This post is part of a continuing series about a Mediterranean Cruise I took with my thirteen year old daughter in the fall of 2012.  Today I am talking about Venice!

You’ve seen Venice in movies, pictures and books all of your life, but still, there is nothing quite like stepping onto a boat in the Grand Canal and taking in the magical beauty of this place.

It is no wonder that Venice is such a well-loved destination.  The floating city lives up to all its hype.  You cannot help but take one million pictures, but you can also just sit and take it all in for hours without getting tired of watching the windows, arches and boats pass by.

The Carnival Breeze ports overnight in Venice, so we got to spend two days wandering the streets and canals. I think Venice is about the best place on earth to let yourself get completely lost for a day.

I’m just sharing a few photos today, because I have about a thousand.  These are some of our first impressions of Venice.  I loved watching Mary Polly see the city for herself.  I told her to wander on and I would follow her wherever.  It seems that all roads eventually lead you to San Marco (St. Marks Square), so we just moved slowly here and there for our first few hours in the city.

We stopped to take pictures of gondolas, windows, bridges and loads of cute little corners in the alleys.  Venice is busting with color and life and we were taking it all in.

We looked into shop windows at Murano glass and elaborate Carnival masks.  We sat on bridges when we got tired and watched people.

We were completely enchanted.

Next up: When we finally wandered into San Marco, we took a spin around the square and then decided to visit The Doge’s Palace. 

The Details, If You Go

The Carnival Cruise Port is near the bus and train stations at the edge of Venice.  There are several ways to get to the main sights of Venice from the cruise port.  There are water taxis and cruise excursions leaving directly from the port, which are the more expensive options.

We opted instead (on both days) to get on the People Mover that is just outside the cruise port.  It is 1 euro to ride it, and from there we walked easily into the city.  Walking quickly, it took us about 20 minutes to reach San Marco, but we were wandering through lovely streets the whole way there.  On our second day we caught the Vapretto #1 (like a bus on the water) at the station just after taking the People Mover.  Both ways were fun and we saw completely different sights each way, so we were glad we did both.

I think I would only take a cruise excursion if I were trying to see some of the other other islands near Venice.  Since Mary Polly had never been to Venice, we wanted to spend our two days there.  (More info about Carnival excursions on and about excursions in general can be found at the end of this Tuscany post and this post on Rome.)

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I am so in the mood for a little beach getaway.  How about you?

We are going skiing this month, which will be so much fun, as usual.

But still, I am a wee bit jealous of those who are heading south for Spring Break instead.

When we went on our Girls’ Cruise a couple of years ago, we went to this wonderful place in Cozumel called Nachi Cocom.  It was the most perfect beach day you could imagine.  Everything was wonderful.  The food, the chairs, the drinks and of course, the company!

On dreary days, I dream of going back there to sit in the sun under an umbrella with a book and  fruity drink.  Also I still dream about the coconut ice cream we had that day.

My friends, Whitney and Sarabeth,  have both previously blogged about our wonderful day in Cozumel.  I visit those pages often and sigh.

Where do you wish you were headed today?

The post Caribbean Cruise Notes: Hanging in Cozumel appeared first on Alison Chino.

If you are planning a Mediterranean Cruise in the near future, you should know, The Port of Dubrovnik, Croatia is worth the price of your entire cruise.

So make sure it’s on your ports of call when you book.

Settled on the Adriatic Sea coast of Croatia, this little gem of a port city is one of the greatest examples of a preserved (and oft-restored) medieval city.

Old city walls completely surround the Old City.  Just over a mile long, you can walk the entire distance of the walls, which is the very best way to see the whole town.

We walked from where the Carnival Breeze dropped us to the Old City, which was an adventure of its own.  There are also buses and tours leaving from the cruise ships.

As we walked, we knew we were getting close as the surrounding buildings and walkways got older and more quaint.

By the time we arrived at the main street (stradun), we were quite warm from our walk, so we started our time in the Old City with gelato.  Never mind that it was 8:30 in the morning!  I loved that in Europe the gelato stands are open at all hours of the day!

After a little refreshment we were ready to take on walking the city walls.  I had read that this was an absolute must and that it could become oppressively crowded later in the day, so we snapped a few photos as we walked from one of Dubrovnik’s main entrances to the other to enter the walls.

All around the city are these statues of St Blaise, the patron saint of Dubrovnik and he is always holding a model of the medieval city in his hand.  He is the protector of the city, and he is everywhere.  A fun activity with children would be to spend the day counting all the times you see St Blaise.

We took our time walking the walls.  We stopped for tons of photos of these charming orange rooftops.  We read all the information signs and marveled at how the city had survived earthquakes and bombings, rebuilding itself over and over again.

Though the strong fortress walls we walked survived most all the damage both man and nature could throw at them, the city’s buildings and especially it’s red rooftop tiles have been restored many times.

Most notably to me was the reconstruction after bombing in 1991 during the Croatian War, when 70% of the buildings were hit by bombs during the Siege of Dubrovnik.  One of my favorite exhibits in Dubrovnik was the memorial to those who lost their lives in this war, located in the Sponza Palace.

Even in late September, it was quite warm walking these walls.  There are several places to stop and rest along the way.  You can even buy a drink or something to eat.  The walls became considerably more crowded as the sun got higher, so we pushed on a little quicker through the latter half.

