Hamilton

I have been hearing the rave reviews about Hamilton for several years now.  I was not convinced that I would like to listen to that much rap music but since the tickets were available we decided to go.
And I am so glad we did! I read the synopsis on line and also read a book about Hamilton.  The story moves so fast that without some background I think I would have been totally lost.  At intermission (what does it say about me that I always want to say 'at halftime'??) I overheard the young couples by us commenting that they had not understood all the words to the rap songs.  I thought it was just my old ears!  I decided to quickly download the lyrics to the songs in the '2nd half' :) and read through them. Boy did that help!

So, if you are going to see it, do a bit of research, listen to the music and read the lyrics.  One family from church had the songs on their karaoke machine and their 12 and 10 year old sons knew every word before they went to the play.  In fact she says that they often answer her questions with Hamilton lyrics!  Impressive!  I totally understand all the hype.  The cleverness of the lyrics, the energy of the dancers, and the fabulous voices made it a memorable night for us.

And finally - ATHENS!!!

I have wanted to go to Athens ever since I was a little girl living in Sicily.  My Daddy had to go to Greece for some reason and he brought back some little marble statues that I thought were so beautiful!  Finally my dream came true!

The Parthenon was built between 447 and 438 BC at the height of Greek civilization.  If you are like me, you have always imagined white marble statues on white marble buildings. with Greek philosophers in white tunics.  I was surprised to learn that archeologist now think that ancient Athens was full of color. The marble was brightly painted.  Using ultra-violet-light they can find color on statues that have no obviously visible signs of decoration.  They can't tell exactly what colors were used but they can see patterns.  Wow!  That changed my whole picture of ancient Greece.  

Painted or not the statues are extremely impressive!  This is a miniature replica. 

Just look at that detail. 

The statues on the temple right by the Parthenon are remarkable also.  In fact, walking around in Athens looking at all the antiquities was quite wonderful.  Way to end a fantastic trip!

Santorini

I choose this cruise over several others because of its stop in Santorini!  When George looked out the window in the morning he said, "Look snow"!  With the crazy weather we've had on this trip nothing would have surprised me, so I raced to the window to look and see.  What a tease!  Not snow but the white houses of Santorini looking, oh so white, against the black volcanic rock.  

Did you know that the whole complex of the Santorini islands is still an active volcano and probably the only volcano in the world whose crater is in the sea?

The unique location is made even more charming by the local architecture.  Small cubical houses are made of local stone that is whitewashed or lime washed with volcanic ash.  

The blue domes add a pop of color.

The interesting church steeples are a nice contrast to the round domes. 

 Sometimes the dome and the steeple are neighbors! 

As we walked through the narrow streets watching the construction workers getting the houses, restaurants and hotels ready for the upcoming tourist season I was sure that they must have a real love/hate relationship with those hordes of people descending on their island each year.

Tourists like me who are looking for the perfect photograph don't see (or choose to ignore) the 'private street' signs.  

Your 'private balcony' is not so private when people are swarming through the town but those same tourists are the chief source of wealth for the islands.

One group who seemingly love the tourists are the cats.  Santorini is home to a huge number of stray cats.  Normally I take a lot of dog photos but not here. 

You could even 'rent a cat'.  

I thoroughly enjoyed checking another one off the bucket list after this day on what is called the 'Gem of the Aegean'. 

Back to the cruise ship for just one more night at sea. 

Albania or Bust

Does he look a little nervous?

I am almost embarrassed to admit that we keep a count of the countries we visit.  We have a bucket list goal of visiting 100 countries so when we docked in Corfu, Greece we could not resist taking the ferry across the channel to Albania. George had done a lot of research about this little excursion.  When you are on a cruise ship and you take a cruise line sponsored excursion, you KNOW that the ship will wait for you if for any reason you are late.  This is not true if you go off on your own.  At the time the ship is about to leave, you hear one long blast of the horn and that means you had better run and get back on the ship.  I actually saw someone on our Black Sea cruise who came running up to the ship after they had already pulled away but were still very close to the dock and the ship did not go back the 25 feet to re-dock.  We did NOT want that to happen to us so the night before we arrived in Corfu we were understandably nervous but still thinking we would at least try to add Albania to our list!

