Remember, only read paragraphs in itlaics if you have a thick enough skin not to be offended by a non-PC attitude. I am not now, and never will be, politically correct. To me, honesty and forthrightness are much more important than being sensitive to every thin skinned knothead I might encounter.
March 8 – TX to Daphne, Alabama. We got off to a fair start today. The only snag was that, with all the preparations to leave, we forgot to ‘Spring Forward’ so instead of getting up at 8AM we actually got up at 9AM. It did give us an extra hour of sleep though so that was good. We hadn’t picked up any books on CD so we decided to stop at the first Cracker Barrel Restaurant we passed and that wound up being in extreme east Texas about 2 hours down the road. We’ve rented a Hyundai Sonata for this trip and it’s a very nice car indeed. This one is equipped with XM Radio and I found the all 50s station. What a hoot. No one plays any of this stuff very often and I’m hearing songs I haven’t heard in almost 50 years. Hey, I still know a lot of the lyrics. Of course, that means that Diana is constantly being serenaded. I think I saw her turn her hearing aids off out of the corner of my eye.
The drive was uneventful and the car, although very powerful, is getting 31-32 miles per gallon and that’s at 80 mph.
March 9 – Daphne, Alabama to Fort Lauderdale, Florida. We got a better start today and zipped smoothly along. In fact, the last part of the trip across central Florida and down the east coast is usually not good at all, but today it was fine. We were just a few miles from Fort Lauderdale when we got a call from Gayle at Cruise Specialists, our travel agents. She called to tell us that we had been upgraded to a veranda room. I’m sure she was shocked when I hesitated to immediately accept the upgrade, as most people seem very impressed with verandas. There were three reasons for my hesitation. First, I wasn’t sure how Diana would feel about it. Second, I really do like my little cubbyhole aft on main deck. Third, when I wrote that long italicized rant on March 27th in my Africa journal, I really meant it (see below). I don’t get the point of a veranda on a ship.
Curmudgeon Cruiser Note: I’m looking at a price list for a 7-day New England/Canada cruise in the brochure I picked up at the presentation and my normal type of cabin, an E room, is $1,749 or about $250 a day for both of us. The least expensive veranda room is $2,549 or $365 a day each. That’s $230 a day more for both of us to go to the same places, eat the same food, use the same public rooms, see the same shows and movies. If I were willing to use the least expensive cabin, HH, the difference would be $2,000 over 7 days bringing the daily cost of the veranda to $571 per day. Yikes!! And this increase would buy me something I might use for 2 minutes a day. I’m sure the marketing stats are driving the increase in this type of room but the economics of verandas for the traveler do not quite work in a rational sense. Well, I guess if you’d pay $25,000 for a wristwatch that keeps no better time than a Timex you’ll buy just about anything. I can just hear the Verandaphilles yelling, “Oh I love my veranda, I can keep the door open all the time and get the fresh air!” This is true I guess but it throws the airflow balance off for the entire ship and wastes money for HAL running an A/C that’s trying to cool the entire planet. I think I’d be happier about the verandas if I knew that while the door to the outside was open the air conditioning to that room would shut down. See if everyone is still happy getting the ‘fresh air’. Well, you have been warned about reading these notes and now you see why!!]
Turns out that Diana was fine with the change and so we are now the proud residents of a veranda room for the first time in our lives. I once told someone that the worst possible thing HAL could do for me is upgrade me to a veranda and I find out I love it. Well I guess they’ve called my bluff. I’m man enough to admit when I’m wrong so I’ll let you know how that works out. I had to laugh when Diana said, “I don’t mind having a veranda room, I just object to paying for it!” That’s why we make such a good team. I look at the logistics and she looks at the economics. Between us we’ve got it covered.
Tomorrow we’ll do some tourism stuff here in Fort Lauderdale before I turn the car in at the airport, just 2 miles from the hotel.
March 10 – Fort Lauderdale, Florida. We had a very nice day in Florida. Our first stop was at the local Target store because there are always sundries you don’t pack. I wanted some Tide To Go spot remover sticks and Diana wanted some deodorant.
Last year we drove the northern part of A1A, that’s the subdivision of Route 1 and A1 that goes right along the coast. This year we drove south on A1A almost to Miami. We stopped at a civic beach for about an hour or so. It was not very busy and I sat in the shade of a lifeguard tower watching the world go by. We ate lunch in a very upscale shopping mall restaurant, Lea’s Tea Room. It had an outdoor patio that was very pleasant. Diana had a salad Nicoise, done very traditionally because, despite the name, Lea’s is very French. I had a dish called Airline Chicken; you know I love to take risks. I’m not sure how it got this name; maybe it means something else in French, but it had nothing to do with the chicken you might get on a plane. It was a whole breast of chicken with the upper wing portion on each side, grilled skin on, after being marinated in Lea’s secret sauce. It was served over grilled vegetables and had a creamy leak sauce on the plate around everything. I love it when they do that with the sauce. You can decide how much of it you want because they don’t put it on the food directly, but drizzle it around the edge.
After lunch we drove around a little more checking out the sights when we found Jaxon’s Ice Cream Parlor. It’s an old style ice cream shop that you really have to work hard to find anymore. They make their own ice cream and it was very good. Their logo is a sink pile high with ice cream and a long drainpipe. It’s their signature dish, the ‘Kitchen Sink’. Apparently it’s a lot like the Farrell’s Ice Cream Shoppe’s ‘Zoo’. It has a scoop of every ice cream flavor with all the different toppings. They had a cut out board with the logo and a place for your fact to peer through. That was a photo op.
In the late afternoon I returned the rental car to the airport and caught the shuttle back to the hotel. I really don’t enjoy embarkation day so it was an early evening for us.
March 11 – Fort Lauderdale and boarding the MS Prinsendam. My second least favorite cruising day, embarkation; second only to disembarkation. We had breakfast and then caught the shuttle to the port. We were onboard the ship by 11:30am and went to the lido for our first lunch. The rooms were ready about 1:30pm and we arrived at our veranda room. It’s not that much different from my favorite room on Main Deck, in fact it may be a little smaller. So far it’s ok we’ll see how it goes for 50 days. Can you tell that I like my little room on Main Deck?
We have a table for 2 on the starboard side right next to the window. It’s a great table! The table for four next to us has two very nice couples so it’s a congenial bunch. Dinner was excellent as usual and our waiter Doni and his assistant Ari are both very capable and have wonderful personalities.
Because our room was upgraded, our FedEx luggage went to the old room and since that room is now empty no one was there to say it didn’t belong to them. When it hadn’t gotten to the room by 9pm I had our cabin steward Adhy go down and check on it and sure enough he came back with all three boxes. Everything arrived in good shape.
There are two movies tonight, one in the theater as usual and one in the showroom. They were Mamma Mia! and The Duchess. I don’t like movie musicals, they’re ok live on stage but not on film, so I opted for The Duchess, an 18th Century British drama. It was ok. The costumes and sets were magnificent.
At Sea day tomorrow, yippee!! A whole day of goofing off.
March 12 – At Sea. The first of two days at sea before our first port. My days at sea don’t vary much. If there’s a Tai Chi instructor aboard that’s my first activity after breakfast and we have one on this trip. After Tai Chi I usually participate in one of the sports events, golf putting, table tennis, etc. and then head to our travel agent’s ‘chat time’ in the Explorer’s Lounge. On some sailings our agent, Cruise Specialists, have an escort or escorts on board and when we’re at sea they make themselves available for a couple of hours in the morning for clients to stop by and ask questions or just share gossip and get to know people. Since they have over 140 people on this cruise, that’s about one-third of the passengers, chat time this morning was well attended. This is the first time I’ve sailed with Henk and Lucia. They are a very outgoing and congenial couple and we had a good time this AM reacquainting with old friends and meeting new ones. I failed to mention yesterday that CSI hosted a party yesterday afternoon in the Crow’s Nest for all their clients. The room was packed.
After ‘chat time’ I head to an early lunch and then see if there’s a lecture worth attending in the afternoon. Our first speaker is John Pratschke and his topic is the post-WWII unification of Europe. Today he talked about what a union was and it’s various elements and then discussed the Coal and Steel Convention signed by Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, West Germany, Italy and France in 1951 as the first stem in what eventually led to the European Union we have today. It was a good lecture once he got through the falderal of a long introduction. I’ll probably attend his next one.
I spend some time reading on days at sea. Currently I’m reading James Patterson’s ‘Step on a Crack.’ It’s a new hero for Patterson, very different from Alex Cross, Lindsay Boxer and Max and I’m enjoying it.
That takes me to dinner and then either a movie, the show or both. At sea days fall into a pretty predictable routine for me. Tonight I was not interested in the move and went to the show to see Ian Finkel. He’s part of a very talented family. His father, Favish Finkel, is a character actor that I know you would recognize if you saw him. Recently he was on Boston Legal. His brother, Elliot, is a very well known concert pianist. Ian is probably one of the greatest xylophone players in the world. His last album won a Grammy Award. He’s a high-energy guy with a good comedic presence and a great showman. The show was great!
On days at sea I definitely spend some time titling my pictures and writing in my journal. I don’t really have any pictures to title so this is an easy evening.
March 13 – At Sea. Breakfast, Tai Chi, chat time, port lecture by Frank Buckingham and lunch. AM is pretty set. Our CSI windbreakers, tote bags and passport cases arrived in the cabin before lunch. The logo on them is great as usual. It’s the Coliseum of Rome in white and a laurel branch in pine green and plum with the ship’s name, date and cruise title in teal. You can always count on Cruise Specialists to design a great cruise logo.
We had a presentation by our second lecturer, Joseph Rosenthal, today. He’s a doctor with Kaiser in California but has been collecting ancient maps for almost his entire life. His presentation was part historical, part cultural and part geographical and some of his ancient maps were used to illustrate his points. Most of them were represented by computer images but he did bring three actual maps with him that he displayed on a table for us to see. The oldest was from 1497 and it was a woodcut print. He also had an example of a copperplate map, printed from an engraved image and a lithograph map. His lecture was interesting (I also love maps) and informative. He has a Woody Allenish sense of humor, which I find funny and some of the stories behind his map acquisitions were hilarious.
We have a table for two for dinner but it’s right next to a table for four so it feel like a rectangular table for six which we prefer. This ship doesn’t have any of those. All the tables larger than four are round for 6 or 8. At round tables Diana can only hear the people sitting directly next to her and that makes following the conversation impossible even with only 6. At a rectangular table for 6 she’s closer to everyone and can hear the whole conversation. That’s our preferred configuration if it’s available. On the Prinsendam it’s not so the duce and quad is the next best thing. Both couples at the table for four were not in the dining room. One couple went to the Pinnacle Grill, the fancy restaurant on the ship (the food there is extra good, huge steaks, lamb chops, fish and the chocolate volcano for desert, I can’t wait) and the other couple doesn’t travel with dressy clothes so they eat in the Lido on formal nights. They’re all fun to talk to so they were missed.
Because it’s a formal night we are having a show by the ship’s cast. They’re doing a show called ‘Europa’ which features songs and dances from Europe. Just prior to the show we were introduced to the captain Halle Thon Gunderson for at least the third time. He’s probably my favorite captain of all time. He has a somewhat corny sense of humor. His accent, he’s Norwegian, is great and he’s an inveterate storyteller. When he does his one o’clock report from the bridge he starts it out with, “It’s me again!” We’ve sailed with him several times and on the world cruise in 2005 his wife and daughter traveled with him from the USA to Australia. His daughter, Isabel was 6 at the time and just a cute as any little girl could be. Her accent was a mixture of Norwegian and Australian that was quite charming. The captain told me that they would be joining us in Barcelona. I’m sure she has changed tremendously in four years. Two years ago he had a picture of her in his cabin taken with her surfboard at age 8. She looked every bit the blonde SoCal surfer girl.
The show was great as usual. I recognized songs and dances from France, Spain, Ireland, Austria and Italy. Ever since Riverdance everyone does the modern Irish dances and that’s fine with me because I love the style.
We’re not arriving in port until 10AM tomorrow so we will have Tai Chi in the morning. Great!!
March 14 – Gustavia, St. Barthélemy (St. Bart’s). This is our first time here. It’s a small place, eight square miles in a banana shape. Like Martinique or Guadeloupe, it’s part of France so it’s just like being on the continent. They use the Euro and send elected delegates to the Assembly of France. It has been in the hands of the British and the French innumerable times, as have most of the islands down here. The Spanish were never very interested in it. Since it is so small and has no exploitable natural resources, no one took an interest in it until the pirates noticed that it was not fortified or defended and it became one of their favorite hideouts.
The truly unique thing about this island is that it was once a Swedish colony. After the French chased the pirates out, Louis XVI traded it to the Swedes for a warehouse in Goteborg and for a time it prospered. Since it was not allied with any of the warring factions in the Caribbean, all sides found a market for their loot from captured ships or raided cities here. My love of irony forces me to report that sometimes the cities that had been raided sent representatives here to repurchase the goods that had been stolen. A few of the warehouses that housed these goods are still standing. But eventually the cost of defending their only colony in the Caribbean was too much for the Swedes and after devastation my tropical storms, fires and pirates; they traded it back to the French in 1878. In 1946 the French declared it an official commune under the Department of Guadeloupe, making it part of France.
We are anchoring off the capital city, Gustavia, and getting ashore on the ship’s tenders. I’m heading to a snorkeling trip and Diana’s taking a Seafari because she’s afraid that the water may be cold and by her standards, it might be. The tours here are short, just a couple of hours as we’re only staying until 4PM.
It was an easy morning as we didn’t anchor until 10AM, time for a leisurely breakfast and Tai Chi. At 10:30 we were in the Queen’s Lounge waiting for our tours to be called to the tender. Diana’s departed almost immediately. Mine was called about 15 minutes later. I don’t have high expectations for snorkeling here as we don’t have enough time to go out to the good sights but any day in the water is fine with me.
It was a nice dive boat, very conveniently laid out. The operator was Plongee Carabies and of course the staff was French. They were very friendly and everyone spoke passable English. The master was an older man and the dive assistants were a young man and lady, Guy and Elise. Everyone was very tan, of course. This far out into the Atlantic you don’t expect to find much coral and the bottom can be somewhat unremarkable. There were brain coral scattered around among the rocks and in the gaps where the surge is strong some fair sized sea fans. There were plenty of fish to see if you were patient and observant, parrotfish, wrasses, dory, needlefish and, swimming just below the surface one decent sized barracuda. The water was great and it was a very pleasant way to spend the late morning.
When I got back to the pier, Diana was waiting for me as planned and we walked around the town. Several of the Swedish era stone warehouses are sill in use as offices or shops. St. Bart’s is like most of the islands down here were 40-50 years ago. No high rise hotels, in fact no big hotels at all, lots of cafes and restaurants with a few very posh stores thrown in. Huge yachts are anchored out in the bay some with their own helicopters. A fair sized anchorage for the smaller boats as well. It’s pretty obvious that this is still a hangout for very rich people. A beer in a café is about $12 and a lunch salad is $27, not the sort of place that welcomes the middle class.
The town is very small and we covered all we wanted in about half an hour. Then it was on the tender and back to the ship for a late lunch. I like eating local food off the ship but not at these prices. The ambiance of the island is a different matter. It’s like most of the islands were 35 years ago. Not much large development.
Our entertainers were Den and Bobbie West. He plays lots of string instruments and sings, she sings. He brought his classical guitar, electric guitar, mandolin, banjo and pedal steel guitar with him. He was very good on all of them but he was best with the classical guitar. They sang and played a wide variety of music from Hawaiian to bluegrass, Spanish classical to blues. It was a very enjoyable show.
Tomorrow we’re in St. Lucia. We’ve been there before so we are taking a tour provided by our travel agent, CSI. With 140+ clients on board this could be the largest CSI tour I’ve ever been on. On thing has been bothering me a little. In the middle of the afternoon as we prepared to sail, Lucia and Henk were paged and asked to call the front office. That’s a very unusual circumstance and could mean that a member or members of our group were in some sort of difficulty. We’re hoping everyone is ok.
March 15 – Castries & Soufriere, St. Lucia. Had to get up earlier this AM as our tour with CSI leaves at 8:30. Castries is a very convenient port, the city is right outside the port gates and the ship is docked right next to the terminal building, which is very small and includes some shops for local fabrics, clothing and rum.
The island is of volcanic origin and has a mountain range crossing it north to south. The southernmost mountain, Mount Gimmie (pronounced Jimmy) is the tallest at 3,117 feet. There’s very little flat ground on this island. You’re either going up or downhill almost all the time. It’s very green and gets about 60 inches of rain at the coast and more than 100 inches in the mountains. It’s about 30% covered with tropical rain forest. Bananas are the most important exports but tourism is the largest industry. In addition to bananas they also export mangos and coconuts. They do produce a very potent rum here that they export and several regular rums that are only sold in the West Indies. Ironically, they do not grow sugar cane here anymore. They produce their rum using molasses produced from the sugar cane of other islands like Barbados. It was a big crop here but that collapsed when the Europeans and Americans started using sugar beets which can be grown, harvested and processed more cheaply and closer to home.
The control of this island was hotly contested between the British and the French. Europeans got here in the early 1500s and France established the first successful colony in the mid-17th century. England held the island from 1663 to 1667 and subsequently the island changed hands from the British to the French and back 14 times before it was finally ceded to the British in 1814. Representative government was introduced in 1924. From 1958 to 1962 St. Lucia was a member of the Federation of the West Indies and in 1967 it became fully self-governed. It is still a member of the British Commonwealth and has a Governor General appointed by the Queen, but the role of the GG is largely ceremonial and a British style parliament governs the island.
The island has produced two Nobel Prize winners, Derek Wolcott for literature and Arthur Lewis for economics, making the island the highest per capita Nobel laureate country ever, anywhere. They are also proud of their Olympic athletes although they have never won a medal at the games. They have produced several Gold medal winners at the Caribbean Games.
We sailed into the Caribbean’s deepest natural harbor at Castries right on time at 8am. It’s a very good harbor, very sheltered. After a quick breakfast we headed to the Ocean Bar the assembly point for the CSI tours. I like touring on this island because the winding hilly roads do not allow for big busses. I much prefer these 18 person mini-busses.
The first stop on our tour was an overlook just outside Castries. It had a great view of the city and port below. Behind the city we can see several mountain ranges on this every vertical island.
We drove through the Sir Arthur Lewis Community College, named for the Nobel laureate in economics. It’s a pretty campus that occupies the top on one of the hills on the island. It’s also home to the St. Lucia campus of the University of the West Indies but most students have to go to one of the larger islands for their last two years of school. One of the old buildings on the campus served both the British and French as a jail. The stone buildings on the campus were built by the French, the brick buildings by the British using bricks that had served as ballast on their sailing ships headed to the islands. Some buildings had both stone and bricks as they were started by one country and finished by the other.
We went down the hill and across Cul-du-sac valley. This is one of the few fairly flat areas on the island. Hess oil had very large oil tanks here where the large tankers unload their cargo. The crude is stored here to be transferred to refineries on other islands by smaller tankers. This island has the best deep-water ports and the larger tankers can get in with ease. The smaller tankers take the crude to Barbados and other places for processing and then bring the finished product back for use here.
Further along the coast and back up another hill we stopped at an overlook for Marigot Bay. It’s a great little bay with a slight ‘S’ shape that provides excellent protection from wind and wave. Lots of smaller sailboats are moored in the most sheltered area. There’s a small sandbar with palm trees on it about half way into the bay, it’s a wonderful sight. A lady had a small stand on the overlook patio. She was selling some local products including ‘Banana ketchup’. She was giving free samples of the ketchup so people could see what it was like. When we were here last time she said that we could use it anywhere we would put tomato ketchup. We bought some and she was right, it’s pretty good. She was also selling banana, vanilla, cherry, almond and lemon extracts (and essences), cinnamon, nutmeg and coconut products.
From there it was down to sea level again, this time to the town of Anse-La-Raye. It’s a small place with narrow streets lined with very small houses in all different states of repair. Some have been lovingly cared for, others very seriously neglected. Our guide said that these homes are all very old and housed slaves who worked in the cane fields before the collapse of that industry. After they were freed, the slaves were allowed to continue living in the homes and many of the island’s families still live in the same homes that their slave ancestors lived in. One of the streets right next to the sea has been converted into a block of shops selling native crafts and locally produced products. Handicrafts include necklaces, carvings and products woven from palm and other fibers.
One of the well cared for houses had conch shells imbedded in the cement of the porch. Diana posed to have her picture taken here because she loves shells. We walked over to the beach and met a man name John who introduced himself as a fisherman. He had that weather worn look that someone who spends his time in the sun and wind would have. He and I talked about the local fishing while Diana strolled up the beach.
Our next stop was for refreshments and a tour of a sugar cane processing plant from the early 1800s when it was still grown on St. Lucia. On the way in we walked across a small stream. Downstream about 200 yards were a group of women washing clothes. Our guide, Vision, (that’s not his real name, it’s his Rasta name) is excellent. He is very knowledgeable but also has a great sense of humor. His English name is Edward James or EJ.
Religion Note: Because its revival is linked to Jamaica and Bob Marley many people think Rastafari is from there and they would be correct. Rastas would have us believe it’s an old African belief system but that is not true in the basic sense. It mixes Biblical concepts with the idea that Emperor Haile Selassie, the former Emperor of Ethiopia, is the incarnation of God and the returned messiah as promised in the Bible. His death in 1975 does not give them problems because they claim it was a hoax and that he’ll be back to lead them in victory against Babylon.
They are monotheistic, a sort of cult of Abraham and Solomon. They use cannabis as a part of one of their sacraments, which probably accounts for its popularity in the Caribbean. They reject western society as being the Babylon of the Bible and view Africa as the Zion of the Bible. They are definitely Afrocentric in their worldview. The black separatist, Marcus Garvey, is viewed as a prophet by most Rastas. They are not hostile towards other races; in fact the sincere ones I’ve met are extremely open and friendly people. They accept Jesus as the first incarnation of God on earth but do not accept calling Him that. They believe that ‘Babylon’ has corrupted the name and prefer to refer to Him as Yeshua (Hebrew) or ‘Iyesus’ (Aramaic). The common reference to their beliefs as ‘Rastafarianism’ is insulting to Rastas. They prefer Rastafari or just Rasta.
EJ gave us a short botanical tour on the walk to the cane mill. We saw 2 types of ginger (pink and read), haleconia (crab claw and red), standard and yellow bird-of-paradise, proteus (sp?) and other plants I didn’t recognize. I saw another Purple Throated Carib hummingbird. We saw one last time we were here. It is larger than the common Ruby Throated hummingbird we see often in California and Texas and it’s a very deep purple with green accents and a very long curved beak. It was moving so fast and the shade was so deep in the forest that there was no way to get a decent picture.
At the cane mill we got an explanation of the process from a local docent and viewed the machinery involved. They have a display of old tools, some pottery crocks and huge iron vats used in the processing of the cane juice. It had a huge water wheel that drove the cane crushing machinery. Water for the wheel was brought from a mountain across the valley by an aqueduct that entered the mill at the level of the eaves and fell on the wheel to provide the power
When we moved to the patio we found some refreshments. First up was rum punch or tamarind juice. I’d never tasted tamarind juice so that was my pick. It was very light and refreshing and the docent told us that it’s good for lowering blood pressure. Next was a table with a display of the local fruit, including grapefruit, cassava, coconut, tamarind, star fruit, lime, orange, noni (yes the health juice that you can even get in Costco now) cocoa and several others I didn’t recognize. They had servings of coconut, fried green banana, a yellow banana, sugar cane and grapefruit for snacking.
Did you know there are over 50 varieties of bananas? The islanders consider the yellow banana that we know to be a fruit. The second type of banana is called a ‘green banana’ and is considered to be a vegetable. You prepare it any way you can make a potato. They fry it, mash it, deep fry it and make pancakes with it, etc. The yellow bananas they have are the smaller, totally curved type and, as usual they were very sweet with an excellent flavor.
As we ate a man playing guitar and singing Elvis songs serenaded us. He had a great voice and most people thought it was a CD until they saw him up above us on a platform. We were able to hear him out in the gardens and inside the mill. It was sunny and warm but a nice breeze kept it from being uncomfortable.
We retraced our steps back through Anse-La-Raye and Cul-du-Sac Valley to Castries where we stopped at a batik shop. I’m very attracted to batik fabric because it’s usually very strong but light cotton fabric that’s very cool in hot weather. Unfortunately I have never been able to find my size in their stores. Here they had quite a few. I was attracted to a navy and white design but Diana steered me toward an aqua shirt with purple and white starburst designs that is unlike anything I’ve ever worn. It fit me and I liked it so we bought it. I will certainly be visible when I wear it.
Just in case anyone is not familiar with the batik technique I’ll give a short explanation. They take 100% cotton fabric and draw on it with wax that prevents the absorption of dye in that area. In its simplest form the fabric is one color plus white. After the wax is applied they put the fabric in a vat of dye until the desired color is achieved, they remove it and let it dry and then boil it in water for a long time to set the dye and remove the wax leaving the white areas. In the more complex forms there are multiple colors where they use two kinds of wax one that will melt at lower temperatures so it can be removed while the wax for the white areas remains on the cloth. The washings to fix the dyes and remove the wax are so hot that the material is preshrunk and will not shrink again after it is made into garments.
We returned to the ship about 1PM, time for lunch and transfer my pictures to the computer and write some on this journal. It was a very nice tour and a good day. Saint Lucia is probably the island I would select if I were forced to live in the Caribbean. The people are warm and friendly, everyone speaks English and there is no abject poverty.
We sailed from Castries at about 3PM as we have to make a stop at Soufriere on the southern tip of the island to pick up a tour that spent all day going down there. We’ll stop and lower a tender to go in and get them. Soufriere is where we anchored last time we were here. It’s right next to the islands symbol the Pitons. There are two of them, the Petit Piton and the Gran Piton. They are lava plugs from the long eroded volcanoes that formed this island. Petit Piton is very steep and pointed; it looks like a plug for the caldera of a volcano. Gran Piton is larger and looks more like a regular mountain. They are an impressive sight especially when you remember that these are the lava plugs from the volcanoes. Their cones must have been much taller as these plugs would have been below the bottom of the cone’s caldera. We held station very close to them to wait for the return of the tender.
The evening’s entertainment was Kimika, a British couple that do songs and comedy. Nick plays the guitar and sings, Tina sings, dances and does the comedy. She does tell some jokes but much of her comedy is interactive with the audience. I usually sit at least half way back in the show room, as I don’t really want to get involved with the acts. Tina started into the audience singing to some of the men but then she said that while they were cute she had her eye on someone else and looked straight at me. I had worn my new shirt to dinner and it had caught her eye so I became part of the show. At first she just talked to me, asking my name and where I was from. By the way when I answered ‘Texas’ it got a big response from some people behind me, I guess there are other Texans on board.
After she retreated to the stage and continued with the act I figured my part was over but Nooooooo, as Michael said in the Godfather, “Just about the time you think you’re out, they pull you back in!” Tina and Nick were going to sing a ballad and he sat on as stool for that so Tina pulled a stool out to center stage and tried to get on it. Let’s just say that she’s a height challenged, pleasingly plump lady and couldn’t quite get up on it. (I’m pretty sure she could have but that wouldn’t have been funny) So she says, “Oh Rod, are you still there?” I answered that I was so she asked if I could come down and give her a hand getting on the stool.
I went up on the stage, which took a while because I was in the middle of the row and two-thirds of the way back. When I got there she commented on the shirt again and, after she grabbed my arm, my muscles. She said I smelled good and then asked if I’d been working out all the while wrinkling her nose. This got a lot of laughs. She had me put one hand on the stool and hold her hand with the other. She said on the count of three I should pull her up on the stool and be sure to remove my hand from the stool or I might never see it again. This got a big laugh also. Just before we started she said I should make a wish and when I replied I already had, both she and the audience laughed. I retreated to me seat only to be called back up when she said she needed a dance partner. Unfortunately tomorrow everyone in the show will know my name and give me the business. Oh well, that the price of fame.
We have 6 full days at sea before making landfall in Europe on the Canary Islands, another new stop for us.
March 16 – At Sea. Typical morning at sea except for the fact that everyone is giving me the business about being up on stage last night. A very restful day of reading, writing and goofing off in general.
A new lecturer got on board at St. Lucia, Dick Waller. His subject is music. He was the principal clarinetist with the Cincinnati Orchestra for 34 years. His first topic today was ‘The Wonder of Great Music in Italy’. Here’s where my love of irony kicks in. The featured piece was Bach’s Italian Concerto, which, despite its name, is obviously German. The first version played it as it was written. Then he played it with a jazz interpretation done by Jacques Louisier, who is of course, French. The presentation was very interesting but very little about it was actually Italian.
This evening sunset was on the port side of the ship right out the window at our table. It was a cloudless horizon and I tried to get everyone to watch for the ‘Green Flash’. As the sun sets it goes through the thickest part of the atmosphere because it’s at such an acute angle from the observer. That combined with the fact that gravity bends light waves (photons if you prefer) causes the colors to be eliminated from the light as the sun sets. Just before the sun dips below the horizon it flashes green, the last color to be eliminated. This evening the conditions were perfect, the flash was a deep emerald green
Physics Note: ‘Wait a minute!’ you say, green is not the last color at the short end of the visible spectrum, violet is. You would be correct. The ultimate last flashes are blue and then violet. The problem is that the eye can’t see them. The radiation above what we can see is ultraviolet, below it’s infrared. All the other colors are between red and violet. The order of the ‘pure spectral colors’ is, from longest wavelength to shortest, red, orange, yellow, green, blue and violet. In fact there are no boundaries between the colors and each changes in infinitely small increments until it becomes the next ‘pure’ color. You all know I’m a big fan of irony so here’s an irony of physics. The next color at both ends of the visible spectrum is black and actually that’s very logical and not at all ironic because the emanations outside the visible spectrum are, by definition and in reality, invisible.
The green flash is the last you see because with the blue sky and sea you have on a cloudless sunset mask the blue flash that would come after the green, and the sliver of sun that would still be above the horizon would be so small and the violet color so deep it would appear almost black. Actually if you see a very clear and distinct green flash, just as it fades out it does appear black.
This evening’s entertainment was ‘Mysteriaque’. It’s a husband and wife dance couple that has combined Adage dancing with magic. Adage dancing is a combination of acrobatics and dance, lots of lifts and very complex positions with flashy transitions. The dancing was great, the magic was average but the show was very entertaining. They met at the Moulin Rouge in Paris and after teaming up in Adage dancing were the featured dancers at the Lido de Paris. They’ve competed all over the world and made it to the finals three times in 2002 before hanging up their professional shoes and becoming performers.
March 17 – At Sea. The ship has decided to account for time changes by setting the clocks ahead at Noon. Since we’re out in the middle of nowhere and have four time changes in 6 days they figured who will know when we changed our clocks. So when the noon whistle sounds today it will automatically become 1PM. This is great!! Now I can start walking my laps at one minute to Noon and get my hour of walking in by 1PM. I’m pretty sure that the hour will go by like it was seconds, one to be exact. But I can say I walked from 11:59AM to 1PM with a straight face. Well, almost a straight face.
My typical morning today, breakfast, Tai Chi, chat time and lunch. It’s formal night in honor of St. Patrick. We’re having the green and white ball after the show. I have an Edinburgh tartan tie that is mostly green and white to wear with my dinner jacket so I’m set for the theme this evening. We did ‘spring forward’ at noon, the system I prefer, rather than have the time change at 2AM. We’ve got three more of those before we arrive in the Canaries.
This evening’s entertainer was Mike Goddard. He’s a half Irish, half Scottish comedian. As he says his heritage makes him want to drink, he just doesn’t want to pay for it. We’ve seen him before and he’s very funny.
After the show they held the St. Patrick’s Day Green and White Ball. They’re always fun. They have drawings for prizes and other give-aways. Diana and I usually dance two or three times during the evening. The first dance is for the Captain and Hostess. Part way into the dance they have the officers get partners and join them. Debbie, the Administrative Assistant Cruise Director, asked me to dance. We’ve sailed with her at least three times and she’s pretty much fun. She was a truck driver in the Canadian Army and has lots of stories to tell.
The ball ended about 11PM and it was back to the room to rest up for another hard day at sea tomorrow. The weather has been nice and the seas fairly smooth, just a little swell to rock you to sleep.
March 18 – At Sea. Another typical sea morning. However the afternoon was quite different. First of all we ‘Swam the Atlantic Ocean’. What that means is that about 30 of us jumped into the lido pool and had our picture taken. Tom Faulkner, the cruise director, and Danielle and Lena of his staff jumped in with us. Tom was dressed in his tuxedo, except for his black walking shorts. It made quite an odd sight to see him in tux, vest and bow tie bobbing around in the pool. The only reason I do these ‘Swimming’ events is that if I didn’t I’d never get into the pool.
Update on the Veranda situation. We’ve been on the ship a full week and I haven’t spent 2 minutes on the veranda. I did go out when we got on just to see if I could open the door. Diana hasn’t been out there at all. She did open the door today and stick her head out to see what the temperature was. I’ll keep you posted on progress on that front.
We had a reunion of the 2007 South America & Antarctica cruisers in the Crow’s Nest. We all regaled each other with stories of the ‘Big Wave’ and some of the other mishaps on that cruise. It was fun to talk to some of them again. It was one of those ‘Where were you when…’ moments.
The ship has a trio playing in the Explorer’s Lounge from 7:15pm to 8:30pm and then again later after the shows are over. It’s piano, violin and bass. They are very good and we’ve started spending time there after dinner and before the show.
Our entertainer was Jane Hunt, a British violinist who now lives in New York. She’s only been performing on ships for two months and this is here first Atlantic crossing. I’ve been seeing her around the ship but she’s so young I thought she was the girl friend on one of the officers. She was very good and played a variety of music from Irish to classical.
March 19 – At Sea. Again with the breakfast, Tai Chi and chat time, a guy could get into a rut with this many sea days. Don’t misunderstand; it’s a great rut, but a rut nonetheless.
We lost another hour today but it’s painless as they just change from Noon to 1PM. Unfortunately one couple at the table next to us came to dinner an hour late. When they saw that everyone had eaten already they discovered that they didn’t change their clocks. I guess they didn’t participate in any of the afternoon activities or they would have discovered their error earlier. Even on vacation you have to pay minimal attention to your surroundings. They went up to the Lido for dinner.
This afternoon Mike Goddard, the comedian who lives in Spain, gave a talk on the bullfights. The Spanish don’t consider the activity a sport; it’s a performance like a Shakespearian tragedy. It’s reported in the theater pages of the newspapers and the people are considered actors not athletes. It was an interesting talk.
This evening’s entertainer was Paul Emmanuel. He sings Nat King Cole’s songs in Nat’s style. We’ve seen him at least twice before. His shows are very good. I love that style of music, That’s Incredible, Ramblin’ Rose, Too Young, all great melodies and great lyrics.
Tomorrow we lose another hour at noon and also the day after.
March 20 – At Sea. Once again, a typical day at sea. Our entertainment was a variety show featuring the Mysteriaque adagio dancers and Mike Goddard the British comedian. They were very good for the second time.
March 21 – At Sea. One more time, a typical day at sea. Our entertainer was Amy Abler a pianist. Hers is a high-energy show, for example she played ‘Great Balls of Fire’ in the true Jerry Lee Lewis fashion. She played sitting down, standing up, behind her back, laying on the floor reaching up to the keys, she hit the keys with her fingers, toes, forehead, chest and butt. About the only thing she didn’t do was play standing on her head. It was a lively show and a lot of fun.
March 22 – Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Canary Islands, Spain. At last, terra firma!! The crossing was very smooth but after 6 days I’m ready to get ashore. We’ve never been to the Canary Islands before but I know quiet a bit about them, as there have been several documentaries and specials on the area. I can’t remember when I learned this but it was a long time ago. The islands are named for dogs not birds. When the first explorers reached these islands wild dogs, Canes in Latin, populated them. This led to the name Canary Islands, in Spanish ‘Islas Canarias’.
Tenerife is the largest of the seven-island group. It’s about 800 square miles but can lay claim to the highest mountain in Spain, Mount Tiede (Tie’-da). At 12,950 feet it’s an impressive peak, especially in a place so small. It’s a dormant volcano and the residents of the East Coast of the USA better hope it stays that way. Apparently the western slope of the mountain is very unstable and if it every blows again that whole area will fall into the sea. One of the specials I saw on these islands postulated that the tsunami created by that event would wash over almost 40% of Florida and hit all along the East Coast and it would only take 5 hours for it to get there. Double yikes!! Our tour is headed to that area.
We sailed in right on time. The cloud cover is heavy but the temperature is not bad. As we drove out of the port the windshield was collecting some mist. We drove past the new airport, built after that 1070s collision between two 747s on the runways at the old airport. We drove though the city of Santa Cruz past the Sunday market and out of town. We are going to get to almost 7,000 feet on our tour to see Tiede. As we drove up we entered what is essentially a rain forest. This area is often cloud covered and wet in addition to the rain they get. As we climbed higher we entered a pine forest that was much drier but still cloudy. We finally drove out of the clouds at about 3,500 feet and were shortly in the moonscape that volcanic activity can produce. It was like looking down from an aircraft. The peaks of the mountains were above the clouds and looked like islands in a white ocean, quiet a spectacular sight. In the distance we could see Tiede and it still has some snow at its peak.
Part way up the mountain we stopped at an overlook for some pictures of Mount Tiede with is ocean of clouds lapping at its base. It was hard to appreciate the size of the mountain because the first 4,000 feet was below the clouds. Nevertheless, it still looked large. It has the classic conical shape of a volcano but it has a peak where the caldera should be. They estimate that it hasn’t had an eruption in about 100,000 years.
We stopped again at a place where we could see the rock strata layers up close. The variety of colors was amazing, from white to black. I’d never actually seen a white rock stratum before, especially not mixed in with the darker colors. From this vantage point we could also see the Atmospheric Observatory that takes advantage of the altitude and the clear air here. There are both radio and image telescopes at the site.
Just before entering the lava fields we stopped for a refreshment break (read that as restroom break, it just sounds so much better.) Eric, our guide in Eastern Europe last year, called them ‘Smile Stops’. As we entered the café a young lady was offering us a treat. I selected a chocolate and cocoa covered almond. Wow, it was wonderful. I immediately looked at the selection she had for sale and bought a 50/50 mix of chocolate and yogurt almonds. Maybe some of them will make it home. By the way, did I tell you I have a wonderful orange bridge I can sell you cheap up in the Bay Area.
As we drove across the plateau to the mountains east side it became apparent that we were driving across a huge caldera of a previous volcano. Our guide, Francis, told us that the caldera is 11 miles across. Man when that thing blew it must have made some noise. Geologists say it happened 1 million years ago. The area has all types of lava. Large fields of red ah-ah, broken lava flows in Hawaiian. That stuff is murder on your shoes as the broken pieces have hundreds of very sharp edges on them. There are also large areas of obsidian that black glass-like mineral that ancient peoples used to use as knives because the edges were so sharp. There are yellow, pink and lavender lava fields as well. The area has a very Mars or lunar like look. Parts of the movie 1 Million Years BC were filmed here.
