Trip to British Isles and Mediterranean Cruise, August 2015
Jim & Andrea Siscel
Slide Show of Photos with captions at end of trip information
On August 2, 2015 Andrea and I boarded our flight via Atlanta to Dublin, Ireland. Arriving in the morning in Dublin we checked into Hotel George Frederic Handel. We later found out that Handel’s first performance of The Messiah was performed in 1742 in a music hall where the hotel now stands. During a museum visit we found out that Fishamble Street where the hotel is located was a main street down to the river in the original Viking settlement in the Dublin area. We used Hop On-Hop Off buses during our time in cities that we visited before our cruise. A word of advice is board by 10 am and you won’t have to wait in line for long. In the afternoon of our arrival we took the bus on the full tour through Dublin. The next day we hopped off at Guinness Brewery, Jameson Distillery, Trinity College to see the Book of Kells, and National Museum of Ireland-Archaeology where we saw Bronze Age gold artifacts and learned about the Vikings in Ireland.
The third day we took a train to Belfast. In Belfast we met my pen-pal, Ivan, from when I was in 3rd grade. We spent a most enjoyable 3 days with Ivan and his wife Inez. Ivan took us on a drive that passed the home where he lived and the school he attended when we were writing as children. We drove to Newcastle by the Irish Sea. We toured the city on a Hop On-Hop Off bus. We hopped off at the excellent Titanic Museum right by the wharf where the Titanic was built by Harland and Wolff ship building company. The city was being visited by a cruise ship, so there were many other tourists in the city. On the third day we took a bus tour to The Giant’s Causeway and Bushmill’s Distillery. My preference is Guinness on draft and Jameson. We had some excellent meals at restaurants in central Belfast. Breakfasts in all of our hotels were top quality and lots of food.
Next we flew to London Heathrow Airport where we met up with Andrea’s brother, Gary and his wife Ruth. Andrea’s cellphone wasn’t working very well and Gary’s not at all. We were lucky to meet each other wandering through the international arrival terminal. We all purchased our Oyster cards for the underground, and headed for our hotel located only 3 blocks from King’s Cross Rail Station. While buying our rail tickets for Sunday we discovered that each station has a very nice variety of restaurants, so we picked one to have our dinner. The next day we took the train to Worthing on the south coast of England to meet Andrea’s and Gary’s cousin from Sweden who we met two years ago. We spent an enjoyable Sunday with Elisabeth, her husband Terry, and 2-year old Daniel. We had a buffet lunch (Sunday roast), toured a beautiful garden, and walked the promenade in front of their apartment. Monday we took the tour on the Hop On/Hop Off bus. We stopped at Westminster Abbey, but the line was so long we didn’t go inside. Instead we toured the Churchill War Rooms. It was in this location under a government building that the war was conducted. There is a museum showing Churchill’s life in the underground area. Many of the war rooms are just as they were during the war. I highly recommend visiting the War Rooms if you go to London. Tuesday we met our tour guide who took us, along with five French adults, to see the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace. He put us in a great corner location right on the barrier where we could see all of the military, guards, band, and horse guards approach and leave the palace. Back on the bus for St. Paul’s Cathedral and lunch in the basement. A beautiful cathedral where many important British people are buried. Next to the Tower of London, late afternoon and the lines were not long. We did a self-tour here, visiting the White Tower-Royal Armory, the Crown Jewels, and Bloody Tower. Tonight across the street to the St Pancras International Train Station to another nice restaurant.
Wednesday afternoon, Aug 12th, we returned to Heathrow for our flight to Barcelona. Thursday we took one of the Hop On/Hop Off routes in the morning. In the afternoon we had a skip the line tour of the Sagrada Familia basilica, which was started in 1926 and is still being constructed. A style like no other church we have seen. Gary, Ruth and I took the elevator to the top of one of the towers and then around 400 corkscrew steps down. Skip the line is highly recommended any place that there might be extremely long lines. In the evening we had dinner that followed with a flamenco dance performance. Wow! what energy. The next morning we took the other Hop On/Hop Off route before heading for our cruise ship, Island Princess, at 1pm.
