Mediterannean Cruise Part 2

This post is long overdue as well, but I just need to do it to make a record of it. I've more trips to blog about, before I forget the details, and more trips coming up this year, so here goes. To read Part 1 of the cruise, click here.

http://theredc.blogspot.com/2009/07/trip-pics-recovered-part-1.html

Thursday June 11th

Today the port was Villefranche, France, which is right near Nice. It was a beautiful view from the ship.



In the square where the royal palace is.

We had decided to take the train to Monaco, which is practically, right next door, and we had heard how beautiful it was, and we were not disappointed. Monaco is so clean and well kept. Breathtaking, and very hilly, but the views were worth it.

The famous Monte Carlo Casino.



|Monaco's Harbour

Then we headed back on the train to Nice, got some crepes for lunch at a sidewalk cafe, and walked along the beach. Holy cow, was it HOT! It was soooo hot. 41 C if I remember correctly, and humid. The water was so blue. I know I took some pictures, but they might have been lost.

Friday June 12th

(Please ignore my back fat)

We were at sea today. I hadn't gotten much color on the trip so far, so I made the foolish decision of laying out by the pool without any sunscreen on. Just for a little while, I told myself. I thought I was doing alright. I kept checking my skin to make sure it wasn't burning, cause it felt hot, but it still looked white as anything, when I took my sunglasses off. I thought I looked a bit pink when I looked through my sunglasses, but thought it was just the tintedness of them, playing tricks on me. (Is tintedness a word?)Anyway, as soon as I walked back inside, I looked in a mirror, and whoa, was I burnt!! Guess the sun was too bright for me to see correctly. I was so sore that night. I asked our waiter at dinner for cider vinegar, because I knew it would help the pain, but he came back with white vinegar instead. I don't think he quite knew what I meant, and there was a bit of a language barrier, so I had to suffer. My own fault though.

Saturday June 13th

Today we were in a port called Livorno, Italy. In the morning, we booked an excursion to Pisa to see the Leaning Tower. It was really quite something to see in person. Unfortunately no one is allowed inside the tower anymore. They were doing some restoration work. Here are a few picsof Brian being silly.

Bracing the tower.

|In the afternoon, we had booked an excursion to Florence. We spent the afternoon in and around a famous square, trying to squeeze in as many tourist attractions as we possibly could. It was almost unbearably hot there too. On the bus ride back to the ship, the busdriver stopped on side of the road, beacuse there was a teenage guy vacationing with his family, who needed to use the bathroom. He must have been pretty desperate to want to go on the side of the road. Anyway, while he was gone, his brother told everyone on the bus to clap for him when he came back on the bus. It was pretty pretty funny, but he was a good sport about it.

These are of the Duomo. It is a massive cathedral. I can't even begin to describe how utterly huge it is. We didn't have time to go inside, unfortunately.

Sunday June 14th

We got off the cruiseship today in Civitavecchia. It's about an hour's train ride from Rome. We got on the train, and went a few stops to a place called Santa Marinella. One of Brian's friends has a brother who married an Italian girl from Santa Marinella, and they run a hotel there. We had made arrangements to stay in their hotel overnight and went out to dinner with them that evening. We just lazed around all afternoon, went for a swim in the Mediterannean, it was a lovely end to our trip.

The view out our window.

Trip Pics Recovered!! Part 1

Thankfully, our cruise pictures were able to be recovered by the photo guy at Shoppers Drug Mart. Yay! Also Jacob's 6th birthday pictures were on there too, so I'll start with that. Jacob turned 6 on June 7th, which, unfortunately, was while we were on our cruise, so we celebrated early. With Jacob, less is definitely more, so we just had some family over after supper for some cake and ice cream. On his 4th birthday, he started crying when we sang "Happy Birthday" and brought his cake to him, so we've kept it pretty low key since. Jacob is really into Pokemon right now, so I made a cake to look like his favorite character, Gastly. He seemed to enjoy himself.

