When you look over the sides of the walls, you can still see the spots where the torches were placed long ago to light the city up at night.

Here we are looking down from the city walls at the main street of Dubrovnik where just under an hour before we had stood and had gelato in the nearly empty thoroughfare.  We entered the wall at the lesser used city entrance directly opposite this one.  My guidebook said that the eastern entrance (Gate of Ploča) is a less frequented entrance, and that we would avoid a line to walk the walls by heading to that one.  We are standing here above the western entrance (Gate of Pila) and it was certainly gushing people by the time we reached this side of the wall.

On the western side of the Old City is the Fort Lovrijenac or St. Lawrence Fortress, often called Dubrovnik’s Gibraltar.

This impressive fortress and theater located outside the western wall feels like a setting for a fairy tale.

On the southern side of the wall, there was a lovely breeze from the sea.  It was wonderful to stand on the wall and look out over the sea.

You could also see where the sea kayak excursions started.  Several people on our cruise did this and it sounded really fun.

Though there were lots of people swimming, the sea was too cold for us Southerners.  By late afternoon, it was really hot enough to jump in though.

We also saw this school as we walked the southern side of the wall.  You could hear the students inside and I thought their basketball court all marked off by the city walls was so quaint.

When we got off the walls, we toured the Maritime Museum.  My favorite part was actually these huge anchors outside.

Mary Polly and I are slightly obsessed with anchors.

At the eastern edge of the city, near the monastery, you can walk out onto this pier.  There are even ladders, so you can swim in the sea.

It was a perfect spot to soak in the sun, breathe the sea air and rest after walking the walls.

The view of the city from the pier is also beautiful.  You can book one of these boats and do a sea cruise if you want.  Or there is a ride that takes you up the mountain behind the city so you can view it all from up high.

I think both of those options would be fun, but we wanted to explore more of the city on our first visit so we wandered back inside the city walls to The Sponza Palace.

The Sponza Palace, first built in 1516, is a mixture of Gothic and Renaissance styles, with late-Gothic windows on the first floor and Renaissance-style windows on the second floor. And, of course, there’s a statue of St Blaise nestled in an alcove.

The building has housed the mint, the treasury and the bank. Its official function now is to house Dubrovnik’s historical archives, containing over 100,000 documents, books and manuscripts.

We enjoyed walking through the building and its courtyard.  All these gorgeous arches!

Like I said earlier, our favorite part of the Sponza Palace was the Memorial Room that told the stories of Dubrovnik’s heros during the 1990s.

After the palace we saw the Church of St Blaise.

Then we wandered up and down many of the enchanting corridors in the Old Town.

There were lots of little shops and restaurants tucked here and there as you walked.  All the paths lead you back to the main street, so you couldn’t get lost.

We had a snack in a little cafe and then we found a bus back to the Carnival Breeze.

As we sat on the deck of the cruise ship and flipped through our pictures, we couldn’t believe how beautiful this little town in Croatia had been.

Amazing.

The sun set on this charming city as we sailed away.  I would love to return to Dubrovnik  one day for a longer stay and see the city at night, but this day really could not have been more perfect!

The Details, for if you go:

We purchased a Dubrovnik Card at a little tourist center near the cruise ship, which is good for riding the bus all day, walking the city walls and a few other museums.  However, in retrospect, since we walked into the city and one of the museums on the card was closed on the day we were in town (Rupe), it probably would have been better to just pay for individual tickets at each of the sites.

The cruise ship has a bus that you can ride to and from the Old City for a reasonable fare and I think if you are just wandering the city, walking the walls, visiting museums, you could certainly purchase this ticket and do everything else on your own.

Since we had the Dubrovnik Card, we really tried to see all the museums listed on it, which meant we missed a couple of sites that I really would have liked to have seen, most notably the monastery.

The walk from the cruise ship to the Old City was about 3 kilometers.  It felt like an eternity to Mary Polly, who wished we had ridden the bus, but there were so many people waiting for buses.  Plus I really enjoy walking around a new place and taking in the local feel of the town.

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The Lovely Port of Olbia, Sardinia, Italy

Olbia is on the northeastern side of the island of Sardinia.  There are several lovely beaches there, or so we heard.

It sounds ridiculous to me now, but after three days in Barcelona, followed by stops in Monaco, Tuscany and Rome, we were so sleepy.

Also, we enjoyed being on the Carnival Breeze so much that we took in as much of the nightlife as you can with a thirteen year old.  We saw the shows, we went to the Dive In Movie and Mary Polly participated in whatever late night offerings were happening in the Circle C (the club for her age).

So by the time I roused her to wander off the boat into Olbia on this gorgeous day, we just had a few hours to roam about the town, which we enjoyed very much.

With a view of the Mediterranean Sea from everywhere and sunny, blue skies, Oliba’s  pastel brickwork and lovely open air markets and restaurants felt like a wonderland.  We were still sleepy as we wandered about which contributed to our dreamy state.

We were abruptly awakened from this state, when we stumbled out of a gelato shop enjoying our treats in the sun and were suddenly surrounded by several policeman questioning us in Italian.  Mary Polly looked horrified as I pulled out my phrasebook and our passports, trying to figure out what they wanted.