On board the Island Princess headed towards Toulon, France. We took a tour to Marseille and Aix en Provence. Visit to a large cathedral on high hill with stunning views of Marseille. A long walking tour of old city part of Aix en Provence, the city of Paul Cezanne.
The following day we arrived at Livorno for a tour of Pisa and Florence. Andrea and I were to go to Cinque Terre, but tour was cancelled because of sea conditions, very disappointing to both of us. Weather was forecast 82 degrees and partly sunny. As we stepped off of the bus in Pisa the clouds opened up and dumped rain for the next hour. The local vendors made lots of money selling 5 Euro umbrellas. I took a few pictures and we headed back to the coffee shop, our meeting place. On to Florence and more walking. We saw Michelangelo’s statue of David, the exterior of the Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore, the Ponte Vecchio, as well a numerous other buildings. We lost, for a while, one of our tour members, but connected back with her before heading back to the ship.
On down the coast of Italy to the port for Rome. One hour bus ride to Rome. First stop was the Colleseum, which we were able to walk around inside. Second stop the Vatican Museum and Sistine Chapel. The crowds were so massive that that it was hard to see what our guide was telling us about or to enjoy the beautiful artwork of Michelangelo on the ceiling. We saw Michelangelo’s Pieta in St. Peter’s Cathedral. When Andrea and I visited in 1969 we stood only a few feet away. Now you are at a distance with bulletproof glass in between. We walked over 3 miles today, yesterday was 5 miles. Another late lunch today eating at 3pm after having breakfast at 6am. Great food, but hard to enjoy when you are tired and very, very hungry. We had lunches on four of our all day tours at very nice restaurants with excellent food.
Continuing south to Naples I had decided that another all day tour to Pompeii was not smart. Plus a recent article in Smithsonian magazine suggested that Herculaneum was a better stop. Herculaneum was hit by a pyroclastic flow and Pompeii by ash and pumice from the same eruption of Mount Vesuvius. The pyroclastic flow materials left more of the small seaside village standing. Very interesting walking tour with lots of remaining artifacts, wall and floor mosaics, and wall paintings. We stopped at a cameo factory. Andrea had purchased her cameos in 1969 when I was stationed in Germany, but Ruth chose some earrings.
Leaving Naples we received a text message that our credit card had possible fraudulent charges on it. Trying to talk to someone in the US, while at sea, via a breaking up cell connection with a 9-hour time difference is not fun. We did get the card cancelled and will now have to use the back-up card which will be left on the ship at all times. Finally an at sea day, sleep-in, and relax on our way to the Greek island of Mykonos. At Mykonos we took a bus tour around the island. Very picturesque, beautiful white buildings with multi-colored shutters, beautiful beaches, and a Greek Orthodox monastery with lots of icons.
Istanbul is next and one of the two main places that I wanted to visit. Since it was Friday we couldn’t go to the Blue Mosque. Our guide instead took us to a smaller mosque where he indicated the blue tiles covering the inside were better than inside the Blue Mosque. It was very beautiful. He reminded us that tulips originally came from Turkey and were smuggled into Holland. Many of the blue tiles had tulips on them. Next we had to learn about Turkish rugs. Andrea made a mistake and left me alone with a sales person. We are now the proud owner of a Turkish rug for our entry hall. She was involved in the final decision of which one to buy. Because of this we did not get to see the Grand Bazaar, but according to Gary we didn’t miss much. Another great lunch at noon to everyone’s pleasure. Next we visited Topkapi Palace where we saw the Harem rooms and the crown jewels of the Sultans. Last we went to the Hagia Sophia, first a Byzantine Christian basilica, then an imperial mosque, and now a museum. It was the world’s largest cathedral for nearly 1000 years, until 1520. By the time we left it most of us senior citizens were exhausted from walking and standing for 3 1/2 hours.