Jacob and Dad

So onto the cruise. Be aware that this will probably be a long post, with a lot of pictures.
We left on Thursday June 4th after supper. Our flight to London Heathrow left Halifax at 11:45pm, and since it was international, we had to be there early. In case anyone didn't know, Brian's a big Pittsburgh Penguins fan, and game 4 of the Stanley Cup finals was being played as were driving, so he got me to slowly go through all of the FM and AM radio stations to see if we could find one that was broadcasting the game. Brian realized that XM radio (which we don't have) had exclusive broadcasting rights, but we did end up finding a very staticky AM sports station that was giving regular updates, so that's what we listened to until we got to the airport. Pittsburgh was up 1-0, I believe when we parked the car.After we checked our bags (what a difference when you don't have kids with you!) we went to our gate, and Brian got out his laptop and went on NHL.com to see how things were going. I, being the good wife that I am, took a little walk down the hallway to see if there was somewhere that had a TV with the game on. I found a bar showing the game, and I raced back to tell him, so we watched it til they kicked us out. (Bar closed at 10:30 but there were lots of people watching and we didn't leave until almost 11pm. The waitresses were ticked.)) Pittsburgh was up at 4-2 by that point. We went back to wait at our gate and boarded the plane. Brian had enough aeroplan points so he booked me a first class ticket, and since this was a conference for work, and airfare was a business expense, he booked himself a first class ticket. Can I just say, if you ever have the chance to fly first class, DO IT!! It was awesome. Especially on this particular airplane.
We each had our own personal TV, the flight attendants kept offering us OJ and champagne in glass glasses, not plastic. We got the hot towel, a little goody bag with travel socks, blindfold, lip balm, lotion, etc., and the best was that the seats could recline and lay down flat so you could actually sleep. Oh, and we got a substantial pillow and a heavier blanket. It was heaven. Brian actually asked the flight attendant if she could find out who won the hockey game, and she was able to find out that Pittsburgh won it 4-2. Brian and I both watched "Taken", although I regretted that the next day when I was so tired from staying up too late and the four hour time change. Above: Brian relaxing in first class.

Friday June 5th

We took the tube to St. Pancras Station, where we boarded the Eurostar train to Paris, where we were going to meet up with Brian's Mission President and spend the night, and catch a flight the next morning to Barcelona Spain, where our cruise departed. We met his Mission President at a fountain near Notre Dame, but we got off a stop too early and got lost, and couldn't figure out how to use the phones to call his cellphone.
Well, that's not entirely true. Brian knew how to use the phones, but for some reason, it wouldn't accept his credit card, it didn't take cash and we didn't have a phone card that they use over there. So finally, we just started walking and asked some guy at a cafe where this fountain was, he told us, and away we went. The fountain was in this square, where there was a hundred people milling about, but we found him, 45 minutes late. We waled, talked, well, they talked, I listened mostly, we got a crepe and he put us on the right subway to take us to our hotel. I wanted to walk around more and buy cheap Eiffel Tower souvenirs, but alas, it was not to be. Guess that's what happens when you're late. You'e short on time. Brian had originally wanted to leave a few days earlier and stay in France for three nights to visit more with Prez, visit a few places from his mission, and I have always wanted to see Versailles. But I talked him out of it. I was already having a hard time with being away 10 days minimum, because we had never left all of the kids before, for that lenght of time, and going halfway across the world. What if something happened? We couldn't just come home at a moments notice, and my Mom wasn't able to stay for 2 weeks, although Brian's parents had offered to stay with them when my Mom had to leave. Well as it turned out, it's a good thing we didn't go for longer. Brian's Dad needed a kidney transplant, his Mom was to be the donor, and we found out less than a month before we left, that the surgery would take place while we were away. I felt bad that I was cutting the trip short, but we'll just have to go back sometime. It all worked out. The surgery went fine, in case you're wondering.





Me, by the fountain.







Saturday June 6th




We caught a flight to Barcelona, hopped in a taxi (we don't speak Spanish) and showed the driver on our itinerary, the port we needed to get to. It was hard not to miss it. The cruise ship was absolutely humongous!!








Here's some pics of our stateroom.
It was bigger than I was expecting,
not that it was huge, but it was cozy.


Bathroom had a tiny shower.
















The rest of it. Our window
overlooked the "Royal Promenade" which was the mini mall, and the windows were incredibly
soundproof. We didn't hear
a thing at night.