Thanks to George's careful planning, we found the ferry ticket office quite easily and purchased our tickets for the hydrofoil.  I had read horror stories of people going by hydrofoil to Albania and having  it break down leaving them no choice but to stay several days in Saranda while it was repaired.  Not a scenario we wanted to experience!  

We made it to the hydrofoil just in time and had an easy 30 minute trip to Saranda, Albania. Next problem was that all the organized tours from the port area took too long.  We knew that we had to be back in time to catch the one ferry of the day.  My brilliant husband decided to go and ask the very nice woman at the ferry ticket office.  She just happened to have a friend who was willing to drive us out to the Roman ruins, wait for us and then get us back in time and all for $30! Perfect!

We explored the Ruins and then headed back to the entrance hoping our driver would be there. And he was there waiting for us, took me to a souvenir shop and we had still had time to splurge and enjoy a real Coke and not a Coke Zero!  We were celebrating after all!

And lo and behold the hydrofoil experienced no mechanical difficulties.  We left just on time.  Our cruise ship was still docked.  The rain didn't start until we were back in Greece.  

A perfect day!  George planned all of this as a Christmas gift to me!  We can add Albania to the list now!  

Turns out that wandering totally alone in a Roman ruin from the 7th century is pretty magical!

After the Romans the town had quite a turbulent history but by the 19th century was a small fishing village clustered around a Venetian Castle. 

 George looks pleased because we explored the entire site and were headed back to our driver, hoping that he would still be there.

Follow Me To Montenegro!

I have to admit that I would have needed to 'follow you to Montenegro' before this cruise as I wasn't exactly sure where it was.  Now after having been there I think that is is one of the most beautiful places we've visited.  It is sort of like Switzerland by the sea! 

For our shore excursion today we saw the 'Highlights of Montenegro'. 

 The drive up into the mountains was exciting!  Narrow snowy roads with precipitous drops!

The views made it worth it! 

Do you see the 'M' shaped road?  The engineer who designed the road was enamored with the beautiful Queen of Montenegro Milena so he designed the road in this particular way to honor her.  Our guide says that they were glad that her sister Olga wasn't the queen! 

Way up in a pretty valley we stopped for traditional snacks.   The smoked ham or Njeguška Pršuta is a specialty of the village.  It reminded us of jamon serrano from Spain or prosciutto from Italy as it is a dry cured, raw ham.  They told us that the unique flavor and smell come from the use of sea salt and the very specific curing process used.

  The 'pig leg' is salted with sea salt and then dried over beech wood fires in little huts.   Just behind the restaurant there was a line of these A-frame drying huts.  George and I enjoyed the ham, parmesan-like cheese and the delicious bread. 

Next we went even higher to the traditional capital of Montenegro. More snow!

I always love watching children play.  Reminded me of our boys playing in the snow.  I remember them making slides in Grandpa's back yard in Utah. 

These boys were throwing snowballs at the cars passing by.  When I took their picture they yelled, "Facebook, Facebook....Like...Like".  First time that has ever happened to me! 

We added a new and very beautiful country to our country count! 

Dubrovnik-The Pearl of the Adriatic

First I have to say that I am so glad we were here during the off season.  Yes it was quite cold in the morning but we did not have the crowds that are common during the high season when up to six mega cruise ships can be docked.  As many as 15,000 tourists walking around those narrow streets would be a nightmare.  There were only 2 small cruise ships in port the day we were there - probably around 1200 tourists on this particular day.  

Here is George on the Main Street.  Looks pretty empty and it was. 

I do understand why this is such a visited city.  I read that Dubrovnik has atmosphere, passion, and deliciousness!  All true! 

Parts of these city walls date from the 11th Century and are surprisingly intact. 

We walked all the way around the city on the walls and enjoyed the views.

Dubrovnik was a major trading center and one of the wealthiest cities in Southern Europe and of course this meant is was often fought over.  Its Slavic citizens managed to fend off the Venetians, Ottomans, and other empire builders in order to remain an independent city-state before eventually falling to Napoleon. I can picture enemy ships in the harbor and the locals huddled safely behind these giant walls.  

I took way too many photos of the roof tiles but they fascinated me.  The red tiles denote the newer roofs.  

 The colors and patterns in these older ones make them seem like works of art.

We LOVE Dubrovnik!