They also have some unique plants here. Most seem to be a variety of succulent. There’s a plant that is very reminiscent of the Silver Sword plant found only in Hawaii, but this one blooms red.
There are Ferraris, Lamborghinis and Mazarattis in abundance on the road here. Our guide says there is some sort of convention going on for the new lines of Italian sports cars and all the new models are here to be tested on the winding roads and to be photographed. I love the sound of their engines as they pass the bus.
At the base of Mount Tiede and extending to the east there’s a dragon’s back of rock formations jutting of the somewhat smooth ground. Some of these look like animals. There’s a lazy camel and a bear on his hind legs. They make a spectacular foreground for viewing the mountain. The air is clear and thin.
Soon we were headed back down into the clouds to the coast to the city of Puerto de la Cruz for lunch and some shopping. The lunch was great. They had paella with chicken, shrimp, mussels, calamari and sausage, hake (a white fish with a firm texture and mild flavor), spaghetti, beef stew, Canary Potatoes (Small with a very thin tan skin that is eaten. They have a very creamy texture when you eat them, almost like you’ve put butter on them.), fresh fruit, all sorts of vegetables, home made ice cream, chocolate mousse, a very unusual apricot cake and of course olives of several varieties. This list is by no means exhaustive and everything was great. When I first saw the hake I thought it was fried pineapple slices. I’ve never had fish doughnuts before.
We did some shopping. Diana lost here binoculars at our first port and I found a very nice Olympus compact set for a reasonable price. Of course I had to get my Fridgie. It’s a little bird. (Canary Islands, yes I know, that even hurt me.)
After the lunch and shopping we went to a small but very unique botanical garden. The point of the garden is to prove that anything can and will grow in the coastal climate of Tenerife. All the plants had signs on them and on some I could actually read the Spanish. Needless to say there were lots and lots of very beautiful plants. Unfortunately one of the prettiest and most unusual plants they had was not labeled. Must be very common here. I saw several examples of it and none of them was labeled. The flowers grow about 20 to a single stalk and a branch may have several stalks. Closed they are football shaped and white with a violet tip. Open they look like a cross between a foxglove and the center of an orchid, and the inside is yellow with an orange feather like patch going up the long side if it were a foxglove. Only three or four of the 20 open seemed to be open at a time and they whither before the next ones are fully open.
After the gardens it was a very pleasant ride back to the ship just in time to get ready for dinner.
Our entertainment for the evening was another variety show. This time Ian Finkel, the xylophone player and Jane Hunt the young violinist. Ian was on first and did his usual high energy show. He’s a large man, my shape but much taller but he can’t stand still while he’s playing. He flows back and forth, jumping up and down. It’s fun just to watch him. After his part Jane Hunts fastest pieces seemed very sedate. Fortunately she excellent and her Irish pieces were pretty peppy. Then something very unusual happened. For her last piece Jan brought Ian back out after explaining that he had arranged a piece for the two of them to play together. It turned out to be ‘Sweet Georgia Brown’ and, since Ian arranged it, it was smokin’. He started off with a solo and then Jane did part of is solo and then they played that last part together. Ian was as he always is, but the change in Jane was dramatic. She looked more like a Rock and Roll guitar player than a violinist. She was moving around and rocking back and forth. It was great and it brought the audience to their feet for the final ovation. A very enjoyable show. Tomorrow we’re in port again so we decided to hit the hay early, at 11PM that is.
March 23 – Arrecife, Lanzarote, Canary Islands, Spain. Another long tour today, over 8 hours. The island is only 75 miles off the coast of Africa about where Morocco and Western Sahara meet. It’s only327 square miles and we’re going to see most of it. While they were known to the Phoenicians and Carthaginians, the first settlers were Roman. The Roman scholar Pliny described the islands as having large numbers of dogs. Leading to the name.
The contrast between Tenerife and Lanzarote are striking. Tenerife has Mount Teide to create weather as the Ocean of Clouds form as the result of the air currents around the mountain. This is the phenomenon that creates the rain in the lowlands and valleys, which makes the rain forest possible. The northern part of the island does not get this benefit and is arid volcanic moonscape as the result.
Lanzarote does not have a tall mountain to form these clouds and the resultant weather so the entire island is arid volcanic moonscape. Most yards are covered in the black volcanic sand that the island’s beaches are covered with. (Tenerife did have one white sand beach however that sand was shipped in from Morocco.) This arid landscape is amazing in that they do grow grapes here and make wine. They also grow some crops in their highly organized fields. What they do is they dig down to the good soil and then put in the plants. Then they cover the entire field in black lava sand. This sand is very porous and it absorbs the humidity from the cooler night air and retains it during the day to water the plants. This is supplemented by a drip irrigation system when needed. The also build wind blocks on the north side of almost every row of their gardens and in vineyards they build a semi circular wall on the north, east and west sides of each vine. Each vine is also recessed into an inverse cone of the black volcanic rock to provide further wind protection and water retention.
Most of the houses are white with green widows, doors and shutters. This results from the influence of Cesar Manrique. He was trained as an architect but became an sculptor and painter as well. He was born in Lanzarote but left here to study in Spain in 1945. When he returned to the island in 1968 he was upset with the changes he saw toward commercialism and started a campaign to have the island remain in a more natural state. Through is efforts 90% the island was proclaimed a World Biosphere Reserve. They limit the height of any new construction to 4 levels in the larger cities and two levels in the villages. They have a yearly limit of 80,000 tourists, which is about equal to the islands population. He developed an architectural style that retained many of the traditional features of Lanzarotian style and suggested the white with green color scheme. It is not mandatory and some people don’t follow it but most do. He also created sculptures that are actually large mobiles. These are dotted around the island. Many of them are in the center of traffic circles. He also created a huge cactus sculpture that has become the logo for a cactus garden located here.
We drove across the volcanic landscape to the Timanfaya National Park. Just before we entered the park proper we stopped at the Paseo en Dromedario. Here we are going to venture out into the volcanoes on camelback. When we pulled in the parking lot there was an impressive array of camels sitting in long rows. They are tied together in strings of 6 camels and, unlike Northern Africa, here you ride in tandem seated in chairs on either side of the camel’s hump. Since Diana and I were pared up they had to tie a bag of rocks on Diana’s side to equal out the weight. We rode for about a half an hour up a small valley to the crater of a small cinder cone, around the cone and back down to the valley. Everyone seemed to have a good time. Diana and I certainly did. Our camel kept trying to bite the saddle’s leather straps on the camel in front of us when we slowed down or stopped. It was like he was trying to help his buddy escape. For safety reasons all the camels have muzzles so he really didn’t have any luck.
From here we entered the National Park. The park’s logo is a devil with a pitchfork raised over his head in both hands, horns and a pointed tail. We drove through fields of a’a, gummy-gummy and pillow lava to get to the El Diablo Restaurant. This building was designed by Cesar Manrique. It’s made from natural volcanic rock, granite and metal. No wood was used as the building is atop an active vent from the magma below. The restaurant’s oven is actually a large, beehive shaped room attached to the back of the hotel. You can walk into it and around the actual cooking surface. In the center of the room is a large 3-foot tall, circular basalt stone block wall. There’s a metal grate across the top of this wall and food is baked by setting it on the grate. You can stand very close to this wall and it doesn’t seem that warm but if you extend your hand over the grate it is very hot indeed probably over 300 degrees F.
We gathered outside and stood on an area of red volcanic pebbles. A man from the restaurant had us stand in a semicircle while he scraped off about 3 inches of pebbles from about a square foot of the surface. He then dug the shovel in and picked up some of the pebbles. He carried them in the shovel and had us hold our hands out to take a few of them. The first lady to get them jumped back, dropped the pebbles and said, ‘Yow!!” After that everyone took them carefully and began to sift them from hand to hand to avoid the heat. They were hot indeed. I’d estimate about 150 degrees. Just to show you how conditioned I am, my first thought was that they wouldn’t be allowed to do this demonstration in the USA. A shame really as it was fun to watch the reactions.
Next we moved to a natural air vent from the magma below. It was about 4-5 feet across and there was a large pile of old weeds beside it. When we gathered the same man took a fork and put about two bushels of weeds into the vent. It took about 15 seconds for the weeds to catch fire and create a large blaze. After that we moved to a pipe about 6 inches in diameter that had been put in the ground. He had a bucket of water that he poured into the pipe just before he ran about 8 feet away. The resulting geyser was very impressive as I expected but I was not prepared for the noise it made. I sounded a lot like a mortar being fired…WHOMP! Very impressive.
The restaurants rest rooms were impressive. The floors were natural stone as were the walls. The doors on the commodes were steel and had huge bolts to keep them closed. The most unique feature was the light sconces. They were steel frying pans set high on the walls with the bulbs inside so the light was all reflected towards the ceiling. The walls were whitewashed and the indirect lighting made shadows almost nonexistent.
The park is all about volcanoes. We’re going to take our tour bus around the Ruta de los Volcanes, a narrow winding road through the park. It’s a very interesting landscape with many colors in the rocks and lava; reds, yellows, grays, black and green predominate. They have shield, composite and cinder cone volcanoes. I didn’t see any splatter cones but there may be some around. Shield volcanoes are formed when the molten magma is extruded slowly as lava and as it cools one layer builds on the next to form the volcano. Sometimes a portion of the lava will cool on top while the center remains molten and as the center pours out it forms a lava tube. When the roofs of these tubes collapse and leave the tube open to the surface they call them Jameos (Remember the J is pronounced as an H, this is Spain). Magma that solidifies in the main vertical tube and forms a plug is often ejected under pressure and throws chunks of hardened lava for great distances. Creatively they call these chunks ‘bombs’. Shield volcanoes are huge. They are broad with gently sloping sides. Mauna Loa and Kilauea in Hawaii are good examples. When they erupt they generally extrude slow moving lava that causes damage but not much loss of life because it moves so slow and they don’t usually explode. They are usually found around tectonic plates.
Gas vents usually form cinder cones. It starts out as a hole in the ground venting superheated air. Over time chunks of lava honeycombed with holes pile up around the hole and form a cone shaped heap. Since no magma is involved the entire structure is like a pile of rocks but because the cinders are so irregularly shaped they have a cohesiveness that allows them to survive wind and rain and maintain their shape. The hills we climbed on the camels earlier today were large cinder cone volcanoes. At their largest, they are still very small compared to magma volcanoes. They are often found in groups on the sides of other volcanoes or near their base. They rarely get taller than 800 feet.
Alternating these two processes forms composite volcanoes. Sometimes the volcano has a lava flow and sometimes it ejects cinders. These alternating layers are why they are called ‘composite’. These are the ones that usually erupt explosively yet between eruptions they are so quiet that they may seem extinct, much like Mount Saint Helens. They are usually large, impressive, snow-capped mountains.
As we drove around the park we stopped at various places while we heard an explanation of the history of that particular area and some details about the processes involve.
There are several indigenous plant, bird and insect species here. The only one I saw for sure was the Timanfaya Plant, which grows on the sides of the volcanoes. It’s a small shrub with very low-key pale yellow flowers. At least the one I saw was.
From the park we drove to the ocean’s edge. Here the coastline varied from craggy lava to lava sand beaches. We stopped at Los Hervideros, a natural lava bridge created by the action of the waves. The surge was making impressive waves as it crashed under the bridge. Just a little further up the coast we came to a salt production area called Salinas del Janubio. Here they have a set of evaporative ponds that they fill using very old windmill pumps. The first ponds are very large. After the water reaches a certain salinity they move it to smaller ponds and then to even smaller ponds where the evaporation process is completed and the salt collected. There were some pretty impressive piles of salt at the edge of the smaller ponds near the ocean.
In the town of La Geria we stopped at a bodega for a small taste of the Canarian wines. There were two choices, white dry or red sweet. The servings were small so we got one of each. As it turned out Diana liked the red sweet, it was almost like a medium Madeira, and I liked them both. The white was medium dry with a chardonnay-like flavor.
All around the bodega building were fields of vines. This bodega uses the semicircular walls, one for each vine. In another area they were growing some corn and onions, here they used the long straight walls to guard the rows of vegetables.
Next we drove to the city of Mancha Blanca for lunch. We ate at a little restaurant right across the street from a small church. The lunch was great! They had paella, Canary potatoes, chicken, a meatball stew, cabbage salad, mixed vegetables and white rice with peas. The also had apples for desert and crusty rolls that were very good. As usual I pretty much inhaled my lunch because I wanted some time to walk around the village to take pictures.
The small church across the street is actually a shrine, the Nuestra Senora de los Dolores. Inside on the main altar is a large statue of Mary called Our Lady of the Volcanoes. Folklore has it that when the area was threatened by lava from one of the volcanoes the local people prayed to her for protection and the lava did not come to the city but turned away toward the ocean. If you look closely at the statue it has tears on its cheeks.
The small shrine has a much more impressive interior than I expected. The altar and the retable are very nicely done. At it’s top the retable has a small silver cloud with 4 angel’s faces peering out. Above that is a plaque with a cross flanked by two hearts. One is wearing a crown of thorns and obviously represents the Sacred Heart of Christ. The other has a garland of flowers and is pierced through vertically by a sword. Were it not for the sword I would have thought this was Mary and it probably is although I’m not sure I understand the significance of the sword. I’m sure there’s a Roman Catholic tradition that would explain this. Anyone know? The exterior of the shrine is the typical Iberian whitewashed stone church with black basalt block accents.
Leaving Mancha Blanca we passed through the town of Guitaza where everyone’s yard is filled with cactus. Nearby is a Manrique designed giant cactus that marks the entrance to the Cactus Garden. We’re headed to the Jameos del Ague. Remember that a Jameos is a lava tube with the ceiling collapsed. This Jameos is located right next to the sea at the end of the 11-mile lava tube formed by the main volcano in the national park. Further inland there’s a 2-kilometer stretch of the lava tube that has been developed so you can walk through it and an auditorium that seats 1,000 has been developed in one of the rooms. At Jameos del Ague the top of the tube caved in at two places about 30 yards apart. You go down in one Jameo walk through the tube and up the other one. There’s a hotel and restaurant atop the area and a small but interesting Volcano Museum in the hotel.
We descended into the tube through the ocean side Jameo. They’ve installed very nice stairs for that purpose. Half way down there’s a patio with a small café where you can enjoy a snack or coffee while looking down into the tube. At the base the tube is filled with water and is home to a very small (about ½ to ¾ inch), blind, albino crab that usually only lives at great depths in the ocean. At some point during the life of the volcano these crabs were transplanted here and the habitat was sufficient to maintain them. They stand out dramatically against the black basalt bottom of the lava tube. They look like stars in the night sky. After walking through the tube and admiring the crabs you ascend to the surface through the inland Jameo. At the top of this one there’s a swimming pool, small garden and patio area. Across the pool is the hotels auditorium that is inside another closed section of the lava tube. It has impressive acoustics. The landscaping around the hotel and the pool area is very impressive. They had an unusual peach colored hibiscus that was very pretty in addition to the more common varieties and lots of cactus.
From here we drove through the village of Haria, the last home of Cesar Manrique and up the side of the tallest mountain on the island, Montana los Blancos. At the top was a little coffee shop with some impressive looking pastries. Diana and I got a large cookie that was a combination of a Pecan Sandie and Scot’s shortbread. It was very good. From here you could see the village of Haria, the surrounding volcanoes and the ocean. It was an impressive sight.
After our snack it was a very pleasant drive back to the ship. We arrived at about 4:30PM and since they’re having a BBQ on the Lido deck outdoors tonight Diana decided to do some laundry. We are washing our own sheets in nonallergenic soap so we headed up to the Laundromat and it was empty. We did two loads of wash and were at the BBQ by 6:30PM. It was very good. They had ribs, paella, salmon, steaks, corn-on-the-cob, salads, shish kabobs and baked potatoes. I like the outdoor BBQs every once in a while.
Tonight’s entertainment was a local folkloric show, the Agrupicion Floklorica Los Campesinos. I think that means the Country folk Folkloric Group. They were dressed in traditional agricultural workers clothing. There were eight dancers and the band was large. It had strings, mandolins and at least three types of guitars and some drums. There were two singers that accompanied the dancers on most of the songs. The men dancers work black fedora style hats, white short-sleeved shirts and medium blue pants. The ladies wore colorful ankle length, full skirts with long sleeve shirts, a scarf over their heads and a wide brim straw hat atop that. All the dancing was done barefoot. On some dances they carried farm implements and in one three couples danced holding a large hockey puck shaped basked over their heads.
The music was very nice and the singing was almost like flamenco singers on some songs and crooners on others. The show was very enjoyable.
A day at sea tomorrow to catch up.
March 24 – At Sea. Normal day at sea, breakfast, Tai Chi and chat time. They have a watch made from materials salvaged from the Titanic. The bezel is made from rusted iron from the hull that has been treated to make it stable. There are four grades of iron, each progressively more pitted and more expensive. The watch they have on the ship is grade III, mildly pitted brown rusted iron and it’s $13,800. I don’t know what a grade IV would cost but I saw a picture of it in the catalogue. The iron bezel is very pitted. The face of the watches is black and it’s made from coal salvaged from the Titanic as well. It does have a 23 jewel Swiss movement and it’s very large and heavy. I don’t think it’s made to be worn. With the 100th anniversary of the sinking coming up in 2012 (they’re limiting production of all four grades to a total of 2012 units) you may find that in 3 years it may increase in value for a short time. Hard to say.
Our entertainment was the British couple that got me on stage last time they appeared. They sang some Oldies and he played the guitar licks while they sang Hotel California. It was another high-energy show. Very enjoyable.
March 25 – Gibraltar, British Territory. It’s much cooler than two days ago in the Canaries. As we docked I noticed a tanker ship circling in the middle of the bay. Just after we docked it pulled alongside right out my window. Apparently we’re taking on some fuel here.
We have a short tour this afternoon but are free this morning. We’re only about a mile from downtown so we decided to walk into town for a look around. We walked right into town through the Great Casemate through the Water Gate into Great Casemate Square. When we were here last May we had the best fish and chips here. There’s a ‘Turf Accountant’s’ shop on the square (That’s British for Horse Racing Bookie), as well as a Burger King and Pizza Hut. There are several very European cafes but the place to eat for my money is Roy’s Cod a wonderfully British fish and chips shop.
We walked down Main Street. It’s lined with all sorts of shops and is a pedestrian only street now. There are two churches on the street, both cathedrals. The Roman Catholic Cathedral of Saint Mary the Crowned and the Anglican Cathedral of the Holy Trinity. Saint Mary’s is built on the site of a former mosque but Holy Trinity is in a building that was previously a mosque. They made great use of the typically Moorish main door behind the high altar. The closed in the bottom which is hidden by the altar’s retable but the top of the door, the rounded section, is now a stained glass window showing Christ in the clouds being worshiped by angels above and humans below.
The interior of the church has three naves divided by rows of columns with Moorish arches connecting them, a remnant from the previous tenants. All the doors and windows are also Moorish style and the building is unique in the world of cathedrals in that it has neither a spire nor a bell tower. Over the side door there’s a large model of an old sailing ship in the unused curved upper portion of the old Moorish door.
Saint Mary’s is more traditional as it was rebuilt as a proper church. It has a bell tower and an open three-nave sanctuary. The high altar is made of beautiful Italian marble that was headed to South America. The ship carrying it sank off Gibraltar and it was salvaged and donated to the cathedral.
At the end of the shipping portion of Main Street is the Gibraltar High Court. When the Mary Celeste was found abandoned off the coast the inquest to determine what might have happened to the crew was held here. Also many famous people have been married here, John Lennon and Yoko Ono, Roger Moore, Sean Connery (twice) among others.
As we retraced our path down Main Street we found the ship’s hostess, Lucy, sitting on one of the benches with a hoard of newly purchased Easter candy. Apparently she loves both chocolate and Easter. Then we headed to Casemate Square to catch the shuttle back to the ship. That was not such a good idea as we discovered the shuttle was not running. We have a tour this afternoon so we walked back to the ship. When we were almost there it started raining, fortunately not heavily.
When we got to the ship our busses were already there so we used the ‘smile’ room and got aboard the bus. First we will be taking a drive around ‘The Rock’ and then going to a hotel on the western side for tea. The ride around was very pleasant. We stopped at Europa Point for a photo op. Last time we were here you could easily see Africa but this time the haze and low clouds didn’t allow that. The point is still a pretty place with the lighthouse and mosque. We did pass the US Embassy (McDonald’s) on the waterfront road. We came back on the higher road and then around to the other side of the rock to the hotel.
The tea was very nice. They had the usual egg salad and cucumber sandwiches, as well as cakes and large, delicious currant scones. They also had clotted cream (I know it doesn’t sound good but think of a very soft and creamy Philadelphia style cream cheese, strawberry preserves and butter. A very cultured time was had by all. These events are especially appropriate for Diana as the derogatory name for her Alma Mater, University of Texas, Austin, is ‘The Tea Sippers’. When you say that you have to hold your hand as though your holding a tea cup daintily with two fingers with the third supporting them and the pinky sticking straight out. As you say “Tea Sipper” you twist your hand at the wrist so the pinky swings straight up while making a snooty face. People from Texas A & M are almost coordinated to pull this off. (I figured I was taking a shot at UT so I should give equal time to the Aggies. Diana’s dad was an Aggie and he told me all the Aggie jokes I know. If you’re not sure what an Aggie joke is just substitute the term Aggie for the words Italian or Polish in any ethnic joke you’ve ever heard and you’ve got it. The first one he ever told me was:
How do you get a one-armed Aggie down from a telephone pole?
You wave at him!
Yes, that’s about it.
As we sailed out of port we had a commentary by our port lecturer, Frank Buckingham. The captain sailed out of port and then around to the western side of the rock, made a U turn so the other side of the ship could see it and then proceeded to sail to Cartagena, Spain, tomorrow’s port.
March 26 – Cartagena, Spain. It’s an interesting port here in Cartagena. The seawall requires the ship to make and ‘S’ turn to get into the harbor. The sea walls extending from either side of the port overlap because the natural harbor faces a direction from which waves often come. If there were a gap in the wall facing that way the waves would get into the marina. Consequently they are long enough to overlap about a hundred yards so the waves are not able to enter because they can’t turn corners. To get in the ship has to first turn to port and then to starboard. Once inside the harbor it must be very shallow as we were churning up mud with our props.
We’re on a tour out of town about an hour to the city of Lorca. This little known city was a critical factor in the defense of parts of Spain from the Moors. The local Marquise defended the territory from his hilltop fortress, the Fortaleza del Sol (Fortress of the sun) and established the frontier between Moorish Spain and Christian Spain at the edge of his property.
Our first stop in Lorca is at the Fortress. It’s high on a hill overlooking the entire valley. There was no sneaking up on this place. After walking up the hill from the bus we entered the fortress about in the middle and found our selves in the Middle Ages (aka Medieval Times). We were given audio sticks that play guided explanations of the site based on numbered signs posted at the various features. The first object we passed was a reproduction of a siege weapon built from plans drawn by Alfonso X, also called ‘The Wise”. It’s commonly called a catapult but technically it’s a trebuchet. The difference being that a trebuchet is powered by a weighted basket suspended below the opposite end of the pole from the bag with the item to be launched (ex. a diseased cow, to spread a illness, a container of Greek fire, or just heavy objects to damage the defensive walls.) is suspended. A prop, which was placed under the basket, is removed and the weight of the basket and its contents whips the pole downward, lifting the other end and launching its load toward the enemy. It’s just here as an example because this fort’s walls are so high up the side of the hill that no weapon of that time could throw anything high enough to endanger them. It would have been useless against this place. But it could be used as an offensive weapon to throw things down on any massed troops foolish enough to try to overrun the place. The height of the launch point would increase its range tremendously.
Our first stop was on the extreme north end of the fortress at the Espolon Tower. This tower faced the Moorish territory and was critical in keeping an eye on them. It’s fairly tall, I’d guess 30 feet and is placed on the narrowest and highest part of the hill giving it a 300-degree view of the surroundings. Inside was a model of the mountain and the fort to give you some idea of the place in its entirety. The mountain is not quite a mesa but the top portion has a relatively gentle slope. The fortress wall was built right where the gentle slope of the top becomes an extreme slope and in most of the perimeter essentially a cliff. So to get over the wall first you had to climb the cliff. This would be most difficult, especially carrying medieval weapons, not noted for their light weight and compact size. The top of the mountain is shaped somewhat like a canoe. Narrow and point at each end and then gradually getting wider toward the middle. The towers at both ends and in the middle allowed for overlapping zones of view that gave the occupants a commanding view of everything for miles.
We walked along the inside of the walls to the flattest area in the wide center of the fort. Along one side were the old stone stables so it’s pretty certain that this area was used as parade ground and exercise area for men and horses. At one end is an area set aside for games and demonstrations. There’s a huge sword sticking out of the ground at a 45-degree angle. Closer inspection disclosed that this is a giant sundial. At the top of the southern wall of the area is a very nice garden with flowers and shrubs. We headed to the western wall and through a gate to stroll back down the hill to the exit and then rode into Lorca proper.
Holy Week is a big thing here and the town spends a lot of time getting ready for it. The residents all belong to a ‘club’, called a paso, based on their heritage. If their parents are members of different clubs they get to pick the one they want when they get older. The clubs are known by colors, white, blue, red, green and black. The blue and white clubs are the largest. During Holy Week they have daily processions put on by the various clubs, sort of like Carnival in Rio but the clubs parade on separate days and it’s the week before Easter not the day before lent.
Each paso has a church and a museum for its regalia. They are called embroidery museums but that’s a very misleading term. The museums house the floats, carried by men, and the costumes they wear for their procession. The costumes are hand embroidered in short stitch style giving rise to the museum’s name. We are going to visit the Paso Blanco or the White Club.
The building looks very plain on the outside and to be honest I was not all that charged up about visiting an embroidery museum, that is until I walked inside. The costumes are gorgeous. It was difficult to believe that the scenes and decorations were sewn. They looked more like a painting or a printing process because the stitches are so fine. The Whites have two main floats, one in silver that represents a castle and one in gold that carries a statue of Saint John the Evangelist. The castle float is ornately worked with every square inch covered by designs and figures. In each corner there’s a Gothic tower with an angel standing inside. The gold float is likewise decorated but has one small panel on each side depicting a scene from Holy Week. On the side I could see it was Christ carrying his cross to Calvary.
The processions have a very international flavor as they portray most cultural aspects of the New Testament. The Paso Blanco starts their procession with Rome. The embroidered robes depict the Roman Eagle, Apollo, Mercury and Marcus Aurelieus. The robes are worn by charioteers driving chariots with as many as six horses across pulling them.
On the robes that follow Israel, Babylon and King Nebuchadnezzar, Esther and Ahasuerus representing Persia, King David, King Solomon and his temple, idolatry entering Israel, Capes representing all 12 tribes of Israel, King Rehoboam whose foolish actions split the kingdom with Rehoboam keeping the Southern Kingdom of Judah, King Jeroboam who became King of the Northern Kingdom of Israel after the split and images from the Revelation to St. John.
After that come the hand carried floats, each supported by 80 men. The first is Christ the Savior, then St. John the Evangelist (The patron saint of Paso Blanco), then Saint Veronica (her image rides on the silver castle float), then Christ praying in the garden and finally the Virgin Mary. Her float is accompanied by four men wearing robes decorated in four architectural styles, Romantic, Gothic, Baroque and Mudejar (Moorish). Each has a scene Christ’s life during Holy Week.
The embroidery is fantastic. It’s very difficult to see the stitches. The colors are dramatic and most of the images are identifiable. I’m glad we stopped to see this ‘Museum of Embroidery’ because it reinforces the idea that you can’t really tell what something is until you see it for yourself.
From the Paso Blanco house we walked a short distance to Saint Patrick’s Cathedral. I thought we’d made a wrong turn in Albuquerque but no it’s in Lorca, Spain. The city was apparently founded on Saint Patrick’s Day and the church is named in honor of that event. On Saint Patrick’s Day they fly the Irish flag by the church. It was closed for Holy Week preparations so we couldn’t go in. The exterior seem to be Early Gothic in style, not as ornate as it would become later but still having a lot of statues on the fairly plain columned front façade.
On returning to the port we saw the monument to the first submarine capable of firing a torpedo through an internal tube. It was a very small boat that came to a point in front the tip of which was the one torpedo tube.
I stayed up on deck to check out the maneuvering to get out through the overlapping sea walls. It was no problem.
March 27 – Barcelona, Spain, Day 1. We’ve been to Barcelona before and like it very well. This time we’re going to go on a tour that emphasizes the work of Antoni Gaudi. His style is unique but is generally classified as Art Nouveau. I’d never call it that but then it’s not my call.
Phoenicians founded Barcelona and, because of it’s strategic location remained a fortified city until the 1800s. In fact it did not expand beyond its medieval walls until the last century. This part of Spain is Catalonia. They have their own culture and language and supported the Republican side in the Spanish civil war. When the Fascists came to power, especially during the government of Francisco Franco they were not allowed to teach or speak Catalan for 35 years; probably as punishment for supporting the wrong side. When the monarchy returned and Juan Carlos became king he began to mend the fences between Spain and Catalonia. When Barcelona held the Olympics you may remember that he did the opening speech in Catalan after which the locals broke into a wild ovation and cheers. Since that time they may not be that happy with Spain but they love Juan Carlos. Catalan is spoken and taught again and the wounds of the past seem to be healing nicely.
Today our tour is centered on the unusual life and work of Antoni Gaudi. He was born in 1852 in Tarragona, Spain and moved to Barcelona in 1868 to study architecture. After a stint in the Army he graduates in 1862 and the story begins. Gaudi is Barcelona’s Frank Lloyd Wright. His work is so unique that it has never been successfully copied and did not give rise to a style. Some have tired; all have failed. The closest thing I’ve seen to his style is the work done in Portmerion, Wales the hotel complex that was used as the set for the British TV show ‘The Prisoner’. Fanciful buildings that almost look like they might have come from Middle Earth. Most of his design features have their basis in nature and naturally occurring structures. It’s the way he puts it all together that boggles the mind.
As we drove away from the port our guide showed us some of the Olympic buildings at the waterfront. As we headed up the street towards our first stop she pointed out the Barcelona water department building a distance off to the east. She said it has three names depending on how happy you are with them, the bullet, the suppository and xxx (I’ll let you fill that one in, but from the first two I’m sure you know what the shape is.) If you can’t imagine what number three is ask me privately and I’ll tell you. I will, however, be stunned at your lack of imagination.
In about 3 miles we arrived at our first destination, Gaudi’s most famous work, the Temple de la Sagrada Familia (The Temple of the Sacred Family). In years past one could count on people knowing that refers to Jesus, Mary and Joseph of the Bible but in today’s confused religious landscape I felt obliged to make that clear that I’m not referring to either the Clintons or the Obamas and certainly not to the Kennedys or any of their in-laws (Can you say Governator…? I knew you could.).
It is like no other church I’ve ever seen and it’s not even a cathedral or a basilica, it’s just an ordinary parish church. The first stone was laid in 1882 and the original design was to be Neo-gothic. The structure is being built totally with donated funds. This is nice because the government and the church have very little to say about how it should look. The main drawback is that in 2009, 127 years later, it’s not completed. I’m happy to say that as we toured it work is going on and they expect to finish it in 2020. So far only one service has ever been held here. In 1926, the year Gaudi died, the church was only started. His plans were complete and he had built enough of the structure to make it clear how it was to be done.
The plans call for the building to have 18 gently tapering, conical towers. Twelve will be bell towers and represent the 12 Apostles. Of the remaining 6, 4 are dedicated to the evangelists, 1 to Mary and 1 to Jesus. So far 8 of the bell towers are completed or near completion. Most of the exterior is completed as well as the roof. They have temporary coverings over the places where the rest of the towers will be. The bell towers will be of different heights (325-386 feet) and Mary’s tower will be taller than any of the bell towers at 390 feet. The 4 evangelist’s towers will be almost 420 feet tall and Jesus’ tower will be the tallest of them all at 553 feet and be directly over the transept. The Jesus tower will be 43 feet taller than the tallest church I’ve ever seen the Cathedral in Cologne, Germany whose spires are 510 feet tall. The completed bell towers are impressive and the Jesus tower will be 225 feet taller than they are.
The church is an almost square rectangle just about the same size as a standard soccer field, which is huge, 390 feet by 292 feet; 90 feet longer than a football field and much wider. The symbolism on the exterior is fantastic. Each façade of the church has its own theme.
The east façade, through which we entered, was the first constructed and is dedicated to the Nativity. In the design Gaudi celebrates the human side of Jesus and the exultation of nature, his creation. There are three porticos on this side and they are dedicated to the three theological virtues of Christianity, faith, hope and charity (more properly translated as love as that’s what charity meant in the 1500s. The door on the right is dedicated to Mary and symbolizes faith, the door on the left is dedicated to Joseph and symbolizes hope and the main door in the center is dedicated to Jesus and symbolized love, this highest expression of Christian virtue.
Above the Jesus door at the peak of the portico is what looks like a Christmas tree decorated with doves and topped with dove sitting on a red cross that has a ’χ’ at the center. It’s actually meant to represent the Tree of Life and is a Cyprus tree. The cross at the top represents the Trinity, tau (χ) is God’s initial Greek, the cross represents Christ and the dove the Holy Spirit. All the doves in the tree are carved of marble.
The façade’s decorations include an abundance of animal life, roosters, turtles, doves, cows, turkeys, geese and a mother pelican with two chicks. Pelicans were an early symbol of Christianity because it was thought they split open their chests to feed their young. Also included are plants, palms, flowers and trees. It would take a long time to understand all the symbolism he designed into the décor but a few fun things are included. Just above the Faith door is a statue of Jesus working at his carpenter’s bench. On the Hope portico a rosary is sculpted above Jesus and a variety of tools below Him. Gaudi loved to combine the holy with the everyday, one is a work of faith the other a work of the hands. In front of the Love door there a column dedicated to Jesus. On a spiraling ribbon wrapped around the column they carved his genealogy. At the base is the figure of a snake biting an apple, in essence cutting out the middleman (Woman actually, but I’m not sure middlewoman gets the point across. If I were PC enough I guess it would be middleperson!).
The Nativity façade is completed. As we entered the building it was obvious that the inside was not. There’s scaffolding everywhere except the dead center of the sanctuary. Clearly a lot of work has to be done inside. The only traditional thing about the layout of the interior is that the floor plan is in the shape of Latin cross with five naves running north to south, bisected by a transept running east and west. Everything else, from the columns to the vaults is uniquely Gaudi.
The columns are fantastic. He designed a totally new column style that has been named ‘Arborescent’ because it mimics the shape of a tree. The bottom part is pretty normal, much like a fluted Ionic column terminating in a capital that looks like a knot; this is the tree’s trunk. At this point the column divides into two or three smaller shafts that continue upward at various angles like a tree’s branches. On the larger columns these split again to create more branches. No part of the column, the base included is exactly perpendicular to the floor. This has the effect of transferring the weight of the roof directly to the floor taking the strain off the walls and eliminating the need for buttresses, flying or otherwise. It also allows him more flexibility in the design of the outer walls and facades because he does not have to consider load bearing from the roof. Gaudi once commented that he wanted the sanctuary to look like a forest.
The vaults supported by these columns seem to be inordinately light and open. They are designed to resemble palm leaves, the symbol of martyrdom. Some are concave and others convex, they are open to allow light to filter down into the naves below. This is why I am not willing to put Gaudi in with the rest of Art Nouveau, the elements of his work are unique and his alone.
I could go on and on about this temple. (Some of you are saying, “We thought you already did!”) Be assured, I could easily get 20 more pages out of it but I’ll stop with this. I discussed the Nativity façade; the other three are the Passion façade (dedicated to the story of the crucifixion), the Glory façade (dedicated to each person’s struggle to emulate Jesus) and the Apse façade (dedicated to Mary to whom Gaudi had a special devotion.)
I will comment a little on the Passion façade. The central door, twice as large as the side doors, is the Gospel Door. 8,000 bronze characters are cast into the door to tell the Gospel story. Whereas the Nativity façade had a column with Jesus genealogy on it, the Passion façade has a column in the same place but this one shows Jesus tied to it to be whipped before crucifixion. In effect this column answers the question implied in the other column, “Why was He born?” He was born to suffer and die for our sins. I’m sure it’s no accident that the Nativity façade faces east, the beginning of the day and the Passion façade faces west, the end of the day. At first I was a little confused as most cathedrals naves run east and west not the transepts.
Starting at the bottom and going upward in an ‘S’ pattern, Gaudi tells the story of Passion Week. He starts with the Last Supper and ends with Christ on the cross and the image of the torn temple veil above him symbolizing the removal of the separation of mankind from God. This place is just too cool for words.
From the Sagrada Familia we drove to Parc Güell where Gaudi lived and worked in his later years. In constructing elements of the park, Gaudi tested and perfected some of the innovative techniques he applied to the Sagrada Familia. For example, the Grand Palca of the park is built on a series of non-vertical columns to test his theory that this orientation would more efficiently transfer the load from the top to the base. The structures in the park including the gatehouse and the gift shop are very fanciful.
On the way back to the bus we passes two of the buildings Gaudi designed, Casa Mila and Casa Batllo. Neither of them has much in the way of design that is a straight line. Curves and organic shapes are the order of the day. Fanciful structures on the roof of Casa Mila are reminiscent of some of the design features on the church. Several look like different versions of the shapes he uses to depict Roman soldiers on the Passion façade. Both of these buildings are unmistakably Gaudi. When it was completed in 1907 the astonished residents of the city called it the ‘house of bones’ and the ‘house of yawns’ both references to natural and organic structures and shapes. This confirms that Gaudi had achieved his desired look, but not necessarily an endorsement of his style. Just another example of genius not being appreciated by its contemporaries.
Back at the ship we ate lunch and then spent some time admiring the view from the upper decks. We are docked very near downtown and have a good view of the Columbus Monument and the shipyards where the ships of exploration were built. There’s a cable car that transverses the port. There’s a station on the shore, one on the other side of the port and one in the middle that is at the top of a tall tower right next to the ship.
Our entertainment for the evening was the Escuela Jose de la Vega, a Spanish dance school. It was four women and one man. They performed various styles of flamenco in traditional costumes. It was a colorful and exciting show. The students were very good and certainly energetic.
March 28 – Barcelona, Spain – Day 2. Today it’s cloudy and raining, however being the intrepid travelers that we are, we’re headed to the Gothic Quarter and the Picasso Museum. It was a short bus ride to the old part of the city and then it was on foot to our first stop the Barcelona (Santa Eularia) Cathedral. It’s a definite Gothic structure, built in the 1000s. Only the three towers are visible from the front as there are scaffolds all across front façade. Inside there are the typical three naves. The narrow naves on the sides of the church have many beautiful chapels between the buttresses. The most impressive to me was the Chapel of Saint John the Baptist. In addition to the statue of John at the center it has 18 panels with polychrome reliefs in them. Some are other Biblical figures and some are scenes from John’s life. I could recognize the baptism of Jesus, the announcement to Zechariahs of John’s pending birth and Herod’s banquet at which Salome asked for John’s head.
