. For the main course, I enjoyed a delicious rib eye steak and Sarah had a New York strip steak.

While all of the above food was perfectly prepared, the highlight of the meal was the dessert. Sarah had the excellent Toffee Panna Cotta, while I had Pistachio Marble Creme Brulee (shown to the right). Note the crystals in the center of the dessert. Curious about what they are? I was too. I started eating the dessert, and a (bit later, felt a weird sensation in my mouth. Then I heard snapping. Confused, I looked at Sarah. She asked what the noise was that she was hearing. The answer: pop rocks. Talk about a blast from the past! I would have never guessed to find that on a restaurant dessert. Shortly after we finished dessert, it was sunset. Below is a beautiful picture of our view of the sunset over the European side of the strait/sea from our table.

Following the large amount of food, we rolled ourselves back to our room and retired for the evening, to ensure that we would be well rested for our first day in Istanbul on tomorrow.

Finally...time to relax!

Today was our first full sea day on the ship, and we were so looking forward to a day full of relaxation. Unfortunately breakfast is only served until 9:30 and we lost an hour of sleep due to a time change on the ship, so no sleeping in for us! Breakfast was breakfast, nothing more to be said about it. From breakfast we walked the two flights of stairs (much better than the long distances we've grown accustom to walking) to Cellar Masters. Here we met up with the group from the Cruise Critic board. We were lucky enough to meet almost everyone we'll be sharing tours and rides with. It was uneventful, but nice to meet everyone.


After a quick bite to eat at the buffet, it was time for us to embrace our inner nerdiness. Celebrity offers a lecture series on board; the speakers (usually professors) tend to focus on topics directly related to the trip. Today's offerings included Plants of Greek Mythology and Gods, Greeks and the Good Life. We opted for the later, taking away a few things to ponder and some good trivia we'll hopefully be able to use at some point in our lives. Rather interesting was the explanation of the Greek flag. As with all flags, every aspect represents something relevant to the culture. We know Greece's flag is blue and white. However, the blue can be any shade. Pretty crazy to think about how many different versions of their flag are possible (and correct)!


Then we truly embraced the essence of this portion of our vacation and took a nap! Once recharged we explored a little (I totally hit the jackpot with a scrapbooking class!), swung by happy hour, then joined two other Cruise Critic couples (Fontaine & Nick; Athena & Danny) for team trivia. As always, our performance was subpar. But we all had fun and cracked some pretty good jokes about the ridiculous trivia questions. We stayed a bit after the game to listen to an extremely talented a capella group (the same group John mentioned in yesterday's post).


Tonight was the first of two formal evenings on the ship, so we had to spiffy ourselves up before heading to dinner. We passed those entering the main dining room and found our way to Silk Harvest, the Asian specialty restaurant on board. We were happily greeted by our waiter, Nino, and assistant waiter. Both were pleasant, but Nino was especially personable and enthusiastic (traits of an excellent waiter). As we scoured the menu, Nino explained that we would be eating family style (four courses: appetizer, sushi, main course, desert) and asked if we had any food allergies or dietary restrictions (music to my ears). He was happy to double check our selections against the list, and we were all set.

As the first course was served, Nino declared, "Let the show begin!" The first course was absolutely delicious, almost to the point where I wanted to ask him to forget the rest and just bring more of the same! We ended up sharing five different appetizers, our favorite being a tie between the Chinese BBQ pork ribs and the cream cheese wontons. We didn't order any sushi...just our personal preference! When the main course arrived, Nino described it as "the best part", and he was right on the money! John's favorite was the green curry stir fried pork (a little too spicy for my liking), and I was a big fan of the orange chicken. At one point I looked across the table and said, "There's no way we can eat all this food." John agreed, but of course polished off the curry pork, orange chicken, and pad thai. Then, according to Nino, came the "grand finale": desert. We devoured a plate of caramelized bananas with coconut ice cream; John enjoyed the ice cream, me...not so much. Then we tackled the sampler plate of ice creams beside it. My favorite by far was the mango. After many thanks to Nino we retreated to our room in hopes of encouraging our bodies to digest quickly enough to indulge ourselves at the Captain's Welcome Toast this evening. That, of course, did not happen!