At first I thought we were in trouble for eating our gelato outside, because picnicking is forbidden in some places in Europe, but then one policeman took our passports inside the gelato shop and a loud argument ensued between him and the proprietor.  He came back outside to ask us more questions we could not understand.

Friends, I wish you could have seen Mary Polly’s face.

I finally decided that he was asking us how much we paid for our gelato.  I could still be wrong about this, but we think maybe they were making certain that tourists weren’t being charged a higher price than normal for gelato?

Olbia was most certainly among the most welcoming ports we encountered.  The port provides a free shuttle from the Carnival Breeze to the town center, which runs all day so you can go back and forth if you want.  So perhaps the police are protecting the tourist industry?

Whatever the case, the incident served as an adventure for sure because we were detained for long enough to completely unnerve Mary Polly.  Also, we were making a scene.  Several people stopped and gathered around trying to translate.

When they finally gave us back our passports and sent us along our way, I was laughing hysterically and Mary Polly wanted to get straight back on the boat.  I think she thought we might still get in trouble.

Instead we walked down to the edge of the sea and sat in the sun for a while.  Laziest day ever.  It was beyond lovely.

You could see our boat from Corso Umberto, which is the main street of the historical town center.  Olbia, which means The Happy in ancient Greek, seems like the perfect place to spend a week or two on holiday.  I imagine one could be quite happy for a long time here.

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One Glorious Day in Rome!

(The Port of Citvitavecchia)

First stop in Rome, The Colosseum.

Pulling up to the Colosseum was one of those surreal moments you dream about when you are planning a trip to Europe.  We glimpsed it from our bus and then our guide let us off enough away that we could take in its full scope before getting closer and going in.

I had Mary Polly make a list of her top ten wishes for our Mediterranean cruise before we left Arkansas, and walking through the Colosseum was Number One on her list, so we were both super excited for the moment we would stand within its famous walls.

We stood on ancient stones and peered into ancient cisterns.

We pondered the moving of and building with giant squares of rock without modern equipment.

Then we climbed high and imagined the brutal scenes that had been played out below us centuries ago.

We were mostly dumbstruck as we wandered around the almost 2000 year old amphitheater, quietly pointing out places we found to one another.

At each window we could spot different angles of the surrounding monuments.

The Roman Forum

The Arch of Constantine

It was tempting to stop at every single window for a picture.  But we pressed on because as our infinitely knowledgeable guide reminded us frequently, we were on a tight schedule.

We walked a little more around the outside of the Colosseum and took in closer views of The Arch of Constantine before we were back on our bus.

Several sights we glimpsed only in passing.

This is the Archbasilica of St John.  It is the mother church of all the Roman basilicas, housing famous sculptures of the 12 apostles.

We saw many ancient Egyptian obelisks in various squares.

These monoliths were transported down the Nile and across the Mediterranean Sea during the Roman Empire.  The logistics of moving these obelisks such a far distance boggled my mind.

After many more spottings of famous buildings than I can even name we made our way to a lovely lunch spot.  Mary Polly and I sat with a precious couple from California who were on their honeymoon.  We enjoyed hearing about their day in Florence.  (Gasp! Was that just yesterday?)  And we drank lots of local wines, enjoyed pasta, bread and maybe the very best ever tiramisu I have ever had.  Ever. Along with a coffee of course.

Next we made our way down the most lovely series of streets to the sight I was maybe the most excited to see.

The Trevi Fountain!

There is a traditional legend that if you toss a coin into the Trevi Fountain, you will return to Rome one day.

I think almost every tour leaving our boat made a stop at this fountain, because of course, who doesn’t want to ensure another visit to the majestic city of Rome?

We certainly tossed our coins in along with the rest of the throng of tourists who had come to see the most famous fountain in the world. With mounting anxiety, I held Mary Polly tight while we pushed through this crowd to get up close to the fountain where we tossed our coins in.

There was a little more breathing room down close, so we sat for a minute and watched all the people.  We were guessing what countries people came from, and we watched a bride and her photographer try to negotiate the crowd to get bridal portraits.

We also spotted this sweet couple mid-embrace.  We decided they were Romans, ignoring the crowd and falling in love.  In their own little world, I thought they really embodied the magical feeling of being near the Trevi Fountain, even amidst the swarms of people.

Part of the facade was being restored while we were there.

For the final leg of our tour, we were headed to The Vatican City.  We passed a few more lovely places on our way, but by this time Mary Polly and I had taken in so much history of Rome that we were slowing in our absorption of details.

In fact, Mary Polly might have closed her eyes until we got to St Peter’s Basilica.

We got to walk down the street, approaching it from afar and marveling at its grandeur as we got closer and closer.  It’s impossible to feel how big it is from the pictures, but we were stunned.  So much so that I had trouble keeping up with our guide as he marched us around the line to enter through a side door.

We wound around columns and through barricades to get to the entrance and then,

Hallelujah!  We were inside the largest church in the world!

Our guide walked us through the Basilica telling us all about it and then set us free to explore on our own for a bit.

I had long desired to see this Pietà by Michelangelo.

Unfortunately, you cannot get very close to it and it is covered with bullet proof glass because a mentally disturbed man attacked the sculpture with a hammer in 1972.

Still, it is beautiful.  I love the way Mary is cradling Jesus in death as in birth.  I have been obsessed with Pietàs in art ever since I became a mother.  Mary’s sacrifice is not talked about much in the evangelical tradition of which I am a part, so the mystery of Mary, Mother of Jesus eludes me all the more.  Which is, I suppose, why I am drawn to her.