Next to the cathedral are the remains of an old roman gate and tower. You can see where the top of the gate and wall of the city on this side served as part of the aqueduct system that brought water to the city. Parts of the cathedral are built on the old Roman wall.
Next to the tower is the start of Bisbe Street, which leads to the Plaza San Jaume. As we walked along the street we passed a very impressive monument, not is its size but in its elegance. It has a gray granite block, altar-like base on which is set a bronze statue of five men. On the left are two are standing by a third man who is kneeling. They seem to be comforting him, perhaps praying. He is dressed only in pants. One of the standing men is in an undershirt and pants the other seems to be wearing a priests robe. The fourth man is standing at the center, separated from, but looking over at the group. He is dressed like a member of the aristocracy and his pose indicates he would like to join the group but feels it necessary to stay apart. On the right side the fifth figure is also dressed as clergy and is kneeling on his left knee, hands clasped atop his right knee, praying. On the granite wall above this bronze is a white marble relief depicting two angels in the clouds. One angel is blowing a trumpet; the other is almost in a skydiving pose, heading toward the group below with a laurel victor’s wreath in his hand. Just looking at the figures you can tell that this scene is meant to convey a victory that came at a great price.
The bronze plaque one the granite base is in Catalan, which is enough different from Spanish that I can’t be sure of all it said. It lists eight names and then, as best I can translate it, says “They sacrificed their lives for God, country and king. (From?) A Grateful City. Established here as a permanent memorial. 1929”. When I get home I may Google some of the names to see what they might have done. The light and dark gray of the granite, the green-gray of the bronze and the white of the marble provide a striking image.
Further down Bisbe Street we passed under a very elegant Gothic arch that provided a second floor walkway over the street from one building to another. Just next to the arch was a large granite medallion on the building of Saint George slaying the dragon. He’s the co-patron saint of the city with Santa Eularia who’s buried in the cathedral.
At the end of Bisbe we arrived in the Plaza San Jaume, which is flanked on one side by Barcelona’s City Hall and on the other side by the seat of the government of Catalunya (Catalonia in English). It was the side of this building on Bisbe that had the carving to Saint George. That façade of the building is Gothic and dates from the early 1400s. The front façade was added in 1596 and is clearly Renaissance.
I asked the guide about this and she said that it was rebuilt on that side because of some damage that occurred. She also told me that Pere Johan carved the Saint George medallion and that the Gothic arch bridge joins the Offices of the President of Catalonia with his official residence. The city hall on the opposite side of the plaza neoclassical and was added to that building in the mid 1800s.
Next we headed to the Plaza del Rei but on the way we passed a bakery that had some excellent looking wares calling to me from their window. I was able to resist mainly because I didn’t want to loose track of our guide. The Plaza del Rei is where Ferdinand and Isabella greeted Columbus in 1493 after his first trip to the Americas. It’s a wonder of Gothic architecture with an unusual watchtower attached to the castle on its flank. The tower is rectangular and not round. Very unusual. Many of the important events of that era took place here. The Royal shipyard near where the Prinsendam is docked is where all the great Spanish ships of exploration were built.
From there we walked down the street to the Basilica Santa Maria del Mar, yet another great Gothic structure. The cathedral did not have a rose window but the basilica does and it’s gorgeous. There’s a statue of Mary at the main altar with Jesus at about 18 months of age sitting on her shoulder, a very unusual pose for them. At her feet is a wooden model of a Spanish sailing ship. When I got to the rear of the ambulatory around the apse I noticed that you could superimpose Mary over the rose window over the entrance of the church. The problems created by the light (long exposure) and depth of field almost dissuaded me from even attempting the shot but since I’m using digital there’s really not cost involved. It’s just my pride that on the line, and what’s that worth. The picture looked good on the camera’s small screen. I’ll have to wait until I get it on my computer to see if it’s any good at all. I’m not hopeful.
Our last stop on this cool, rainy and windy day is at the Picasso Museum. I must say up front, I’m not a fan of Picasso. I know he’s the co-founder of cubism and all but I’m just not a fan. I do, however, occasionally try to stretch myself a little beyond my comfort zone just to see what happens. Because of this, I’m actually looking forward to seeing a lot of his work at one time. The museum traces his work through his lifetime and most of the collection was donated by his family so many of the works are from his younger years. I have to admit that the young Pablo Picasso was a very good artist. His portraits of his parents and even the self-portrait are wonderful. The kid could paint!! His landscapes from the early period are impressionistic but very attractive as well. Most of you know I’m a huge fan of the Impressionists. His academic studies show a great talent for drawing.
His early painting ‘The First Communion’ displays his talent with color. The communicant is a girl dressed in white with a white headpiece and a long flowing white veil. All this white on white would be a daunting task to photograph much less paint. The folds in the dress and the transparency of the veil are so real you feel like the little girl might get up and walk away at any moment. The flowers and candles on the altar are so well executed you can almost feel the heat and smell the aromas. At least now I know he wasn’t just faking it, he could deliver art I understand at a very impressive level. I guess I remain confused about his later works.
If you followed our trip last year you know that one of my favorite paintings is ‘Las Meninas’ by Velazquez at the Prado in Madrid. Apparently Picasso liked the painting also because he produced 44 oils with direct reference it. Some are the painting in its entirety but most are his interpretation of small sections of the painting. If you Google ‘Las Meninas’ you can find it on the Internet. Do it first with Velazquez’s name, and then do it with Picasso’s name. Compare the two. It’s amazing! In the three I could find in the museum where he had interpreted the entire painting you can identify all the individual elements but you’re seeing them through the eyes of Picasso. It’s a little scary. Many of his oils concentrate on the little princess, Infanta Margarita Maria. I’m glad I saw the museum because it gave me a new appreciation for Picasso’s skill as an artist. His early works are exceptional. Unless a terrible quirk of fate took these skills from him, I have to assume that his later works are exactly as he wanted them to be. I still don’t really understand them but I have a new reference point from which to try to take them in.
I went back to the small square on my own to get some Euro from an ATM and passed a little bakery on the way. Going back I bought a chocolate croissant that Diana and I split. It was extraordinary!
Just outside the harbor there’s a large sculpture done by Lincolnstien that pays homage to the three greatest artists of the city. He used the shape of Picasso, the tiles of Gaudi and the primary colors of Miro. It’s ugly but interesting.
March 29 – Marseille (Lourmarin, Roussillon and Gordes), France. The weather is not much better here in Marseille; it’s rainy and cool. It’s not raining hard so we should be all right. We’re headed into Provençe for a day of exploring small villages.
Our first stop is in Lourmarin. It’s early on Sunday morning and not too many people are moving around. The bus stopped a little way from the town at the Chateau Lourmarin and we walked past the small church to the city. I peeked in the church and the priest was preparing for Mass. He was already dressed in his white robe and he was arranging his materials on the altar.
Every town in France has a WWI memorial and Lourmarin is no exception. It’s just outside the town proper and is a statue of Winged Victory with the names of the fallen carved into her base. The town is very compact and is part of a string of villages that are historical preserves in southern France. There’s no obvious new construction in the area. As with all old cities the streets are cobblestone and very narrow, one-way traffic for sure. Even most of the cafes were closed. Near the center of town we did find one that was a combination coffee house and bar. Diana and I went inside and ordered a hot chocolate for her and a café latte for me. Both were delicious and at a total of 6 Euro (about $8.50 for both not outrageously priced). We sat at the counter, which also serves as the bar in the evenings. The bottles were arranged on shelves behind the counter to our left to keep them away from the heat of the espresso machine. I was surprised that they had more Scotch than anything else.
The buildings are all made from irregularly shaped local stone, very simple is design. Most have painted shutters and the majority of them were shades of blue. A very quaint and pleasant little town.
Just outside Lourmarin we stopped to see a Roman bridge from the 1st Century. It was angular in design with the two sides flat slopes. The only curves on the entire structure were the support arches underneath.
Our next stop was Roussillon, another of the small village reserves. The unique thing about it is that there’s an ancient ocre (ocher in English) quarry just outside town. The mining stopped here a long time ago and it is a historical interpretive site now. There’s a 1-kilometer (.6 of a mile) walk through the old quarry. There are 16 colors of ocher here, including shades of red, orange, lavender, gray, green, yellow and a very rare white. It’s very cloudy and hazy so I’m not sure how the colors will register, they should be plenty saturated under these circumstances but I don’t know if there’s enough light to get a good image. We walked through the quarry and then down the hill and up the next hill to the city.
It’s another small village. The main difference here is that most of the buildings are stucco over the stone construction and they are all painted in the ocher from the quarry next door. The colors are very pleasant and give the town a festive look that Lourmarin didn’t have. The small square by the Hotel du Ville (City Hall) had buildings painted in four of the shades around it. Even the shutters, although contrasting with the building are ocher colors from the quarry.
I walked up the hill to the church but it’s Sunday and the church is not open for visiting. There would have been some spectacular views of the countryside if it wasn’t for the clouds and fog. Still the view we did have was very nice. Because the modern construction in the distance was not visible it was easy to imagine yourself being in the Middle Ages looking down from the safety of your hilltop village.
Our next stop was at a little restaurant for lunch. They had red and white wine on the table as well as water. They brought our large plates of crustini, two slices topped with thick olive pesto and Brie and one bruchetta. There were also two large slices of ham and a salad underneath it all. It was very good and we all ate heartily. When they came to clear the plates they didn’t take our knives or forks. I figured that there must be some desert coming that we would need them for. Oops!! We had just had our appetizer course. Next came plates of roast beef, potatoes and squash. Most of us, me included, didn’t realize that there was more food coming. It was so good that I managed to eat it all as well. This time they did take our silverware but, ominously, there was a spoon still at each place setting. Oh no, desert. They served us espresso with hot cream and a desert she called nougat glace. It was a very thin cookie like crust on the bottom with an inch of very creamy light tan colored ice cream on top. The ice cream was sprinkled with chopped pistachios. Thankfully it was light and I actually had room to finish it. On the way out of the restaurant both Diana and I agreed we were going to eat dinner in the Lido restaurant this evening. We are stuffed and at the Lido you can get a salad and appetizer and skip all the other things.
One more village to see, Gordes. Our bus was able to drop us off in the main square of Gordes so everywhere you went from there it was downhill. Unfortunately to catch the bus you also had to walk back up. Again, in the main square stood a WWI Memorial. It had the usual arrangement of a fortress with a church next to it on the hilltop with the rest of the village spreading down the mountain. The fog has lifted somewhat so there were some good views across the valley below.
Thom has arranged for a local folkloric show this evening. They were dressed in traditional French costumes and performed very nice folkloric style ballet. The music was a little unusual, everyone in the band played both drum and a type of flute. The kept the drum rhythm with their right hands while the left hand held and played a piccolo like instrument that only required one hand to play. It looked like a tin whistle but they have eight holes and can’t be played with one hand. It must be difficult to beat complex rhythms on the drum while playing a flute with your other hand. They did a very nice show that was well received by the audience.
March 30 – Monte Carlo, Monaco (Cannes, Grasse & St. Paul de Vence, France). Today we ride the tender into Monte Carlo. There’s a pier there that could take us but two other ships are docked there so we anchor out. Last time we were here we were on the upper cornice looking down on the bay when we saw the ms Noordam sailing out of the harbor. Our guide was quickly on the phone to find out what was up. The water had gotten too rough for tendering and they were sailing to the other side of the isthmus for smoother water. The weather has followed us from France; it’s very cloudy and raining but not heavily. The tender ride in was uneventful and we joined out bus for the day’s adventures.
Our first stop is back in France in Cannes, home of the famous film festival. It’s right on the water so the drive was down the coast. Little Monaco is a tiny principality and we were out if it in less than 10 minutes. Since it’s totally surrounded by France that’s were we are going. We drove through the outskirts of Nice and in about half an hour we were in Cannes. The bus drove through the city on the waterfront street. There are lots of fine hotels blended in with the tall condominium buildings. Our guide told us that more than 40% of the homes here are second homes and are empty most of the year. We stopped at the main city square and got off the bus for some free time. There’s an American Embassy right on the square. (That’s what Diana and I have decided to start calling McDonald’s.) The old city of Cannes is on a nearby hilltop, as are most surviving old cities along the Mediterranean. This hill is actually much lower than most but then the city is on the coast.
One thing is different about Cannes, the WWI memorial. It’s a large bronze of winged victory being carried on a shield by three men in uniform. The bronze is atop a large marble pillar with the major battles of the war carved around the top. The base of the pillar has marble plaques with the names of Cannes residents that died in the war. It’s bigger than all the memorials we’ve seen to date. It faces the City Hall from across the street. On the other side of the monument is a large plaza next to the sea and a huge marina. Lots of the boars are very large and impressive but some are of an affordable size. Nice to know that some fairly normal people must live around here. Back on the bus we drove by the convention center where they lay out the red carpet for all the stars at the film festival.
From Cannes we headed into the mountains to drive to the city of Grasse. This city is famous for one thing, perfume. There are 40 parfumeries here, but only 4 that do their own manufacturing. We are going to tour Galimard Parfumerie one of those four. They spent some time showing us some very old equipment. Basically the processes are the same ones my ancestors used to make ‘apple jack’ (If they had been making it south of the Mason-Dixon Line it would have been called ‘moonshine’.) Essentially you mash up a bunch of something (ex. flowers, fruit, spices) dissolve it in water or something you can mix with water and then put it in a still and distill it until you get what they call ‘la vapeur d’eau’ or essence; the scent of the item in concentrated form. These pure essences are stored in the laboratory and mixed to create the scent they desire. When Channel or Hugo Boss or and of the designers wants to create a new scent they come here and work with the chemists and most of all ‘The Nose’ until they get what they want. The Nose is the most important link in the design change. They are born with a special gift for smells. Then they are trained and tested and finally certified as an official nose. There are only about 200 or so in the world and 40 of them are here in Grasse.
There are three standards for scents in France, Perfume (80% alcohol and 20% essence), Eau de Perfume (80% alcohol, 12% essence, 8% water) and eau de toilette (80% alcohol, 6% essence and 14% water). Since the only part of all this that carries the scent is the essence it’s easy to understand why perfume lasts longer and is more expensive. These standards are accepted in most of the world. The term cologne isn’t officially recognized but it’s the man’s equivalent of eau de toilette. Since men’s scents are often used as an aftershave balm we need to splash a considerable amount on our faces to get the job done. It’s the alcohol that does the job the scent is just a bonus but it is nice if it smells good.
We walked through the lab. There must have been 600 or more bottles of essence on the shelves in there. Our guide told us that The Nose can identify over 1,000 different smells. They have just formulated a new scent for women that they hope someone will select for their label and market. Sometimes they make a scent on spec and wait for someone to adopt it (You didn’t think that Elizabeth Taylor actually formulated ‘White Diamonds’ on her own). Other times they work directly with the final marketer to design a scent. After the lab we went to the scent room where we had a chance to try some of their unadopted scents. They had on for men, #1747 that I liked so I bought a small bottle. It’s classified as a perfume so you don’t need much. Our guide said that you don’t actually open the bottle, you just stick a pin through the inside plastic cap and use that to apply the scent, like a roll on, if you take out the plastic plug and put it on your fingertip you get too much.
It was time for lunch so we headed to Georges du Loup, a small town in the hills to eat. We wound up as a small hotel the Auberge des Georges du Loup. Lunch was very good, a nice salad, chicken with potatoes and vegetables but the desert was outstanding. It was a very thin, lemon tort. It was sweet and tart and just delicious.
Our last stop was at the small medieval hilltop town of Saint Paul de Vence. It’s the most picturesque of all the old villages we’ve seen on this trip. That came as no surprise as this has been a favorite village for artists since the 1800s. The list of painters that have lived here is long and distinguished. It’s a very small village indeed, with the usual organization. The palace and the church are at the top of the hill and everything else is arranged around them.
We entered the village through the 14th Century main gate at the north end. We walked the entire length of the main street ‘rue Grand’ to the south end where there’s a smaller gate beside a large rampart. Outside the small gate is the village cemetery. It’s got some very interesting graves. Some are war heroes with their decorations reproduced in bronze on their graves. The most interesting grave is that of Marc Chagall, the artist. He loved St. Paul. His grave has a giant rosemary plant growing at the head of the marble sarcophagus. On the way back we diverted from rue Grande uphill to see the College Church built in the 1200s. It about as plain a church as you’ll find on the outside, just unfinished local stone. The inside is plain as well but there are some ornate chapel altars and some great stained glass. My favorite was our old friend St. George once again slaying that pesky dragon.
Just outside the north gate there was a group of men playing bocce. I’m not sure what they call it in France but that’s what they call it in Italy. After that it was back down the hill on the bus and back to Monaco.
The sea has gotten rougher since we left this morning. The swell seems to be about 7-8 feet with 3-4 foot waves atop that. The tender was bouncing pretty good as we headed out. It was pretty cool to look out the window and see nothing but water when we went down into the trough between the swells. It wasn’t really that bad if you been around small boats much but for some of the people the ride was a definite white-knuckle experience.
We just got back in time to head to the room, drop off our stuff and head to dinner. At dinner my friend John, a retired naval officer, said that one lady on his tender got seasick. It was not that long a ride so she must be very sensitive.
Tomorrow we have our first stop in Italy at Liverno and I’m going to finally get to Pisa.
March 31 – Livorno, Lucca and Pisa, Italy. Today we are docked in the city of Livorno. It’s an old Roman city in the Tuscany Region of Italy. Originally it was a small fishing village but today it’s a large port. We are docked right next to the old fortress just a short walk from downtown.
Only 10% of Tuscany is flat and the port of Livorno is right in the middle of that area so my first impression was that the area was pretty level. Turns out that this entire section of Tuscany was once a delta of the Arno River. It was very marshy and not very hospitable. Malaria was rampant and people didn’t want to live here. In order to bribe people to come here laws were passed that exempted anyone in the region from taxes and the port was declared a ‘free port’. All this happened before Italy was a country. It’s amazing how many European countries are younger than the USA. For example, both Italy and Germany didn’t exist before the 1800s. Italy, not unlike Germany, was originally a collection of city-states and principalities. Garibaldi eventually united them sometime in the 1860s, I think. In any event, putting in a matrix of canals eventually drained this lowland area and malaria was wiped out here in 1954.
However, we are not staying in Livorno. We are headed to the cities of Lucca and Pisa. In about 25 minutes we were in the foothills and a little later arrived in Lucca. Lucca is the birthplace of Puccini and the famous meeting between Caesar, Crasso and Pompey took place here in 56BC. Luccans are proud to be the only city-state not conquered by Florence in the whole of Tuscany. As a result the people and attitudes are a little different that the rest of the region which lived under Florentine rule for years. They are a little less open but when approached are just as friendly. People have been living on this site since the Paleolithic era but it is most likely that the Ligurians or Etruscans founded the current city. The Romans were here big time and are probably responsible for the size and shape of the old town. Since the old city is walled and, once again has very narrow streets, the bus had to drop us off at the wall and we went on a walking tour.
Our first stop was at Puccini’s house. There’s a statue of him sitting in a chair in the plaza that his house faces. They celebrated his 150th anniversary last year and the signs are still up.
Next we stopped in St. Michael’s square to see the church of St. Michael’s on the Forum. It gets its name from the fact that it stands on the site of the old Roman Forum. The church was built in the 13th century and is Romanic is style. It has a whimsical; fantasy look because the various courses of arches are supported by many styles of columns. In the top two sets, every column is different. In the lower courses there are several columns that are just round but most are unique.
There was a little girl, probably about 2, trying to feed the pigeons on in the square. She had a plastic bag like the ones you get at the grocery store in the US. It had some pieces of bread in it and she was having a hard time controlling the bag so she could get the bread out. She’d try to turn the bag upside down to make the bread fall out but since she was holding it by the top edge all she succeeded in doing was folding the top inch of the bag over. If it had been a box that would have worked but the bag, being flexible, just folded over. She was frustrated. Her grandparents sat by watching her struggle to figure out the problem. Finally she reached her little fist down into the bag and pulled out a handful of bread. As she threw this on the stones of the plaza the pigeons celebrated her success by attacking the bread with all diligent speed. This pleased her mightily and she repeated the performance over and over until the bag was empty. Since she had no more bread to throw she focused on the pigeons and the expression on her face said, “Hey, I worked hard to get that bread on the square. Why won’t you eat the pieces right here at my feet so I can get a better look at you?” She got no takers on until she moved away to be by her grandparents.
Our next stop was at the unique Amphitheater Plaza. It’s on the site of the old amphitheater and is an oval circle of buildings with a plaza in the middle. There are four tunnels through the buildings to allow access to the plaza. There are two cafes and some shops on the ground floor of the building. The upper floors are obviously residences as many of them had laundry hanging out to dry on the balconies. Here again, all the old buildings seem to be painted in the ocher colors we saw at the quarry day before yesterday.
While walking back to the gate we cut through a shopping street and I was surprised to see a store named the General Lee. No it wasn’t a Chinese restaurant; it was a reference to the car on the Dukes of Hazard. I asked the guide about this and he said that show was a big hit here in Italy and was still in reruns today.
Next stop Pisa. I’m anxious to see if the tower is still leaning. Busses can’t get anywhere near the tower complex so it was a little hike to the walls of Miracle Square. About the last 50 yards of the street leading to the gate was lined with souvenir stands. Of course the main theme of these wares is the Leaning Tower of Pisa. There were models, t-shirts, fridgies, scarves, hats, bracelets, necklaces, fanny packs, backpacks, earrings, posters, calendars, post cards, shot glasses, spoons, plaques, thimbles and many other items with the image of the tower on them. I’ve been to places before that only really had one thing to see in them but I’ve never encountered this much merchandise dedicated to the single attraction anywhere at anytime. It was amazing.
You’re going to think I’m nuts (Well, actually some of you know I’m nuts.) but the tower was not the most interesting thing on the square for me. The tower shares the Miracle Square with the cathedral, a baptistery and a cemetery.
The cathedral is impressive. It’s Romantic style like St. Michael’s in Lucca but much larger. The large central doors are bronze and have eight panels depicting scenes from the life of Mary. The most impressive thing in the interior is the pulpit. None of this little curved staircase, small platform next to a column for Giovanni Pisano, no sir. In fact, the pulpit is Pisano’s masterpiece. It’s a large, circular, walled platform about 8 feet in diameter setting atop 9 10-foot pillars. Carved into the platforms 4-foot walls are 8 scenes from the life of Jesus. The workmanship is fantastic. I could identify some of the stories for sure, the crucifixion, Herod’s slaughter of all the children under 2, Joseph, Mary and Jesus’ flight to Egypt, but some were less obvious. One looked like it could have been Jesus throwing the moneychangers out of the temple, but I’m not sure.
The tower is, of course, the tower but I have to tell you that if it wasn’t leaning it would be third in line as far as interest goes. Yes, it’s odd that it’s leaning over at about 5 degrees. Yes, it’s odd that the top part is leaning less because it was added after the bottom was already tilting and they built it so it would be straight. Yes, it is an elegant design and attractive. Nevertheless, it’s the lean that makes it special.
The baptistery is the building that I was impressed by. It’s a round building that was originally open topped. That was so it could collect rainwater for use in the baptisms. It was started in 1153 but took 200 years to complete. Later a tile roof was added in the shape of an upside down sun lamp reflector. The building has 3 levels leading up to the eaves. The bottom level is the tallest and has half columns set directly against the wall with arches connecting them but flush with the wall itself as well. The second level is a wall behind full columns with real arches connecting them. Atop the capital of each column is a relief carving of a face. It’s about 4/5 as tall as the first level. A series of pointed Gothic arches spans each three columns. The side of each pointed arch rests on the 1st and 3rd columns. Each middle column has a different person’s bust in it. At the peak of each pointed arch is a statue, also all different. All in all there are 24 busts, 24 statues and 48 faces. That’s a lot of folks represented on the outside of the building. The top level is a series of Gothic windows like you’d find on almost any structure from that period. It’s a unique and interesting building and my favorite on Miracle Square.
We were going to walk downtown when we got back to Livorno but it had started raining so we just spent the rest of the day relaxing on the ship. We may need it, tomorrow’s tour is 11 hours long.
April 1 – Civitavecchia-Rome, Italy. Well it’s April Fools Day but since that’s not really a tradition in the Philippines or Indonesia I don’t think you have to be worried about the crew. The event staff is another problem. They’re mostly from the US. I’ll have to be careful around them.
The weather is still inconvenient. It’s dark, cool, blustery and looks like rain. We’re headed to Rome a little way south; maybe it will be clearer there. Ever since we started this 9 day run of ports it’s been raining or threatening to rain. I told the Protestant minister on board that I was going to do my sun dance on the top deck this evening when we got back from the tour. He said anything that could work should be tried.
Today’s tour is estimated to be 11 hours so we’re in it for the long haul. One advantage is that the tour is limited to 10 people so we have a very comfortable but smaller bus and don’t have to travel with the usual herd of people. The ride into Rome took about an hour and a half. We did a little panoramic drive past the major points of interest, the coliseum, the forum, the ancient walls and Castel Sant’Angelo. We left the bus at the last major street in the area and walked past the Quirinale Palace to the Trevi Fountain. This is the largest of Rome’s fountains and easily the most famous because of its inclusion in the film ‘Three Coins in the Fountain’. I’ve been there three times now and each time I’ve thrown a coin into the fountain over my left shoulder. The belief is that if you do that you’ll return to the fountain again. So far it’s working. Nicola Salvi completed this Baroque masterpiece in 1762. It’s got a nautical theme. King Neptune stands in the center and is flanked by two tritons each leading a horse. The one on the right is moving along normally but the triton on the left is struggling to restrain a very unruly steed. The allegory represents the two contrasting states of the sea, calm and tempestuous. This has been a water related spot since 19BC as the Aqua Virgo aqueduct coming to Rome ended at this spot.
Just across the small plaza from the fountain there’s a small church, Santi Vincenzo e Anastasio a Trevi. It’s fairly unremarkable except for one thing. The iron fence across the entrance steps is covered with padlocks (left). They are mostly the sturdy brass body type with a stainless steel clasp. There were many sizes and brands so the display still had a very eclectic look. Closer examination revealed that most locks had two names and date written on it in permanent marker, usually with a + or ‘y’ between them. Most of the names were Latin, Carlos or Carmen for example. I am told that these are ‘lucchetti d'amore’ – Locks of Love. This phenomenon started in Florence about 10 years ago. Couples attached locks to the Ponte Vecchio Bridge and tossed the keys into the Arno River. In 2006 the Florence officials had enough and over 5,500 locks were cut off the bridge. The fad arrived in Rome early last year and the Trevi Fountain’s traditional connection with lovers made this church’s fence a natural place to continue the tradition.
Editor’s Update: Just 21 days after this photo was taken, Roman officials cut every lock off the fence and carted them to the city dump. Call me cynical if you like, but this action may just have carried the symbolism to its natural conclusion. Life being what it is today and young people being what they have always been (at least in my lifetime), it’s very likely that the great majority of the commitments memorialized by these locks were in the dump long before the locks got there. Ouch, that hurt, but then it has long been said, “The truth hurts.”
As we have been walking in this area of Rome it has dawned on me that all the painted buildings here are in colors that we saw at the ocher Quarry. Apparently that source of pigment was very widely used in this era. Many buildings are natural stone but those that aren’t are ocher of one shade or another.
Pinocchio is a big deal around Rome. I’ve seen dolls of him in a lot of the souvenir shops. We passed a wood carver’s shop that had him in all sized up to life size. They had other things as well, carved nameplates, clocks and the largest of all, a life sized, very authentic Bortolucci motorcycle.
We are headed to the Pantheon and that’s great because we have to get some lunch during this walking tour and the Piazza de Rotunda in which the Pantheon is situated has the hurried tourist’s friend (I know you are all saying it in your minds already), McDonald’s. Our guide gave us a half an hour to eat and take a look at the area. Diana and I headed immediately to Micky D’s, wolfed down our burgers and fries and headed into the Pantheon. This is the only McDonald’s I’ve ever seen that has absolutely no sign outside. You have to get close enough to see the sign inside the store through the windows. The ancient buildings on the plaza are all protected and no changes whatsoever can be made to the outside. Surprise of surprises, every painted building on the plaza is in a shade of ocher. I love it when I learn something new about architecture on a trip. Especially old architecture. There are three narrow buildings in front of the Pantheon; but they share common walls. The center building is the McDonald’s, the one on the right is a traditional café and the one to the left appears to be completely residential. While we finished our meal, Diana actually got a Happy Meal with a transformer toy in it, other people speaking everything from German to Swedish to a British accent so thick it sounded like they were only pronouncing one letter per word (I think it was Cockney) came into The McDonald’s.
The Pantheon is the most extraordinary and well preserved of Rome’s ancient buildings. The current building is not the first. There was a traditional rectangular building here from the time of Agrippa, around 26BC. Emperor Hadrian erected the present building in AD 118. The main building is essentially a round cylinder topped by what appears to be a very shallow dome with a pedimented portico over the front entrance. Once you are inside you can see that the radius of the dome is equal to the height of the cylinder on which it rests. This puts the building in perfect proportion. A circular hole in the center of the dome lets in the only light, as there are no windows.
As the name Pantheon would indicate this was originally a Roman temple to ‘All the gods’, the pan (all or every as in Pan-American Games)-theo (god as in theology)-n (noun ending). Sometime in the 7th Century Christians started complaining that demonic spirits was harassing them as they passed the building so permission was given to turn the building into a church. Today it is basically a crypt containing a wide range of tombs from Raphael’s very modest monument to the huge marble and porphyry sarcophagi of Kings Victor Emanuel II and Umberto I.
From the Pantheon we walked down a block across the Corso Rinascemento on the corner where the Italian senate meets. It’s a yellow ocher colored building that’s only remarkable for the two sentries beside the main door wearing Napoleonic era uniforms. The plain-clothes security could not have been more visible. Apparently pale blue was the color of the day as they wore different suits, shirts and ties but every single one of them had something on that was pale blue, mostly a shirt or tie. A crowd had gathered across the street so there must be someone big coming or going. We slithered through the mob and continued on to the Piazza Navona.
This is Rome’s most magnificent Baroque piazza. It’s large as it used to be the site the 1st Century stadium of Domitian that was used for chariot races and other sports. Many of the foundations of the surrounding buildings are constructed from the stone of the stadium. The foundation of the piazza’s church, the Church of Saint Agnes in Agone has several of these stones that are still visible.
According to tradition, during the persecution of Christians under Diocletan, Agnes, a young Roman noblewoman was martyred in the stadium for her beliefs in AD 305. After Christianity was accepted a small shrine was developed in the stadium that became a site for pilgrims. In time the oratory became a small basilica that was replaced by the current church when the Pamphili family, Pope Innocent X, built a papal palace and developed the piazza for the used of the pontiff and his family. The noted Renaissance sculptor, Bernini (seems like he is responsible for 90% of Rome’s fountains) designed the central fountain based on the four greatest rivers known at the time, the Nile, the Plate, the Ganges and the Danube. A statue personifies each river and a waterfall worked into sculpture somewhere near the human figure. In the center of the fountain on a pedestal is an Egyptian obelisk. There was quite a crowd at Navona so it was difficult to get a good picture of anything.
Last time we were here Saint Agnes was not open. This time it’s open so we decided to go in for a look. I’m glad we did. Inside is an impressive display of marble reliefs depicting the martyrdom of four saints and statues of several others. All the works were done by the principal students of Bernini and Algardi and are worthy of their reputations. The statue of Saint Agnes among the flames and the main altar’s altarpiece that shows Mary, Joseph and Jesus with Zachary, Elizabeth and John the Baptist especially impressed me. Too quickly, our time was up and we had to proceed to the Vatican for our visit there.
Normally we would not have booked a tour to the Vatican as Diana and I have both been there twice before. Not because there isn’t any more to see but because, on these one-day tours, they hit the highlights and we’ve seen those twice. This tour includes rooms that are normally not open to visitors and that intrigued us to the point that we decided to go.
For most of the tour our Vatican guide, Luigi, and two Vatican guards accompanied us with keys. They would open rooms for us and lock them after we left. It was amazing. Luigi worked for 15 years on the restoration of the Sistine Chapel and is a Vatican expert. He was very enthusiastic about his topic and it translated into a great tour.
We started out in the Christian Art Museum. This was not one of the places we had to ourselves but there were very few people there and no large groups. It was very interesting. There were inscriptions and sculptures from catacombs, the oldest form of Christian art. There were icons and altar triptychs from the 1100s-1300s and paintings and sculptures from the 1400s-1500s. The highlight for me was the Deposition by Caravaggio. Those of you who followed our last trip are probably tired of hearing about him but I love his work. My goal is to see all his known works. This will be difficult because two of them are in private collections. However the Vatican has one and it’s normally not seen either but it was on this tour. The painting shows Jesus’ body being accepted by Joseph of Arimathea for burial. I was not disappointed; it’s magnificent. There’s an entire room dedicated to Raphael the centerpiece of which is The Transfiguration, a large canvas with marvelous colors and a wonderful composition.
We exited the museums and walked across a square dominated by a huge bronze pinecone that was part of an ancient Roman fountain and stood in the courtyard of old Saint Peter’s. There’s a 12-ton modern round bronze sculpture in the center of the square that can be spun with one hand. We reentered the museums on the other side of the square and entered the Octagonal Court. Here they have a display of ancient bathtubs, sarcophagi, sculptures and reliefs. From there we went to the Circular Hall that’s a small imitation of the Pantheon. The floor is covered with an impressive display of Roman mosaic floors excavated from various sites and fit together.
Next the guards opened a small door that led directly on to a spiral ramp paved with a herringbone pattern of bricks. This ramp led up to an area with a wonderful vista our over Rome. Luigi told us that the ramp was set this way to allow horses to go up it carrying dignitaries in a sort of oat driven elevator. This ramp is connected to the building where the papal apartments are housed. By the nature of their election they are usually elderly men and before elevators this was the best way they had to get from floor to floor with people or heavy objects. We were not allowed to open any of the doors on the way up because this part of the complex is definitely off limits to everyone.
After descending the ramp we climbed some regular stairs through more locked doors to see the Etruscan artifacts in the private collection of the Pope. It contains terra cotta figures that adorned their temples and gold jewelry. The statues were nice but the jewelry was exceptional. Many of the items were wreath like and meant to be worn on the head much like a hair band or tiara. Most were styled after plants of one sort or another, usually ivies or another sort of vine. The work was exquisite and finely detailed. It was hard to believe it was that old.
When we descended from the Etruscan area we entered first a Greek and then a Roman area with pottery, jewelry, kitchen utensils and tools. In the Roman room there was a two-horse chariot on display.
At this point we reentered the public part of the museum starting with the Gallery of the Candelabra. This is the hall where the larger ancient Green and Roman sculpture. Of course, Diana had to pose with the statue of the goddess Diana. It will be interesting to compare the picture from the last time we were here. Next we entered the Gallery of Tapestries. They are wonderful but so subject to damage by light that it is impossible to get any decent pictures in that hall. The Gallery of Maps is next. Its walls are covered with large ancient maps in ceramic, but it’s the ceiling that is the spectacular part of this hall. It’s a huge concave surface covered with paintings surrounded by figures and geometric designs, a riot of color with a golden hue due to the gilding of large areas in the designs. It’s really a favorite of mine. One of the challenges is trying to determine what the subject of the paintings that are set in the peak of the ceiling. It’s very tough. Most of them have a label built in but they’re all in Latin and my Latin stinks.
From there we went to the rooms decorated by Raphael for Pope Julius II. He was commissioned to redecorate four rooms of the private papal apartments. The rooms are spectacular. Every surface is covered in either frescos or gilded designs. Each room has a theme. In one room, The School of Athens, which shows the debate between Plato and Aristotle, Raphael pictured da Vinci and Michelangelo as the philosophers.
Then it was back through the locked doors where we had the unusual privilege of visiting the Pope's private place of worship, the Paolina Chapel. The Chapel contains two important works by Michelangelo, which are not normally seen by visitors, The Conversion of St. Paul and The Crucifixion of St. Peter. The Chapel also has an intimate and dramatic view of the Sistine Chapel. Next we visited the magnificent Royal Room. Adorned with paintings by Vasari and Raphael, this private papal chamber is the site of the Pope's meetings with international Heads of State. It is from this room that he appears on the Balcony of Blessings to bless the crowds in St. Peter's Square.
After that we went back through the Raphael rooms to the Sistine Chapel. I could sit there and contemplate the ceiling or the Last Judgment on the front wall. Every time I come here I see new things in the frescos. First time I was here in 1968 the ceiling was hardly visible. You could make out parts of it but just outlines mainly with almost no color whatsoever. At that time you could take as many pictures as you wanted. Now the ceiling and walls have been fully restored and they are wonderful indeed. A thorough cleaning and some repairs have brought out the original bold colors. We had about half an hour there and it wasn’t enough.
Our guide called us together and took us to the front of the chapel through a door on the left side that was unlocked for us. Inside the small room are a desk and a sofa that they used to call a fainting couch in Victorian times. Luigi told us that, after a new Pope is elected he is usually so overcome by emotion that they bring him to this room to recover before he makes any sort of statement or any appearances.
After that we left the chapel and went down into the crypt. Most of the popes are buried here and the niche containing John Paul II was causing quite a jam. The split the corridor about 100 feet from his grave, on one side you had to just keep walking past as you looked, on the other side you could stop there for a while. Naturally that side was hardly moving at all and with the walkway cut in half the other side backed up as well.
After that we went into Saint Peter’s Basilica. The first Pieta of Michelangelo is displayed here. It’s behind glass to prevent any more damage since a nutty Italian attacked it with a hammer. Last time I was here I couldn’t get a picture because the glass is thick and shooting at any angle distorts the subject and shooting straight on just bounces the flash right back at you. Much to my surprise my new camera was able to get a decent picture. St Peter’s is a pretty dark place and they have all the major things of interest roped off at distances that make photography difficult. I spent time just soaking up the atmosphere because I’d given the basilica quite a good going over the last two times I was here. The first time I was on my own and spent a long time here and in the Sistine Chapel.
From the basilica we walked out into Saint Peter’s square and across to our bus. The one and a half hour trip back to the ship was very quiet. After the mornings two and half hour walking tour and the five hour walking, climbing and standing tour of the Vatican everyone was ready to just sit and rest. I didn’t feel that tired but man my dogs were barking.
We didn’t get back to the ship until 7:30PM so it was up to the Lido for dinner and then back to the room to wash up and get to bed. We’ve got one last port day before a day at sea.
April 2 – Naples-Herculaneum, Italy. The ship is docked almost in the center of the old city. There’s a large fortress just 250 yards from the ship. Naples is located just toward the sea from Mount Vesuvius, the famous volcano that devastated Pompeii. The Greeks founded the city that they named Neapolis (New City) in about 600BC. Two centuries later it became an allied city of Rome. Like the Caribbean islands we visited earlier, Naples has had many rulers. France, Aragon, Spain, Austria, Bourbon all had control of Naples until in 1860 it became part of the new Kingdom of Italy. The city is unmistakably Italian but with some marked differences. It’s always had a reputation as a rough place with a freewheeling attitude toward rules and authority.