Next stop was at Kusadasi, where we saw the Basilica of St. John the Apostle, the Virgin Mary Shrine, and Ephesus, a Roman provincial capital. The excitement of the day occurred when Andrea slipped on the polished marble street in Ephesus. Luckily no major damage beyond a bruised elbow and small finger. Interesting locations that had been rebuilt to some degree after collapsing over time.
Athens was that last major place that I wanted to see. We saw the 1896 Olympic Stadium that was built for the first modern Olympics. Next was the climb up the Acropolis to the remains of the Parthenon. Another location checked off of my bucket list. Back down the Acropolis to the Ancient Agora (marketplace) and a lengthy walk to noon lunch. We had no idea what a Greek lunch consisted of, so as two courses of appetizers were brought out we ate everything. Then the main entrée appeared with two chicken breasts. We all almost completed one of them. Then dessert followed with three different selections. Of course you could have all of the red and white wine that you wanted. Our guide made a smart decision and called for the bus to take us to the final location. We never would have made the mile walk to Temple of Olympian Zeus. We were able to do a little shopping before returning to the bus and then to the ship.
Oh Boy another at sea day to recover from the past four busy, busy, much walking days. This evening we celebrated Gary and Ruth’s 25th wedding anniversary in the ship’s Bayou Restaurant with a special violin solo for them. We arrived in Venice at Noon the next day and went off the ship onto a water taxi that took us near San Marco Square. Ruth wanted a gondola ride, so that was part of our tour. We walked to the gondola boarding area in a back canal for our 20-minute ride. The gondolier did not sing. He said that was only done on evening rides. We visited a Murano glass store, where we saw a glass demonstration. The glass artwork was in the price range of Dale Chihuly’s work. Then we walked to the Doge’s Palace. Excellent tour and we saw where the court system judges handed out justice. Something I hadn’t expected was that we were able to walk from the Doge’s Palace to the prison via the Bridge of Sighs.
Wednesday, August 26 off to the airport at Venice for a flight to Amsterdam. A quick 40-minute connection that saw us almost running from one terminal to the end of the adjacent terminal to make the connection. At 6pm we made it home via Shuttle Express.
A fantastic, though exhausting trip, we are so glad we took it.
Jim & Andrea Siscel
Slide Show of Photos with captions at end of trip information
On August 2, 2015 Andrea and I boarded our flight via Atlanta to Dublin, Ireland. Arriving in the morning in Dublin we checked into Hotel George Frederic Handel. We later found out that Handel’s first performance of The Messiah was performed in 1742 in a music hall where the hotel now stands. During a museum visit we found out that Fishamble Street where the hotel is located was a main street down to the river in the original Viking settlement in the Dublin area. We used Hop On-Hop Off buses during our time in cities that we visited before our cruise. A word of advice is board by 10 am and you won’t have to wait in line for long. In the afternoon of our arrival we took the bus on the full tour through Dublin. The next day we hopped off at Guinness Brewery, Jameson Distillery, Trinity College to see the Book of Kells, and National Museum of Ireland-Archaeology where we saw Bronze Age gold artifacts and learned about the Vikings in Ireland.
The third day we took a train to Belfast. In Belfast we met my pen-pal, Ivan, from when I was in 3rd grade. We spent a most enjoyable 3 days with Ivan and his wife Inez. Ivan took us on a drive that passed the home where he lived and the school he attended when we were writing as children. We drove to Newcastle by the Irish Sea. We toured the city on a Hop On-Hop Off bus. We hopped off at the excellent Titanic Museum right by the wharf where the Titanic was built by Harland and Wolff ship building company. The city was being visited by a cruise ship, so there were many other tourists in the city. On the third day we took a bus tour to The Giant’s Causeway and Bushmill’s Distillery. My preference is Guinness on draft and Jameson. We had some excellent meals at restaurants in central Belfast. Breakfasts in all of our hotels were top quality and lots of food.