The dome of the Basilica, the largest in the world, designed by Michelangelo, was of course, amazing.

We built all day to this moment.  The one where we would stand under Michelangelo’s dome.

And it did not disappoint.

Bernini’s famous bronze baldacchino sits under Michelangelo’s dome and over the altar.

You can take as many pictures as you want inside of St Peter’s Basilica because all of the paintings are not really paintings at all, but mosaics.  They are enormous and you cannot believe they are made of tiny bits of colored glass or marble until you get right up close.

Our guide was particularly enamored with this meticulous art.  It takes years to perfect and most Vatican mosaic artists can only complete two or three of these masterpieces in a lifetime.  I found a fascinating article talking about the Vatican studio where people are continuing to learn this ancient art form.

Finally, it was time to leave St. Peter’s.  We had a few minutes to wave to the Swiss Guards who keep the Vatican City safe, in spite of their jester-like uniforms.  And another minute or two to buy a postcard, a rosary or any number of other small trinkets.

Then we waved Goodbye to Rome and hopped back on the bus.

It was a wonderfully exhausting day, and I think everyone on our bus fell asleep as we made our way back to the Carnival Breeze, where we sat on the deck and watched the sun set on our first ever day in Rome.

A Few Details for If You Go:

These are the boring kinds of details I was looking for before I went on this cruise, so I wanted to share them with you.  Please feel free to skip to the comments and tell me if you could only stop at once place in Rome, what would it be?

How can you possibly see Rome in a day?

You can’t.  That’s why there are 3000 euros tossed in the Trevi Fountain every day! You want to go back!

One night on the boat we ate dinner with a couple who had spent a week in Rome before flying to Barcelona to board the Carnival Breeze.  Then they stayed on the boat the day we ported in Rome.  I thought this was a wonderful idea for several reasons.  Firstly, Rome is the furthest place you drive to from the sea and at all the ports, you are so anxious to see everything that you don’t want to stay on the boat, but I am sure it would be lovely to enjoy a day on board while everyone else has left, especially in a must see stop such as Rome.

Alas, we did not have an extra week to spend in Rome, so we had to make the best of one day.

How do you choose your Rome excursion?

We chose our Rome tour based on the fact that the Colosseum was Number One on Mary Polly’s list of sights to see in Rome.  She had read and studied about the Colosseum and was very excited about seeing it.

Of the tour choices with Carnival, Rome At Its Best was the only one where you entered the Colosseum so our choice was pretty much made for us.

The highlights of this tour were the Colosseum, St Peters’ Basilica and the Trevi Fountain.  I was sad that we had to miss the Vatican Museum and the Sistine Chapel, but with only one day in Rome, you have to make some sacrifices.  If you want more than anything else to gaze at the Sistine Chapel, then you need to choose the St Peters and Vatican Museum Tour.

Our cruise director did a lecture on Rome excursions which I attended while I was figuring out our day in Rome, but I came to it with a list of what I really wanted to see.

In general, I found attending these lectures and reading Rick Steve’s Mediterranean Cruise Ports (which I carried with me) to be enormously helpful in planning our time in Europe.  This book and many others are available for browsing in the library of the Carnival Breeze, which is nice if you haven’t had much time ahead of your trip to plan your days on shore.

How do you move about with 50 people in Rome?  And how do you hear the guide?

I was curious about this, and like our day in Tuscany, was concerned that we would be waiting on other people all day. But we had a bus driver and two guides.  One guide walked in front and the other walked in the back and kept us moving.  The rear guide, David, was so super sweet, but very firm.

One time a lady in front of me stopped to look at a handbag for sale and he was all, No shopping ma’am! No time for shopping!

Her husband laughed and said, I’ve been trying to tell her that all my life!

At one point, Mary Polly and I had to find a restroom and he waited with us and then caught us up to the group because he was able to call the guide in front.

Our front guide, Marco, knew more about Rome than I can ever imagine knowing about anything.  Seriously, I know he does this for a living, but he was unbelievable.

We all wore these little radios with one earphone around our necks (Mary Polly is wearing hers in the Trevi Fountain picture above).  Marco would speak into his little microphone and you could hear him just like he was right next to you even if you were fifty feet back.  I loved this because he didn’t have to yell and you didn’t feel like you had to stay in such a tight pack with everyone.  As long as you could hear him, you knew you were in range of the group.  Plus if you fell too far behind, there would be David, smiling and reminding you to keep up.  Mary Polly felt free to just remove her earphone whenever she got tired of listening.

Also, Marco would give us time to roam on our own at each of the sights.  I noticed that when he did this, several people stayed with him and asked him more questions, which he was always glad to answer.

A word more about Rome

For every one person that visits Disneyworld, there are nine who visit Rome.  We were there at the end of September and it seemed mobbed to me.  However, every time we entered a major monument, Marco would look around and say, Good, not so crowded today!

And I would think, If this is not crowded, I certainly don’t want to see it when it is!

Also, even though it was September, it was quite warm.  Mary Polly and I both wore jeans and short sleeves and sweaters because your legs and shoulders have to be covered to enter the Vatican and the churches in Rome.  By late afternoon, we were quite hot , so it must be positively grueling in the summertime.  However, we did convince David to let us stop to grab some gelato.