The weather today is much improved. It’s still cloudy but they are lighter and there are gaps where the sun can shine through. It appears to be clearing. We are headed to Herculaneum, the other city that was destroyed in the AD 79 eruption of Vesuvius. The drive through Naples was slow as the proverbial flow of molasses in winter months. Narrow streets and an excess of autos, trucks and busses have created quite a gridlock.
Unlike Pompeii, Herculaneum was rebuilt after the eruption and there’s a new city all around the old one. In fact, for years the old city was little known. A cloud of poisonous gas and hot cinders and ash destroyed Pompeii. This made the excavation fairly easy, as the materials to be removed were not fused together and the digging was quite simple. Herculaneum was hit by a flow of pyroclastic mud like Saint Helen’s created when it blew. Later the lava from Vesuvius flowed to the sea right over the city sealing it under a dome of solid rock. It was known that a city was there somewhere from the writings of Pliny but exactly where was uncertain.
In the early 1700s an Austrian prince began digging on the sly but was soon discovered and the dig became an official archeological site with proper controls and procedures. Several holes were dug through the lava to the softer materials below and the city was located. It was very fortunate that the mud buried the city first because if the first thing to arrive had been the lava the city would be encased in solid material and excavation would have been all but impossible. As it was they could dig through the lava bed and then explore the softer materials below. Once the dimensions of the city were determined the lava layer was removed and excavation started on the city.
At first no bodies at all were found and the theory was accepted that they had had enough warning to flee the city and no lives were lost. However in 1982 excavations at what had been the waterfront area of the city, now a mile from the sea and 50 feet underground, found 300 skeletons all grouped together. They now believe that they did have more warning than Pompeii and had all gone to the wharf area to flee the city by boat when the poisonous gas cloud arrived killing them all.
Because the hot mud engulfed the city, things are amazingly preserved. Unlike Pompeii many of the buildings are still standing and structures, pottery, sculpture, frescos and even wooden things survived. In Pompeii the hot ash burned everything flammable and knocked almost everything else down.
As we approached the ancient city we were on the seaside looking down on the excavation. From our vantage point we are standing above the highest building of the city and it’s about 120 feet down to the lowest part of the dig at sea level. Where we are standing would have been about 30 yards out into the sea in the days of Herculaneum and we’re about a quarter of a mile inland. The eruption extended the shoreline here about that far and buried the city to a depth of about 50 feet from the highest rooftops. From the strata at the front of the dig it looks like the first 35-40 feet was solid lava rock and then the pyroclastic layer was about 80-85 feet thick going down to sea level.
As we look inland from our position we can see the wharf area of the old city directly facing us. It was at the base of the wharf, probably at the foot of the seaside square that they found all the human remains.
Pause here to remember my admonition about italicized portions of this journal and then decide if you want to skip the next section.
Archeological Note: From the first excavations in 1709 until 1982 it was believed that the people of Herculaneum had escaped destruction. Based on the dig at Pompeii, where people had been suddenly overcome by the gas cloud and ash and were therefore found all over the city, the scientists (in this case archeologists) assumed that, since they found no bodies in the city everyone had gotten out. Because the scientists believed this, based on their assumption that the two events were similar, the public also held that opinion. Careful science would have stressed that this was just an assumption but then as now, scientists are generally so taken by their own ideas that they present them as fact. That resulted in almost 180 years of error based on scientific assumptions being treated as truth. Unfortunately scientists have not changed one little bit over the years. The majority of them, or at least the ones who seek publicity, still operate in exactly the same way. Today we have the theory of evolution being presented as scientific fact even though, in all recorded human history, several thousand years, no one has ever observed any living thing becoming a different living thing. Sure, over a long period of time animals with certain traits will be more successful in surviving and because they survive they breed and those traits become more prevalent in the population. So in one area of the world a mammal, a bear for example, with white fur will be prevalent and in other areas of the world the same animal will have brown fur. This is not evolution, this is natural selection and that sort of change has been observed. Evolution as it is currently taught, is when one animal becomes an animal of a completely different type, a duck becomes a pig or a lizard becomes a bird for example. This phenomenon has never been observed nor does it exist in the fossil record. Yet, despite this appalling lack of real evidence almost every elementary, middle and high school in the country teaches it as though it is fact. Outrageous!! The only reason they get away with this is that the only viable alternative is creation and since that has theological overtones our society rejects it as irrational although evolution is at least as irrational.
From the wharf area the city went up the hillside for about half a mile, so it wasn’t a large place. You can see the storage areas on the waterfront where items shipped in or out could be housed. Behind the harbor facilities is a very high wall, about 35-40 feet with a wide ramp going to the top. This was the level at which the city proper started and continued up the gently sloping hillside. There’s a broad avenue at the top of the wall and directly across that avenue is a row of very impressive homes. They have courtyards and porticos facing the water much the way prosperous cities do now. The view from these homes was fantastic and since the port was 40 feet below them at the base of the wall, none of the activity associated with it would mar their view.
We walked across the ridge created by the excavation looking down on the city’s waterfront and entered the city proper across a metal bridge constructed to save us the walk down into the dig to sea level and then up again to the city. The first thing that struck me was the intricate construction of the walls we encountered right at the city’s entrance. The walls had one row of 4-inch high blocks fashioned from natural stone then two rows of one-inch thick clay kiln fired brick. This pattern repeated itself up the entire wall. The natural stone blocks were of uniform height (4 in.) and length (12 in.) but varied greatly in width from 3 to 8 inches. The clay bricks were uniform in size at one inch high, 12 inches long and six inches wide. The walls wind up being 12 inches thick as the bricks and blocks are set with the width showing. Between the portions of the walls with this construction the wall would be different. It’s made with 4 x 4 x 12 stone blocks set to give the same width to the wall. The odd part was that the blocks were set with and edge on the bottom giving the wall a diamond shape pattern. The bottom blocks were halved from corner to corner giving a flat surface for the base. Everything was set with about half inch mortar lines. It was too expensive to construct with marble or granite so they built with block and brick and then stucco was applied and painted to look like marble. This was a typical Roman technique and I’ve seen it everywhere from Israel to Spain and Morocco. The thing that is different is the brick and block combination for the underlying wall. I’d never seen that before.
Many of the structures have walls that are over half standing; some have complete walls including parts of the tile roof. Some of the two story houses have the entire first floor intact and parts of the second up to and including some of the roof. Because they were quickly encased in very hot mud many of the doorways and windows still have there original wooden lintels in place, another reason so many of the structures are still mostly standing. Other wooden things survived as well. Wooden bed frames, doors and even a room divider are on display. One of the most unusual displays I saw had what looked like a four spoke handle for a winch of some type and a coil of rope found during the excavation. 2,000-year-old rope, it’s amazing!
Many of the mosaic floors are intact. They vary from white with small, regular black plus signs to elaborate images of animals and bold geometric patterns. The public bathhouse had a mosaic floor with Poseidon with an octopus, dolphin and cuttlefish. It also had an unusual design to the ceilings. They were arched for their entire length and had ridges running over them from one side to the other. The water vapor would condense and run down these ridges and drip onto the people sitting in stone seats built along the walls.
One wine shop had many amphorae totally intact standing along the walls and in specially built shelved that would prevent them from falling. The bakery had a pair of grindstones and some ovens. There were several restaurants with serving bars and pots with built in fireboxes under them for boiling. From the layout I think it’s safe to assume that at least some of the fast foods were soups or stews.
There were several very fine houses scattered around the city. One is called the House of Neptune & Amphitritis because a very fine wall mosaic of these two gods in it’s main room. The mosaic is surrounded by very fine frescos. It’s a two-story home with mosaic floors and lots of rooms. One of the rooms had extensive frescoes on the walls that included a small winged god that resembled the later Christian idea of an angel. They had a display of a plaster cast made from three of the skeletons they found in the port. They were grouped together like a family unit of some sort. It was a sad scene for sure. The house also had a nice courtyard with a columned portico at one end.
We walked up to the highest part of the city and here we saw the workings of the water system. One large pillar was still standing that had been the end of the city’s aqueduct. Unfortunately the brought the water down from the aqueduct and throughout the city to it’s various wells and fountains by lead pipe. Lead was soft and easy to work into pipes but as we now know very dangerous if the water stands long enough to dissolve the lead. The human body does not easily excrete lead and even minute amounts can build up over time and cause serious health problems or death. They had strategically placed large rectangular marble vats to hold the water placed around the city.
The grandest house in the city from my point of view was directly across the avenue running along the wall coming up from the port. The house was set back from the avenue and in front of it was a garden and then a patio opening out onto the avenue. From the front door, the garden or the patio they would have had a beautiful view of the ocean. It’s called the Deer House because two marble carvings of deer were found in the garden area. It’s not quite as pastoral a scene as you might be imagining as each deer is being attacked by four dogs that are biting its neck and legs. It’s pretty clear that these two deer are about to meet their demise. They were not large statues, only about three feet tall. Inside the house the frescoes were particularly fine. They were colored to represent marble walls but every few feet there was an inset that looked like a painting hanging on the wall complete with frame. Most of the paintings were still life style but several had groups of people in them. I wonder if the owner had his family portraits painted on his walls.
It was a poignant experience visiting this city, maybe more so even than Pompeii because it was easier to imagine the daily life of the inhabitants as the structures are in such good shape.
On our way out of the new city we stopped at the Donadio Manufacturing store to watch a demonstration of cameo making and of course get a chance to buy some if we want. I have to admit their work was very exquisite. In addition to working in the traditional shell, they also worked in green, blue and black agate.
The sail away from Naples was very nice. Mount Vesuvius looms over the city. Naples was damaged during the eruption that destroyed Pompeii and Herculaneum but since the mountain blew in the other direction they didn’t get the gas, pyroplast, ash or lava that did so much damage to the other cities. We also sailed very close to the Isle of Capri another impressive sight.
April 3 – At Sea. Just a typical restful day at sea. Well deserved after 9 straight days in port. I didn’t do anything I didn’t have to do.
April 4 – Piraeus-Athens, Greece. Back in port today. I haven’t been in Greece since Feb 9, 1969 when I flew home to be separated from the Air Force. Diana has never been here so I’ll see some old stuff and she’ll see some brand new sights.
Our ship is docked in the city of Piraeus the port for Athens. It’s just a little way from one to the other. Everybody knows pretty much about Greece because we all had to the Western Civilization at some point in our educational careers. Let’s just say that Western Civilization, in the European sense, started on the island of Crete with the Minoan culture and things haven’t been the same every since.
We have two main things to see today, the Acropolis in Athens and the Temple of Poseidon at Cape Sounion. I chose that tour because it will take us to the major historical sights in the city and then we’ll have a 1-hour drive along the water to get to Poseidon’s temple. I would hate for Diana to only have the impression left by Athens by which to judge Greece. That would be like taking someone to New York City or Los Angeles and having them judge the USA on that basis.
Our ultimate Athens destination is the Acropolis but on the way we are making some stops during a panoramic tour. Our first drive-by was the Temple of Olympian Zeus. It was the largest temple in Greece, even larger than the Parthenon. It was started in the 6th Century BC but was not finished for 650 years. We have some freeways like that in SoCal. Emperor Hadrian dedicated it to Zeus in 132 AD and had statues set up in honor of both the god and himself. Right next to the temple is Hadrian’s arch, which marks the dividing line between ancient Athens and the new Athens of Hadrian.
Our first stop was at the all-marble Olympic Stadium built in 1896. It was constructed for the reinstitution of the Olympic games. Stadium was a length measurement for the Greeks and a stadium was exactly one stadium long inside (how convenient, you say, but wait there’s more). However, since in the ancient world distances were often tricky they vary from about 609 to 630 feet, amazingly close to the length of our football field.
From there we drove by various museums, government buildings, Presidential Palace and Constitution Square for a stop at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. As with this monument in the USA, soldiers guard the tomb. They have to stand totally still and cannot look around, just like ours but unlike the US they are dressed in traditional uniforms not modern ones. To say that they don’t look all that ferocious in the Evzones outfit is to understate the matter. They have a red hat with a long black tassel draped to the right side and in front of their chest. In winter they wear a navy blue (in the summer it’s white), high collar tunic with red piping at the cuffs and hem. The tunic is belted at the waist does not quite reach mid thigh. It is pleated like a kilt but not nearly as long. It gives the impression of a very short mini-skirt. They do not wear trousers but have white leggings on that might be like pantyhose. Just below the knee they wear a blue garter with a tassel that hangs almost half way down the back of their calves. Their shoes are red and black and have huge black pom-poms on their toes. Greeks are renown to be fierce fighters and give a very good account of themselves in battle so I guess they don’t feel the need to impress anyone with their uniforms. The men selected to guard the tomb are large so the impression is a little bit like Paris Hilton on steroids getting ready to invade Rodeo Drive. If the hem of the tunic just came down to the knees it would have an entirely different look. Maybe because I’m used to Scot’s kilts. These ceremonial soldiers appeared to be carrying M1 Garand rifles complete with bayonets and red shoulder straps. I must say they were nicely coordinated with the red caps, straps and shoes.
We arrived at our ultimate Athens sight, the Acropolis. Its symbolic ruins have survived for 25 centuries and have remained a part of the Greek culture for the entire world to appreciate. It’s a little hike uphill to the ticket booth and then a little more to the main entrance that was the first gate to the Acropolis, the Beule Gate. From there, a series of stairs lead up to the much larger Prophlaia, the new entrance to the Acropolis built in BC 437. The Prophlaia is under restoration and has significant scaffolding around it, as does the Temple of Athena Nike just outside the gate overlooking the stairs. From the platform of the entrance we had a great view of the Areopagus (Mar’s Hill) where Paul delivered his ‘Unknown God’ sermon to the Athenians, which of course being mostly epicureans and stoics, they rejected completely.
Philosophical Note: I’ve always thought it was pretty cool that both ends of the spectrum rejected Paul’s message. Epicureans believed that pleasure and the avoidance of pain are the chief end of man and did not believe in an afterlife. Stoics saw self-mastery as the greatest virtue. They believed self-mastery results from being indifferent to both pleasure and pain, reaching the place where one feels nothing. In contrast to the practical atheism of the Epicureans, the Stoics were pantheists accepting any and all gods. So those that accepted no god and those that accepted all gods, those who believed in feeling everything and those who believed in feeling nothing and those who believed this life is all there is and those who believed there was an after life both rejected the Gospel. The sermon itself is a work of art and a powerful presentation of the message of Christ. It is a testament to its power that some Athenians actually believed and were converted.
After entering the Acropolis proper we paused at the west end of the Parthenon for the guide to give us a presentation. This place once had many fine buildings and temples of which only two remain once you are inside the Prophlaia, the Parthenon and the Erechtheion. The Parthenon was a temple to Athena and although almost all of the sculptures have been lost a few can be seen. There is one of a man and some horses on the east pediment almost at the left end. All that remains of the structure is the outer columns (the definition of Doric style), most of the east and west pediments, the lintels on the north and south sides and the inner wall on the east end.
The Erechtheion, although less famous and smaller than the Parthenon is the area where the oldest and most sacred relics of ancient Athens have been found. These include the Mycenaean palace, the tomb and shrine of Kekrops, marks of Poseidon’s trident and the sacred olive tree of Athena. It is a more complex structure as it was built on uneven ground. It has two sanctuaries inside, one dedicated to Poseidon Erectheus (the source of its name) and one to Athena Polais. It had three porches all on different levels, one each to cover the entrance to above sanctuaries and a third that does not cover an entrance but is an external structure only. The roof is supported by sculptures of six maidens instead of columns. Their robe’s folds fall in a vertical direction mimicking the fluting of the Doric columns used on the rest of the structure. This is the Porch of the Caryatids and is easily the most elegant and interesting structure on the Acropolis.
From the Acropolis we drove across town to a hotel for lunch. It was delicious. Various Greek salads with feta cheese, olives, tomatoes, onion, artichoke hearts and other delicacies were followed by eggplant lasagna (It’s really mousaka but I’m not sure how to spell that. It had just the right touch of cinnamon.), chicken, meatballs and various vegetables.
After lunch we departed Athens and drove past marinas and resort towns to the Temple of Poseidon at Cape Sounio (some maps have Sounion). The trip down the coast was worth the price of the tour all by itself. The road hugged the sea and was occasionally carved from the solid rock of the seaside cliffs. The temple was built in the 5th century BC. The temple's location, 180 feet above the sea, affords a magnificent view of the blue Aegean and distant islands. It served a military as well as a religious purpose. Any ships approaching Athens would be seen from far off and a boat could be dispatched to warn the city of their approach. Much less of this temple remains that the Parthenon but more than the Temple of Zeus. It’s the location that is the big draw here. It’s a dramatic sight on the hilltop overlooking the surroundings. Being on the end of a small isthmus it has a very panoramic view of things.
On the way back into Athens we passed the old airport that is no longer in use. Most of the buildings are still standing and in good repair. I spotted the Olympic Airlines terminal that I flew into and out of on my way to my 18 month assignment to the Island of Crete. I didn’t see the TWA terminal that I arrived from and left to the head to the USA. TWA went out of business long before the airport was closed and I guess the terminal was put to other uses.
It was a great day in Greece but long and with lots of walking up and down temples and hills.
April 5 – Istanbul, Turkey – Day 1. To get from the Aegean Sea to the Black Sea you have to make a run east through three named bodies of water. From the Med you enter the Dardanelle Strait is about 40 miles long and mostly very narrow. It’s somewhat like sailing the Inside Passage in Alaska but a little wider in general. This area has seen several momentous events; the slaughter of the Anzac Brigade during WWI on the Gallipoli Peninsula and the discovery of the ancient city of Troy by amateur archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann in the late 1800s are the most prominent. Of course, the invasion of Troy by Greeks in the Trojan horse could be added to that list as well. Few people believed the old Greek tales of the Trojan Wars. Troy was generally believed to be a mythical place until Schliemann found it. It is now very PC to criticize him for taking much of what he found to Germany. However, if he hadn’t found it we’d still believe that the place never existed and that the Iliad was just a work of fiction. Besides, no one else was looking for it. As far as I’m concerned, Bravo Heinrich!! He’s the one who endured the ridicule of the scientific community and the public in general when he began his quest for Troy. Here’s the irony I love so much. If the officials hadn’t thought he was such a crackpot they would have stopped him from digging or even searching for Troy. Oops!! Can you say, “Gotcha? I knew you could!” (If that last sentence seems odd to you, you didn’t watch enough ‘Mr. Rogers Neighborhood’ growing up. It was his way of building a kid’s vocabulary. He’d talk about a word and then ask the kids at home to say it. “Can you say tortoise? He’d pause a few seconds and then say, “I knew you could!” (After that explanation I’m sort of sorry I put it in there in the first place)) (If you’re wondering what the ‘))’ is about, check with a math major or a computer programmer.)
It was 6:40AM and just getting light when we reached the end of the Dardanelles and entered the Sea of Marmara. I did get a few pictures of the WWI memorial erected by Turkey that is right at the end. Ataturk, the father of modern Turkey, made a very remarkable speech at the 1934 dedication ceremony. He praised the Australian and New Zealand soldiers who died fighting Turkish troops (Turkey sided with Germany in WWI) and said that they were Turkey’s sons as well. Turkey remained neutral in WWII.
In one city we passed there was a very unusual fortress. The main part was almost round but was pinched in a little on one side to make it sort of heart shaped. This large circle was connected to a squat round tower about 100 yards away by a walled area the appeared to be somewhat triangular. It connected to the large fort on the side I couldn’t see, if in fact it connected at all. It ran downhill toward the water getting wider as it went until it formed a sea wall at the waters edge with the far corner connecting to the tower. It’s the oddest design I’ve ever seen in a fortification and I can’t figure out why it’s shaped the way it is. Gosh, another research project for when I get home.
After sailing about 90 miles on the Sea of Marmara you arrive at the entrance to the Bosporus Strait and the city of Istanbul. We sailed into port at about 4PM and it took a while to get docked. This port is busy! There are ferries going too and fro across the Bosporus Strait between European Istanbul and Asian Istanbul. You see Turkey is divided into two parts, European Eastern Thrace on the Balkan Peninsula and Asian Anotolia (formerly Asia Minor). Istanbul exists in both areas as it is split by the Bosporus. Until the 1970s the only way to go back and forth was by ferry. They now have two suspension bridges that carry a lot of traffic; one is six lanes the other 8. There are still an amazing number of ferries on the water and added to the fishing boats that seem to anchor wherever the mood strikes them it’s a difficult place for a large ship to maneuver. Thankfully the Prinsendam is not larger than it is.
The sail in was great. The city is crammed with interesting buildings. At this point I wasn’t sure which was which so I just shot pictures and will figure that out later. There was a knot of small fishing boats anchored in the middle of the harbor and as we negotiated our way to the pier they had to pull up anchor and scatter to keep from getting run over. I’m sure the harbor pilot warned them because the all started moving in different directions at the same time. As we approached the pier I noticed hundreds of large moon jellyfish in the water. They’re the large round transparent and milky white jellyfish that aquariums usually display in a dark tank lit from above with a faintly blue light. Some of the ones near the ship were huge. The largest must have been at least 18 inches in diameter if not two feet.
Istanbul is an interesting city. The Greeks called it Byzantium, the Romans called it Constantinople and the Ottomans call it Istanbul. It’s been occupied since the 7th century BC and it’s where the Emperor Constantine made Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire and changed the name to Constantinople. By the 16th century the Ottomans were back in control and its name became Istanbul. After WWI the Allies occupied it and the people found this very humiliating. The Ottoman general Mustafa Kemal (Ataturk) started a war of independence and in 1923 the Turkey was born.
It’s our first time in Turkey. With our late arrival it’s pretty much time to get organized and ready of dinner. We’re eating off the ship at the Maiden’s Tower Restaurant. The Maiden’s Tower is in the middle of the harbor and has served as a lighthouse and customs house for the port. It was built in BC 500 so it’s 2,500 years old. Today it’s a restaurant.
Our bus picked us up at 7PM and we took a panoramic drive around the city before meeting our boat to the tower at 8PM. It was a typical 40-foot cabin cruiser and our party of 10 was joined by other people for the ride to the tower. Most of the other guests were young, well dressed couples so I think this is a romantic place for dinner. The somewhat bumpy ride was only about 10 minutes and we were at the tower. The restaurant is in the large building attached to the tower and has two levels. We were seated at a large table with plenty of space. At each place setting there was an impressive array of silverware, three forks, three knives and a spoon so there must be four courses.
On the wall opposite the entrance there’s a mosaic showing a maiden atop the tower and a man swimming toward it in waters of the strait. This mosaic represents a myth that involves the tower. It seems that Ovid’s sister, Hero, from the Temple of Aphrodite (on the Asian side of the strait) fell in love with Leandros who lived in Abdios (The ancient name of the European side of Istanbul). Leandros visited her every night by swimming across the Bosporus using the fire on the tower as a guide. One night strong winds blew the fire out and Leandros got lost and drowned. In her grief, Hero threw herself into the sea and drowned as well.
There’s a small stage in front of the mosaic and during dinner a trio, a man with a guitar, a man on keyboards and a lady playing a mandolin like instrument but with a large gourd shaped body. She did most of the singing but the men would join in on some songs. They sang some Turkish, British and American songs and it was very nice.
Dinner started out with a large plate of appetizers. There were 10 different items on the plate. The ones I knew about were a small stuffed bell pepper, a piece of ham, cheese (probably goat cheese), a marinated heart of an artichoke and a stuffed grape leaf. The ones I’m not sure about were a slice of some sort of pâté (probably seafood based) and scoops of the following all finely chopped into a stiff dip like consistency: a dark red mixture that seemed to be tomato and olive based, a light red mixture that might have been sun dried tomato with paprika and olive oil, a light tan mixture that may have been hummus and a bright pink mixture that seemed to be cream cheese based and was a little sweet. I ate them all on bread and every one of them was delicious. I wish I knew what they really were.
The second course was a medium sized egg roll like concoction. It was stuffed with vegetables and I think lamb and then deep-fried. It had a tomato-based sauce on it. It was good but not as good as the appetizers.
The entrée was roulade of lamb with rice and pine nuts and grilled vegetables. It was delicious. It’s odd but in the US I usually don’t like lamb much but in Europe and on the ship it’s almost always at least very good, if not outstanding. The lamb was marinated and then rolled with just a little filling of some kind and grilled. All that was left of the filling were some coarsely chopped spices; the rest had melted into the meat. By the time we finished all this food we were stuffed. Many people could only finish half of their entrées because it was just too much food.
After dinner we climbed the tower for a great view of both sides of the city. All the major buildings are illuminated, as are many others and the sight is very impressive.
We got a surprise on the way back from the tower. Our little boat picked us up but took us to the Asian side of the city where our bus drove us back across the Bosporus Bridge, a very long suspension bridge built in the 1970 to join the two city halves. The lighted city was a beautiful sight from high up on the bridge.
When we got back to the ship it was after 11PM and we have an early start for a tour tomorrow so it was off to bed.
April 6 – Istanbul, Turkey – Day 2. This is another cloudy, breezy and cool morning. Today we are seeing the sights of Istanbul. First we took a little drive around the city for orientation and then we stopped at one of the most interesting churches anywhere, the Hagia Sophia Museum. For the first 916 years of it’s life the building was a church. For the next 481 years it was a mosque and since 1935 it has been a museum. It’s one of the greatest examples of early Byzantine architecture. It still has traces of Roman influences. The huge dome covers most of its nave. It’s difficult to say how the interior was laid out prior to its conversion to a mosque. There’s a small semicircular concave bulge in the center of the wall opposite the entrance that may have served as an apse for the main altar. Its two side naves are very narrow while the central nave is extraordinarily wide.
The interior is heavily decorated with mosaics and designs in colored marble. Much of it is in pretty bad shape but because the Muslims whitewashed over them when they converted it to a mosque they are fairly well preserved considering their age of almost 1,600 years. The dome is over 180 feet above the floor and the windows are very small and few in number. The ceiling is probably at an average height of 100 feet so a normal flash is useless and the available light is insufficient for photography without a tripod. You could see them but with a little more light I’m sure they would have been spectacular. The best way I can describe them is that they are like the decorations you see in a traditional Greek Orthodox church. Very formal poses, little use of perspective, like old icon art. Lots of gold tiles with reds and greens predominant in the designs. I got one picture of a mosaic of Christ that I think I can clean up enough to make worthwhile. At the back of the sanctuary on either side of the central nave were two large marble jars each carved from a single block of stone. The chandeliers are large Ottoman oil lamps. They’re wrought iron structures with 40 glass cups setting in rings on the edge of the central horizontal structure. The cups used to hold oil lamps but now they have stuck a small electric bulb in each one from the top without even attempting to hide the wires. Looks sort of like you took a string of Christmas lights and dropped each bulb into a small glass letting the wires just hang out all over the place. Fairly tacky work and it doesn’t give out much light.
The exterior of the building is unfaced block and brick. It may be the larges fired brick building I’ve ever seen. It’s a complex structure with a huge central dome and half domes as buttresses on the side walls. There are little domes at various places around the building and with the addition of four minarets in the mosque conversion it looks very exotic. It’s a very impressive building that has not been well cared for over the years.
Our next stop was the Topkapi Palace. The palace was built in 1460 by Sultan Mehmed II, the Conqueror, and was used as his headquarters for the Ottoman Empire and became the primary residence of the Ottoman Sultans. It’s a large complex with buildings for administration, justice, living and cooking. We entered the first and largest courtyard through the Imperial gate. This is a large grassy area with flowerbeds planted in beautiful tulips, crocus and pansies. Oddly enough there’s a church here, the Hagia Irene. Constantine built it in the early part of the 4th century. Like the Hagia Sophia it’s a brick structure. It looks very nice on the outside but I’m told that none of the mosaics or frescoes has survived. They have a species of crow here that has a gray body with black head and wings. It’s about the prettiest crow I’ve ever seen. In fact I didn’t think it was crow until one called, “Caw, Caw.” I guess crows speak the same language the world over.
Across the first atrium we came to an inner wall with a double-spired known as the Gate of Salutation. This crenellated gate with its flanking spires would be at home in the wall of any medieval castle, but instead of being round they are octagonal. Only the sultan was allowed to enter this gate on horseback, everyone else had to walk. Just inside the gate walkways that radiate across the inner atrium to get to various parts of the complex. The walk to the far right leads directly to the kitchen building that is set in the inner wall. It has 18 very large chimneys set in two rows in its roof. Must have been a hungry bunch.
We paused under the covered walkway of the kitchen for our guide to pass on some general information about the Ottoman Empire. There was a map on the wall there for that purpose. He also pointed out the various buildings we could see in this area, the Tower (Kosk) of Justice (the sultan’s hearing room), the Harem (living quarters for his wives) and the Gate of Felicity through which you enter the inner palace. It’s currently not raining but it has been off and on all morning. I think my sinuses are starting to plug up.
We entered the inner palace through the Gate of Felicity. This is where the sultan spent his workdays. The gate had some very nice landscape frescoes on the edges of the ceiling. Just inside the gate is the Presentation Room. This is where the sultan would hold audiences with visitors. In the center of the inner palace courtyard is the Library of Ahmet III. In the buildings bordering the courtyard are the Privy Room (where the sultan’s advisor’s have offices), the Sacred Relic Room, the School for the Inner Boys (these boys were in training to be aides to the sultan) and the Treasury. The Sacred Relic Room holds various mementos from Mohammed the Prophet and other Muslim dignitaries.
The Treasury holds a display of items that belonged to various sultans. Two of the artifacts are very famous, the Topkapi Dagger and the Spoonmaker’s Diamond. The diamond, at 86 carats, is supposedly the third largest in the world. The dagger is fantastic. You can only see one side of it and it may be that the other side is not decorated. On the side you can see there are three huge emeralds that completely cover handle. The only other decorations are 8 large (4 carat+) diamonds, one set on each corner of the emeralds. The hilt is set with a circle of somewhat smaller diamonds. The scabbard is set with diamonds of all shapes and sizes at the top and on the tip. The center one third of the scabbard is finely engraved and has an enameled still life of a basket of fruit and flowers at the center. The dagger is one of the curved blade type and at the tip of the scabbard is a round cut emerald. The entire handle and scabbard are made of gold. If it weren’t so gorgeous it would be gaudy. The display is in four rooms and includes gilded thrones, elaborate dishware, jewelry, swords, daggers, suits of armor, military awards and utensils. A pretty impressive collection. We had to leave the area before I had a chance to do all the exploring I wanted to do but that’s the nature of tours.
Our third stop of the day was the Blue Mosque. This structure is probably the zenith of Ottoman architecture. It is obvious that the Hagia Sophia greatly influenced the design but 2 centuries of experience allowed the design to have greater interior space and be much brighter inside. Whereas photos in the Sophia were all but impossible, pictures here were much easier but still a bit challenging. Both the Sophia and the Blue Mosque have a large central dome with supporting domes around it. The main difference is that there are fewer and slimmer support columns in the Blue Mosque and a lot more windows. Construction advancements allowed for more efficient transfer of ceiling weight to the floor resulting in fewer and smaller columns and by taking some of the weight off the outer walls they could put in more windows. So while the external shape of the two is very similar, the engineering is very different. The inside of the mosque is painted in very ornate designs in somewhat muted colors. The stained glass windows are very pretty.
We crossed the street in front of the mosque to the area where the Roman Hippodrome was located. Here I was greeted by what seemed like an old friend, the obelisk of Tutmosis III of Egypt taken from the Temple of Karnak at Luxor. When we visited there last year our guide mentioned this obelisk because its mate is still at the temple standing to one side of one of the gates.
From the Hippodrome we drove to the spice market where we are going to have lunch. The restaurant is inside the market, a location we can’t drive to so we walked to the spot through the spice market. It was a wonderful walk. We passed not only spice vendors but also sellers of candy, dates, nuts and a few shops selling leather and jewelry. The market is in an L shaped building and we had to walk all the way through. When we got to the restaurant I saw why. It’s actually the last store in that end of the spice market and it’s right on the street. Problem is it’s a pedestrians only street and the bus couldn’t get any closer to have us go that way. Plus, since it’s raining the walk through the covered market was much drier and warmer than walking on the street. We are eating upstairs. Downstairs they have a take-out department. They had large shish kabobs of lamb and chicken turning in front of gas burners and as the outside would be cooked they used large knives to shave the done parts in strips into a tray below. When the countermen needed more meat they had a large scoop that they used to scoop up the shavings for use in gyro-like sandwiches. When I was on Crete in the Air Force I loved that stuff. They call them suvlaki, but to other Greeks that just means cooked on a spit. To the rest of the world they’re gyros. (In case you’ve ever been confused about what to call these meat, lettuce, tomato, onion and zidziki sauce marvels, it’s pronounced yee’-row. At least that’s what my Greek uncle Stephanos called them and he was in the restaurant business.)
Our lunch was delicious. I love the salads in this part of the world. The flavors are so much brighter than in the US. I think it comes down to the dressings. Here olive oil is the major player with some spices and maybe a little vinegar. And the olive oil, egad! I’m sure you can get olive oil this good in the US but I’m not sure what you’d have to pay for it. We had lamb kabobs and they were excellent. The desert was the only weak spot. It was something like rice pudding and while it was ok, I know the cuisine has better selections because we had three of them last night.
After lunch we walked back through the spice market to the bus and then drove to the Grand Bazaar for some shopping time. This place was crazy. The main walkway is pretty tame, mostly very high-end jewelry stores and fashion shops but the alleyways off to the side were a whole ‘nother story pardner. They had carpets, leather goods, clothing, lamps, candy, ceramics, shoes and antiques. It was as though the cave of Ali Babba and the 40 thieves had been picked up by a tornado and deposited here in downtown Istanbul. It was a colorful and noisy symphony of sights and sounds. The only downside is that the marketing, while in do way aggressive, is too intrusive for my taste. Don’t these guys know that if I want something I’ll as them for it? Apparently not!! Although I have to admit some of them do it with a great sense of humor and style. Like the man who invited me into his shop to see his “genuine fake watches”. I turned him down but I had to laugh and give him a smile.
It was a full, fun, wet and cloudy day. We had seen some wonderful sights but it was time to head back to the ship to dry off and warm up.
April 7 – Varna, Bulgaria. Finally a decent sunny day. It’s not warm but it’s dry and sunny. Varna is a city of about 8 million people. The Ottomans ruled Bulgaria for 500 years and the Communists from Moscow about 40 years but they are now independent and opening up to the West after all that time of isolation. As with most Soviet satellite countries, anything of value was taken to Moscow and very little was given in return. Our guide told us that their agricultural system was a mess under the Soviets but now that they are free, people have been going to the USA under a State Department sponsored program and they are learning how to farm efficiently. He says that this has been a big help to them.
Bulgaria is in the center of the Balkan Peninsula. It’s bordered on the west by Serbia and Macedonia, on the south by Greece and Turkey, on the east by the Black Sea and on the north by Romania and Moldavia across the Danube River. Its capital city is Sofia and it has a total population of a bout 1.5 million. Varna is it’s main port but is more famous as a resort area. There are lots of very nice beaches right around town.
I don’t often get into politics but the Bulgarians did something that just cries out to be mentioned. In 1946 Bulgaria was taken over by the Soviets, converted to a People’s Republic and became a satellite of the USSR (read as Russians). In 1989 the First Secretary and head of the Communist Party, who had been Head of State for 30 years, was forced to resign. In 1990 they held free elections and in 1991 they became a parliamentary republic. In 1995, in an apparent fit of nostalgia, they voted to put the Bulgarian Socialist Party (this is what the Communists now call themselves) into power. Two years later, after a string of social and economic crises they regained their senses and held ‘early’ (that means that elections were not due to be held but because of a vote of ‘no confidence’ in the government, the Commies were thrown out and the Coalition of Democratic Forces (that’s the name of a political party) was put in office.
Political Note: A vote of no confidence by a parliament is not exactly the same as recalling a candidate in the USA but is very similar. To impeach someone you have to have evidence of a crime and gain a conviction. To recall someone all you have to do is get a majority of the voters to agree that the person is doing a terrible job and you can’t allow them to fulfill the term to which they were elected. Not all jurisdictions in the US allow for recalls but some do. In the parliamentary system a vote of ‘no confidence’ in the current government says that you can’t afford to have them continue in office and ‘early’ elections are scheduled to see whom the voters want to run the country instead.
Apparently one year of democratic rule by the Communist party was enough to remind the people why they were so happy to see the behinds of the Russians go back over the hill to where they came from.
We are joining our travel agent, CSI, for a tour into the countryside. It’s been out policy that the first time we go anywhere we try to get out of the big city to see what the country as a whole is like. Usually if we get someplace for the second time we’ll stay in the city. Today we are headed to the village of Socoro (Falcon).
Before leaving town we drove around Varna to see the University, Palace of Culture, Maritime Garden, Assumption Cathedral and we drove across the Asparuhov Bridge both ways to get a view of the city and harbor from a higher vantage point.
The countryside was pretty, small villages dotting the valleys where agriculture is the main business. They seem to have quite a bit of arable land so I’m pretty sure that the only problem with their farming has been those problems inherent in a centrally controlled system. That is, people a long way off who have no idea of local conditions or the processes they’re managing are making unalterable decisions that get handed down the line like gospel to the poor slob at the other end who has to implement these decisions which more often than not prove to be not only bad but catastrophic.
It took about one and quarter hours to get to Socoro. It’s a fairly small village, almost everyone has a fair sized garden and most have a grape arbor. The houses are neat and well tended, apparently there’s no shortage of civic pride in the village.
Our first stop was at the local school. The children come here up to age seven and then they transfer to the larger school across the street. The first room we entered had displays of the children’s handiwork; colorful drawings, projects made from construction paper and structures made from Lego type plastic blocks were on the walls and the shelves. The flag and the great seal of Bulgaria were on the far wall. From that room we entered a hallway. The first door on the left was a little washroom with sinks and a small shower. Hanging on the far wall was a wooden shelf with vertical dividers every four inches. In each little space was a cup and directly below that in a longer space hung a small towel. I didn’t see any evidence of paper towel dispensers or water fountains so I guess these cups and towels were how the kids get a drink and dry their hands. Directly across the hall was a larger room that had little cots in it apparently for naptime.
The next door opened into a classroom that could have been in any kindergarten in the USA. The kids were sitting in two rows of little chairs and singing as we entered. There were 16 boys and two girls. The teacher told us that they had only 4 girls at the school but two were absent that day. The kids appear to be ages 5-7 and they were well behaved considering all the hubbub that bringing in 20 strange adults can muster. One pretty little blonde girl was not seated with the others but was in the play area pretending to be cleaning up the small play kitchen. As we walked into the room three of the kids started saying hello in pretty good English. They reached out to alternatively shake hands or give a high five as we passed them. It was very cute.
Once we had all gotten in the room and order was restored the children sang us a song and then 2 boys came front and center to recite a poem for us. There were hand motions involved in the story but since the language sounded very much like Russian I didn’t catch any of the plot. At the end they bowed to a thunder of applause. Next one of the girls came forward to recite another poem. Everyone else in the room had on tennis shoes or some other form of sneaker. This little girl had decided to make a fashion statement. She was wearing green and yellow mouse slippers. They were so clean that it was obvious she hadn’t walked to school in them but had put them on especially for this occasion. The fact that they clashed with her denim skirt and white sweatshirt didn’t faze her in the least. I’m betting those mouse slippers are her favorite wardrobe item. Her performance got her a rousing round of applause as well.