Next we flew to London Heathrow Airport where we met up with Andrea’s brother, Gary and his wife Ruth. Andrea’s cellphone wasn’t working very well and Gary’s not at all. We were lucky to meet each other wandering through the international arrival terminal. We all purchased our Oyster cards for the underground, and headed for our hotel located only 3 blocks from King’s Cross Rail Station. While buying our rail tickets for Sunday we discovered that each station has a very nice variety of restaurants, so we picked one to have our dinner. The next day we took the train to Worthing on the south coast of England to meet Andrea’s and Gary’s cousin from Sweden who we met two years ago. We spent an enjoyable Sunday with Elisabeth, her husband Terry, and 2-year old Daniel. We had a buffet lunch (Sunday roast), toured a beautiful garden, and walked the promenade in front of their apartment. Monday we took the tour on the Hop On/Hop Off bus. We stopped at Westminster Abbey, but the line was so long we didn’t go inside. Instead we toured the Churchill War Rooms. It was in this location under a government building that the war was conducted. There is a museum showing Churchill’s life in the underground area. Many of the war rooms are just as they were during the war. I highly recommend visiting the War Rooms if you go to London. Tuesday we met our tour guide who took us, along with five French adults, to see the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace. He put us in a great corner location right on the barrier where we could see all of the military, guards, band, and horse guards approach and leave the palace. Back on the bus for St. Paul’s Cathedral and lunch in the basement. A beautiful cathedral where many important British people are buried. Next to the Tower of London, late afternoon and the lines were not long. We did a self-tour here, visiting the White Tower-Royal Armory, the Crown Jewels, and Bloody Tower. Tonight across the street to the St Pancras International Train Station to another nice restaurant.
Wednesday afternoon, Aug 12th, we returned to Heathrow for our flight to Barcelona. Thursday we took one of the Hop On/Hop Off routes in the morning. In the afternoon we had a skip the line tour of the Sagrada Familia basilica, which was started in 1926 and is still being constructed. A style like no other church we have seen. Gary, Ruth and I took the elevator to the top of one of the towers and then around 400 corkscrew steps down. Skip the line is highly recommended any place that there might be extremely long lines. In the evening we had dinner that followed with a flamenco dance performance. Wow! what energy. The next morning we took the other Hop On/Hop Off route before heading for our cruise ship, Island Princess, at 1pm.
On board the Island Princess headed towards Toulon, France. We took a tour to Marseille and Aix en Provence. Visit to a large cathedral on high hill with stunning views of Marseille. A long walking tour of old city part of Aix en Provence, the city of Paul Cezanne.
The following day we arrived at Livorno for a tour of Pisa and Florence. Andrea and I were to go to Cinque Terre, but tour was cancelled because of sea conditions, very disappointing to both of us. Weather was forecast 82 degrees and partly sunny. As we stepped off of the bus in Pisa the clouds opened up and dumped rain for the next hour. The local vendors made lots of money selling 5 Euro umbrellas. I took a few pictures and we headed back to the coffee shop, our meeting place. On to Florence and more walking. We saw Michelangelo’s statue of David, the exterior of the Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore, the Ponte Vecchio, as well a numerous other buildings. We lost, for a while, one of our tour members, but connected back with her before heading back to the ship.
On down the coast of Italy to the port for Rome. One hour bus ride to Rome. First stop was the Colleseum, which we were able to walk around inside. Second stop the Vatican Museum and Sistine Chapel. The crowds were so massive that that it was hard to see what our guide was telling us about or to enjoy the beautiful artwork of Michelangelo on the ceiling. We saw Michelangelo’s Pieta in St. Peter’s Cathedral. When Andrea and I visited in 1969 we stood only a few feet away. Now you are at a distance with bulletproof glass in between. We walked over 3 miles today, yesterday was 5 miles. Another late lunch today eating at 3pm after having breakfast at 6am. Great food, but hard to enjoy when you are tired and very, very hungry. We had lunches on four of our all day tours at very nice restaurants with excellent food.
Continuing south to Naples I had decided that another all day tour to Pompeii was not smart. Plus a recent article in Smithsonian magazine suggested that Herculaneum was a better stop. Herculaneum was hit by a pyroclastic flow and Pompeii by ash and pumice from the same eruption of Mount Vesuvius. The pyroclastic flow materials left more of the small seaside village standing. Very interesting walking tour with lots of remaining artifacts, wall and floor mosaics, and wall paintings. We stopped at a cameo factory. Andrea had purchased her cameos in 1969 when I was stationed in Germany, but Ruth chose some earrings.