Note to self: Return to Rome in January.

More info about Carnival excursions and about excursions in general can be found at the end of the Tuscany post.

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Our original plan was to take one of the excursions to Florence, but the one we chose was canceled at the last minute so on an impulse, we jumped on an excursion called The Essence of Tuscany.

This was one of those fortuitous decisions that made me later wonder if perhaps a little travel angel had guided our journey.

Because the entire day from start to finish was positively perfect.

Our day started early so my sleepy girl was thankful for the bus ride from our cruise port.  I had to nudge her occasionally though to look out the window at the happy landscapes.  Immediately we fell head over heals for our easy-going adorable guide, Chiara.

Her soft voice speaking occasionally over the microphone on the bus was a subtle interruption rather than a startling announcement.

She let us know that we would be visiting two Tuscan hill towns with a stop for lunch at a country villa in between.  At both towns she would show us a few things, but then let us roam on our own until an appointed time.

(It would not be until I had been on two other Carnival excursions that I would come to fully appreciate how very perfect this arrangement was.  More on this later.)

We stopped first in San Gimignano, a place I had visited before with Taido.  It is the setting for parts of the movie Tea with Mussolini, an old favorite with Judi Dench and Maggie Smith.

We started in the town square. Chiara told us the very best spot for gelato, which we were happy to eat, even at 10 in the morning.  She recommended two local flavors, white wine and chocolate.  They were both divine.

Mary Polly had berries with lavender which was also sublime.

After gelato we wandered around the square and the surrounding towers for a while.

San Gimignano is famous for its preserved towers and walls which date back to the 12th, 13th and 16th centuries.

Mary Polly loved exploring this small town.

It is walled in on all sides, and everything eventually leads back to the square so it is virtually impossible to get lost, which is why it is a wonderful place to just let yourself go.

Go ahead and get lost and forget your way because the wandering of these little alleys and cobblestone walkways is magical.

Every doorway seemed like it might open to a wonderland.

Mary Polly and I both kept pointing out doors we’d like to live behind.

This might explain the fairly ridiculous number of pictures of windows and doors I have from our time in Italy.

So beautiful!

Some places looked like they might be homes to hobbits or dwarves.

Or even fairies.

Soon we had wandered up to the old fortress and park that overlook the town.

We climbed to the top of the tower and sat for a while to enjoy the view.

I showed Mary Polly the exact spot in the park where Taido and I had enjoyed a picnic lunch many years before.  We listened to musicians playing in the park, and wandered in and out of olive groves.

Then we made our way back down to the square.

Everyone was filled with the same delight as we were, talking about how perfect San Gimignano was.  We got back on our bus and drove a short way to our lunch spot.

At lunch, we were greeted with the most welcoming sight.

Long green checkered tables lined with local wines, olive oil and Parmesan cheese were shaded from the noonday sun.

We filled up these tables and had a lazy first course of bread, cheese, pancetta and bruchetta.

Then we had pasta.  More bread of course.  And traditional Italian custard for dessert.

We exchanged stories over lunch.

I might also have cornered Chiara to see if she could arrange an Italian Countryside 40th birthday trip the following year.  Maybe it was the wine, but I was pretty much in love with her by this point.

Next we went to Volterra.  Thankfully, we had a little drive (and a little nap) to get there.

Volterra also has beautiful towers, but it is mostly known for its Roman ruins from the 1st century.

We stood on a small ridge above the Roman Theater while Chiara told us the its history and gave us a few more tips about walking through Volterra.

Here she is.  So cute, right?

Then she let us go and wander the village on our own.

I loved this striped stone work on the buildings.  It’s from the 13th century (I think…I kind of lose track).

We wandered inside a couple of the churches and Mary Polly even lit a candle for a loved one.

I could look at ornate ceilings and arches and artwork within old European churches for the rest of my life.  So fascinating to me.

More wandering through beautiful streets.

More getting lost and dreaming about staying in Italy forever and ever.

More finding our way back to the beginning by way of tiny alleys.

And fairytale gateways.

We were sad for our Tuscany day to be over because we loved it so much.

It would have been fine with us if our boat had left us there for a day or two more, but it was time to get on our bus and head back to the Breeze.

Goodbye Volterra!

Goodbye lovely Italian countryside!

Caio Chiara!

If you go:

There are a few slightly tedious details I would love to share with you about taking this particular excursion with Carnival and about excursions in general.

I hesitate to share them here because this post is already quite long and this part is kind of boring.  However, this is exactly the kind of information I was searching madly for before I went on this cruise so here they are.  Please feel free to skip to the comments and just tell me how much you want to go back to Italy with me next time.

1. Why choose The Essence of Tuscany as an excursion?

The ports of Livorno (Florence/Pisa) and Rome are back to back on this cruise, as they seem to be for most Mediterranean cruises.  I cannot wait to share about our time in Rome, (next week?) but its pace was dizzying, as it should be if you only have one day in Rome.  Had we done a similar day of touring monuments and museums in Florence as we had originally planned, I am not sure if we would have been to appreciate our day in Rome quite as much.  This is even more true for Mary Polly.  We walked miles and miles every day of trip, are both in reasonably good shape and enjoy a challenging day of sightseeing.  However, this more easy going day in Tuscany turned out to be her favorite part of our entire two week trip.