The teacher then explained a little about the school and the school system in general with our guide acting as translator. The government picks up the bulk of the expense for the kids to attend school but most of the parents pay a little as well. The church subsidizes those who cannot afford to pay even that amount.
When the presentation was over and questions asked and answered the teacher and the children performed a little dance for us. They held hands and walked in a circle while singing a song. At one point the circle stopped moving and they alternately put one foot in the circle and then the other foot in the circle. Looked a little like the Hokey-Pokey. But then the song changed and the circle broke up and everyone started hopping around. Maybe it was a song about the Easter Bunny. Doubtful!
As we left the room most of the kids came forward to shake hands and wish us bye-bye. The visit was fun and a break from our normal tourist activities. Best of all the kids seemed to be having a great time as well.
Our next stop was at the village church. Well, not exactly. The village is so small that it doesn’t currently have a pastor but receives religious services from the priest in the next town. They have a small chapel in the town that is used for services. It’s a small building that would not look like a church at all except for the small cross at the peak of the roof and a steel erector set type column in the front that has the chapel’s bell at the top. It’s dedicated to the Archangel Michael and has very small icons on the walls of Jesus, Mary and various saints. They are Eastern Orthodox and as such have no chairs in their churches. Everyone stands for the services. The lady that takes care of the chapel was very friendly and gave us a history of the structure and their services through our guide. Until the Russians left church services were tolerated but not encouraged.
From the chapel we headed to the home of the local caterer. He’s not really a caterer but when anyone in the village has something to celebrate he can host it in a building on his property. There’s probably not enough business in this little village for anyone to make a full time business out of catering.
His garden was very nice and had art work, mostly excellent woodcarving, from the area on display. He had a structure that looked almost exactly like the social hall at any of the Pocono’s or Adirondacks summer camps. Inside were tables with hand woven, very heavy coverings. Hanging from the ceiling was a very impressive array of dried gourds of all types. Some were 4-5 feet long. When I first looked up I thought they were sausages of some kind hanging in a smoke house.
At each place on the table was a plate with a large square of pastry. I discovered it was ‘banitsa’ a feta cheese and egg concoction with a crust on both bottom and top. I guess it’s an egg pie. It was very good. They served very light lemonade with the banitsa. As we came in the host offered us a small glass with a clear liquid in it. He said what it was but I didn’t quite catch it. I sniffed it and knew exactly what it was. The Italian’s call it grappa. After you’re done with the wine making process you still have a little grape matter that was not usable in the wine. You take this, make a mash and distill it a few times and that’s grappa. Every Mediterranean culture has this stuff and they all have a very innocent sounding name for it. Usually they translate whatever that name is into English as ‘grape brandy’. Sounds quite civilized, no? A better translation would be ‘firewater’. This stuff will seriously knock you down. It’s not the smoothest drink you’ll ever have but it does not seem to be all that alcoholic and after the first sip it smoothes out nicely. I did taste it and it was exactly like grappa.
Six ladies in traditional costumes came in to dance for us. Accompanied by the host and another man on accordions they performed some folk songs and dances from the region. The songs were fun and the dancing was like line polka dancing, same steps but without a partner. The costumes are mostly red, green and white, the same colors as the Bulgarian flag. The most amazing things were the woodcarvings. Some were intricately carved, others were more the product of cutting and piecing wood together in patterns or shapes, from huge sunflowers to grotesque faces the workmanship was outstanding.
Then it was back to the ship. After lunch we decided to go outside the port where some local crafters have displayed some of their wares. Crocheting and knitting are very popular hobbies here and the ladies sell their items to make some extra money. All along the wall leading up to the port there are displays of needlework. The ladies standing by their work are so nice and eager to talk to you that you really want to buy something from everyone. Diana bought a few very nice crocheted items of unusual design and excellent craftsmanship.
Our entertainment for the evening was a local folkloric group. They danced and sang to the accompaniment of a drum and a chanter attached to a bellows much like a bagpipe but without any drones. They were lively and energetic. The show was very enjoyable.
April 8 – Sevastopol, Ukraine. This is our first time here and until very recently this area had to be avoided because it’s the home of the Russian Black Sea fleet. They also have a major submarine base here and the area was totally restricted. Captain Gunderson said that it’s a little odd for him to sail into port here because for years he had to sail very wide around it to avoid problems with the Russians. Now that the Ukraine is independent that’s changed. The Russian fleet is still here but the Ukrainian’s control access to the port and they are happy to have us. The Russians hated to loose the Ukraine because it cuts them off from direct access to the Black Sea (and therefore the Mediterranean) and it was a rich agricultural area growing much of the USSR’s wheat. The Ukraine is a fair sized country with about 60 million residents and shares borders with Russia, Belarus, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania and Moldavia. Lots of neighbors, all of whom were formerly either in the USSR or members of the Warsaw Pact. The Ukraine is occupies most of the southern Crimean Peninsula.
The city of Sevastopol is at the end of the large peninsula that projects into the Black Sea from the north and was established by Catherine II of Russia in 1783. It was the site of the White Army during the Bolshevik Revolution and elements of the anti-Bolsheviks fought on even after the port fell. Too bad that we didn’t jump in on the side of the Loyalist White Army against the Reds, we might have spared ourselves the entire Cold War period. But then, who knows whether the alternative would have been any better.
Historical Philosophy Note: That’s the problem with history; you know what happened on the course that was taken. You just don’t know what the results would have been if a different course was selected. Could have been better, but also could have been worse. The common wisdom is that we should never have gone into Vietnam because it turned out to be a big disaster. Well, who can say what the world would look like today if we hadn’t? Might be better, but could be worse. We’ll never know. How many more terrorist attacks would have been made on US soil since 2001 if we weren’t in Iraq and Afghanistan. I sure don’t know and no one else does either. This I do know. If the choice is fight them there or fight them here, we better choose there. Also, since there haven’t been any I can say for sure that there couldn’t have been less under any other scenario.
Before leaving for the countryside our guide, Manita, took us on a driving tour of the city. The ship is practically docked downtown. Right on the city’s main square is a McDonald’s. Our guide says their kids love it. It’s what they use to keep the kids in line. “If you’re good this week we’ll go to McDonald’s on Saturday.” She says it works like a charm. Imagine that working in most of the US. I don’t think so.
There are monuments to the military all over Sevastopol. Many of them are dedicated to submariners. Our guide’s husband is a retired submariner who was stationed here. He survived an accident with a sub in which most of his friends were killed. Submarine duty is tough as best and I’m sure in the Russian Navy it was much worse. At the height of the Soviet’s power they had 688 ships stationed here including over 100 submarines. The Russian navy is still here under an agreement with the Ukrainians. Of course, the Ukrainian navy is also here and I understand there’s quite a bit of tension between the two. I think this is understandable. Suppose the British would have maintained a fleet in Boston after the Revolutionary War, I don’t think that would have set very well with the colonials.
The Cyrillic alphabet is driving me crazy. Sevastopol is CEBACTOПOЛb in Cyrillic and Yalta is ЯЛТА. It’s a phonetic language so you can sound it out if you can just remember the substitutions like, Я=Y, B=V and П= P. Actually the last one is pretty easy for me because it’s the symbol for pi and that’s a Greek alphabet P, something I remember well from by year and a half on Crete.
The drive through the countryside was beautiful. This is a wonderful agricultural area and it’s small wonder that it was known as ‘Russia’s Breadbasket’. Despite this fact there have been a few miscues here. In the 1950s Nikita Khrushchev came to the USA and, according to our guide fell in love with the idea of growing corn after seeing the vast fields in Kansas and Iowa. He issued an order that the Ukraine should grow more corn despite the fact that the climate there is totally different from the US Midwest. Acreage was taken out of wheat production and put into corn, which, as any Aggie could have told you in advance, failed miserably. That had a doubly bad effect as they not only didn’t get the corn, but their wheat production was reduced to the point where they had bread shortages all across the USSR. Well, not in the homes of the high party members but everywhere else. The USA had to step in and sell wheat to the USSR, a great embarrassment to the Communist system but a big boon to US wheat farmers. In fact they sold so much wheat to the Soviets that grain prices rose in the US sparking protests in some quarters. I guess it’s always something.
On the other hand, Khrushchev fell in love with ice cream and brought ice cream making technology back from the US. That was the start of the ice cream industry in the USSR. Of course, they also had to have freezers to go with the ice cream. Apparently Nikita was fascinated by the concept of a ‘freezer’. When he was told that almost every home in America had one he refused to believe it and thought it was just US propaganda.
We are heading to the village of Bakhchisaray (Бахчисарай in Cyrillic) to see a palace of the Crimean Khans. This is another tour arranged by our travel agent, Cruise Specialists. Our overall aim is to learn about the Crimean Tartar culture that thrived here. Historically Tartars are somewhat short, have dark eyes, skin and hair with high cheekbones. The Crimean Tartars are a subset of the Tartar group. They are ethnically mixed with Bulgars, Khazars, Slavs, Romanians, Byzantine Greeks and Goths as well as Venetians and Genoese, some of whom were brought to the Crimea as slaves by the Tartars themselves. As a result many Crimean Tartars have lighter skin and are taller and less Mongol looking than the pure Tartar.
They began as a nation at the time of the Crimean Khanate. The Crimean Khanate was a Turkic-speaking Muslim state that was among the strongest powers in Eastern Europe until the beginning of the 18th century. They accepted Islam in the 1200s and subsequently became one of the centers of Islamic civilization. They were excellent horsemen, rivaling any cavalry that ever existed. The threat from the Crimean Tartars forced the creation of the Russian Cossacks, another very good mounted soldier. In fact, in 1571, they seized and burned Moscow and believe me, Moscow is a long way from the Crimea on a horse.
The Hansaray (Khan’s Palace) in Bakhchisaray, built in the 1500s and home to a succession of Crimean Khans, is one of the Khans’ greatest palaces and is the only one open to the public today. It is completely walled and holds a mosque, a harem, a cemetery, living quarters and gardens. The architecture is unique and I guess it could be called Tartar style although I’m not sure that is an officially recognized type. In conjunction with the completion of the palace the capital of the Khanate was moved to Bakhchisaray. The palace's was constructed by Russian and Ukrainian slave labor and was designed by Ottoman, Persian and Italian architects.
A small but deeply cut stream runs in front of the palace and provides a moat like defense from that side. There’s currently a concrete bridge leading up to the Northern Gate but I don’t think that was there 500 years ago. The gate itself is wide and arched and swings open in two halves that are more like heavy wooden doors than a gate. There’s a small door in the left half to allow the entrance of a person on foot. The structures are fairly square with right hand angles on most of the joining walls and towers. The roofs are curved tile like you see in Spanish architecture in the US. The eaves are carved to look like they have tassels hanging from them. The exterior walls are white but they are painted with colorful geometric patterns in red, blue and gold. Directly over the Northern Gate (the main entrance) is a small relief carving or mold of intertwined green dragons breathing small spits of red fire at each other. Three pointed arch windows are above the dragons, flanked by two identical painted designs.
Upon entering you find yourself in a large courtyard with buildings on three sides and directly ahead there are broad terraces up a gently sloping hill to the wall at the back of the palace. To your left would be the ‘Big Khan Mosque, the Khan’s Cemetery and the stables. To your right are the Living Block, the Main Block, the Pool Court, the Harem and the Falcon Tower. The building containing the main gate is used for administrative offices.
We went through a gate in the southern end of the Living Block and entered the Main Block from a small courtyard. Through a double arched doorway, sort of a small vestibule, we found ourselves in the Divan Chamber. Divan is derived from the Persian word for council. In this room all the important state, economic and war decisions were discussed and made. There are long divans set along the wall to the right and a shorter one at the far wall. I assume the Khan sat on that one and his advisors sat on the longer one against the wall. The stained glass windows on the eastern wall were casting interesting shadows on the wall and floor. I had to wait until the group cleared out to get a decent picture of them.
We left the Divan Chamber by the door opposite the entrance and came into a partially covered courtyard known as the Ambassadors’ Courtyard. In the courtyard there are two more doorways and two fountains. The Golden Fountain is a simple affair. It’s a white marble slab about 7 feet high and 4 feet wide set in the wall with a pipe coming out of the wall about 3 feet up that drops a stream of water into a marble rectangle that looks like a planter box at the base. The slab is carved with intricate designs that are filled with gold leaf. Not really very impressive. The other fountain is an important part of this palace and probably saved the palace from destruction while the Russians were in control. Most Khan palaces were severely damaged or completely destroyed.
The second fountain is the ‘Fountain of Tears’. It was erected by Khan Krym Guirei in 1764 and placed next to the mausoleum of his concubine Diliara Bikech. The Khan was said to have fallen in love with this Polish girl in his harem. Despite his reputation for cruelty, he was grieved and wept when she died, astonishing all those who knew him. He commissioned a marble fountain to be made, so that the rock would weep, like him, forever. Russian writer Alexander Pushkin was so moved by the sad story of this small fountain he wrote a whole poem to it called "The Fountain of Bakhchisaray". When Catherine II annexed the Crimean territory the fountain was transferred to its current location in the Ambassadors' courtyard and Pushkin’s poem is credited with saving the palace.
The fountain itself is set up like a pachinko machine. Water drips out at the top into a center bowl. When that bowl becomes full it drips out on each side into two smaller bowls. The two smaller bowls are lower in the center so they both drip into a center bowl just like the top one. This pattern is repeated two more times until the last set of small bowls drip into a catch basin at the bottom of the fountain. This catch basin has a hole drilled at the top in the middle where it can drip down into a spiral shaped groove in the floor. This spiral groove represents the eternity of his tears, going round and round forever.
To the right is a set of seven stairs leading to a room that was once an open court called ‘The Pool Court’. There’s a small fountain in the center of a square pond in the middle of the room. It has been enclosed with short walls and stained glass windows taking the wall up to the ceiling. The windows are about half clear, frosted glass with two stripes of blue, red and violet diamonds running around the room just above and below the center of the glass. There’s a built in couch running the entire circumference of the room and a small brass chandelier hanging from the orange and gold ceiling.
Directly across the courtyard from the Divan Room is the entrance to the Palace Small Mosque and it is indeed small. Our small group was just able to fit into the space comfortably. It had a simple niche in the wall to indicate the direction of Mecca. The five prayers each day have to be performed kneeling toward that city. The most remarkable thing in the mosque was the circular stained glass window over the niche. It has a green circle around the circumference with a yellow circle in the center of a blue six-pointed Star of David. Now that’s an unusual sight in a mosque. Our guide told us that the six-pointed star with the circles has been a Tartar symbol for as long as anyone can remember. In fact, she said there is evidence that people who predate the Tartars used it. She said that no one knows the what the symbolism represents. The outer circle is round the inner circle is more elongated like a racetrack.
From the mosque we exited the Living Block and went over to the Harem Block. It’s here that the Khan lived with his family. All the windows are covered with wooden screens to prevent anyone outside from seeing in. There’s a porch on the front that has a screened in area for the women to sit outside and still not be observed. Inside there are only three rooms that you can visit. The Buffet Room, which had a fireplace for cooking and a large table for serving, the Drawing Room, which served as a community room for the family and another small room that holds a collection of Tartar period musical instruments. There are several sizes of stringed instruments, a large tambourine-like instrument, various flutes and pipes, a large zither style instrument, a drum and what looks like the airbag from a bagpipe.
From the Harem we crossed the main courtyard and entered the Khan’s Cemetery. There are two large mausoleums where the chief leaders are interred and then a graveyard for the Viziers and other dignitaries. They bury the body underground but they place a sarcophagus type box atop the grave. The box is open at the top for adults and most have two pillars coming up from the ends of the box. For a man one of the pillars has what looks like a thistle flower atop it. Our guide told us it represents a turban. For women, the two pillars may have a fez like top or a rounded or pointed top but no turban. For children the top of the box has a cover and no pillars.
When I was done looking around I went and sat outside the Northern Gate to people watch. There must be a school nearby because small groups of children came by intermixed with adults. The children weren’t sure if they should look at the stranger much less talk to him. But a smile and a wave usually produced a grin if not a return wave.
Soon the group gathered and we boarded the bus to drive to a Tartar museum in the countryside. On the way we passed vineyards, groves of what appeared to be peaches in bloom and what I think is the sprouts of winter wheat. We traveled through some valleys with high rock cliffs that appeared to be very weathered soft limestone. All the edges were rounded and the crevices smooth.
In about 30 minutes we arrived at the Tartar Culture Center. It’s a private home that has been restored to traditional standards. Our host is an architect. He restored the estate buildings himself and is one of the founders of ethno-tourism in the Crimea. You entered the property by crossing a small creek on a wooden bridge and going through a covered gate in the fence. There’s a flower bordered walk up to the house from there. The house was built in 1827. It’s a rectangular structure with a lean-to ell at right angles from the back of the house. We were welcomed into the home and directed to the bathrooms or up four steps into the living room. Just like the Khan’s palace this room had divans all around the wall. There are tables set with coffee cups and some snacks. The snacks were in two serving dishes, a bowl containing dates, dried figs, walnuts, sugar coated peanuts and some little rolls that had a marshmallow consistency and tasted like coconut. On a plate beside this were little, half-inch thick crescent cookies in a circle each nested with the two on either side and dusted with powdered sugar. They very much like Scottish shortbread. Also on the table were bowls of potpourri and crystallized sugar for the coffee. The coconut items were delicious as were the dates and the figs. The walnuts were good but nothing special. The shortbread-like cookies were fantastic. I’m a big fan of Scottish style shortbread and this was right up there with the best.
When we were all settled our host and our guide came in to give us an explanation of the Turkish coffee ritual. This is a very social thing here and must be done by a certain protocol. First they brew the coffee in a large urn and transfer it to small copper pitchers with a long wooden handle on the side. The server carries a teaspoon with which she skims off some of the top of the coffee in the pitcher and places it in the individual’s cup. She then pours coffee into that cup until it is about four-fifths full. (If you think that extra space is to give you room to add cream or milk, think again! There’s no cream, milk or other whitening materials anywhere in sight.) If you want sweet coffee you don’t put the sugar in the coffee itself. That would be roughly equivalent to putting soy sauce on a bowl of white rice in a Japanese restaurant. A HUGE no-no if you expect any credit at all for having good manners. What you do is you put the crystallized sugar lump between your teeth and sip the coffee through it.
I like my coffee black so this is not a problem for me. Despite the fact that one of the real reasons to travel is to try new things, I saw most of my fellow travelers (actually tourists, a traveler would have tried the Tartar method) drop the lumps of sugar directly into their coffee. I was expecting the coffee to be bitter and not very good. Actually, it was very strong but the flavor was great. When I wasn’t getting any more coffee from the cup I looked down into it and about one fourth of the cup was filled with a thick brown sludge of coffee grounds. I mean thick. If you turned the cup upside down it did not run or fall out. Yikes!!
After the coffee and snacks were consumed our host showed us around the house. He had Tartar antiques all around, 150-year-old rugs, embroidered linens that were over 100 years old, furniture and ceramics from the 1800s. It was fascinating to see these items as they would have been used when they were new. At this point we met our host’s daughter. She was a very cute 2-year-old. As with little girls everywhere she was dressed primarily in pink, pink tennis shoes, pink tights and a pink sweater. Her little skirt was tan to give a little contrast. She had huge brown eyes and short brown hair and obviously is totally smitten with her daddy. She was happy to pose with him for a picture that the strange man wanted to take. You could see that she is proud of her English skills as she greeted me with a very clear Hello and said 'Yes' when I asked if she would let me take a picture of her with her dad.
We moved to an arbor behind the house to have lunch. As I walked out I noticed two ladies kneeling beside a large pot over an open fire. They were ladling soup into bowls. I asked if I could take their picture and they said yes. The reason I hesitated is that they were both dressed in traditional Muslim style with long robe-like dresses and headscarves. It could be that that’s part of the cultural experience and they are not devout Muslims in the Iranian sense but more like Turkish or Moroccans, much less legalistic about things that the Koran does not require.
Lunch was great. We started with bread, a marinated salad in the style of a slaw but with much more than cabbage and carrots and a white cheese with some mild black seeds on it. Then came the soup. It was a vegetable soup with lamb and it was delicious. The secret was that they had provided a garlic/yogurt mixture in a bowl on the table that you were supposed to put in the soup. Some people didn’t even try it but I put about 4 spoonfuls into it and mine was just the touch it needed to go from just good to delicious. The secret is to understand that the locals understand their cuisine much better than you do and if they put something on something or in something you have to at least try it.
Next came huge stacks of stuffed grape leaves, much like the Greek style but there was something different about them. Some spice I couldn’t quite identify, maybe cinnamon. I was the first to try them, as I often am. My only comment was, ‘These things are just like potato chips, you can’t eat just one.’ They were fantastic. I heard other people saying as they chewed their first, ‘You know he’s right, I’m going to have to have a few more.’ They brought so many that I don’t think any table finished the entire plate. I hate to admit it but I ate about 8 of them and didn’t feel guilty because there were still about 20 on the plate when we left.
In addition to the food they served small bowls, actually much like lotus shaped Japanese teacups, into which we poured rose water. It didn’t look like much but the flavor was sublime. Not at all strong but delicate and definitely rose. They also served small bowls of rose preserves. They just eat them straight and when I tried them that way, they were good. But I put some on the bread they served earlier in the meal and it was over the top. I don’t know if it was the surroundings, the beautiful day, eating outdoors or what, but that was the best lunch I’ve had on this entire trip so far.
After lunch our host took us on a small tour of his village. There’s the old Mosque and Madresse (a Tartar School) that was used as a post office during Soviet times. He is working to get both buildings restored to their former look. It was a great day. CSI strikes again!!
Our host is obviously a Tat or Yahboyu Tartar because his is tall and very Caucasian in appearance. Of the three groups of Crimean Tartars only the Noğay retain their Mongolian appearance. His daughter could easily pass for any tanned little girl from SoCal.
Our guide told us on the way through Sevastopol that Stalin had awarded the city ‘Hero’ status for their stiff resistance during WWII. She said there’s a monument with the medal on it that we can see from the ship on our way out. It was a great day and we got to the ship 15 minutes prior to all aboard time a very efficient use of the day.
The sail away was very pretty and I did spot the Hero Medal Monument, a tall pyramid shaped structure with the Red Star at its tip and the gold wreath, red star and red flag with the word ‘Hero’ on it that is the Hero Medal. There were people sitting at the base of the monument and on the slope below it watching us leave and taking pictures of the ship. We’re the first ship of the year and not all that many American ships come here so we’re a bit of an oddity.
Tomorrow is a day of scenic cruising so it will almost be a day at sea. Yea, I need another one.
April 9 – At Sea Cruising the Bosporus and Dardanelle Straits. To sail out of the Black Sea you first enter the Bosporus Strait. This 20 mile long channel varies from one-half to one and one-half miles wide. The Black Sea is the only sea in the world that has an average water level that is higher than sea level. The difference is about 10 inches. If the Bosporus were wider this difference would be lowered but as it is the restricted water flow out of the Black Sea accounts for the differing height. This also causes the strait to have a very stiff current and going out of the Black Sea it pushes you along. Interestingly the First Officer also told me that the difference in salinity between the Sea of Marmara and the black sea cause an opposing undercurrent that adds to the navigational considerations.
On the way through the strait you pass small villages with old fort and mosques. The villages are usually in valleys. Along the shore just outside the villages are old wooden palaces called yalis (ya-lees). They range from fairly simple to very ornate but they are all fairly large and usually right on the bank of the water. In very short order we sailed past Istanbul, which marks the end of the Bosporus and the beginning of the Sea of Marmara.
Marmara is about 80 miles long and pretty wide for the first 40. It’s truly like being at sea because you can’t see any land. For the last 20 miles is slowly narrows until you are in the Dardanelles. This strait is about 40 miles long and passes the sight of many very fierce battles from WWI. The European bank (on the northeast) is the Galipoli Peninsula where the combined Australian/New Zealand forces, the ANZACs, were almost totally wiped out by the Turks. Every year both nations hold a memorial day to honor the sacrifices these men made. Most are buried here in cemeteries along the Dardanelles. Near the entrance to the Aegean Sea on the Asian bank you can see the hills where the ancient site of Troy was discovered.
Once we were in the Aegean we quickly lost sight of land and the scenic cruising part of our day at sea was over.
April 10 – Kusadasi-Ephesus, Turkey. Today we are going to see a very important site from both a historical perspective and a Biblical perspective, the site of ancient Ephesus. Kusadasi is a prime location for sun worshipers and historians. Many people come here to get to the ancient village of Ephesus. Lately however, it has developed into a tourist spot of its own.
Ephesus was already a Greek city on the west coast of Anatolia in the 6th century BC, in the region known as Ionia during the Classical Greek Period. It was one of the twelve cities of the Ionian League. The city was famed for the Temple of Diana (aka Artemis, completed around 550 BC), one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. It was destroyed in 401 AD. The importance of the city as a commercial center declined as the harbor slowly filled with silt from the river Cayster. Malaria began to plague the area as the silted in harbor formed a marsh that bred mosquitoes and it was deserted.
Ephesus was one of the seven churches of Asia mentioned in the Book of Revelation. The Gospel of John might have been written here. It is also the site of a large gladiator graveyard. It has a long and illustrious history.
When Alexander the Great defeated the Persian forces at the Battle of Granicus in 334 BC, the Greek cities of Asia Minor were liberated and Alexander was greeted warmly in Ephesus when he entered it in triumph. When he saw that the temple of Artemis was not yet finished, he proposed to finance the temple and have his name as an inscription of the front. But the inhabitants of Ephesus refused, claiming that it was not fitting for a god to build a temple for another god. This era is known as the Hellenistic Period.
Ephesus later became a subject of the Roman Republic. Taxes rose considerably and the treasures of the city were systematically plundered. When Augustus became emperor in 27 BC, he made Ephesus the capital of proconsular Asia, which covered the western part of Asia Minor. Ephesus entered an era of prosperity. It became the seat of the governor, growing into a metropolis and a major center of commerce. It was second in importance and size only to Rome. It is estimated that Ephesus had nearly half a million inhabitants in the year 100, making it the largest city in Roman Asia. Ephesus was at its peak during the first and second century AD.
The city was famed for the Temple of Diana (Artemis), who had her chief shrine there, the Library of Celsus and its theatre, which was capable of holding 44,000 spectators. This open-air theater was used initially for drama, but during later Roman times gladiators also fought there. The population of Ephesus also had several major bath complexes, built at various points while the city was under Roman rule. The city had one of the most advanced aqueduct systems in the ancient world, with multiple aqueducts of various sizes to supply different areas of the city.
Ephesus was an important center for early Christianity from the AD 50s. From AD 52-54, the Apostle Paul lived here, working with the congregation and apparently organizing missionary activity into the outlying areas. He became embroiled in a dispute with the Silversmiths, one of the strongest and most influential artisans guilds. Their livelihood depended on selling the statuettes of Diana in the Temple (Acts 19:23–41). He wrote the letter 1 Corinthians from Ephesus (possibly from the "Paul tower" close to the harbor, where he was imprisoned for a short time). Later Paul wrote to the Christian community at Ephesus, according to tradition, while he was in prison in Rome (around 62 A.D.). It is possible that this was a general or circular epistle, an encyclical. Three early copies don’t have a city name filled in the opening but have blank there instead. Some take this to indicate that the letter was to be addressed to several different churches. It’s fairly well accepted that Paul used scribes because his eyesight was not too good or he had some problem that prevented him from writing legibly. In any event I’m not sure this omission in later manuscripts is any indication of who was to get the letter. It could be that some enterprising scribe was going to make a little money on the side by making copies addressed to certain individuals or cities. It’s not possible to tell from the evidence at hand, although since the letter does not contain any personal references or specific problems in Ephesus it is possible that it was to be circulated and just went to Ephesus first.
Anatolia was also linked with the Apostle John and the Gospel of John might have been written in Ephesus around AD 95. Ephesus is one of the seven cities addressed in Revelation (2:1–7), indicating that the church at Ephesus was still strong.
Two decades later, the church at Ephesus there was still important enough to be addressed by a letter written by Bishop Ignatius of Antioch to the Ephesians in the early 2nd century AD, that begins with, "Ignatius, who is also called Theophorus, to the Church which is at Ephesus, in Asia, deservedly most happy, being blessed in the greatness and fullness of God the Father, and predestinated before the beginning of time, that it should be always for an enduring and unchangeable glory" (Letter to the Ephesians). The church at Ephesus had given their support for Ignatius, who was taken to Rome for execution.
Ephesus is the largest collection of Roman ruins east of the Mediterranean. Only about 15% of the city has been excavated. Can you tell that I’m really hyped to be here? I haven’t been this stoked since our trip to Luxor and Giza. Here’s just one small part of the reason why. When you visit Jerusalem or almost any site in Israel you can’t be completely sure that you are walking on any of the streets or places any of the Biblical characters walked. Almost everything has been covered over, built upon or otherwise destroyed. (No, I really don’t care what your guide there told you. If he said you could be sure that Jesus touched or walked somewhere the odds are he was telling a whopper.) Here in Ephesus we do have the problem of destruction but we don’t have the problem of ‘built upon’. The structures are as they were. Granted, many of them were built after the time that Paul and John were here, but some remain. The theater mentioned in Acts 19 for example. There’s only one theater here and there’s never been another one. The road up from the port, Harbor Street, and the Marble Way in front of the theater are original, as is the Agora. Unless Paul never went to the market or the theater in the three years he live her he walked those streets. The Library of Celsus, the Odeum and the Temple of Hadrian were all built later but the Temple of Diana was definitely there in Paul’s time. It’s the near riot of Diana’s devotees that caused Paul to leave Ephesus for Macedonia and after that Greece.
The drive from Kusadasi to Ephesus was about 45 minutes through very pleasant countryside. We passed an amusement park on the way called Adaland. It had buildings with onion dome spires and other exotic structures. Sort of an Islamic Disneyland. Our guide Ocan (with a long O) did the smart thing and got us off the bus at the highest point of the city and let us walk downhill to meet the bus at the lower end.
The first recognizable structure you see looks like a small theater but it’s the Odeon or more correctly the Bouleuterion because that’s were the Bouleia (Senate) met. It only holds about 1,500 and it is possible that it was also used for other purposes but it was built to serve as the meeting place of the Senate.
Directly east of the Odeon is the Prytaneum, the administrative center of Ephesus. This structure had a temple like appearance because the front façade was eight columns holding up a large entablature however the interior of the building consisted of a large hall surrounded by rooms that housed the religious and civic administrators of the city.
We walked down the street in front of these buildings until we came to a series of arched rooms that are still not fully excavated. This area served as warehouses for the city’s supplies of food, wine and other goods. In a large field just south of this area we could see a large collection of marble chunks. Some appeared to be parts of columns, lintels, walls and who knows what all. Each had been marked with a series of numbers. Ocan told us that this was the world’s largest jigsaw puzzle. As pieces are unearthed they are marked with numbers that identify where and when they were found. They are then moved to this field and sorted by location. As the supply of parts from a single location begins to grow people start to see if any of the pieces related to each other for the purpose of reconstruction.
We walked down a small, narrow but nicely paved street an open area called Domitian Square where the Temple of Domitian, one of the largest temples in the city was constructed. This temple and its statue are some of the few remaining artifacts that can be connected with Domitian.
There, on the side of the square, I encountered an old friend, this time identified. On a large block of marble braced up on the side of the square was a carved relief of the same winged god that was on the fresco at the House of Neptune & Amphitritis in Herculaneum. Here he is identified as Mercury. There are too many similarities for this not to be the same person. Very cool.
Also on the Domitian Square is the Tomb of Memmius, the grandson of the dictator Sulla. It was erected in the 1st century AD, which puts it in the same time frame as both Paul and John. (The first century is years 1 through 100.)
Math Moment: It has always been amazing to me how our culture seems to accept the notion that provable actual facts can be a matter of opinion. For example, what was the first year of the 21st Century? If you said 2000 please move to the back of the class. It was the year 2001. I remember at the time that there were articles in the newspaper discussing which year it should be including Op-Ed pieces by people who are supposed to be reasonably intelligent. Apparently Mathematics has now become the subject of opinion. Keeping in mind that there was no ‘Zero’ year between BC and AD (the year 1 AD followed directly behind 1 BC), the first year in the 1st Century AD was the year 1. Now, also keeping in mind that a century has to have 100 years in it, what would be the last year of the 1st Century AD? That’s right the year 100. If it were the year 99 that century would be one year short of 100. Therefore, the first year of the 2nd Century BC was the year 101 and the last year was the year 200. Carrying that math forward and if we agree that a century without 100 years in it is something that does not exist then, the last year of the 20th Century was 2000 and the first year of the 21st Century was 2001. Looking back on my profession, computer systems. It seems that the Millennium Bug should have been called the Almost the Millennium Bug. If a millennium is 1,000 years and the first year was 1 then the first millennium ended on Dec 31, 1000 and the second one ended Dec. 31, 2000. Since the use of a 2-digit year (the Millennium Bug) would cause the program to fail on Jan 1, 2000 when the 2-digit year would go from ‘99’ to ‘00’, it wouldn’t quite be the millennium yet. Some things are just not a matter of opinion. There really is such a thing as fact and truth or right and wrong and the sooner our society figures that out the better off we’re all going to be. See, I warned you about reading these italicized paragraphs.
On the east side of the square is the Heracles Gate. It’s named after the images of Hercules found on its columns. It’s said that if you touch both posts of the gate at the same time you will have the strength of Hercules himself. Don’t you just hate it when they switch between the Greek and Roman names for the gods. Heracles/Hercules or Diana/Artemis. You say tomato, I say tomato. (That doesn’t work very well in writing)
Once you’re through the gate you are on the Street of the Curetes. It’s a fairly wide, marble slab paved street that runs downhill from Domitian Square to the small square that was at the center of Ephesus. You have a great view of the library from the top of the street. Along the street there were many structures only some of which have been identified. On the right a little way down is the Fountain of Trajan. It was built in 102 AD and dedicated to the Emperor. It had two basins one at the street and one a little higher and further back. The water cascaded from under the statue of Trajan and fell seven feet to the first basin. From there it flowed into the street side basin for use by passersby.
Almost directly across the street I noticed a wide mosaic that ran parallel to the street. Behind it are small rooms with arches at the back leading to other rooms. Turns out it was a strip mall. The mosaic was the walkway and the rooms the stores. All in all it was about 15 yards long. Across the street from the downhill end of the strip mall is an impressive structure, the Temple of Hadrian. It has a large arched doorway between two square doorways. At the top of the arch is a great bust of Hadrian. All the pediments and column capitals are ornately carved. This area must have been a porch because five feet behind these doors is a wall with a central door leading into a room that has not been excavated. Inside the porch on either side of the entablature are carved friezes with scenes from the foundation of Ephesus.
Just downhill from the temple was a large; three story building, the Baths of Scholastica. These were the public baths of which the Romans were so fond. Attached to the baths and in very good condition is the public latrine. It has a layout that would probably make most Westerners uncomfortable. There’s a central pool that was uncovered. Around the room, like the divans of the Tartars there’s a row of seats with keyhole shaped holes in them about 18 inches apart. I’ve heard of dancing cheek to cheek but this is a whole new concept for me. In areas where the seats are not set on the top you can look down inside. They had constituently running water about four feet down to carry everything away. Not bad for the times. Across the street from the baths are the Hill Houses. This was a fancy area of the city where the upper class lived. It’s currently under excavation.
A short distance down the street from here you are in the central square and facing the Library of Celsus, definitely the most beautiful building in Ephesus. It was built around 114 AD by Gaius Julius Aquila, probably as a tomb and monument for his father Celsus. But advances in city planning and the construction code thwarted his plans. It seems that by the time the plans were completed and the materials on site it was only allowed to build a tomb in the city center if it was in the context of a public building, like a library. The façade is highly ornamented and has three doors flanked by double columns on each side. Between these four double columns are niches with four statues personifying the characteristics of Celsus, wisdom, knowledge, thought and virtue. It was two stories tall and contained more than 12,000 scrolls. The grave of Celsus is beneath the ground floor directly across from the entrance.
As you stand facing the library on the square the building directly behind you is the brothel. That puts the brothel between the library and the baths. When you enter the square you have a choice to make, study or sex and a bath.
To the right of the library is a large gate leading to a flat open area with columns around most of the perimeter. This was the city agora or market place. From the central square there’s a very wide street that goes between the library and the city gymnasium called the Marble Way. When you get to the bottom of the Street of the Curetes if you turn right you are on the Marble Way. Just past the agora and on the opposite side of the street is the city theater. It could accommodate 44,000 people. It was begun by the Greeks and expanded to its current size by Roman Emperor Claudius I. It has a large stage building and the stage itself is very roomy. The orchestra area is semicircular in shape. In Greek times this area held the famous Greek Chorus. They didn’t use any instruments in their plays but had a group of people who spoke their lines in unison usually giving the audience information that the actors in the play didn’t know. “And now brave Agamemnon goes to meet his death!” might be something you would hear a Greek Chorus chant at the end of a scene. In the later days of the Roman Empire, gladiatorial contests between men or men and animals were held here. This necessitated the construction of a solid wall in front of the orchestra for its protection. There are three large tiers of seats around the orchestra. The highest seats are 100 feet higher than the level of the orchestra and a long way from the stage.
Along the Marble Way there are symbols carved into the paving slabs. Some are very obscure but our guide stopped to explain one of the to us. The Marble Way connects with the Arcadian Way the street coming up from the harbor. The symbols in the pavement were the outline of a left foot, an archway and a square with a star over it. The guide says that it means ‘There’s something interesting on the left at the square ahead that you will really enjoy.’ Of course, that’s the location of the brothel. Another one was a circle with lines across the diameter cutting it into 8 wedges. This was the sign that Christians were here. ΙΧΘΫΣ are probably letters you recognize from the Christian fish symbol. The circle cut into 8 slices has lines to trace all these letters.
At the end of the theater just before the gymnasium there’s a small columned fountain in the wall of the stage building. This is one of the few Greek structures that is still as it was in the Hellenistic Period.
At the end of the theater just by the gymnasium we turned left onto the Arcadian Way. Ahead we could see the remains of the port buildings including Paul’s Tower where it is believed he was imprisoned. Also at the harbor was a small bath and market.
From there we walked along the ridge to the right and headed toward the parking lot where our bus was waiting. I wish we had longer to look around the city. There were so many things I didn’t have a chance to examine closely.
We drove to a cultural center where we are going to have lunch, see some folkloric dancers and have a carpet making demonstration.
The lunch was great. I know for sure that some of the items had feta cheese in them but that’s all. They had a burrito like affair with feta and vegetables in it. It was very good and that’s saying a lot for something that didn’t include any meat. There were two small spring roll like items and I didn’t detect any meat in them either. They were also good. Last came fresh fruit and Turkish coffee.