Leaving Naples we received a text message that our credit card had possible fraudulent charges on it. Trying to talk to someone in the US, while at sea, via a breaking up cell connection with a 9-hour time difference is not fun. We did get the card cancelled and will now have to use the back-up card which will be left on the ship at all times. Finally an at sea day, sleep-in, and relax on our way to the Greek island of Mykonos. At Mykonos we took a bus tour around the island. Very picturesque, beautiful white buildings with multi-colored shutters, beautiful beaches, and a Greek Orthodox monastery with lots of icons.
Istanbul is next and one of the two main places that I wanted to visit. Since it was Friday we couldn’t go to the Blue Mosque. Our guide instead took us to a smaller mosque where he indicated the blue tiles covering the inside were better than inside the Blue Mosque. It was very beautiful. He reminded us that tulips originally came from Turkey and were smuggled into Holland. Many of the blue tiles had tulips on them. Next we had to learn about Turkish rugs. Andrea made a mistake and left me alone with a sales person. We are now the proud owner of a Turkish rug for our entry hall. She was involved in the final decision of which one to buy. Because of this we did not get to see the Grand Bazaar, but according to Gary we didn’t miss much. Another great lunch at noon to everyone’s pleasure. Next we visited Topkapi Palace where we saw the Harem rooms and the crown jewels of the Sultans. Last we went to the Hagia Sophia, first a Byzantine Christian basilica, then an imperial mosque, and now a museum. It was the world’s largest cathedral for nearly 1000 years, until 1520. By the time we left it most of us senior citizens were exhausted from walking and standing for 3 1/2 hours.
Next stop was at Kusadasi, where we saw the Basilica of St. John the Apostle, the Virgin Mary Shrine, and Ephesus, a Roman provincial capital. The excitement of the day occurred when Andrea slipped on the polished marble street in Ephesus. Luckily no major damage beyond a bruised elbow and small finger. Interesting locations that had been rebuilt to some degree after collapsing over time.
Athens was that last major place that I wanted to see. We saw the 1896 Olympic Stadium that was built for the first modern Olympics. Next was the climb up the Acropolis to the remains of the Parthenon. Another location checked off of my bucket list. Back down the Acropolis to the Ancient Agora (marketplace) and a lengthy walk to noon lunch. We had no idea what a Greek lunch consisted of, so as two courses of appetizers were brought out we ate everything. Then the main entrée appeared with two chicken breasts. We all almost completed one of them. Then dessert followed with three different selections. Of course you could have all of the red and white wine that you wanted. Our guide made a smart decision and called for the bus to take us to the final location. We never would have made the mile walk to Temple of Olympian Zeus. We were able to do a little shopping before returning to the bus and then to the ship.
Oh Boy another at sea day to recover from the past four busy, busy, much walking days. This evening we celebrated Gary and Ruth’s 25th wedding anniversary in the ship’s Bayou Restaurant with a special violin solo for them. We arrived in Venice at Noon the next day and went off the ship onto a water taxi that took us near San Marco Square. Ruth wanted a gondola ride, so that was part of our tour. We walked to the gondola boarding area in a back canal for our 20-minute ride. The gondolier did not sing. He said that was only done on evening rides. We visited a Murano glass store, where we saw a glass demonstration. The glass artwork was in the price range of Dale Chihuly’s work. Then we walked to the Doge’s Palace. Excellent tour and we saw where the court system judges handed out justice. Something I hadn’t expected was that we were able to walk from the Doge’s Palace to the prison via the Bridge of Sighs.
Wednesday, August 26 off to the airport at Venice for a flight to Amsterdam. A quick 40-minute connection that saw us almost running from one terminal to the end of the adjacent terminal to make the connection. At 6pm we made it home via Shuttle Express.
A fantastic, though exhausting trip, we are so glad we took it.