2. Why do an excursion at all?  Why not just go on your own?

Believe me.  I asked the internet this question a lot, because excursions are not cheap.  We only did three excursions in eight ports.  The other five we did on our own.

However, Livorno (which is an hour from Florence) and Civitavecchia (which is an hour and half from Rome) are both industrial ports.  You have to hire some kind of transportation just to get out of the port area.  There are lots of people (via the mind-numbing chat threads of Cruise Critic) who get into smaller groups and hire excursions on their own outside of Carnival.  I think the main advantage of doing this is that the group size is smaller.  They are not necessarily that much cheaper (though they can be a little), but since it was my first cruise in the Mediterranean, it just seemed safer to me to book with Carnival.  I would love a smaller group size and I would love to hand choose a guide (for example, obviously if I were going back to Tuscany, I would be calling Chiara), but the thought of Mary Polly and I ending up in a car with four drunks from Cleveland, Ohio was frankly worse to me than the thought of being on a bus with 50 people.

How does the excursion work exactly?  Do you have to stand in line for a long time?  What is the group size?  Don’t you waste a lot of time waiting on other people all day?

The group sizes on Carnival’s European excursions are quite large.  There are close to 50 people on each bus.  In the past when I have cruised with Carnival in the Caribbean, you just get off the boat and find your excursion, but on the Carnival Breeze, they have a system where you go into the theater to get grouped for your excursion.  On your excursion ticket is a time that you need to be in the theater.  The excursions that were leaving for Florence and Pisa had the earliest times, around 6:30 or 7am.  Our excursion wasn’t leaving until 8.  We, of course, arrived early to the theater because when I am unsure about a situation I tend to be a little nutty about the details.  So I watched many of the other excursions leave the theater first.

What happens is that as you enter the theater you are handed a number on a little sticker.  This turns out to be your group number and your bus number.  Apart from the fact that this makes you feel a little bit like you’ve been branded and herded like a cow, the numbers are actually make things move quite efficiently.

Because I was early for my excursion, I was handed the number of the first bus leaving for my tour.  As it turned out, there were several Essence of Tuscany buses, as there were several of all the other kinds as well.  So serendipitously I discovered a detail that I found very helpful for all of our other tours.  If you arrive early for your excursion, you are placed on the first bus leaving.  This also means you will be the first bus to arrive at all the sights, ooh and also at lunch.  This was certainly nice on our Tuscany tour, but proved to be even more helpful on our Rome tour since there were so many more buses going to all the different sights.

Also, and more importantly, if you are early for your tour, then your bus tends to be made of people who are responsible and on time.  This detail saves you being on a bus with people who don’t mind being late.  It seems like a small, petty thing until you are waiting on a bus full of people ready to go to the Colosseum, but you are held up by someone who thinks the entire world tour revolves around them.

Once I realized all of this on our Tuscany tour, you can bet that I was a half hour early for our Rome tour, where there is a lot more stopping and starting.  Mary Polly was not really loving me when we had to be in the theater at 6am, but we were on Bus #1 to Rome.

The post Snapshots of Tuscany appeared first on Alison Chino.

What is funny is that I probably would not have toured it if I hadn’t had Mary Polly with me.  The Musée Océanographique dates from 1901 and was the brainchild of Prince Albert I.

Jacques Cousteau was even the director of the museum for several years.

We wandered all around the stunning building taking pictures before entering.

We loved these mosaic floors in the entryway.

This kind of beautiful detail was found all over the museum, which made the building as much a marvel as the exhibits.

Ornate stonework throughout.

The museum is more than just an aquarium.  It’s really a museum of the sea.  All different aspects of marine life, historical and present day, are highlighted.

The lowest level of the museum is filled with aquariums.

We stared into tons of blue aquariums, mesmerized by Mediterranean sea life.

In addition to all the collections of sea life in skeletal and stuffed forms, there were several modern art exhibitions happening at the Musée Océanographique.

Of the different modern exhibitions, my favorites were these pirate-like metal skeletons that were on fire.

I was totally fascinated by them.  I think there were three or four different ones.

Another whole hall was dedicated to maritime travel.  Old ship models and maps made up a history of sea faring.

On top of the museum was a little cafe with lots of outdoor seating, as well as a playground of sorts.  We thought this was so cute.

The views from the top of the Musée Océanographique were of course, breath-taking.

We spent a good bit of time enjoying the rooftop before we headed back down to the exit.  You exit through the museum shop which was full of cute sea treasures.

If you only have time to go into one building in Monaco, the Musée Océanographique would be my first choice.  Mary Polly and I both named it our favorite part of our dreamy day in Monaco.

The post Snapshots of Monaco’s Musée Océanographique appeared first on Alison Chino.

Cruise Port: Monaco.

We had attended our cruise director’s lecture on the highlights of the cruise port Monaco and he was not lying when he told us that at the first glimpse of the port, we would be dazzled by its old world elegance.

The sun was shining in through our little porthole windows when we woke up.  We waited in our room for our cue that we could leave the boat.

(Note: Being at the very bottom of the Carnival Breeze had it’s advantages on port days, as the exit was just around the corner from our room (1215).  We didn’t have to wait for the elevators or climb the stairs after long days of sightseeing.  We could pop right in and out of our room.)