The dancers were good. The men’s costumes were every reminiscent of Cossack uniforms. The ladies wore long-sleeved, belted robes and tall hats with a veil down the back. The dances were very energetic. At one point one of the men was dancing on his toes. The carpet weaving demonstration was pretty routine, lots of knot tying. Some of these rugs, the silk on silk type have almost 3,000 knots per square inch. The think I’d never seen before is how they process the silk cocoons to get the raw silk. They put the cocoons in warm water and that kills the worm and softens the silk fibers. Then they use a stiff bristle brush to pick up the cocoons and pull one thread of silk from each one. They put these threads together on a spindle and crank away leaving the cocoons dangle in the air as they unravel. The threads were so fine that you could hardly see what was holding the cocoon in mid air as it bounced and spun.
They had a four piece Turkish band playing on the lido for and outdoor BBQ. As usual the food was great and the band was good. Our evening entertainment was a Turkish dance group. They performed with great energy and style. The belly dancer was excellent. We all agreed it was the best folkloric show we’d ever seen on any ship at any time.
April 11 – Santorini, Greece. I’ve never been to this island before although I spend 18 months on the island of Crete in the late 60s. It was first colonized by Minoans from Crete in 3000 BC and has been inhabited ever since. It was a much larger island then. In 1500 BC a violent earthquake followed in 1450 BC by a huge volcanic eruption formed the crescent shaped island we have today. The caldera of the volcano is 6 miles across. Only about three fifths of the caldera wall is above water because, like Mount Saint Helens, the volcano blew out violently toward the west. Inside the caldera more recent volcanic action has formed three small islands on which you can find steam vents and the sulfur smell of underground volcanic activity. They still experience earthquakes here as we did on Crete. In 1956 Fira (Thira) was all but destroyed by one but was rebuilt on the terraces of the caldera’s cliffs. Talk about optimistic.
There are three major groupings of Greek islands and one odd ball. The Ionian Islands are near the Ionian Peninsula, as the name would indicate. They include Corfu, Kefallonia and Zakynthos. These are the greenest and most fertile of the islands. The Dodecanese Islands are all close to Turkey. In fact, if Greece insisted that the normal territorial waters be respected around each island, Turkey could not have a port on the Mediterranean Sea. (This issue has been a source of irritation between Greece and Turkey from time immemorial.) Rhodes is the most famous of these but Kos, Karpathos and Patmos, where Saint John received the Book of Revelation, are included in the group. The Cyclades Islands are between the other two groups and Santorini and Mykonos are the most famous of this group. This is the home of the archetypical whitewashed houses and blue domed churches you see in tourist advertisements for the Greek Islands. They’re what most people think of when you say the words ‘Greek Islands’.
The one ‘odd ball’ is the island of Crete. It’s by far the largest and southernmost of the Greek islands. It is, however, the home of the oldest known Western civilization, the Minoans. Much of their history is shrouded in myth and mystery. It is believed that the story of the labyrinth and the great bull actually refer to the palace of Knossos on Crete. To someone who had never seen a structure larger than their cave home this palace would have been a bewildering experience.
The sail in to Santorini was spectacular. The harbor is inside the volcano’s caldera so the ship actually sails right into the old volcano. There are steep, high cliffs right from the water up on three sides of the ship. These cliffs are almost 1,000 feet straight up from the water. In fact, those of us going on tour had to be dropped off at the commercial port of Athinios south of Fira. There’s only three ways up from the tender pier at Fira, walk, cable car or donkey and I think the jam up to get all the tours off under those circumstances would be awful. At the port there’s a very narrow switchback road from the village of Athinios down to the pier to accommodate the unloading of the supplies that come into the island. Our buses can use that to get down to the water to pick us up. The ship anchored there and sent us ashore by tender. After all the tours are off the ship they moved it to anchor off Fira and tender everyone else in from there. When our tours are over we’ll be dropped off in Fira and use one of the three methods to get down to the tender pier and back to the ship. Our tour included a voucher for the cable car or the donkey. If you walk down there’s no charge but since the walkers share the narrow path with the donkeys you probably have to spend some time getting the donkey dung out off your shoes.
The switchback drive up the cliff from the pier took longer than the ride to our first stop, the village of Megalochori (Great Village, as in Megalopolis (Great City)). Known as the residence of thinkers and dreamers, Megalochori has hundreds of small, whitewashed houses on narrow streets. Our bus dropped us off a little outside town next to a vineyard. The grape vines are gown in a very unusual but traditional way here. The vines are trained in a circular shape that looks sort of like a straight-sided basket. Since there is very little new growth on them now it looks like some huge fan of Easter has laid out acres and acres of baskets to prepare for the big day.
As we entered the village’s narrow streets I saw an impressive bell tower ahead of us. It was pyramid shaped with three larger bells on the bottom row, two medium bells on the second and one small bell at the top. In fact each bell was a unique size giving the tower six different notes to play. The oddest part was that the tower was atop an arch over the small street and the ropes to toll the bells went off to the side to the church the tower serves. When we got up to the tower I tried to get a picture of the church but everything was so close that no meaningful composition could be had.
As we approached the blue domed Church of the Virgin Mary it was obvious that preparations were underway for Easter. A group of men had gathered in the small square in front of the church. They were busy assembling a large wooden cross that was to be hoisted into place. On benches around the square women were cutting and trimming cedar boughs to be used for decorations. All this was under the direction of the village Papas (Greek for Pastor). He was wearing the typical winter garb, a gray cassock with a long black vest and cylindrical hat with a flat very slightly rounder top. The exact uniform that they wore on Crete 40 years ago. After Easter his outfit will be almost exactly the same but mostly in white. As he was getting ready to leave he asked the women if they would trim the doors and windows of his house as well and they said that it was their plan to do so. I don’t melo much Ellanika (please forgive the phonetic spelling) anymore, but I catch enough to get along.
We continued through the small town between the small, whitewashed houses to the other side where our bus was waiting. On the drive to Emporio Village, which is further inland, we passed the ruins of Greek windmills. All that remains are the cylindrical stone towers that form the base of the structure. The vanes were cloth sales that could be adjusted depending on the direction and strength of the wind. Some of the ruins still had the metal rods that held the sails but most were just the towers standing on the ridgeline like some abandoned watchtowers.
At Emporio we were dropped off at the village square as far as the bus could go. There was a fisherman there with two boxes of small fish for sale. We walked up the hill on a fairly wide cobbled pedestrian avenue past a large church painted in pale yellow and white with the obligatory blue dome. The unusual features of this church are the dark, rust red accents on the bell tower; just a touch on the four corners at the very top and a stripe around the center of the bells arches.
At the top of this wide avenue we turned right onto a typical, very narrow street and continued up the hill. On the way we passed another church with a triangular 6-bell tower but this time it was actually on the church. The church was whitewashed but the edges of the arches and the pillars were made of a medium brown brick. A little later we passed a very small church with a two-bell tower that was the traditional white and blue color scheme. There are a lot of churches on this fairly small hill. At the top of the hill, just below the walls of Fort Kasteli we encountered another church. This one had 5 bells in a unique arrangement. It had a small tower with two bells on the bottom level and one bell on the top and in another tower set at right angles to the first are one large bell on the bottom and a smaller bell on the top. The two-bell tower had the largest and smallest bells. The three-bell tower had the middle notes.
The fort proper was above all this and is not in good repair. We entered in and climbed some stairs to the base of a tall watchtower that is being restored. In the room at the base of the tower they had a mosaic floor of gray and black smooth river rocks. The tower has been partly painted and repaired but there is still a lot of work to do. From this vantage point the view of the islands coastline is spectacular. We walked down the hill on a different route from the one we took up. The narrow streets curve and intersect as odd angles so you can never really see that far ahead of you. A good defensive scheme as any enemy coming up the hill would suddenly find themselves getting unwanted attention from the defenders at very close range.
From there we drove to the black volcanic sand beach in the town of Perissa. This is the nightlife center of the island in the summer. The seaside is lined with cafes, restaurants and bars. If it were warmer I’m sure that some of us would get in the water but not today. That is not to say that everyone shares our opinion. Two young women have come to the beach for some time in the sun. One actually got into her bathing suit but just long enough for her friend to snap a picture of her standing in the surf. The friend didn’t even pretend and had her picture taken in her sweatshirt and jeans. One of the nice things about black sand is that it will absorb and hold heat so once the pictures were taken they both got on their blankets and got some sun on their faces. A Japanese family was at the beach. The parents weren’t going in the water but their two little girls, about 5 and 3 were in their shorts and splashing and running in the surf. They would scream and run up the beach as the water surged in around their legs. They were having a great time and if they were cold they didn’t give any indication at all.
Diana and I sat in one of the covered areas on the beach side of the road and ordered coffees from the waiter who came across from the café on the other side. I got a café latte and Diana ordered a mocha. They arrived on very unusual saucers, shaped like an ocean roller with a round indentation for the base of the cup. Diana’s mocha was piled high with very thick whipped cream and my latte was excellent. Each came with a small chocolate cookie. While we were enjoying our coffees three determined young ladies came to the beach and, despite the cold and breeze, immediately undressed to their bathing suits and laid down on their towels to enjoy the sun. The sun was bright and the black sand was warm so it wasn’t as bad as it could have been. They seemed to enjoy it.
I decided to get a closer look at the village church and Diana wanted to do some shopping. The church has multiple blue domes and a blue top bell tower. Here as on an earlier church they have painted part of the bell tower a rusty red. As I was observing this, the symbolism struck me. The shapes on the corners of the bell tower are the exactly the same as the ‘horns’ on the brazen altar of the Wilderness Tabernacle. The horns of the altar were one of the places that the blood of the sacrifices was applied for sanctification of the altar, the priests and the people. The rusty red color applied to these ‘horns’ on the bell towers represents the blood applied by the Israeli priests for spiritual cleansing of the nation of Israel and by fulfillment the blood of Christ applied to us for our sanctification as well. If those of you who may be Greek Orthodox have any insight into this please let me know. I have not seen this done on any of the Greek churches in the US, nor was it done on Crete.
High on the hilltop overlooking the city is a monastery that the guide says has been there for at least 500 years. From this distance it looks to be of much more modern construction. Our guide seems quite knowledgeable so I’ll take her word of it.
We left Perissa about noon headed for Fira the island’s largest town. It hangs right on the edge of the caldera and affords great views of it and the ship. The bus had do drop us off at the inland side of the town and we walked up to the square of the large Greek Orthodox Cathedral. It was a little bit of a pull and after climbing up the two villages we visited some of the older travelers had a tough time of it.
Once we were there our guide pointed out where we caught the donkey or cable car down to the tender pier. It was on the other side of town but the walk was not bad because there were lots of little shops, cafes and restaurants to look at on the way. We were looking and shopping when we found a small street side café selling souvlaki. You can get these in the states but it’s not the same. Most of the meat is made by a company called Athena. Places like Daphne’s Greek Cuisine and most other fast food Greek places buy it from them and use it to make the gyros. It’s good but not as good as you can get here. On Crete this was my day off treat. I’d go downtown to Iraklion and get a bottle of beer and two or three gyros and sit on the square to watch the world go by. The one new touch that threw me a bit was that they now put 3 French fries into the pita along with the meat, lettuce, onion, tomato and ziziki (sp?) sauce. That’s ok but I asked them not to put them in for the second one I ordered. Did I mention that it was very good? Diana came back from her shopping expedition while I was eating the first one and I was so effusive with my praise she had me get her one also.
We finished our lunch and continued toward the cable car. As we were preparing to leave the captain’s wife and daughter, Isabel, joined us in our car. The system has small 6 person cars linked together that travel up and down the cliff. One side goes up as the other goes down, more like a funicular system but this one travels at way to steep a grade to have any sort of traditional rail car. It looks like the small cable cars that you sometimes see at amusement parks but fully enclosed. As the cars exit the top station the incline abruptly changes from the 45 degrees of the station to almost 90 degrees from horizontal for the trip down. As soon as we started Isabel’s mom asked her to sit in the center of the seat so she could, “Take your picture with Daddy’s ship in the background.” I had to chuckle at the Daddy’s ship phrase. I wonder if HAL knows. Actually Captain Gunderson has been in command of this ship from it’s launching in 1988. In fact, he was the Captain in charge during its construction. He stayed with the ship as it went from the builder, Royal Viking, to Seaborne and then to HAL. I guess it’s understandable that he has a proprietary interest in the ship; he certainly seems to love it.
Back on the ship we relaxed until dinner. Sail away was not until 11PM so dinner was an on deck BBQ.
April 12 – Easter at Sea. A very good day at sea to celebrate Jesus’ resurrection. At this point I have to mention that Holland-America Line (HAL) is very good about having religious services on board for these long trips. There’s always a priest, rabbi and minister on the ship. The priest and minister have services every day we’re at sea and on Sundays. The rabbi has a service for Shabbat and any Jewish holidays like Passover. The ship reserved one side of the Lido Restaurant for the Seder dinner. I’m a regular church attendee when I’m home but I don’t really go to the services on the ship most of the time. I don’t attend church out of habit or ritual, if it’s not spiritually meaningful or informative as far as I’m concerned it’s pretty much a waste of time. Many of the Protestant ministers on the ships are just too secular to be spiritually edifying. They want to talk about social issues or current events and not the meaningful things of God. As far as I’m concerned that’s what social, service or country clubs are for, not church and especially not daily Bible studies. I understand the need to be nondenominational as they have a wide variety of people attending but there’s a core of doctrine inherent in Protestant view of Scripture that has to be exposited or the minister is wasting his and my time.
All this to say that the minister on this trip is great! His name is Gene Tanner, and he actually talks about the Bible and our relationship to our Creator. On top of that he’s a great speaker. He has obviously done his homework and is not just regurgitating the things he was taught at Cemetery, oops I mean Seminary. (I usually refer to schools of higher theological education as cemetery because they have killed many a fine mind.) So, in opposition to my general rule, I am attending both Sunday and the daily devotionals on this trip. On Sundays he is teaching on the names of God in the Bible, what they mean and what that implies about His relationship to us and ours to Him. In the daily devotionals he’s teaching on lesser known personalities of the Bible. People you don’t often hear about like Philemon, why they are in the Scriptures and what they teach us about our spiritual lives. They are not long meetings, 20-25 minutes with no singing, just teaching.
Easter service was no exception. Gene, that’s what he asks us to call him, gave one of the best sermons on the resurrection I’ve ever heard. It wasn’t anything new, I’ve been studying that event for 56 years, but it was a fresh look through ‘new eyes’ at the almost 2,000-year-old event. The pastor also holds services two times a week for the crew. Most Filipinos are Catholic and most Indonesians are Muslim, but there’s a small portion of each that are Protestants. On Easter, the ships assistant chef Jerry, a Filipino, came to the service to lead our singing. He was in his chef’s uniform because he had to be excused from work to come and he had to go back as soon as the singing was over. But you could see on his face that he was very happy and proud to be leading worship for the passengers. That was a special moment for him and us. A great service!!
I have to give Diana the credit for this discovery. She is willing to go to the devotionals, even if I think they are of marginal value. This time she reported back to me that Gene was especially good and that I’d probably like him. I was skeptical because my experience has not been good with the ministers. In fact, on many cruises I have enjoyed the rabbi more that the minister. But, understanding that God gave me Diana because I often need her insight, I decided to go and am very pleased I did. I have been remiss in not mentioning this earlier but Easter finally provoked me to get to it.
By chance or design, Easter was a formal night. Randy the Yum-Yum man, the guy that rings the chimes and mans the mint, date and ginger bowls as you leave the dining room, was dressed as the Easter Bunny. He’s got a great personality, more outgoing that the usual Filipino and that’s saying something, as the average is very gregarious. I decided that the ship was a little warm so I wore my suit and not my tux. I was glad I did, as it was a little warm in the dining room.
Our entertainer was Larry Linkin a clarinetist. He played a lot of the traditional Benny Goodman style music but the branched off into some jazz and classical as well. We’ve seen him before and he’s a good entertainer as well as musician.
April 13 – Valletta, Malta. Ah Valletta, we’ve been here twice before, once on purpose and once because Momar Kadafi Duck wouldn’t let us in to Libya so we went to Malta instead. It’s a great island and Valletta is a great city. In fact, St. John’s Co-cathedral in Valletta is my favorite cathedral in the world. It’s history, style and décor are so wonderful you could spend months studying the place and still not get it all.
The island’s history is a great story as well. The short version is that it was a Phoenician settlement as early as 1000 BC and was subsequently occupied by the Greeks, Romans, Moors, Normans, and the Kingdom of Sicily. In 1530 Holy Roman Emperor Charles V gave it to the Knights of Saint John of Jerusalem (also known as the Knights Hospitaller or later The Knights of Malta) for their service to the Empire in ejecting the Moors from Europe. They fortified the island and it became the premiere island stronghold in the Mediterranean. In 1789 the French, under Napoleon, captured the island and the Knights were forced from the island. They moved their HQ to Rome where it remains today. I would have said that this was a terrible shame but in every defeat there is a victory. The French occupation of Malta gave my personal hero, Admiral Horatio Viscount Lord Nelson the opportunity to once again dominate the French and send them back to the homeland from Malta. In 1799 Malta became part of the British Empire. In 1964 they became independent and self-governing.
Valletta was founded by Jean Parisot de la Valette, the Grand Master of the Knights and named for him. He assured his place in history by repelling the Turkish army of Suleiman the Magnificent when they tried to invade the island. To this day, in the museum of the Palace of the Grand Masters you can see Dragut’s sword. Dragut was the commander of Suleiman’s army. He was killed in the battle of Fort Saint Elmo and his loss, together with the Turks inability to capture the key island turned the tied against the Ottomans and vary shortly they were completely driven from Europe. This is why Charles V gave Malta to the Knights, despite being overwhelmingly outnumbered and sustaining terrible casualties they had prevented a key position from falling into Ottoman hands and set the stage for their exit from the mainland as well.
In Saint John’s the knights are buried under the floor of the church. The area is tiled with ornately carved mosaic coverings over the more than 400 knights tombs. It’s a beautiful floor. The Grand Masters are buried in chapels around the walls. Most of these chapels are very lavishly decorated to honor the master. One chapel is the exception, that of the Grand Master who surrendered to Napoleon rather than fight. His chapel is plain to say the least. Other than the sign with his name and dates on it, there is no decoration and the materials used are very plain. In most churches this would not stand out but in the church every surface is decorated, carved, painted or colored in some way. His action was viewed as treasonous and cowardly as they were no more underdogs to the French than they had been to the Turks. 250 years of easy living had weakened the leadership of the Knights and they had lost the will to sacrifice for a greater good. Unfortunately large segments of the population of the USA are currently in exactly that mode. Thank God for the ruminant of self-sacrificing, patriotic and honorable citizens willing to serve.
We had booked an off road 4x4 adventure that would have taken us to the less visited sights of the Island. There was a culture here from at least the 4th millennium BC. That would make it as old as the Minoans. Very little is known about these people. At that has been found are some temple like structures and some statues. Unfortunately we received a call from Shorex about 4 days ago saying that Diana and I were the only two signed up for it and it wasn’t going to run. We looked at the other tours and didn’t schedule any because we’d been to all the places before so we planned to just hang around Valetta and spend some time in Saint John’s.
The sail in to Malta was spectacular as usual. You approach Valletta from the east so the sun is rising behind you and shining on the fortifications and walls of the city giving it a glowing gold coloration. I was up on deck for this event. This morning it’s cloudy but not raining as we sail past the city and into the harbor at the base of the old city walls (There’s both a city wall and a sea wall. Together, including the cliff face, they are about 50-60 feet tall.). The pictures will not have that early morning sun snap I love so much.
It must have been divine intervention because the weather is terrible; wind, rain and pretty cool. It’s just as well that we don’t have a tour. We are both fighting the last remnants of our colds and we don’t really want to have a setback. We decided to take the public bus up to town and then walk down the main street to Saint John’s, do some shopping and go into the cathedral. It started raining in earnest while we were waiting for the bus and wasn’t really letting up so when we got to the city gate we went quickly inside and tried, as much as possible, to stay under cover while we walked down Republic Street towards Saint John’s. We have a few items we are looking for and we are hitting the shops to find them.
When we got to the cathedral the line to get in was very long so I said let’s get a coffee and think this over. We went to Republic Square just opposite the Grand Master’s Palace to find a café. I knew there were quite a few of them on the square because we had lunch there last time we were here. We settled indoors at the Café Regina where Diana ordered a large hot chocolate and I ordered a large cappuccino with a cheese pastry. I wasn’t sure what the pastry was exactly but how bad could it be? When it came it was a very flaky, circular crust shell with a ricotta cheese filling. We split the pastry and formulated an alternative plan of attach while enjoying our drinks.
They have a multimedia show here called ‘The Malta Experience’. People who have reported on it always give it a good review but my preference is to see the real thing while I’m there, not video of it. Diana, on the other hand, enjoys Imax presentations and multimedia shows whether we’re at home or on the road. Since we’ve been here twice and she hasn’t gotten to see it yet we decided to head there if it seemed feasible. It’s on the eastern shore in the old fortifications and there’s no direct way to get there.
When we left the café the rain had let up and it was just a light sprinkle so we decided to walk to the show. I knew if we kept heading downhill and as much toward the east as possible we wouldn’t go far out of the way. Problem is that the streets are so narrow and the buildings so tall that you really can’t keep a point of reference in sight. The streets curve and meet at odd angles so it’s often unclear which direction you are headed, and I have a really finely tuned ability to keep track of just that. Amazingly we emerged from the tangle of narrow streets just 50 yards down the street from the theater.
The bad news was that the next showing was not for 45 minutes. Fortunately there were a few seats in the waiting area so Diana shopped and I sat for a while before she joined me. The show was good. It had excellent video and narration, starting with the old, mostly unknown people and bringing the island’s history to light. Each seat had it’s own headphones that you could set to any of 14 languages to hear the narration. The music came out of speakers in the auditorium and since the headphones were the on-the-ear type you could hear that also.
It was raining hard again when we left the theater so we caught a cab back to the ship where we dried off and warmed up.
Back at the ship we had a local folkloric show that was very low key but did present the dancers in very pretty traditional costumes. Most of the dances were agricultural in theme.
Our entertainer was Paul Adams, an English comedian. His understated humor had us all laughing. We’d seen him before and he’s always been very good.
April 14 – At Sea. Another great day at sea, the first of two. My new morning routine is breakfast, Bible study, chat time, lunch, write, show, write and bed. We are heading back to Spain, this time to the home of sherry and flamenco, Cadiz. We were here last year and it’s a very enjoyable place.
Not much else to say about this restful day. We’re both still fighting our colds but they never really got that bad and they seem to be getting better.
April 15 – At Sea. Yippee!! Once again I’m out of the country on tax day. This is getting to be a habit. I stuck to my new routine and I’m loving it. I did get in a little Tai Chi on my own. Just the 7 brocades but I remembered them all.
I woke up at 3AM and decided to take a look out the window. There was the Rock of Gibraltar. The captain had mentioned that we would pass it at that time so we must be right on schedule.
Our entertainer was Martin Mastic, a Polish classical guitarist. He’s very good but I didn’t really like many of the songs he played.
April 16 – Cádiz, Spain. We were here last year and once before that. It’s not as good as Malta but it’s great nevertheless. Cádiz (Ca’-dis) is on a small peninsula that juts out into the Bay of Cádiz. If your shoulder were the mainland, if you extend your arm, Cádiz would be on your fist. Once again our friends the Phoenicians were the first settlers, this time followed by the Carthaginians and then the Romans. It was a thriving port in Roman times but became a forgotten backwater under the Visigoths and the Moors. Under Spanish control it became important again as the starting point for many of the voyages to the newly discovered Americas. It claims to be Europe’s oldest city.
Cádiz in on the Costa de la Luz (The Coast of Light). It’s just outside the Mediterranean Sea before the Strait of Gibraltar. On the other side of the strait past Gibraltar on the Mediterranean is the Costa del Sol (Coast of the Sun).
Politically Incorrect (but totally accurate) Historical Viewpoint: It has become popular to point out that since there were already people living in the Americas, the Europeans didn’t discover anything. How many times have we all had to endure the educator, documentary filmmaker or newscaster whining, “Those Europeans didn’t discover anything, there were already people there.” Well that’s such a load of horse pucky that you could fertilized all the farms in Kansas for the next hundred years with it if you could just get it in a cart and ship it there. Those manipulative, agenda driven hacks are counting on us to be stupid or gullible enough to believe them and parrot back their drivel on command. Get any competent dictionary and look up the word discover. Never mind, I’ll do it right here. To discover: 1. to see, get knowledge of, learn of, find, or find out; gain sight or knowledge of (something previously unseen or unknown): to discover America (I was so pleased to find this example in the dictionary) ; to discover electricity (this is not in italics as it is not my opinion but taken directly from the dictionary). Notice that although electricity has been in existence since creation we can correctly say it was ‘discovered’. Various European explorers were the first of their continent to see, get knowledge of, learn of, find the Americas so they definitely ‘discovered’ America under definition number 1 (the meanings are usually listed in order by common use in the dictionary). 2. to notice or realize: I discovered I didn't have my credit card with me when I went to pay my bill. Definition 2 really doesn’t apply except in the sense that they did ‘notice’ the Americas. 3. To notice or learn, especially by making an effort: got home and discovered that the furnace wasn't working. Those pesky European explorers certainly made ‘an effort’ in learning of these lands so I think they would qualify under definition 3. 4. To be the first, or the first of one's group or kind, to find, learn of, or observe. Again, they were the first of their group or kind to find, learn of and observe the Americas so they would qualify as the discoverers under definition 4. It’s fairly easy to see that in every sense of the word discover the European explorers did in fact DISCOVER the Americas. Definitions 1,3 and 4 clearly fit and only one has to apply to qualify your use of the word as proper. Is it any wonder I grow weary of the sloppy mental processes that pass for thought in the mass media and education in the USA. We should be outraged and yet most of us sit passively by and let our culture be corrupted by these nonsensical notions. None of us should tolerate fools lightly unfortunately I don’t speak out as often as I should but I am getting better as I get older. There now don’t you feel better? I know I do.
Sir Frances Drake attacked Cádiz to try to gain control of trade with the Americas. Cádiz was among the few Spanish cities that withstood the siege of Napoleon and the country’s first constitution was declared here in 1812.
Our guide, Tony, gave a panoramic tour of Cádiz before leaving town. But then it was on to the highway and up into the mountains to Vejer de la Frontera. When you see a city in southern Spain whose name includes the word Frontera (Frontier) you can rightly wonder what frontier it was on. The answer is that it was on the boundary between Spanish territory and Moorish territory. There are quite a few Frontier cities in this area. They were important trading spots for the goods that each was skilled in making. Like older villages in many places the bus could not take us up to the city but dropped us off at the bottom of the hill. The walk up was challenging for some of the older travelers but everyone made it. The view from outside the city gate was beautiful. Green fields stretched across the valley in all directions. As we entered the newer part of the city, identifiable because it’s outside the city wall, we passed a very nice looking three star hotel that was the Convent of San Francisco. The whitewashed building with mustard yellow accents was probably built in the late 1700s. The hotel square is going to be our meeting place when it’s time to head back downhill to the bus.
Continuing uphill we entered the walled portion of the city through an archway between buildings. A little further on we entered the defense bastion through the Segur Gate in the western wall, built in the 10th century.
Pop Quiz: I used to love to hear the groans when I said those words to my college accounting students. (What I didn’t tell them until after the quiz was that I didn’t grade it but allowed them to grade it themselves and keep it as reminder of which areas might need a little more study.) So here’s the question. Which years are included in the 10th Century AD? Well I never said it was going to be hard.
Answer: 901 AD to 1000 AD. Remember no year 0!
In a castle this would have been the keep but for a city it is the last bastion of defense. You go here when you’ve abandoned trying to protect property and are making the last effort to protect your life. The walls were very high and crenellated with a defensive walkway along the inside about 3.5 feet from the bottom of the crenellations. In the wall just above the level of the walkway were observation and firing slits. The first building inside the walls was a the Divine Savior parish church. It was built in the Mudejar style (A subset of Gothic and Moorish usually done by Moorish architects working in Christian countries.) in the 14th Century and remodeled in the Late Gothic style in the 17th Century. You can tell which is which and what was changed. The original building was done in fairly rough stone with irregular joints; the remodeled part is done in finished stone with very regular joints. The church has a single bell tower and a few fancy structures setting on the edge of the roofline. Clearly visible on one of these is a six-pointed star like the one in the mosque at the Tartar Palace. Before visiting the Ukraine I would have been sure that this was some sort of reference to Judaism but after seeing that star in the Tartar Khan’s personal mosque, I’m not sure. Another research project for when I get home.
There are two wonderful ceramic tile pictures on or near the church. The first is in the church square. It’s a picture of Christ with a crown of thorns carrying a wooden cross that is edged in silver. This is a little unusual but the oddest things in the picture are the three, three pronged objects coming out of His hair. They are all the same and appear to be made of silver or ice. The two outer prongs are shaped like a serpentine knife blade and come to a point. The center prong looks like a dagger blade but it has an 8-pointed star-like feature where the point should be. I don’t believe I’ve ever seen anything like it.
The second ceramic is on the wall of the bell tower. It was done in 1854 and it’s a picture of the Virgin Mary with baby Jesus. Both are wearing golden crowns. Jesus is in white and Mary has a blue and red dress with a white and gold scarf on her head and a gold and olive green, floor length robe. Its title is “The Virgin of the Olives” and there are little olives decorating the margins of the tile with the name on it. They are both very striking and beautiful.
A little further up the hill we came upon another small church, the Church of the Conception. It was the convent church for the Convent of Our Lady of the Conception founded in 1552 by Juan de Amaya the Elder. It is Renaissance style and was built in the 16th Century. It had a very finely carved doorframe but it was made of softer limestone and is quite weathered. Only a little of its former beauty survives.
Walking along the narrow streets between the two story, whitewashed houses is almost like walking down Wall St. in NYC. Yes the buildings are much taller on Wall St. but the street is wider so the effect is almost the same. Unless the street lines up with the sun you are in constant shadow. Because the walls are white the effect is a little brighter but the overall effect is the same. You can’t see much except for the buildings. We came to a small side street that ended at a low wall not too far away. There were four arches over the street and through the arches and above the wall you could see the white houses of the new part of the city bathed in bright sunlight. I was struck by the composition and tried to capture it on film (ok, yes pixels). I came out ok but a pale representation of the actual experience.
After walking up and down the hillside we came to the outer wall again but this time at the northern gate. Just outside the gate we encountered a life-sized bronze of a woman that at first I thought was a nun of some sort. Upon closer inspection I noticed that her head covering also concealed all of her face except her left eye and about 2/3 of her forehead. I was now torn between a nun and a traditional Moorish outfit. I wish I could have stayed around to hear the guide’s explanation of the sculpture but as Maverick said in ‘Top Gun’ it was a “target rich environment” and my camera was screaming at me to get busy.
Leaving Vejer de la Frontera we drove toward the seacoast through a forest of Maritime Pines in the La Brena Nature Park. I call them Umbrella Pines, as that’s the way they grow. They become tall limbless trunks with at broad evergreen top that can range from lollypop to parachute shape. In other words they look more like a deciduous tree than an evergreen pine. When they grow in groups, which they tend to do, it creates a large open space with a thick covering of branches and pines that resembles a ceiling. Some of them reach 300 feet in height, now that’s a tall ceiling. These trees were planted under the direction of Generalissimo Francisco Franco, the longtime dictator of Spain.
We turned north to drive along the coast. The beaches here are fairly broad and above the tide like there are beach hummocks with grasses, shrubs and wildflowers. It’s a very pretty drive but a little hard to appreciate from the bus because it’s flat back to the road and you have no elevation from which to view large sections of the beach.
In a very short while we arrived at Cape Trafalgar. Today there’s a nice lighthouse almost at the cape’s point but in 1805 it was the site of one of the most famous and important sea battles in history. It was just offshore here that my hero (I hear you all groaning, “Oh no, not more drivel about that pesky Nelson. Sorry!) Viscount Admiral Horatio Lord Nelson whipped the combined Spanish and French fleets, a loss from which neither empire ever recovered. Despite being greatly out numbered and completely out gunned (the combined French and Spanish fleet not only had more ships, their ships, individually, had more guns) the inventive and bold Nelson damaged, captured or sank a great portion of the fleet. In those days ships were power and the French and Spanish were unable or unwilling to reenter the naval competition that had been going on for over 200 years.
Unfortunately, to inspire his men Nelson insisted on being in his full dress uniform on the deck of the lead ship, rather than direct the engagement from a command ship at a safe distance. A French sniper in the rigging of one of the enemy ships saw him and he was mortally wounded. He refused to die until the engagement was over and the enemy was completely vanquished. He was put in a cask of rum for the voyage home to England and at his funeral; his men drank a toast to him with that rum. To this day in the English Navy rum is referred to as Nelson’s Blood. We visited his tomb in the crypt of St. Paul’s Cathedral in London last year and stayed in a hotel just off Trafalgar Square. Don’t tell me I don’t honor my heroes.
We continued north to Conil de la Frontera, another of those Moorish frontier cities. Another typical Andalusian town where Moorish influence is on display in the narrow streets and low, white houses. The thing that makes this place unique is that very few of the so-called ‘White Villages’ of Spain are anywhere near the sea. Most are in the mountains as Vejer de la Frontera was. This village is on one side of the road and the broad beaches of Cabo Roche are on the other side. It’s a very pleasant place and I decided to have a coffee at one of the beachside cafes and just watch the people go by. I found just the perfect place, La Bahia Café right across the small road from the beach. Diana walked a little way into town to see if there was any shopping. I guess there wasn’t because she came back empty handed.
From Conil we drove directly back to the ship. Just outside Cádiz, at the narrow beginning of the isthmus on which the city was built, we passed what appeared to be some very short fortifications on each side of the road. I wondered who would build a fortification so short. Actually you can only see the top of the forts because they have sunk into the marshy soil and are mostly covered by mud and water.
We were back on the ship at 3PM and had time to get into our dinner clothes and go to the 4:30 folkloric show Thom has gotten on board. It was Cuadro Flamenco La Cava, obviously a flamenco group. They were excellent. The best flamenco we’ve seen on this trip and among the best ever. They had a guitarist, a singer and six dancers, four women and two men. The two primary dancers were women and Diana and I disagree on whom was the better of those two but freely admit that both were outstanding. One of the men was pretty good and the other was fine. The two younger women were ok but obviously still growing in the art. Most excellent flamenco dancers seem to be older, 30-45. The younger ones may be more limber and energetic but the expression isn’t mature enough to be great. They can really move their feet but flamenco, more than most dances, relies heavily on posture, arm and head position and manipulation of costume (especially for women) and the young just haven’t had time to develop all that. The men hold their jackets and use them as part of the dance but the women, with their long, full dresses really use them to great expressive advantage.
The evening show was a double bill of Larry Linkin, the swing clarinetist, and Martin Mastic the classical guitarist. I like both of these men so the show was very good.
April 17 – Lisbon, Fatima & Batalha, Portugal. We have spent a lot of time in Lisbon. Last year we were here for 4 days and we had been here before that. We have booked a tour to Fatima & Batalha. You may have heard of Fatima but probably not Batalha. I hadn’t either but I had heard of one of its churches and one of its leading residents but more about that later.
The sail in to Lisbon is one of the better ones in the world. You have to sail in the estuary and then up the Tagus River a little way to get to the city and the port. On the way in you sail past some historic places the most prominent of which is the city of Belém (Bethlehem). It was from here that the important Portuguese ships set out on their voyage of discovery (see my not in the last email for the discussion of that idea). There are several important monuments in close proximity to both each other and the riverbank.
The first important structure is the Tower of Belém. This beautiful Manueline tower was built between 1515 and 1519 in the center of the Tagus to defend the city and the nearby monastery. A giant 1755 earthquake destroyed Lisbon and changed the course of the river. It’s now on the waterfront in the city of Belém. It has stylistic touches from the Gothic and Romanesque school plus Venetian-style loggias and Moroccan-style domes. Yikes, make up your mind please! There’s an artillery platform facing the river whose crenellations bear the coat of arms of the Order of Christ the successor to the Knights Hospitaler. (There’s a story in itself. The pope was unhappy with the Hospitaler knights and ordered it disbanded. The king of Portugal said he’d do it if he could form another order in its place. The pope said ok and all the order of Christ was formed and all the Hospitaler knights transferred to it. So in essence it was a difference without a distinction.) It’s five stories tall and pretty building.
Just down the riverbank is a monument shaped like an amphibious biplane. Even though I don’t like to fly I am totally fascinated by aircraft so I had to go take a look. It’s a metal replica of a Fairey III-B, a wood and canvas seaplane. Turns out it’s an interesting story. It seems that in 1922 two Portuguese naval officers set out to make the first successful aircraft crossing of the southern Atlantic Ocean going form Lisbon to Rio. The trip took them 19 days, which seems a little long even if you consider that they had to land and refuel several times. Turns out that they had a few problems on the way, not the least of which was sinking 2 planes. While landing at a refueling ship near the St. Peter & Paul Rocks, an outcropping of the mid-Atlantic Ridge between Africa and South America, they damaged a float and the plane sank. Fortunately the refueling ship was close enough to rescue them. They requested another plane and the Portuguese government decided to send one. Shortly after that they had fuel problems and were forced to make a sea landing and again one of the pontoons was damaged and the second plane sank. A passing freighter rescued them and a third plane was sent, which carried them safely to Recife, Brazil and then coast hopping down to Rio. In my personal opinion calling this trip ‘successful’ is about like saying that the Titanic had a successful journey to the mid-Atlantic. The Fairey III was a very reliable British aircraft with a service life that began in 1917 and continued for some 30 years through WWII, so the plane was not a problem. Apparently the pilots were. It seems to me that to be successful they had to arrive in Brazil flying the same plane in which they left Portugal. I sure wouldn’t call a trip from CA to TX a success if I arrived in TX after destroying two cars on the way. (If this seems familiar to anyone, I wrote about these guys last time we were here, but it’s a story I love so I couldn’t stop myself from telling it again.)
Next came the Monument to the Discoveries. It celebrates the fact that most journeys of exploration left from this riverbank. It’s a 170-foot high structure shaped like the prow of a caravel, the small, lanteen-rigged ships used by the Portuguese to explore the coast of Africa. It was erected in 1960 to celebrate the 500th anniversary of the death of Prince Henry the Navigator. Prince Henry was the third child of King John I of Portugal. As the third child he had to try harder to gain his father’s favor and he did that for sure.
Henry organized and financed the early explorations of the Portuguese into North Africa. In fact it was he who convinced his father that they should capture Ceuta in what is now Spanish Morocco. At age 19 Henry was put in charge of raising the army and organizing the fleet needed to cross the Strait of Gibraltar and take the Moroccan city. Two years later at age 21 Henry and done just that. His experience in Morocco opened Henry’s eyes to the vast riches to be gained in the Saharan spice trade. He knew that these spices were coming across the continent on arduous desert crossings and wanted to explore the possibility of shipping by sea.