A few moments to relax and we were off again for the toast and evening show. The captain introduced the head staff, and we were surprised to learn that the head chef is from the States. We stayed for about twenty minutes of the "Broadway" show that followed. The show didn't have a plot, and a few minutes into it we were ready to go. It was a fairly early end to our evening, but we'll be ready to go and well rested when we arrive in Santorini tomorrow!

All Aboard!

Today marked the end of our week exploring Italy and the beginning of the cruise portion of our vacation aboard the Celebrity Equinox. With tired feet from six straight days of nonstop walking, we were looking forward to two days with minimal walking to rest our feet before our first port stop, Santorini. We woke up this morning and ditched our plan to visit a nearby church due to the rain that was falling. We packed our bags, enjoyed breakfast, and relaxed until 11:00.


At 11:00 we met two other couples who are on the cruise in the lobby of our hotel's building. We found them on Cruise Critic, a website which is a very useful resource for finding people to share tours and transfers. This allows you to see some of the ports with a much smaller group than you would get by booking an excursion through the ship, and usually at the same, if not lower cost. The six of us waited a few minutes and were picked up by RomeCabs, a company which provides transer service between Rome, it's airport, and it's seaport. In our case, it was about an hour from the city to the seaport. It's possible to take the train to the seaport, but with the frequency and sporadic nature of train strikes in Italy, we thought it best to ensure we wouldn't have any hiccups arriving at the ship on time. The six of us had some good conversation as we traveled, and we were dropped off only feet from the ship.


After a very quick 15 minute or so boarding process, we were in our room. We began unpacking and taking care of various odds and ends. We headed to lunch at a restaurant on the ship called Bistro on Five, a creperie. I had a Buffalo chicken crepe, Sarah had a Mexican crepe, and we shared a Nutella, banana, and pistachio crepe for dessert. They were excellent. I am sure we will be returning to this restaurant again for lunch, and possibly breakfast as they have a number of breakfast crepes as well.


Next up was the muster drill. Certainly an important aspect of a cruise, given the recent Costa Concordia tragedy, but definitely boring. On other cruises we have been on, I believe the muster drill hasn't been until after sailaway, but this time it was immediately before it.


Following the muster drill, we met a few of the people that we are sharing tours with in various ports. Everyone we have met so far for transfers and tours has been very nice and we are really looking forward to getting to see the ports without being a herd of sheep. This is especially true after getting to explore as just the two of us for the past week. We still have a few couples to meet, and hope to accomplish that tomorrow.


We had dinner in the ship's main dining room, which was, of course, delightful. Sarah had some sort of pasta, and I had a perfectly cooked pork chop. The real highlight though was the marshmallow sweet potatoes that came with the pork chop. At dinner we sat with a woman who was a dead ringer for Barb T., from looks to personality. She was even with a woman who looked like Judy T. Quite interesting; and the table, which also included a woman who travels Europe to paint, had lively conversation.

We returned to the room to finish unpacking, and at this time, I hoisted our flag on the balcony. Behold.

We headed to the ship's theater for the evening show, which was an introduction of some of the different musicians on the ship. There is an a cappella group (which we deduce is made up of a group of Nebarska-Lincoln alumni) that was outstanding. The singers and dancers were meh, and there was a good guitarist as well.


I will leave you with a picture of the view looking from our balcony towards the aft of the ship. Note ugly lifeboats. We saved $1,400 over the cost of a room in the same category that didn't have these obstructions. I have read that some people are vehemently against having one of these "obstructed view" staterooms. I say that the cruise line can stick a lifeboat below, above, or next to my balcony any day of the week if it will cost $1,400 less.

Tomorrow is a sea day. We didn't take any pictures on the ship today besides on our balcony, but tomorrow we will be about the ship taking pictures of anything interesting we come across and will post what we find. Think of it like a scavenger hunt!