The port of Monaco is U-shaped, and all the places you want to see are set into the edges of this enclave.  The Old Town, referred to as Monaco-Ville is on the southern side of this U (to the left of our boat as we exited or the port side), and the famous Monte-Carlo casino is on the northern side (to the right of the boat or the starboard side).

As soon as we got off, we began to climb towards Monaco-Ville along this curving (sometimes steep) path to the Palace Square.  There were buses and excursions that would take you all around, but we walked.  The whole town of Monaco is very walkable if you are in reasonable shape, and you get to see so much more.

I was so glad we found this stone pathway, because the views all the way up were so lovely.

The path winds through old ramparts, lookouts and terraces.  We were both squealing around every corner, Look at this!

The whole country of Monaco is like a fairytale.  The second smallest country in the world, bordered by France and the Mediterranean Sea, it is ruled by Prince Albert III under a constitutional monarchy.

Monaco boasts the world’s highest GDP (and is well known for being a tax haven), which for us meant the cleanest streets I have ever seen, perfectly maintained grounds, and zero crime.

We wandered in and out of pastel colored alleys up the hill until we reached the Prince’s Palace Square.

We sat at the top taking in the views and the morning sun for a while before going to tour the palace.

We bought a combination ticket for the Palace, the Napoleon Museum and the Aquarium (Palais du Prince, Musée des Souvenirs Napoléoniens et Archives Historiques du Palais and Musée Océanographique).  It cost 30 euros for both of us, 1 student and 1 adult.

We toured the Prince’s Palace first.  There is a changing of the guard every day at noon, just like in London.  We enjoyed the tour of the inside and of the Napoleon museum (where they have his actual hat), but none of it compared with the views from the Palace Square.

The Port de Fontvieille is on the southern side of the palace square, which is the only part of Monaco we didn’t walk through.  So pretty though!

We exited the square just across from the Palace to see the Cathedral next.

The Monaco Cathedral is the final resting place of the Grimaldis, the ruling family of the Principality of Monaco.  Prince Rainier III, Princess Grace (wife of Prince Ranier III), Prince Louis II (grandfather of Prince Ranier III), and Prince Albert I (father of Prince Louis II) are among those buried there.

We enjoyed walking through the building and finding the names of the famous rulers of Monaco.  Princess Grace‘s part of the vault was covered with flowers.

Our very favorite stop in Monaco was the aquarium, the Musée Océanographique.

It is perched right on top of cliffs overlooking the Mediterranean and is as amazing on the inside as it is on the out.  I have so many pictures from this stop that I’m going to save it for its own post.

But we definitely loved it and spent the bulk of our morning and into the afternoon touring it.

By the time we finished with the aquarium, it was well after lunch and we were only halfway back down the hill to our boat.  We knew we wanted to make the trek up the other side of the port to see the famous casino, Monte-Carlo, but it had warmed up a lot and we were hungry.

So we decided to go back to the boat for lunch and to change clothes.  I think Monaco is the only port on our cruise where we could do this, and it was so nice.  Being our first stop on the cruise, we were also carrying more than we needed to, so we could readjust and throw off a few things.

The boat was not leaving Monaco until 7pm, so we had plenty of time after lunch to explore Monte-Carlo.

In the hot afternoon sun, we headed back out.  This time we climbed from the starboard side of the boat.  The walk up the hill (also the Grand Prix, I believe) was intense, and Mary Polly would tell you that we walked way too much this day, but again, I really loved seeing the port this way.

We were always looking back as we got higher and taking pictures of the Carnival Breeze, which dwarfed all the other ships in the port.

We approached the Casino from the back.

From this side, it overlooks the sea.  We sat on the stairs behind the Casino and rested from our climb, before we walked around to the front and found a gelato stand, something we did at every single cruise port.

The front of the Monte-Carlo Casino is impressive.  You have to be dressed up and 21 to enter, which we knew ahead of time, so we didn’t try to go in.

We walked the grounds around it, took more pictures, enjoyed our gelato and then walked back through the city.

We loved this chapel and the ruins in the walls behind it.

The stones along this road were my favorite ones we saw all day.

More walking on lovely streets.

When we finally got back down to our boat, we were both beat.

We sat outside on the concrete dock, and watched while several people actually swam in the sea just off the dock.

Mary Polly dipped her toes in the water, but it was too cold for us.

Sitting in the sunshine by the sea was the perfect way to end our dreamy day in Monaco.

The post Snapshots of Monaco appeared first on Alison Chino.

Last year at this time, I had already booked our Mediterranean cruise on the Carnival Breeze, and I was doing lots of searching for information about this ship and particularly, about the stateroom that would be our home for twelve nights.

From our first moments on the Carnival Breeze, we were blown away by the boat.  It was magical to watch Mary Polly take everything in since it was her first time to ever go on a cruise.  We ran all over the nearly empty boat checking everything out and taking lots of pictures.

We found places we knew we’d come back to over and over again: the sky course (MP loved doing this, the Lido deck (lots of nights here with blankets and movies), fun lounge chairs, and a nearly empty walking deck.  This boat is the only one I’ve seen that has a walking deck that circles the entire boat. (I think it is deck 5.)  It is much longer than the small track at the top of the boat for running.  I loved walking on this deck in the evenings, and it was a great escape from the hustle of the other decks, since it turned out to almost never be crowded.