His first success was the discovery of the tiny island of Porto Santo. Not much in the way of real estate or riches but the exploration fever had struck Henry bad. You have to understand that Henry did not personally make any of these discoveries. He planned, organized and executed the sending of others to do the physical, some would observe dangerous, part of the job. Soon after his men discovered Madeira. He also organized and collated all the information that was gathered, producing charts and maps of unknown territories. To say that the Portuguese were the first European explorers and that Henry was the organizer, financier and main impetus for this activity pretty much states the importance of his contribution to the eventual Spanish, English, Dutch and other explorers to come.
As such, Prince Henry stands alone and erect at the bow of the monument. Behind him are two lines, a total of 30 figures, of Portuguese personalities, going down the gunnels of the bow shaped structure. Kneeling behind him are explorers Vasco da Gama (route to India), Cabral (Brazil), Dias (first to cross the Cape of Good Hope) and Magellan (first to circumnavigate the globe) as well as artists, writers and scientists who aided or popularized the Age of Discovery.
The best views you can get of these monuments are from the water and with the sun just rising the photo opportunities were great. Just before we turned into the port facilities we passed under the April the 25th Bridge a copy of the Golden Gate that spans the Tagus. It’s exactly the same in style but smaller. On the far bank of the river is another copy this time of the Christ the Redeemer of Corcovado from Rio erected here to celebrate the Portuguese neutrality of WWII.
Shortly after docking we were on the bus and on our way. It’s cloudy and looks like we will have rain sometime today. Our first stop on our tour is the town of Fatima. It took about an hour and a half to get there. Our bus dropped us off just up the street from the Hotel Santa Maria where we are to have lunch. Right now it’s for a bathroom break and we head to the Fatima sanctuary complex. I’m not sure exactly what to call the area. It’s large and it occupies the center of the city of Fatima. There are seven chapels, a basilica and a church in addition to the multitude of monuments, a fount and a huge wooden cross. The whole complex is over half a mile long and a quarter of a mile wide.
All this is the result of a series of events that began with an apparition of Mary appearing to three shepherd children where the complex now stands. On May 13, 1917 Lucia de Jesus, age 10 and her cousins, Francisco and Jacinta Marto, ages 9 and 7, were tending their sheep here. Just after noon, when they prayed the Rosary as they did daily, a bright light shone on them and they thought it was lightning and started to seek shelter when ‘a Lady more brilliant than the sun,’ (their words) appeared to them and told them that they had to pray much. This happened four more time in the following months. It’s a little incredible but at the last appearance on October 13 there were several thousand people in attendance as the word of this had spread quickly through the country.
Since 1917 pilgrims have been journeying to this place. At first they came only on the 13th of each month, the day of the appearances. But later this expanded to holidays and now they come every day.
A Skeptic’s Note: Being a Protestant of the Lutheran tradition I sometimes discount the supernatural. (Meaning I generally have the Lutherian, German view of spiritual things which tends to discount or at least ignore the more supernatural aspects of God and emphasize the practical, interpersonal relationship with God that brings us into His family. For example, when translating the Old Testament from the Hebrew, names of evil spirits have been largely ignored and translated as ‘arrow or pestilence, etc.’ with no mention that these Hebrew words are also the names of spirits.) I have learned over the years not to underestimate God or try to fit Him into the nice neat little box I’m comfortable with. God, being God, is able to deal with mankind in any way He chooses. I have become more accepting of the supernatural, which after all is the true realm of God, and am more comfortable with these concepts. Because of my personal makeup and personality I will always lean toward the practical, intellectual aspects of God and His relationship with mankind. But I am no longer willing to automatically discount reports or traditions of the supernatural. The story if Fatima is intriguing. Outside Roman Catholicism it has been largely discounted over the years and that skepticism probably wise. There’s nothing quite so embarrassing as a gullible Christian willing to swallow anything just because some supposed holy man says it. However, I now believe that this wise skepticism should never keep us from at least considering the validity of or lesson to be learned from a reported supernatural event.
After everyone who wanted to had availed themselves of the WC, we walked to the complex and entered it from the eastern side in just about the middle. In a small area just before you entered the plaza proper they have a piece of the Berlin wall on display. As we entered the square on our right at the top of the hill we could see the Basilica. Across the plaza in the same direction is the Chapel of the Apparition, which marks the sight where the children first saw the Lady. On the left we could see the Cruz Alta (High Cross) a 60-foot tall simple wooden cross with a highly stylized Jesus on it. In the center of the plaza is the 1932 Monument to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. It’s a tall monument with a golden statue of Jesus at the top. At its base is a fountain from which pilgrims can take water. The Church considers this entire area to be a sanctuary not just the insides of the various structures.
Just as we started into the square it began to rain. Since Mass was about to start in the Basilica Diana and the Chapel of the Apparition was holding a Rosary service we decided to visit the Holy Trinity Church at the far south end of the plaza. It’s a very modern building shaped mostly like a hockey puck. It was dedicated on October 13, 2007 on the 90th anniversary of Mary’s last appearance. It’s a large structure, at least 500 feet in diameter. Across the front is a gold and white toned mosaic. Hanging directly in the center of the altar is a large sculpture of Jesus on the cross. Directly behind him, in the golden mosaic is a large lamb so when you looked at Jesus on the cross you couldn’t help but see the ‘Lamb of God’, very nice composition. Inside the altar, seen through a glass window, is a piece of rock taken from the tomb of Saint Peter the Apostle in the crypt of Saint Peter’s Basilica in Rome; given with the blessing of the pope on March 9, 2004. It had to wait a while for the church to be finished. To the left of the altar is a pure white statue of Mary.
When we left the church it was still raining but not heavily. Pope Paul II made a pilgrimage here while he was pope and Diana had me take her picture with a very nice bronze of him that commemorates the occasion. We continued across the plaza to the Chapel of the Apparitions because the Rosary service had ended. We went inside and sat down to soak in the ambiance. The chapel was constructed in 1919 on the exact site of the appearances. The marble pillar on which the Statue of Our Lady is placed marks the exact spot where Mary appeared. It is only taken from the chapel for the purposes of the yearly procession. The structure is fairly small and does not have a wall at the front. The sides are partly open and partly glass so it is a very open area. Except for the glass sides it appears very much like a picnic pavilion in a park.
I find it amazing sometimes how much emotion you can feel in various places and how little you can feel in others. There is definitely a feeling here, probably because of the sincere devotion evident in most of the other people sitting with us. Because we are here early in the year and in the rain the pilgrim to tourist ratio is very high. Most of the tourists are people I recognize from the ship. Most everyone else is a pilgrim or at least a devoted Catholic. Some are here for a miracle and although the Church has discouraged the practice, it has long been a tradition to crawl on your knees around the chapel while praying and reciting the Rosary to show your devotion and ask for a special dispensation of God’s grace for a miracle.
Today is no exception. It’s cold and raining and there are people, some young, some old, upright on their knees on the hard marble courtyard making their way around. It was heartbreaking and inspiring at the same time. Not emotions I’m used to feeling simultaneously. I found myself almost involuntarily praying for these devoted pilgrims and for God’s blessing and comfort for them whatever their need was. One especially poignant scene was a young mother with a warmly wrapped baby in her arms, proceeding under an umbrella held by a younger woman as she made her way slowly around the chapel. It was the photo of a lifetime but the sight was so emotional for me I couldn’t take it. I couldn’t even touch my camera but I really didn’t have to. That image is indelibly inscribed in my memory with all its intertwined emotions of sadness, desperation, hope, devotion, love and faith. So many contradictions that they are unexplainable and yet inseparable. Writing about them is bringing them all back. Whenever I think the going is tough I’m going to see this young lady and her baby and realize it’s not that bad. The love and friendship being expressed by the girl holding the umbrella, leaving herself exposed to the elements with no covering as she was holding the umbrella very low to better protect her friend and the baby. On so many levels the picture was one of devotion, faith and love. If I were artistically inclined I could paint it or draw it but I could not bring myself to photograph it. It seemed like too much of an invasion on a very private, personal moment. Because there are so few tourists here among the pilgrims I was very glad to see that no one else was photographing it either. Whether this was due to disinterest or respect I don’t know and don’t care. I guess I’d make a pretty lousy photojournalist. I did take several photos of the inside of the chapel and the statue of Mary.
With all this spinning around in my head we started up the broad stairs to the Basilica. The main theme of the Basilica’s décor is the Rosary and its Mysteries. Each of the 15 altars around the perimeter of the sanctuary is dedicated one of the mysteries. Since there are 20 mysteries I wonder which ones were not included. The 20 mysteries are divided into four groups of five and I’m pretty sure one whole group is not included. The Joyful Mysteries are there (The Annunciation, The Visitation, The Nativity, The Presentation of Jesus at the Temple & The Finding of the Child Jesus in the Temple). The Sorrowful Mysteries are there (The Agony in the Garden, The Scourging at the Pillar, The Crowning with Thorns, The Carrying of the Cross & The Crucifixion). The Glorious Mysteries are there (The Resurrection, The Ascension, The Descent of the Holy Spirit, The Assumption of Mary & The Coronation of the Blessed Virgin Mary). So the Luminous Mysteries are missing (The Baptism of Jesus in the Jordan, The Wedding at Cana, Jesus' Proclamation of the Kingdom of God, The Transfiguration & The Institution of the Eucharist). Maybe they are somewhere else in the church but I didn’t see them anywhere.
The church itself is done completely in the same white/gray stone except for the seal on the bell tower at the buildings roofline and the gold crown at the peak of the spire just under the cross. Extending to each side at the front of the building is a colonnaded portico. In the right portico is the Reconciliation Chapel and in the left the Holy Family Chapel. Along the back wall of the porch are the Stations of the Cross in painted ceramic tile. They’re about 10 feet tall and done in pastel colors.
When we entered the Basilica Mass was not quite over so we stood at the back and observed the ritual. The Portuguese language sounds odd to my ear, lots of sibilant sounds and the Mass was no exception. When it had ended we looked around the interior of the church. There is only one wide nave with arched chapels lining both sides. The inside of the church is largely unadorned stone like the outside. Above the side naves are balconies with traditional columns and stained glass windows in the outside wall. Above the balconies is a curved ceiling that has dormer like recesses also with stained glass windows.
The curved top of the apse is the exception to the rule. It is beautifully carved with the heavenly scene of the coronation of Mary as Queen of Heaven. God and Jesus each above her at her side are lowering the crown onto her head as the Dove of the Holy Spirit hovers above them. Angels of various styles and sizes watch reverently. The painting above the high altar and below this carved ceiling shows depicts the encounter of the little shepherds with Christ through the Eucharist watched over by the Virgin Mary.
The side chapels dedicated to the Rosary’s Mysteries are very uniform. Each has a gold relief scene depicting the event of the mystery surrounded by a carved pink marble base and top supported by pink marble columns. Atop the mantle like pink marble top is a carved white marble structure to hold the title of the miracle. This white marble carving extends to both ends of the frame and includes angels beside the title plaque and urns on the ends. Above all this is a colorful fan-shaped stained glass window each with a lady holding some object like a rose or a round mirror. The only real differences in the chapels are the gold relief and the subject of the stained glass window. On the wall between each of the chapels they have the Stations of the Cross. They are done in colorful mosaic tile with gold tiles as the background for the scene. Very striking.
At the front of the church flanking the apse are the tombs of the three shepherd children that first saw the apparition; Lucia and Jacinta on one side and Francisco on the other. Both Francisco and his sister Jacinta died at age 10 and were originally buried elsewhere but were moved here in the early 1950s. Only Lucia lived a full life dedicated to God’s service. She died in the early 2000s and was buried here then.
It was nearly time for lunch so we walked back to the hotel. When we exited the Basilica we passed a large lighted candle in the center of the broad stairway at the bottom. On the right side of the church was a very tall, stylized angel with a very modernistic nativity scene incorporated in its base. Usually I don’t care for the modernistic style but this was very attractive. Across the street from the sanctuary plaza there was a small u-shaped building with about 20 small stalls selling religious articles and souvenirs. I got a small tasteful silver medallion Fridgie for my collection.
Lunch was very nice. We were at a table with the ship’s priest, a Canadian lady and two couples from Florida that were originally from Cuba. Father xxxx is from India and has that wonderful Indian accent. I was going to ask about his background and how his family had converted from Hinduism to Christianity but we were having a good time talking and I never got the chance.
This afternoon we are heading to Batalha to visit the Dominican Monastery of Santa Maria da Victoria. It was built by King João (John) I in 1386 to give thanks to God for his victory at Aljubarrota. It was built in three phases with construction completed in 1477. This 14th-century Gothic structure is from the ornate late period. It has small Gothic spires sprouting up from every conceivable place on its roofline. The arch above the single main entrance doorway is carved with six concentric rows of figures, each with a different subject. For example the outside row seems to be ordinary people engaged in ordinary jobs or trades, the next row in appears to be religious figures, popes and priests, the third row seems to be various kings, the next row saints, the next row angelic musicians and the inner row six-winged seraphim the highest order of angel. At the base of each row on both sides are the 12 Apostles.
Inside the building is very austere and quite dark. The thick pillars and small windows combine to keep light from getting in or reflecting about once it’s inside. It has the typical three nave structure but the naves are very narrow, even the central one. It appears to me to be three times higher than the width at the floor.
One of the last rooms to be finished was the Founder’s Chapel. It was designed to be the burial place of King João, his queen Philipa of Lancaster (yes she was English) and the rest of the Avis Dynasty. João and Philipa are buried there in the center of the room. Theirs is a large sarcophagus with carvings of them in repose on the top. Their sons are buried in the walls around them. Their most famous son Prince Henry the Navigator has the only sarcophagus with his figure laying atop it but his brother Prince João and his wife Isabel have the most elaborate. The arch behind the sarcophagus is ornately carved with the scene of the crucifixion. While his brothers died in their early 40s, one actually made it to 50, Henry lived to be 66.
After leaving the monastery it was back to the ship and a Lido dinner because we were pooped.
April 18 – At Sea. Another great day at sea. Gene Turner, the Protestant pastor on board is a great speaker.
In the afternoon we had the Dutch Chocolate Extravaganza. It’s always fun to see what they have done for this buffet. The staff has a great time with it as well. Standing by proudly as the passengers take photos and ooh and ahh at the presentation. There was a chocolate ship, castle, band, tree with dueling dragons, chocolate vases with vegetable flowers in them and so many small chocolate delights it overwhelms the eyes ability to take it in.
The show this evening was ‘Caliente’ by the ship’s cast. They did their usual great job.
April 19 – At Sea. A second day at sea to rest up from all the chocolate.
Our show was Rebecca Lowe and Kuba. He plays the vibes (vibraphone) and she sings. He’s an excellent musician and she has a very good voice. You can tell that she has trained for musical theater. Her voice is very expressive.
Tonight is formal for the Officer’s Black and White Ball. I like to go see whom the captain has ordered to be there in their dress uniforms to dance with the ladies. Some like it and some don’t’ and it’s pretty easy to tell them apart. Years ago if the officer was traveling with his girlfriend or wife they were nowhere to be seen. Now the officers, with their wives and girlfriends congregate in the back of the lounge and the ladies have to go back there and get one if they want to dance. Previously the officers in attendance would approach unescorted ladies and ask them to dance. Somewhere, sometime, either Women’s Lib or Sadie Hawkins took control of HAL’s formal ball etiquette. Diana takes great delight is waiting a few seconds and then going back to the group and asking the least interested officer to dance. Since the song has been playing for little while they have usually decided they are safe till the next song. That’s when Diana swoops in to grab one. She never did that until they started hiding in the back of the room. It’s a hoot.
April 20 – Ponta Delgada, Saõ Miguel Island, Azores, Portugal. We’ve been here before but have not explored the east end of the island. Last time we went to the west end. Since not a lot of people have been here they’ve been asking me how it is over the last two days at sea. My response, “If you love visiting National Parks you will love it. If your idea of a great time is going to St. Thomas in the US Virgin Islands you might not like it much.” The island of Sao Miguel is about 35 miles long and averages about 7-8 miles wide; not a big place. Nevertheless it has fairly tall mountains, the island is volcanic and is green and beautiful.
Ponta Delgada is the largest city on and the capital of the Island of Saõ Miguel (Saint Michael in English), the largest of the 9 islands that make up the Azores. The word açores in Portuguese means hawks, and the island group is named for the large birds that inhabited the area when Diogo de Silves first saw them. These islands are not yet big on the tourist map for most of the world the USA included. They should be, they are gorgeous; clean, well maintained, no poverty, little crime, no graffiti and warm friendly people. Plus most of the island would qualify as a National Park in the US from a natural beauty standpoint.
Last time we were here we headed to the west coast to see the green and blue lakes of the Sete Cidades. These two lakes are side by side but the depth of the water and the surrounding mountains make one look green and the other blue. Both are in the caldera of a volcano. This time we are headed to the north coast and the west side of the island.
This place is just a beautiful as I remember it; green hills with lots of flowers blooming right now, mostly azaleas and camellias but later huge hedges of hydrangeas. When we arrived at the north coast it looks a lot like the coast of Oregon or Northern California, very rugged and rocky. The sail in was very pretty.
We are going on a tour with our travel agent, CSI, and that means we’ll be dispatched by Henk and Lucia our escorts. I’m sure that riding heard on 140 passengers can be challenging and difficult work at times but they make it look so easy and have fun doing it. I’m afraid I couldn’t do the PR part of their job, too many knot heads. I’d be offering diving lessons off the fantail while at sea if it were up to me. Fortunately, it’s not. They handle the most inane questions and thoughtless comments as though they people were offering to put them in their wills. They obviously have a full dose of the gift of hospitality. Some of the self centered, wrong-headed complaints that come up are beyond belief. Lucia and Henk, not a problem for them. They field the dumbest complaints (ex. “My cabin faces west and I never get the sunrise. Can you switch the earth so the sun can rise in the west? Well maybe not quite that dumb but almost!) with skill and diplomacy taking a gentle but firm hand when it’s called for and that is truly an art form.
On the down side, I do miss Nancy Wright a lot. She was our escort on the last 3 Prinsendam cruises and I got to know her very well. I hope she makes a full and complete recovery from her recent medical issues. That’s certainly what I’m praying for. On the upside, there’s absolutely no drop off in professionalism or skill with Henk and Lucia and I have quickly become quite attached to both of them. They are fun to talk with and obviously very caring people.
Our tour begins, as usual, with Lucia in the Ocean Bar greeting and stickering every one when they arrive. Henk is on the pier coordinating the busses and calling Lucia with the latest updates on which bus is available for boarding. It’s always a much more low key experience than the HAL tours. They always have more busses and more tours than CSI, who wisely only offer one per port. Still CSI does have some very, shall I say, aggressive clients and that can get on your nerves if you don’t avoid them. The percentage is much lower than the ship’s passenger population at large though so it’s not much of a problem, at least for me. I can only guess what these people are like for Lucia and Henk to deal with. I have to say that they don’t appear to have any problem with them whatsoever. I guess that’s a skill I have to learn
We are headed to the northern shore and east end of the island. Ponta Delgada is on the south shore so we had to cross the island. We skirted the island’s central mountain range that runs north to south and arrived at the Santa Iria Bay. The drive was through fertile agricultural fields occasionally interrupted by an old cinder cone from a volcano. We drove past the major geothermal plants they have to generate electricity. Huge plumes of steam were rising from multiple places as we drove along the sea.
When we arrived at the center of north coast we stopped at an overlook that had a great view. The coast is rocky and very irregularly shaped. It looks a lot like portions of the Maine or Oregon coasts. There’s a ceramic tile plaque at the site and although my Portuguese is almost nonexistent it appears that there was a battle here in 1831 where the in which loyalists were able to defeat their enemy and secure the liberty of the Azores. The names Dom Pedro IV and Dom Miguel figure prominently in the proceedings but I’m not sure in what way. It’s listed as the Battle of Ladeira da Velha on August 3, 1831 on the sign. Yet another research project for when I get home.
There was a small WC down a few stairs from the overlook. An older man was there, attending them. His dog was up on the overlook making friends with all the tourists. He was a black and white beagle/border collie mix from the look of him, tail wagging, scampering from one person to the next. When we got there several busses were already parked but we were the last to leave. He paced beside our bus as we all got aboard and then he ran over to the entrance to the overlook and sat there, tail no longer wagging, as we drove away. He’s obviously done this before. It was interesting to see the pure emotion that changed so quickly from exultation to sadness. That’s a dog, heart directly pinned to his sleeve.
After we left the overlook we drove along the ocean for a few more miles past small seaside villages and then turned inland. As we climbed into the hills we started seeing row after row of what appeared to be 4 foot high, well groomed hedges but only about 8 inches apart and covering huge fields. This sight was familiar to me from several places but the one I remember best was Sri Lanka. It’s a tea plantation. They only pick the new growth for making tea and so every year the tea bushes get the fresh new growth removed. Once the bushes get about 3-4 feet tall they aren’t allowed to get any taller because that would make the new tea growth more difficult to pick. The rows of tea plants look like 4-foot wide and 4-foor tall hedges, very squared off and neatly trimmed. They leave the 8-12 inch space for the pickers to walk down the hedgerows, a very efficient system. I’ve never heard of Azorean tea but from the extent of the fields I’d say they grow quite a bit.
We are headed to the Furnas Valley, the large caldera of a dormant volcano. It hasn’t shown any sign of problems for several hundred years. It’s such a beautiful place that wealthy Azorean’s had summer homes here with lavish gardens specializing in camellias. It’s said that now two families grew the same type of camellia and each was fiercely proud of their type. Spas sprung up that made use of the natural hot mineral waters. People would come from Europe and especially Portugal for ‘the cure’. There are still spa hotels operating here.
Our first stop was at the Pico do Ferro overlook. Our bus wasn’t able to go to the top of the hill so we had a sort walk up to the viewpoint. The sides of the path were lined with azalea plants that were in bloom. The bees were busy zipping from flower to flower. These were the large very fuzzy type of black and yellow bee, with one white stripe at the stinger end. They are to the bee world what the 747 is to aircraft. In fact they are so fuzzy they look like very short flying caterpillars. There were lots of them but not much buzzing. Apparently they are also the stealth version of the bee.
Once at the top we could see the entire Furnas Valley. In the deepest part of the caldera is Lake Furnas. It’s a gorgeous setting, the placid blue lake surrounded by verdant hillsides of trees and grasses, which are in turn surrounded by the distant, craggy rock rim of the volcano. In the valley below you can see the whitewashed houses and stores of the Village of Furnas. You have to admire the optimism of these people, living inside the caldera of an old volcano in an area of active geothermal and volcanic activity. It’s worked out for the so far.
We drove down into the city, another of those with narrow streets. These are not so narrow as the city was built in the 1800s not the 1100s so carriages were being used. They are not wide enough to accommodate two-way traffic so when we meet someone both the bus and the other vehicle have to drive up onto the narrow sidewalks. Our destination is one of the older spa hotels, the Terra Nostra, which has been newly renovated. Right next to back of the hotel’s property is Thomas Hickling’s Botanical Garden. He developed the gardens were developed in the 1800s as part of his estate. It has been improved over the years. In addition to trees and plants from all over the world the park includes winding waterways, lily ponds (complete with huge koi), terraces, grottoes and paths.
The main flowers are camellias, for which the valley is famous, but there are azaleas, foxglove, wisteria and other flowers with which I am not familiar. There are also lots of ferns growing in the shade of the trees. We walked into the garden through a back gate in the hotel’s property and across a stone bridge. Along the waterway under the bridge they were growing Taro plants, the starch of the Pacific islands. After crossing the bridge we went up a flight of wide stairs to the side of a large oval pool. It was at least 100 yards long and 40 yards wide. There’s a small island in the middle and steel pool ladders both on the island and along the sides. The water in this pool is dirty brown like it’s full of silt but actually the color comes from the mineral content, lots of iron. In small quantities the water is actually very clear. Along the front side of the pool there are two short fountains where the water splashes in. The stream of water is very warm but not too hot and is crystal clear. The estate is now owned by a German doctor and he brings his patients here during the summer. I’m pretty sure it’s a tax gimmick to make the upkeep and costs of the garden and house deductible on his German taxes.
There’s a bust of the founder up near the house, a large very sharp angled two-story structure with a second floor balcony running its entire length. There’s a beautiful blue wisteria vine on the side of the outbuilding that was blooming profusely. But one of the plants near the house was so unusual I had to ask about it. It looks like a type of agave or century plant but may not even be a succulent as the leaves are very thin and flexible. From the center of the round, starburst shaped base of long leaves that slowly taper to a point, long green 25-foot stalks head skyward. At the very top are clusters of red flowers and green leaves. The guide called it torch plant but I’m not sure that’s the real name. Gosh, another research project. (In case you’re wondering if remember to do these when I get home, it’s really very simple. I just search this Word document for the word ‘research’ and there they all are!) The overall look of the plant is of a green starburst firework with a streak of green heading up to a smaller burst of red and green. It’s quite an impressive plant. The base is about 8 feet tall and 10 feet in diameter, the stalk is at least 20 feet tall and the red and green growth at the top is about 2-3 feet in diameter so it’s a very large plant.
The garden was so pretty that I lagged behind the guide to take pictures. One of the other passengers, Ed, was also taken with the beauty of the place so we formed a team of two, informing each other when we spied something out of the way that was worth a shot. The house is at the highest point of the property so you have a 180-degree view. There are some large lily ponds with bright orange and multicolored koi in them. From one end of the property you can see the Village of Furnas and the church. A very impressive and well-designed place.
As we circled back to our entry point we came out above a large pool with a very large rock stepping stone bridge set in a curving pattern leading to a very small island in the middle of the pond. At the stepping off point of this stone path were two large black swans. One appeared to be asleep and the other was also asleep by the time I got down to the pond level.
After our stroll through the garden we went back through the hotel and crossed the street to the pavilion where our morning snack was waiting. It was more than a snack. They had cheese sandwiches, chorizo sandwiches (cut in quarters), cookies, little fried cheese puffs and little meat turnovers. To drink they had orange juice, white or red wine. It was a very nice spread and I could have all the chorizo sandwiches I wanted because most of the people I’m traveling with are picky eaters. Yea!!!! One of the interesting features of the hotel is that they can bury the food they want to cook in the ground and it will be cooked by natural heat. They have several pits that are close to the hot vents that they use for this purpose.
Our next stop was in a small area just outside Furnas called Calderas because it’s where there are natural vents, fumaroles and hot water springs. It’s a fairly small area but the activity there reminds me of Yellowstone National Park. There are steam vents that give the air a slight sulfur smell. Some people were bothered by it but it wasn’t really that strong. There were pools of churning, bubbling water that produced as much steam as the vents and also bubbling mud pots in various shades of red and green. Out by the road there were two fountains from which you could drink the mineral water. It is naturally carbonated with a pleasant mineral water taste and sure enough, just like the guide said, if you drink at least a quarter of a cupful you will burp in about a minute from the gas released by the water. The water was mildly warm. That used to be part of the spa treatments in the 1800.
There was another larger fountain at the side of a small stream. From the look of it the water coming out was very hot as there was a lot of steam. When I got down to the fountain all the steam was coming out of a small vent next to the fountain. The water in this fountain was actually very cool and had a whole different taste from its warmer counterparts about 15 yards away. Once I swiped my hand quickly through the stream of water coming out and discovered it was cool we all decided to taste it as well. It was mildly sweet but that might have only been the result of the comparison between the two. Everyone was calling it desert water.
Our guide told us that the Furnas caldera has over 30 springs each of which has a different temperature and mineral content. There are two main rivers, the hot one that has the high iron content we saw in the garden pool and a cold one that flows through the village.
We were dropped off downtown, about 40 yards from the ship. Diana wanted to do some shopping and I wanted to get a local lunch. I settled on something called a Francesinha. It looked very different from most sandwiches I’ve had but the real reason I ordered it is because it was the only item on the menu that was exactly the same in Portuguese and English, indicating that it was not readily translatable. It was a sandwich of cheese, sausage, beef and pork, grilled on the outside after being dredged in an egg wash (not quite French toast but close) then put in a shallow plate with some gravy and a fried egg on top for the crowning touch. It was great!! I had a café latte with it and was totally pleased. Diana finished her shopping in time to join me for a coke; she didn’t want anything to eat. Then it was back to the ship and on to the next port, Bermuda in four days.
April 21 through 24 – At Sea. Four days at sea and time to catch up on rest and writing. It was great to get into the ‘at sea’ routine. I am particularly enjoying the daily devotionals. Gene Turner is a wonderful teacher. This is a bonus I don’t usually get while cruising. During this time we had our last formal dance of the cruise, the Black and Gold Ball.
This is the first time in five cruises that we haven’t crossed the Equator and had a King Neptune Ceremony. It’s just as well as the Prinsendam’s air conditioning doesn’t work well in warm weather if the seawater is also warm. One of my favorite crewmen, Marco, a chef in the Lido will probably not be aboard if we are ever back on the Prinsendam. He’s immigrating to Canada and had an interview at the Canadian embassy in Barcelona and it went well. He’s been on the last three cruises we’ve been on and is a great person and good cook. For the last 189 days on this ship I have not had to order my breakfast. By the time I get to the cook station he already has my order frying in the pan. On this cruise he was working with Christopher and John and I think he told them what I wanted because I never had to tell them my order either. I can hear you asking yourself if I have the same breakfast every morning and the answer is yes. Eggs scrambled with ham and cheese with two sausage patties and before you can even formulate the question my total cholesterol is always between 139 and 167 with very favorable HDL:LDL ratio. When that changes, I’ll change my breakfast.
There are several other staff members that I don’t think I’ll be seeing again. I think Captain Gunderson may be considering retirement when the Prinsendam is sold by HAL. I think it’s in the schedule until 2011 but after that who knows. Our hostess, Lucy, may be thinking of a lifestyle change. Event staff is the least stable of any of the ship’s departments but the Prinsendam has been the exception to that. I’ve gotten to know several of them well because I’ve traveled with them so often. Tom, Debbie, Sparky and Kevin are old friends by this time and I’m not sure that I’ll see any of them after this trip. None of these people has said anything to me to give me these impressions but I have a sense that I’m not far off. Thom Faulkner has assembled a great staff and I’m not surprised that all but two of them are the same as last year. They will the staff I will probably rate all future event staff by. I will miss them all.
April 25 – Hamilton, Bermuda. Dry land at last. We’ve never been to Bermuda before. It’s so far north that the Caribbean cruises don’t go there. Some cruises from the Northeast go there and back but we’ve never taken one of those. It’s a very small place and had decided to become a haven for the ultra-rich. You have to be a Bermudan to own land and the only way you can get to be one is to marry one or be born to one. Lots of very posh houses and resorts here. All jobs have to be offered to Bermudan first and then if it is not filled you have to get approval to offer it to outsiders. You can only live in Bermuda temporarily for 6 years and then you have to leave. I think we could benefit from some of their immigration ideas. It’s a beautiful place, clean within an inch of its life and very neat and orderly. Mark Twain once said, “You go to heaven if you want. I'd rather stay here in Bermuda.” I’m not sure I’d go that far but it is a very idyllic and civilized place.
There are two main ports in Bermuda, St. George and Hamilton, the capital. The larger ships have to tender in St. George. In Hamilton they have to dock at the Royal Dockyards where the pier can accommodate them and then be bussed or ferried across the hook and into Hamilton. The small Prinsendam can dock right downtown in Hamilton on one side of Front Street, the major shopping and eating thoroughfare in the city. We have docked close to town before but I don’t ever remember when I could walk off the gangway, across the street and directly into a restaurant or shop. Very convenient.
The sail in to Hamilton was unique. The island is shaped somewhat like a fishhook. The shaft of the hook runs from northeast to southwest at a 45-degree angle and then curves up to form the hook. At the eye in the hook where the line would be tied is the city of Saint George and at the point of the hook is the Royal Naval Dockyard. Hamilton, our port, is on the main shaft of the hook directly across from where the point would be just above where the shaft starts to curve to form the hook. This is a very rusty fishhook and not only is Hamilton inside the curve of the hook but the shaft is extremely rusted and it’s inside a large cavity in the rust. That’s why the large ships can’t get to it.
First we sailed past the Royal Dockyard at the tip of the hook. This is not an extremely old facility. In fact it was built just after the Revolutionary War when the British lost access to the ports they had established in their former colonies on the mainland. There had been a small facility here prior to that but nothing like the major Atlantic outpost that it became after the war. It was in full operation until 1951 when a large part of it was closed. It serviced British and NATO ships until 1995 when the closure was complete. Now it’s a major tourist area. There’s a museum and shopping center as well as hotels and restaurants. I have always liked the way the British name their pubs and the one here is no exception, The Frog and Onion. I was to discover later that many things here have onion in the name because of the famous Bermuda onion. We’ll talk more about that later.
Once past the dockyard the ship has to make a 180-degree turn to head towards Hamilton and here’s where it gets tricky. To enter the port at Hamilton you have to negotiate Two Rock Passage. The mouth of the bay, that split I mentioned in the rusty fishhook’s shaft, is strewn with islands, some large some small. Between LeFroy Island and a large rock just off Mowbray Island they’ve cut a channel into the bay. The distance between that rock and Mowbray Island is about 110 feet and the beam of the Prinsendam is about 95 feet, not much room for error. This is what keeps the large ships from docking in Hamilton. Once you are through Two Rock Passage things open up again and you have a clear run to the pier.
On the sail in we passed many large homes and some very fancy hotels and yachts. It is clearly evident that this is not your run of the mill island. Saint Bart’s is pretty posh but Bermuda is in a whole other league. It’s definitely the Monaco of the Atlantic islands and the prices reflect its status. The Bahamian Dollar is about on par with the US$ so the prices did not require conversion. As we pulled into the pier right downtown I was able to see a bronze statue in the front garden of the Cabinet Building. I couldn’t tell what it was so I took a picture and looked at the magnified image in the viewer. It was a black woman being burned at the stake. I’ll have to take a look at it before our tour.
Camera Trick Note: I’ve quit carrying binoculars because a digital camera is much better unless you want to see movement. You take a picture at the maximum optical zoom your camera can give you. Then you open the picture in the camera’s LCD viewer and use its zoom feature to get in even closer. I only have about a 3X zoom but the viewer can zoom in about 10x. The two combined for an impressive magnification factor. The beauty of it is that it’s difficult to hold a high power binocular steady enough to really see detail. The photo is absolutely still and detail is easy to read. For example, yesterday we were passing a cruise ship at some distance and I have a friend who likes to log cruise ship sightings. He has a pretty good pair of binoculars but couldn’t read the name. I took a shot with my camera and then zoomed in on the display screen and the name was easy for both of us to read. Since I shoot with minimum compression and maximum file size (pixels) I can do the same thing with prints. I shoot at the max telephoto and then use Photoshop to crop the picture to include only the subject I wanted and print it. Since the file has lots of detail the cropped print looks perfect. I have a picture I took in Africa of a lion at about 100 yards. She’s fairly small in a 4x6 print of the raw picture but she fills up the entire length of the shot after I crop it. My guess is the effect is about the same as having a 1000mm telephoto on my old 35mm camera. That’s a 40-inch long, heavy and bulky combination of metal and glass. A side benefit of this technique is that you can compose the picture when you crop it, so you don’t have to be so careful about the photo’s composition while shooting and can concentrate on capturing just the right image of the subject.
Our first appointment is an island tour by boat provided by Cruise Specialists but that doesn’t start until 10AM and we were docked at 8AM. After we had breakfast I decided to leave the ship and walk over to the Cabinet Building to get a look at the bronze. I walked across the street and went into the grounds. It is a very well done bronze. It shows a black woman in island garb tied to a stake with kindling at her feet. Her feet are tied to the stake about 18 inches off the ground and her hands are tied behind her back and then to the stake. Below her feet is a stack of wood for the fire. Her back is arched away from the stake as she turns her face forward. Despite her precarious position and imminent death, her face is serene a clear indication that she is at peace with whatever act has put her here. Unfortunately for me there is no sign or plaque giving any details about who she is or what events led up to her death. I’ll have to ask our guide about it
I had some extra time so I walked up to take a look at the Cabinet Building and its grounds. To the right of the building is a modern obelisk, a monument to Maj. Gen. Sir William Reid, British military officer and governor of Bermuda. Centered in the frontage of the property, appropriately along Front Street, is a cenotaph for the WWI & II dead from Bermuda. (A cenotaph is a monument or tomb representing and honoring a person or group of persons who are interred elsewhere. Or, as in the case of William Wrigley the chewing gum king, the preserved initial tomb of a person whose remains have been removed. Wrigley was originally buried on Catalina Island, a place he dearly loved. During WWII his widow moved his remains to Forrest Lawn in Los Angeles because she did not like Catalina. She considered Catalina to be too crude and unsophisticated to visit. His original tomb in the Wrigley Botanical Garden on Catalina remains as a memorial to him and would qualify as a cenotaph.). One the way back to the ship I asked the security guard in the port entrance about the bronze at the Cabinet Building and he didn’t know anything about it. I’m always amazed at how little some people know about the places they live and work.
When I got back to the ship I went to the Ocean Bar to meet up with the CSI tour group. As always, Lucia was there to greet us and decorate us with a sticker showing our bus number. Henk is down on the pier to give Lucia notice by radio when our busses are ready to go, a very efficient system. In this case Henk is going to tell us when the tour boat is here and ready to load us up. It was a short walk to the boat, which was docked a few feet from the Prinsendam’s bow. It was a 50-foot, two deck tour boat. There was enclosed seating on the lower deck and an open deck on top, half covered by a canvas top. I like to be in the open where you can see both sides and have an unobstructed view for pictures so I sat in the uncovered seat at the stern of the ship. The tour is called ‘Famous Homes and Hideaways’ and it’s a 2-hour sail around the Hamilton area to see the sights and homes of the famous.
It’s a very pleasant day, cool and sunny, just right for a ride on the water. As much as I love cruising I love small boats more. Maybe it’s nostalgia for the times when Dad, Ardeth and I went on vacation on our boat or maybe it’s just the whole experience of being on the water in a small craft. You feel every bump in the water and every puff of the air and even on a calm day it’s exhilarating. The Arro-Lu was a great boat, very seaworthy and comfortable.
We sailed past many pastel colored homes, many fairly old, but looking very well maintained. One home and a building downtown were painted a rather shocking orange/burnt orange when compared to the other buildings in town. It’s not a very pretty color and when mixed in with the very calm, light pastels around them it seems quite out of place. I’m guessing that the neighbors were not very pleased to see these colors show up. If they get too many of these renegade homeowners who ignore tradition the place will be considerably less charming.
The most famous person’s home we saw was that of Michael Douglass and Catherine Zita-Jones. It’s high on a hill along side the bay of Hamilton harbor. Only citizens of the Bermuda are allowed to own property on the island and Michael is Bermudan by way of his mother Diana Douglas nee Dill. She is the daughter of the attorney general of Bermuda, Colonel Thomas Melville Dill. We also saw the home of Noel Coward, the author, and a home where John and Yoko Lennon had stayed for a time while in Bermuda.