There were so many beautiful spots to sit and enjoy being on the Carnival Breeze.  Because of our sailing time (September), our boat had 1000 less people on it than it did during the high summer season, and there were less than 100 kids on board.  I’m sure these lower numbers partly accounted for our very pleasant sailing.  We never had trouble finding a chair, and though it was often warm and sunny, it was not ever scorching hot.

The Food on The Carnival Breeze

The food choices on a cruise ship kind of make my head spin.  I have to pace myself because I want to eat everything all at once.  It was a good thing we had 12 nights to try all the food on this boat.  On a shorter cruise, I’m not sure we could have scratched the surface.

In the mornings, we were always trying to get off the boat very early to pack in our sightseeing, so we settled into a routine pretty quickly.  I had yogurt, fruit and nuts.   Mary Polly had a bagel with Nutella.  Every. Single. Day.

The breakfast choices were certainly more varied, but I was glad to find my usual fare that I knew would give me the steam I needed to get through a busy day.

At the end of our port days, we arrived back at the boat hungry, no matter what time it was, and we varied our afternoons with sushi, pizza and our very favorite, the Tandoori grill.  We ate at least a bite from the Tandoori grill every day.  Its offerings included Greek salad, hummus, naan and lots of different Indian dishes. We ended up back there again and again.  It was on the very back of the boat, on the outside, so it was also a great place to sit.

We actually only ate in the dining room for five nights of our twelve-night cruise.  It seemed like we were usually too full from hitting up the Tandoori grill in the late afternoon and then we’d get hungry again late at night when the dining room was closed.  We enjoyed roaming the boat and seeing what was available at different times.  And of course we ate lots of ice cream.

At night we would go make cups of tea and either watch a show or the movie, or go to the library bar and read or write in our journals.

On some of our sea days we ate at the various other restaurants on the ship.  The Italian restaurant that was open by reservation only at dinner was open every day for lunch to just walk in and enjoy.  It was delicious.  There was also a Barbeque outside on sea days that was out of this world.  They even had grilled veggies, including sweet potatoes.  Also, there is a burrito spot and a burger place, both very good.  Mary Polly and I both laughed thinking about how much the boys would love all the food on the boat.

Also, it is just such a treat not to have to cook or clean (or even buy groceries) for that long!  I loved being able to focus on where we were going each day, reading maps and guidebooks, without even having to give a thought to what we were going to eat.

Favorite Wind Down Spots on The Carnival Breeze

To say that I wore Mary Polly out at all the ports is an understatement.  With only one day in each place, I wanted to see as much as possible.

By the time we would get back to the ship, we were exhausted.  Mary Polly would usually take a shower and I would grab a book or my notebook and go find a spot to watch the ship leave (often on deck 5, pictured above).  If it was already dark, I would head to the library bar.

We loved how many nice tables and chairs there were on the boat for this perfect end-of-the-day activity.  We both checked books out from the library and I would sometimes have a glass of wine from the cute little wine tasting dispensers.

All of the comforts of the boat really made the trip for Mary Polly.  She loved getting back every day and being able to speak English again.  Even if we had gotten lost or fought with each other during the day, being back on the boat would kind of wash all that away.

We would usually get our second wind after an hour or two of reading and I’d let her look at the schedule and choose what we were going to do next.

The Porthole Stateroom

If you book your cruise far enough in advance, you can get a room with a window for the interior room price, because it either has an obstructed view (usually lifeboats) or it is a smaller “porthole room.”

I was so thrilled with getting such a good deal on room and board for two weeks in Europe with my daughter that I felt like it didn’t matter if our room turned out to be no more than a closet.  I figured we would hardly ever be in our room anyway, right?

As it happened we were delighted with our porthole room.  (From the outside of the boat, our room is the two little holes.)

Mary Polly was so exhausted from our daily wanderings that she relished every extra minute in her comfy bunk.  The room turned out to be really nice and had more than enough space for all of our things.  The bathroom on this shiny new ship was actually bigger than the one in a more expensive stateroom on my previous Carnival cruises.

The above and below pictures address a few of the details I had wondered about: Would there be enough hangers? (Yes.) Would there be both European and American plugs? (Yes.) Would there be a hair dryer?  (Yes.) Where would we hang wet clothes? (On a little built-in retractable clothesline in the shower!)

There were so many small well-designed details in our stateroom.  I think that is part of the fun of being on a brand new boat.  We had a wonderful stateroom steward and of course, we adored our towel animals every night.  In Venice, we even had a towel gondola!

All in all, we were so pleased with our room.  I would stay in it again in a heartbeat.  I love having the natural light from the window at the interior room price.

So there you have it.

We loved the Carnival Breeze.  I never stopped being amazed at how enormous it was.   We were always excited to spot our boat from different spots in the ports.

And of course, this view never got old.

I think I could stare at the sea forever.

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The post Snapshots of the Carnival Breeze appeared first on Alison Chino.

hello, Whitney here, posting for Alison today while she’s away on vacation. I took these pictures of her and Mary Polly as they were packing for their trip and thought they would be a perfect way to link up with Lindsey from the Pleated Poppy for WIWW. This is in fact what Al and MP are wearing as they cruise the Mediterranean and today as they walk the streets of Venice.

The post What We’re Wearing in Europe: WIWW appeared first on Alison Chino.