The most interesting sights we saw were the old seaplane airport on Darrell Island, one of the largest of the many islands in the bay. In the middle 1930s a terminal and ramp were built to accommodate the likes of the Boeing 314 NC Flying Boat and other large, four engine, propeller driven aircraft. The beauty of this system is that you don’t have to acquire land for or construct a runway; you just use the calm waters of the Great Sound and then taxi the plane up the ramp out of the water and to the terminal. Both Pan Am and Imperial Airways (Later British Airways) flew seaplane service to the island.
Seaplane Note: For those of you that have never had the pleasure of landing on the water in a seaplane, I thought I’d pass on a little information. When I was still flying I had to make a business trip to Catalina Island. I decided to take the Catalina Seaplanes flight from Long Beach Airport to Avalon, Catalina. They were flying WWII surplus Grumman G-21’Goose’ aircraft. In 1937 the Goose was designed as an 8 seat commuter aircraft for people living on Long Island to get into Manhattan. It embodied several firsts for Grumman, first monoplane (single wing), first multi engine (two radial prop engines) and the first of their planes to enter commercial airline service. During WWII the tough, versatile little plane served well, first as a transport aircraft with the Coast Guard and other military branches and later as a training and observation aircraft. We took off from Long Beach airport and landed in the Pacific Ocean just off Avalon on the island.
The take off from Long Beach airport was not very remarkable except for the fact that the Goose is a tail dragger so you start down the runway sitting uphill and the first thing that happens is the rear wheel lifts off the ground before you can actually get airborne. The water landing was fairly violent because the water was rough. The pilot slowly approached touchdown and our first contact with the water was skipping from wave top to wave top like a child’s skipping stone. As you may know water is not compressible so when you hit it it’s the physics equivalent of hitting a solid object. The contact with each wave top produced a sound like someone with a high-speed grinder trying to carve a slit in the planes hull. Zit, Zit, Zit, Zit. Soon the fairly smooth skipping became more like bounding from wave to wave. I think the pilot got tired of bouncing from one wave to the next so he became a little more aggressive in his angle of attack for landing. This stuck the bow of the plane into the side of a fairly large wave and brought us to a very abrupt stop. (After my three+ years in the US Air Force, lets just say that it was the most violent landing I was ever in that was not considered a crash!) Because the nose of the craft plowed directly into the face of the wave it produced a huge spray that covered the entire plane. All you could see through the windshield and the side windows was water. I’ve never been submerged in a submarine with windows, but I know what it would look like. Eventually the water stopped pouring across the windows and we bobbed to a stop, fortunately upright and without any serious leaks. Amphibious aircraft are notorious for winding up upside down and sinking, usually very slowly allowing everyone to get out. We taxied up the ramp and onto the apron to disembark the plane and all six of us were grinning from ear to ear, including the pilot. His only comment was that if the plane hadn’t had a flat tire he would have diverted to the Catalina Airport for a runway landing under these sea conditions but that he’d landed in worse. The five passengers all shook his hand before leaving for downtown.
Two weeks later when I returned to Long Beach we took off from the Bay and the sea was very smooth so the water takeoff was not as exciting as the landing. Still it was an odd experience because the plane has to struggle to overcome the initial resistance of being settled in the water. The engines roar and the plane vibrates but at first it doesn’t appear to be moving at all. Slowly it starts forward and as the hull begins to plane on the water’s surface it picks up speed until it finally lifts off. In Long Beach we landed on the airport’s runway so that was not too unusual except for the fact that the Goose lands fairly level but then the tail wheel has to be dropped onto the runway providing you with that uphill ride again.
As we crossed a long section of the Great Sound the guide told us the sad story of how Bermuda was a world power in the onion business until someone from the USA stole some plants and started growing them in Texas. What he failed to mention is that the reason the regular Bermuda Onion dropped in popularity is that the geniuses at Texas A & M took the regular Bermuda and improved it over the years producing a much better onion. A single packet of Bermuda seed came to South Texas in 1898 and by 1920 Bermuda was no longer a major player in the onion market. Ironically the major reason for this was that new, inexperienced growers in the islands allowed the strains and verities to mix indiscriminately producing degradation in the quality of their seed and an increase in disease. In Texas, the Aggies, through careful selection and planting practices had actually improved quality. In the 1930s Texas A&M bred the Texas Grano 502 the source of all the world’s sweet onions. I don’t care if you call them Vidalia, Maui or whatever; they all come from the Grano 502. (Are you getting the idea that I love onions?) In the 1960 they also introduced the first supersweet onion and in the 1980s introduced the famous Grano 1015Y (Texas A&M has the tradition of naming onions for the date on which they should be planted, in this case Oct 15th) and an entirely new strain of supersweet, disease resistant onions. Of course our guide didn’t say any of this, he just blamed Texas for Bermuda’s onion decline. I guess blaming others for the results of your screw up is not uniquely an American trait.
The guide somewhat redeemed himself by identifying the subject of the bronze statue in the Cabinet Building’s garden. It’s Sally Bassett, a slave woman. She’s an historical figure in Bermuda who lived about 280 years ago and was burned at the stake on suspicion of trying to poison a slave master. The Sally Bassett story will be part of the monument and the monument will become part of Bermuda’s African Diaspora Heritage Trail but it is not yet finished. I had assumed she was being burned for religious reasons from the serene look on her face. Apparently she took great satisfaction in trying to kill the slave owner. I would have thought she might be upset that her attempt was not successful.
As we passed Long Island (no not the one in New York) we could see the cemetery that was used for prisoners from the Boer War who died in captivity. Later it was to be the burial place for Naval yellow fever victims until the mid 1800s. At one end of the island in a small copse of trees there was a very small shack with two hammocks suspended from trees just outside the front door and a small picnic table right next to the water. With all the very nice housing around it was refreshing to see that someone was living the rustic lifestyle so common in the Caribbean and South Pacific, not to mention the Yucatan coast.
There was one small bay that they called Millionaire’s Row and it was there that we saw the Lennon house as well as other large very nice homes with boathouses, boats, outdoor pavilions, guest houses and all the amenities for a very comfortable island lifestyle.
We arrived back at the Prinsendam’s pier just after noon and although the ship was right next to us we decided to look around the city and have lunch in town. I asked the lady who represents the tour company where she would eat if she were going to dine on Front Street. She said that there was a very nice British style pub just down the street but she would eat at the Pickled Onion. The restaurant was on the second floor, above a very chic women’s clothing store. There’s a covered porch along the front of the second story and that’s where we sat. The menu had a good variety of entrees and I was tempted to have burger but decided on the fish and chips. Diana selected the ‘homemade quiche’ because she likes quiche and it’s supposed to be made on site.
As we were waiting for our food Henk and Lucia, our CSI escorts came up with Terri and Ed another couple traveling with CSI. I’ve gotten to know Terri and Ed on this cruise and hope to travel with them again someday. That’s one of the things I like about CSI’s ‘chat time’ on sea days. You can get to know some very interesting people that you come to enjoy spending time with. When our food arrived it was well presented. My fish and chips came in a rectangular wire basket about 9x5x4 with three large pieces of fresh cod setting atop the basket full of fries. The coating was golden brown, light and crunchy and the fish was firm and delicious. Diana’s quiche came with a spring salad. The quiche was about 6 inches in diameter and 2 inches thick. It definitely had a homemade look. The crust was flaky and just the right tan color. When we had finished eating Diana announced that it was the best quiche she had ever eaten. That’s saying a lot as she often has quiche for breakfast.
After lunch Diana wanted to do some shopping and I wanted to walk around town to see the sights. So we agreed to meet at the ship and headed out. Everywhere in the world there are young people that are constantly connected by cell phone and Bermuda is no exception. Texting seems to be a big deal here too. I saw one knot of young women all intently staring at their cell phones. For all I know they might have been texting each other. You never know.
I walked down Front Street to the intersection with the birdcage. Traffic police use this metal structure in the center of the intersection of Hamilton’s two main streets in the busy season to direct traffic. You may have seen it on TV as clips of the very creative signals used by the officers have been on many programs like ‘America’s Funniest Home Videos’, etc. I remember seeing it on ‘You Asked for it’ the first TV reality show in the 1950s. People would write in requesting that Art Baker had film of something they’ve heard or read about. Someone had read an article on the Bermuda Bird Cage and Art had obliged her by betting dome film of the policeman directing traffic. Unfortunately they only use it in the summer so it’s vacant now and there’s nothing quiet as forlorn in appearance as an empty birdcage. I walked up Queen Street to Par la Ville Park where people were picnicking, playing ball and sitting the sun. The park was once the garden of Hamilton’s first postmaster, William Perot. His post office is still functioning and has a small stamp museum inside.
Perot loved to garden so he installed a box that allowed people could deposit their letters and a penny for postage without his assistance. Of course not everyone put in a penny but he was obliged to deliver all the letters anyway because there was not way to determine who had paid. A friend of his told him to create his own stamps. He took a date stamp and removed the month and day. Then he stamped it on paper with only the year showing across the middle of the round stamp that said Hamilton Bermuda around the circumference. He hand wrote ‘One Penny’ over the year, signed his name below it and then hand cut the circular stamp. Only three stamps survive from the first year, 1848, and a total of 11 are known. The last example of the 1848 Perot sold was auctioned in London for $105,000 in 2003.
I walked up Queen St. to Church St. and turned right to head uphill to Hamilton’s most prominent feature, the Anglican Cathedral of the Most Holy Trinity. It’s a Gothic structure that would be comfortable in any British city. Scottish architect William Hay built it in 1886. His idea was to create a structure in the British tradition and he succeeded. Piers of polished Scottish granite support the clerestory (The wall supporting the upper roof that extends upward above the nave from the lower roof. It always has windows because it’s purpose is to provide light to the center of the church) in the nave; soaring archways are trimmed in stone imported from France; and the choir stalls and bishop's throne are carved out of English oak. The copper roof is in stark contrast to the almost universal white roofs of Bermuda. The major stone of the structure is gray limestone from the local Par-la-Ville quarry.
When I entered there was only one other person inside, the Prinsendam’s captain, Halle Thon Gunderson. He was in mufti but still immediately recognizable from across the sanctuary. He was doing just what I like to do, reading all the memorials and honors that were displayed around the walls. As he said to me when we stopped to talk, “You can tell a lot about the nature of a place by what they esteem important enough to commemorate in their churches.” I had to agree, that’s why I like to take a look at them. Unfortunately this does not work in modern churches. Most of them are so appearance oriented that classy décor takes precedence over commemoration. The jumble of plaques, tablets and other memorabilia that litter the walls of old European churches would not be tolerated in most churches today.
The stained glass windows are beautiful, rich colors and wonderful symbolism. They are tall and slim with Gothic arched tops. There one for each of the four evangelists and others that represent a story from the life of Jesus. One seems to be the exception to that rule because it’s about the conversion of St. Paul on the Damascus Road until you remember that the bright light shown in the window is Jesus appearing to Paul. Each of the story windows has four pictures. The story starts at the top (sometimes the first picture in the Gothic arch portion of the window is symbolic) and then proceeding down as the story advances. A couple of the required close examination before I figured out what the story was. There’s no inscription on or around the window that tells you. There might have been a booklet in the church gift shop but it was not open.
Two of the windows are installments on the same story. In window 1 the top picture is an angel blowing a trumpet facing to the right, not particularly indicative of Jesus’ resurrection but certainly a symbol of his visits to earth, especially the next one. The second picture is Mary Magdalene coming to the empty grave early in the morning carrying a lantern. The third picture is Mary telling Peter and John of the empty tomb. The fourth picture shows John outrunning Peter to arrive at the tomb first. In window 2 the top picture is an angel blowing a trumpet facing to the left. I guess this is a contrivance to show that the stories on the two windows are related. The second picture is of the two angels that Mary saw as she was crying outside the tomb. The third picture shows Mary as she finally recognizes Jesus, she thought at first that he was the gardener, and calls him ‘Rabboni’. The fourth picture shows Jesus appearing to the disciples behind locked doors. All these events happened on the first day of His resurrection. The other windows tell the stories of Lazarus being raised from the dead, Jesus and Peter walking on water, Jesus calming the storm on the Sea of Galilee and the miracle of turning the water into wine at the wedding in Cana. The triple windows in the wall of the apse have the Holy Trinity as their subject as you would suspect from the name of the church.
The church is on the highest point of Hamilton’s tallest hill and the church’s tower provides a panoramic view of the entire area. The only other building near this height is the tower of the Supreme Court building, which is just down the street. A few blocks down on the same side of the street is Saint Andrew’s Presbyterian Church. It’s another Gothic structure but this one is done completely in pink and white. While it’s not shocking pink, neither is it pastel. It’s actually very much like ‘Barbie Pink’. The color gives the building an aura of whimsical fantasy. Certainly if Barbie and Ken ever got married it would be in Bermuda and in St. Andrew’s Church. The only thing on the entire building that is not pink or white is a bronze relief of the burning bush Moses saw in the desert. There weren’t any signs and the building wasn’t open so I couldn’t determine what the significance of this bronze was outside the clear Scriptural implications like when God talks to us we better listen.
On the way back to the ship I stopped by the Cabinet Building for some more shots of the Sally Bassett bronze because the sun was in a much better position. I sat in front of the pier building for a while watching people go by and talking to shipmates as they returned from forays into the town. Finally I went back aboard expecting to find Diana in the room as I had spent a lot of time walking and taking pictures. She wasn’t there and neither was her purse or any packages so she’s not on the ship. I went out on our veranda that overlooked the pier building and the gangway. All aboard is 3:30PM and it was 3:28. At almost exactly 3:30PM I see Diana coming down the street at her usual pace, not seeming to be in any particular hurry. She walked through the building and onto the ship at 3:32 and asked the deck officer if she was the last aboard and he told her there were two more still off the ship. They keep track of who’s off the ship by scanning your room key when you leave and come back. About 5 minutes later everyone was back and the ship was making ready to cast off.
On way out of the harbor we passed through the same small passage we used coming in. The tide was really coming in at that point. Water was running between the rocks like it would run in a river with a steep slope. It looked like the rocks were doing about 12 knots through the water with the wake they were causing as the water flowed past. Out in the Great Sound we passed a flotilla of dinghy of some sort either racing or getting group instruction, or maybe both. I didn’t know the class symbol on the sail. An official or instructor was accompanying them in a Zodiac style rubber boat. It was a very pleasant sail away and a fitting end to a great day.
April 26 – At Sea. Since we had the Mariner’s lunch and awards ceremony and the Baked Alaska Parade it looks like they are getting in all the traditional activities before we get to New York.
One of the traditions that I always enjoy is the show buffet and they held it this afternoon. One of the best things about this event is the interaction with some of the chefs that you rarely ever see because they toil away in the bowels of the galley. (There’s a wonderful image) They seem genuinely pleased to have everyone admiring their artwork. The doors open for pictures about a half hour before the eaters are allowed to storm the food like the Mongol hoards flooding Eastern Europe or the locusts heading for the farmer’s field.
I usually go in for the picture time and then head up to the Lido for lunch. It’s usually empty, as most people want to eat the artwork. The signs for the buffet are usually made of bread, chocolate or cake. You’ll always find the HAL logo in several media as well. Today they had some unusual ice sculptures, a castle, a lobster tree, the leaning tower of Pisa and a finely carved eagle. They had vegetable flowers in watermelon and grapefruit baskets, a butter iceberg with hard-boiled egg and olive penguins, a chocolate windmill and many delicious looking canapés and other finger foods.
On a table at the doorway they had a large wooden windmill surrounded by cheeses still in their original packaging. One of the wheels of cheese was the one that I remarked on the day I first had some, Old Amsterdam. It’s packaged like a Gouda cheese, a round edged wheel in wax, but in this case the wax is black, not red, with thin white lines and a picture of the Amsterdam skyline in black with an orange sky in the center of the wheel. The flavor is hard to describe but it has characteristics of an Italian cheese like a Parmigiano or Reggiano as well as those of aged Gouda, sort of a Dutch/Italian blend. The color is very distinctive, a golden orange. Like I said before, I had never eaten any or even heard of it before I saw some on the Lido lunch buffet. I doubt I can find any at home but I’m going to look.
Made in Holland from local pasteurized cow's milk and imported Italian cultures, gold medal winner Old Amsterdam tastes like a young Parmigiano-Reggiano crossed with an Aged Dutch Gouda. It seems like it would be a very versatile cheese for sandwiches or over pasta. It would certainly add color to a pasta dish.
Tomorrow, New York and back in the USA.
April 27 – New York, New York, USA. Diana last took a tour in New York in 1966 and it was it was 1958 for me so we decided to take a tour of Manhattan. The regular HAL pier is under refurbishment so we had to dock at the next pier north, 50th Street. It was very good to see the USS Intrepid back at the Pier 86 Museum after its 2-year absence for refurbishment. In 2006 it was towed to Staten Island for the facelift. I’ve visited it several times and would go back again today if we weren’t on a tour. Directly across from the Intrepid is the bakery for H & H Bagels, my all time favorite, especially the pumpernickel.
The sail in to New York is always impressive in that it takes time and passes some very historic and emotion evoking locations. After picking up the pilot near where the old Ambrose Light Ship used to be stationed you enter Lower New York Bay and turn north to pass under the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge between Fort Worth in New Jersey and Fort Hamilton in New York. This takes you into Upper New York Bay and here’s where the real history starts. To the left you have Bayonne, New Jersey, to the right Brooklyn, New York. As you approach the southern tip of Manhattan Island you pass between Governor’s Island and Liberty Island the home of the Statue of Liberty. Just north of the Statue of Liberty is Ellis Island, the main port of entry for European immigrants from 1892 to 1956.
Family Note: My family on my mother’s side came to the Americas long before these monuments were established. They immigrated into William Penn’s Pennsylvania Colony in 1683 with a large group of Protestants from central and eastern Europe who had escaped to Holland during the 30-Years’ War (1618-1648). When the Dutch got a little nervous about having so many Bavarians, Bohemians, Palatinates and others in their country, William Penn who needed agricultural colonists welcomed them to the ‘New World’. The little country church in which I was baptized was formed in 1683 and initially met in a log structure. The current building dates from 1759 and a Lutheran congregation still meets there. I’m not really sure when the Longenbergers arrived in the USA but I know that my great-great-grandfather was a mule skinner in the Pennsylvania coal mines in the middle 1800s so Ellis Island was not their entry point either. Makes tracing them a bit more challenging especially since colonial era courthouses had this irritating habit of burning down periodically destroying whatever records they held. I’m not casting aspersions on anyone or group but there were a lot more lightning based courthouse fires than there were courthouse lightning strikes. The coal regions of Pennsylvania were wild and wooly areas in the 18th and 19th Centuries, every bit as raucous as the ‘wild west’ of the late 19th Century. If you didn’t like what the records in a courthouse said you eliminated them by arson. The main targets were land records because back then land was money
The Statue of Liberty is always an inspiring sight for me. When we had our boat in the 60s we kept it on the Hudson River north of New York near Staatsburg. Since the Hudson freezes along the edges during the winter we had to move the boat to Sea Bright, New Jersey on the Atlantic in late fall. The run between the two took us on the same route that ships coming to or leaving New York take. I remember sailing our boat across Lower New York Bay, under the Verrazino Narrows Bridge (being built at the time) and into Upper New York Bay. I had seen the Statue of Liberty many times before on trips to New York with my Grandmother and my Dad but the first sight of it sailing into the harbor, as the immigrants had, made much more of an impression on me. Because we were on our own boat we could go right up to Liberty and Ellis Islands. 1964 was certainly a simpler time. If I tried to take the same route today Homeland Security, the Coast Guard or the Harbor Police would surely try to send the Arro-Lu to the bottom long before I actually got there. (Our boat was named for the three of us; Ar for Ardeth, my step-mom’s name, Ro for me and Lu for my dad, Luther.) At that time Ellis Island had fallen into a state of decay that make it quite a sad sight, very melancholy. This condition was exaggerated by comparison to Liberty Island and the Statue, which were well maintained. Now with both of them in very good condition, the sight is very much like the people coming to America would have seen.
You can tell which members of the crew haven’t been to New York before. When the ship was sailing past the Statue of Liberty they rushed out on deck in small groups to have someone take their picture with the statue in the background. A very nice compliment to the USA when you think about it. It’s a rare event indeed to see the Indonesian and Filipino crew rushing out to have a picture anywhere, Antarctica maybe, but not like they do in New York.
After you pass Ellis Island on the port side, the lower tip of Manhattan is on the Starboard side. Lower Manhattan is the home of the Financial District and Wall Street. It’s also the location of Ground Zero, former site of the World Trade Center. Rivers surround Manhattan, the Hudson to the west, the East River to the east and the Harlem River on the North. How you decide that the Hudson River, East River and Upper New York Bay meet will determine what body of water is to the south of the island. Based on the water flow I’d call it the East River.
The sun was just coming up as we entered the Hudson River. I could just make out the World Financial Center, which is just to the west of Ground Zero. The number of cranes in the area means that construction is still going great guns at the site. Just after passing this site you are sailing over the Holland Tunnel one of the ways to get across, or in this case under, the Hudson River. Later you catch sight of the Empire State Building and the Chrysler Building, both icons of the city for years. A little farther north and you pass the New York Waterways, World Yacht and Circle Line piers where ferries and tours leave to sail to New Jersey and around Manhattan. It was then that it struck me; this is the exact stretch of the Hudson where the US Airways flight landed. We are docking at the 50th Street Pier and the plane touched down near 56th Street. Since the current would carry it down the river it’s right here where the rescue took place. If we’d been docked at the time we would have had a ringside seat. Yikes!! Having these three boat piers nearby undoubtedly saved some lives.
Once we were docked our room overlooked the pier and gangway. I could see the Captain go ashore with some officials. He was carrying two radios, one to contact the bridge I’m sure, the other I don’t know for sure. Then I watched the parade of the 100+ of my fellow travelers who are disembarking in New York. I recognized them all but didn’t know most of them well except for Terri. She lives a few blocks from the pier in Manhattan. I’ve gotten to know her at CSI chat time and I’ll miss her on the way to Florida. She has a great sense of humor.
Because it’s our first port back in the US everyone has to clear Immigration here, even those of us who are going on to Fort Lauderdale. So when we exited the ship to head to our tour bus we all had our passports with us and had to clear back into the country. It went quickly as they had four agents in the port to check our passports. After that it was out of the pier building and we were back in the USA.
The tour was nice. We went north from the pier past Columbus Circle and up Central Park West. As the name implies this is the part of 8th Ave. that runs directly on the western side of the park. Much of it is in the Historic District and has beautiful architecture from the late 1800s early 1900s. There are many luxury Co-ops on the street including the Dakota where John Lennon lived and was shot. The buildings are everything from Greek Revival to Beau Arts and Art Deco. I had to chuckle when we passed 55 Central Park West. I could almost see the giant Pillsbury Doughboy loping down the street toward it in Ghostbusters. The building is nominally Art Deco but has so many unique architectural features that it does not neatly fit any particular style completely. It was selected for Ghostbusters because its unusual exterior looked like it could have been designed by the insane architect, Ivo Shandor as the movie contended.
Further north we passed Grant’s Tomb, made famous by Groucho Marx’s consolation question on ‘You Bet Your Life’, “Who’s buried in Grant’s Tomb”. He asked his contestants this question if they didn’t win any money during the regular quiz. If you’ve never seen the show it was Groucho at his best, ad-libbing one-liners while interviewing the contestants. I used to watch it in the early 50s. I had never seen a TV before my dad brought one home. That was probably 1950 or thereabouts. I guess you would believe that a 4-year-old boy would love Groucho and I did. I actually remember some people getting that question wrong. Ouch!! Grant’s birthday is today and they must be going to have a memorial of some kind as there are folding chairs set up and members of the Corps of Cadets where there rehearsing for the ceremonies.
Our next stop was Harlem and I have to say that it looks much better than the last time I was up here. Apparently the area is undergoing gentrification. We drove by the Apollo Theater, one of the most famous theaters in the USA and certainly the most prominent, and for many years the only, venue for Black talent in New York. In 1934 the 17-year-old Ella Fitzgerald made her singing debut here. Her performances pulled in large crowds and she won one of the earliest amateur night contests earning the princely sum of $25. Down through the years many performers have gotten their start here. Singers Billie Holliday, James Brown, Diana Ross, Gladys Knight, the Jackson 5, Patti LaBelle, Marvin Gay, Luther Vandross, Stevie Wonder, Aretha Franklin, Ben E. King, Mariah Carey, the Isley Brothers and Sarah Vaughan got their start here. Jimi Hendrix won the amateur musician contest in 1964. Not all the artists at the Apollo have been Black. Buddy Holly performed there in 1957 and later John Lennon, Hall & Oates and other already famous White artists have performed here.
From there we drove down several streets of traditional New York ‘Brownstones’. In case you’ve been wondering about that term, it’s a row house or town house that has the front façade covered in brown sandstone. In NYC however the term is loosely applied to any row house built before 1910 regardless of the nature of the front façade. This leads to a lot of confusion among non-New Yorkers so I thought I throw in a little explanation. In NYC if the Brownstone actually has brown sandstone on it it’s called a ‘Traditional Brownstone’.
We drove down 5th Avenue past Saint Patrick’s Cathedral the largest Catholic Gothic structure in the US. The bronze doors are fantastic. From there we went to the old GE Building and rode up to the Top of the Rock observation deck. There are three levels on the decks and since the building is just south of Central Park it has a great view over the entire area. It was quite hazy by the time we got up there, the best time to go would be early in the AM before the sun activates the photosensitive types of smog. Nevertheless the view was great. There’s a great view of the Empire State Building and Saint Patrick’s Cathedral.
We had some free time after we rode down from the observation platform. Rockefeller Center is just around the corner so Diana and I went to take a look. The statue of Prometheus over the plaza is one of the most vivid memories I have from my 5th grade field trip here. You’ve seen it I’m sure because this is where they put up the Christmas tree and have the ice skating rink in the winter. They were cleaning the statue and working on the fountain so the view was not very good but it was nostalgic anyway. I took a picture from almost exactly the same perspective as one I took in black and white over 50 years ago. It will be fun to compare them.
Our next destination was near the southern end of the island on the East River side, the South Street Seaport. It’s a complex of shops, cafes and restaurants that includes Pier 17 and a maritime museum. The two most interesting displays in the museum are the Ambrose Lightship and the Peking. The Ambrose Lightship used to be anchored at the ocean end of the Ambrose Channel, sort of a floating lighthouse. I’ve always had a thing for lighthouses and the lightship is the rarest form of lighthouse. The Peking is a steel hulled, four-masted barque. These were the last of the windjammer freight ships. Except for the steel hull they were almost identical to the wooden ships that had sailed for several hundred years. Mostly they were used to sail the inhospitable and difficult to provision route around Cape Horn. Steamers required a great deal of coal to fire their boilers and the logistics of getting coal to the stations on that route were difficult and expensive making sailing ships the vessels of choice. With the advent of fuel fired boilers the provisioning problems were much smaller and the sailing ships were retired from freight service. After serving as a children’s home for 8 years she was pressed into service by the Royal Navy in WWII. The New York museum acquired her and she is not permanently on display here. For those of you on the West Coast, the Star of India in the San Diego Maritime Museum is also a barque.
Our time here included our lunch stop so Diana and I headed to Pier 17, now a shopping mall. The food court offered quick dining and that’s what we wanted as seeing the sights was a high priority for me and shopping was a high priority for Diana. I should note here that the definition of ‘shopping’ as applied by Diana does not usually include the act of buying. Most of her shopping forays do not result in a purchase. Being a man I call that activity ‘browsing’. We ate at the Subway.
Tourist Eating Note Amendment: You are familiar with my McDonalds fixation when I’m in sightseeing mode. I’m adding Subway to that list. We never really ate at Subway until our last visit to Paris. We had been touring all day by Metro and walking and hadn’t really stopped to eat. We went to see Notre Dame in the afternoon and stayed for both the Vespers and Mass. By the time we got out we were hungry and just across the Seine River on the Left Bank was a Subway deli. We tried it and I have to say I liked it. The main advantage being that you can eat quickly and not use up valuable sightseeing time if that’s the mode you’re operating in at the time. The food is good and has the advantage of being healthier than Mickey D’s.
After lunch I continued to look around the area while Diana shopped. On the East River side you have a great view of the Brooklyn and Manhattan Bridges. There’s a performance area on the pier and today’s performer was an acrobat. He performed feats of flexibility and strength. A pretty good crowd gathered while he was performing and many actually dropped some money in the hat he had setting on the edge of his mats.
From the Seaport we drove through the financial district past Wall Street down to the waterfront around Battery Park. On our way north on the west side of Manhattan we encountered a huge traffic jam and about 50 police cars blocking the streets. As we sat there waiting for things to clear up the guide explained that the NYPD often conducted drills around the city to test preparedness. We sat in the bus about 25 minutes until the streets were cleared and we could proceed. Later I discovered that the police response was to the panic created by a flyover of Air Force One and 2 F-16 fighters. Oops!! Just one more thing the government has screwed up. Why we would ever consider trusting them to run a health care system, I don’t know. The health care systems they run now are examples inefficiency and waste. If you want to see what I mean just go to any Veteran’s Administration hospital and take a look around. There are lots of good people working there but the system they work under stinks and Medicare is little better. I certainly don’t want the government anywhere near my health care.
After clearing the traffic jam we continued up the West Side to the World Financial Center. This large complex of buildings is across the West Street from Ground Zero, site of the World Trade Center. The Center is a grouping of 4 towers. Between towers 2 and 3 is a 10 story, glass enclosed mall called the Winter Garden. The reason we’ve stopped here is that on one end of the building there’s a tall flight of stairs that leads to a spot where you can look down on Ground Zero. It was a sobering moment to look down on the hole in the ground that still exists. There are several construction cranes around the site and lots of activity. The current conditions give no hint whatsoever about the final plans for the area. The other side of the Winter Garden faces the Hudson River and had a glimpse of the Statue of Liberty.
The sail away was spectacular. The sun was setting and Manhattan is on the eastern bank of the Hudson so the lighting was great for pictures until you tried to get shots of Ellis Island or the Statue of Liberty. As we sailed across Upper New York Bay the sun was finally at acute enough angle to see enough of the lighted side of the statue to take a half decent picture. The orange Staten Island ferries we were passing look exactly like the ones I used to see in the 50s and 60s when I lived in eastern Pennsylvania. This was the least expensive way to cruise past the Statue of Liberty and see Manhattan from the water, in those days 25 cents. Soon we were back under that Verrazino Narrows Bridge and out into the Atlantic.
April 28 – At Sea. There’s two days at sea coming up but they aren’t quite as attractive to me as they usually are. The problem is that we’re leaving the ship after the two days and we have to pack and I’m not at all pleased with that. If I hate packing to leave home for a trip you can imagine how I feel about packing to leave the ship. This is the first long cruise for a surprising number of people on the ship. Some report loving it and others report that they can’t wait to get home. We fall in the ‘loving it’ group. It will be two days of saying goodbye to old friends and new. My goal is to be packed today and then just kick back and enjoy tomorrow.
Tonight will be our last formal night and the Texas Tenors are performing again so the show will be great! Diana says that she’s going to wear her birthday present to dinner. It’s a copy of a pre-Columbian necklace made by the Tairona people. They were known from 600-1600AD in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta of Columbia. They revolted against the Spanish and were consequently dispersed or killed. Their descendants are the Koguis of Columbia one of the few surviving indigenous peoples of pre-Columbian South America. Koguis means ‘jaguar’ in the Kogi language and that’s what Diana’s necklace represents. It’s gold stylized jaguar heads interspersed with BB sized turquoise beads. The jaguar was the most important mythical animal for the Tairona. When the jaguar possessed their shamans it gave them the power to heal. I have to admit I’d have never known they were jaguars from looking at them.
Another grand tradition of the sea is gone, just one more victim of bureaucracy. One of the oldest traditions in the HAL dining room is that they serve Baked Alaska on the last formal night of the trip. All the waiters go into the galley and then march out and around the dining room holding the baked Alaska over their heads as the crowd claps in time to the music. In the past they have always had sparklers stuck into the desert adding a touch of festive celebration to the dinner. Well, insurance rules, fire regulations, or a spirit of timidity has ended that tradition. The sparklers have been replaced by mini chemical lightsticks the waiters waive in their hands. Somehow the pale green glow of a lightstick does not quite replace the bright yellow sparks shooting out of a sparkler. Missing also are the sound and the smell. I really like fireworks and as a result love the 4th of July. The smell of sparklers is an integral part of the 4th of July experience and the baked Alaska parade always evoked fond memories of the celebration. Oh well, the waiters still have their great smiles and seem to be enjoying the parade anyway. They still march in to the Sousa favorite, “The Stars and Stripes Forever”. You know, “Be kind to your web footed friends, for a duck may be somebody’s mother.” and who doesn’t enjoy hearing Sousa’s magnum opus because it too evokes memories of the 4th?
The Texas Tenor’s concert was great once again. These guys not only have voices but they also have great stage presence and they know how to work a song. They are one of the top performers I’ve ever seen on a ship and one of the few ship’s entertainers I’d buy a ticket to see.
The Black and Gold Ball followed the Tenors second performance. Diana and I usually go to the balls just to see the crew dressed up and the somewhat uncomfortable officers dancing with the older ladies. We get in a few dances and have a good time.
It was a great evening.
April 29 – At Sea. It’s Diana’s birthday today. We celebrated yesterday because, as the last day on board, this is a really messed up day. I succeeded in finishing my packing last night after the ball when my formal clothes were no longer needed. Diana is finishing up today. We’re doing pretty well. We’ll have four cardboard boxes to FedEx home and our two suitcases and my carryon that will go with us. At chat time today everyone was pretty subdued as we are all anticipating disembarkation tomorrow. It was a very relaxed day for me and that’s what I like for the last day afloat.
As I said before, there are people on the ship that I’ve traveled with before and have gotten to know quite well that I don’t think I’ll be seeing again. First on that list is Marco, the lido chef that I’ve sailed with three times now for almost 200 days. He’s a great guy and a wonderful chef. His smiling face will be missed for sure. Lucy, the ship’s hostess, is another person that I’ve gotten to know. Her face is so expressive that she can’t really hide what she’s feeling as she talks or listens. She’s a sweet young lady. Corey, Kevin and Sparky, her partners in crime, will also be missed. We probably won’t be on a HAL ship in 2010 and by 2011 I think most of them will be on to better things. Of the event staff I only expect to see Danielle and Lena again and that will certainly be agreeable. They’re younger and may still be cruising in two years hopefully on the Prinsendam. I do hope to see Thom Faulkner again. He’s the perfect Cruise Director for the Prinsendam.
April 30 – Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Worst day of any cruise, getting off the ship. When we docked I went directly to the Ocean Bar. I received a note last night that said ICE wanted to see me when we docked. I’m pretty sure that it’s because I bought Diana’s birthday/anniversary gift on the ship and that put us over the limit on duty free entry. Thing is that what I bought was made in the USA and thus is exempt from duty as it is ‘US good returning’. We’re pretty experienced at this so we made sure that the shop on board gave us a certificate of US manufacture. I had my customs form and the certificate with me as once this item was removed from consideration we were not even close to the duty free limit.
I’m glad I went down early as quite a crowd developed. Those of us who were there early just remembered our arrival order so it was not a problem for us. One really pushy lady that had been on my nerves occasionally during the cruise came down at the last minute and parked herself right next to the tables that had been set up for the customs officials. The guy who knew he was first in line told her it was first come, first served and she’d better look around to get some idea of whom she followed. She ignored him and when the agents showed up she lobbied them to go in alphabetical order. We informed the agents that we knew what order we had arrived in and they were happy to let us organize the system. I knew my meeting would be quick and when the four people in front of me were done, I was finished in about 45 seconds.
Dealing with the Government Note: Having worked for the Treasury Dept. for 33 years in various capacities, including investigative, I have some observations to pass on to you that my be helpful to you sometime. There are some definite NEVERs when dealing with the government. 1. Both members of a couple should NEVER go to the meeting unless required to do so. Only the calmest, most under control, logically organized person should go. Ganging up on the agent is rarely useful. 2. NEVER volunteer information but do answer the question asked. Chattiness and embellishments are one of the fastest ways to get into trouble. This is another reason only one person should go. 3. NEVER stray from the current topic. It never helps to recount all your antigovernment feelings or negative governmental experiences to the agent. They really don’t want to hear them and you begin to look like a chronic griper that regularly has trouble with the government. Any sympathy or understanding you might have gotten from the agent will disappear quickly and, to be honest, nothing is quite as satisfying as sticking it to an overbearing, argumentative whiner. This brings us naturally to #4. NEVER become combative, abusive or argumentative. Agents deal with that all the time and it will not impress or intimidate them. In fact, it will do just the opposite. Any decision that could go either way will probably be made against you and if you want reconsideration you will have to invest more time and or money to get it. The best place to resolve any issue with the government is at the lowest possible level. Last but not least, NEVER lie. It’s not often enforced but making false statements to a Federal agent in the course of an investigation is a felony. Remember Al Capone got into trouble for not telling the truth. In Al’s case the FBI and various state and local law enforcement agencies could never lay a hand on him but the US Treasury, of which Customs is a division, put him away for life. In his case it was the IRS because he filed false tax returns, definitely a form of lying. Also, the agent you are talking to had nothing whatsoever with passing the laws or making the rules he or she is enforcing. They may feel that the law is as unfair or ridiculous as you do. That is a subject to take up with your Senator, Representative or President, not the agent.
There are also some definite DOs. DO go prepared. Fill out any forms and have your paperwork (bills, certificates, etc.) handy. DO your homework ahead of time. If you travel regularly take some time to read the Customs rules and regulations, at the very least the general ones. There are some great sites online to do just that and it’s amazing what is exempt from duty. In my time on ships I’ve heard a lot of talk from fellow passengers who are widely traveled about customs. Most of it was just plain wrong!! DO present your position in a logical, unemotional and polite way. Most agents are aggressive personality types but will only display that aggressiveness as a response to bad behavior. Intimidation is rarely a good approach. DO speak courteously in a professional manner. If the agent has a nametag, use their name, “Good morning Mr. (or Agent) Smith, it’s very good to be back in the USA.” Which leads to, DO greet them as you would a person you like that you meet in a professional setting. Remember, no one likes a person who makes his or her job harder than it has to be.
Two of the first four people to see Customs before me violated several of my guidelines. Fortunately the agent was in a good mood and stayed that way at least until I was through. Two of the couples spent 15-20 minutes to get cleared when, if they had approached the meeting properly, they would have been on their way in less than 2 minutes. I wouldn’t care except for the fact that it was 40 minutes I didn’t really have to be there.
Having cleared Customs on the ship I was now in possession of a stamped and signed Customs Declaration. It usually doesn’t make any difference but sometimes having that card pre-cleared can save you some time and hassle in the terminal.
Disembarkation was late as it always is. I’m not sure why they put those optimistic times on your departure materials. My experience is that everything is always later than advertised, usually by quite a margin. For example, our documents said we should be ready to leave at 9:30 and it was very close to 10:30 before our numbers were called. Ever since they allow you to remain in your room to be called I don’t really care. It’s a comfortable place to sit and remember all the fun you’ve had.
We took a taxi to the airport where we picked up our rental car from Budget and hit the road. Over the next two days we had an uneventful trip home.