We walked around the ship, saw two pools (one was adult only, and I forgot to take a picture), a mini golf course, a sports court, rock climbing wall, spa, gym, different kids areas by age, mini mall, ice rink, 2 level theatre, 3 level formal diningroom, massive buffet, etc. Boy, they had everything! It was amazing. Our dinner time was at 6:45 pm every night and at the same table, which was quite nice. We were seated with a doctor originally from Russia but working in Hamilton, ON and another doctor from Niagara on the Lake, ON, his wife and their 12 year old granddaughter. We only ate with the Russian doctor that night. He went to the buffet every other night, but it was nice to be able to talk to people about what we each did during the day, what excursions we did, etc. All the staff were so nice. They couldn't do enough for you, and they came from all over the world. Our Head waiter was Italian, our waiter was from, oh, I forget. Somewhere in the Caribbean I think, and our assistant waiter was from Mauritius. Brian spoke french to him. He liked it. The waiter did, I mean. But everyone spoke pretty good english.

Sunday June 7th
Our first port of call was Valencia, Spain. I didn't love it. It was nice and all, lotsofhistoricarchitecture, huge, old churches. Oh, funny story. We were in this one church looking around. They had all the 12 sons of Israel going around the whole chapel, so we were looking at all the incredible detail, and were were getting close to the front of the church, and Brian was considering going up front, like really really up front, to look at something, and all of a sudden we heard this weird singing, sort of chanting, and this Catholic priest was coming out followed by all the altar boys I guess, and then it hit us. It's Sunday. Mass is about to begin. So we hightailed it out of there. It was embarassing because we were on the opposite side of the exit, so we had to cut across a row of pews to get out. We looked around, and it was bloody hot out, so we headed back to the ship about mid afternoon. There really wasn't a whole lot to see. I was super tired too. I kept nodding off.

We laid out by the pool and read until dinner. I brought "Twilight " with me to read for the third time. I actually saw a fair number of people reading the Twilight series. Brian had to check who had won the hockey game the night before. Pittsburgh got smoked. Not good. Tonight's dinner was formal dress. I had gotten a cute little black Evan Picone dress on e-bay before we left, for CAD$31, including shipping, exchange, everything!! I was way excited to wear it. Everynight had a different dress code.




June 8th
Today we went to Palma de Mallorca (pronounced My-orca) It's an island off the coast of Spain.
This was probably my favorite port. Either that or Villefranche. I can't decide. We had booked an excursion that took us across the island to a place called Porto Cristo, where we stopped at the beach, and visited some underground caves.






Me at the beach. We stuck our feet in the Mediterranean Sea, and it was COLD!









I think the caves are among the largest in the world. We weren't allowed taking pictures down in the caves. There was the largest underground lake in the world, and we watched a classical concert where the performers were plaving their instruments on little boats while they were moving. It was kind of weird, but pretty cool too. After the caves, we stopped at a Pearl factory. Mallorca is world renowned for their pearls, which are manmade, but apparently they have some top secret formula where you can't tell the difference between their pearls and real pearls. I love pearls. They're classic, timeless really, and I was looking forward to purchasing some. I thought that since we were going to a factory, that the prices would be quite reasonable. Well, they weren't so much. Well maybe they were, but I'm kind of a cheapskate, so we didn't really think they were such a great deal. Brian remarked that of course if we were on a tour, that they would probably mark things up 'cause tourists would buy them anyway. So I had planned to go to a couple of pearl stores in Palma, that the cruise's shopping expert recommended. So after we got off the tour we got some lunch, and looked around the capital city, Palma. I really liked it.



There was a massive Cathedral. I think it has the longest aisle in the world, for real. No joke. We found an internet cafe, and checked our e-mail, and then we were going to call home. But then I realized that I forgot our calling card back in our room on the ship. Oops. Big oops. We headed back toward the shuttle bus to take us back to the ship, to get the card. It was starting to get a bit late, and we didn't have time to get the card, come back to Palma and finish shopping. Sucky for me.



Me in front of the main door. Huge, isn't it?




Left: Brian in the guard's post.













Tuesday June 9th

Today we were at sea, on our way up to Marseille, France. Brian had his conference all day, so I went to a seminar on how to boost your metabolism, at the spa. I laid by the pool and read, met Bri for lunch, and then laid by the pool some more and just relaxed. It was awesome. I saw lots of people with kids, and was grateful that mine weren't with me. I heard babies crying, and could say with absolute surety that they weren't mine. I almost didn't want to come home to reality. Does that make me a bad mother?

Wednesday June 10th

Today was Marseille, France. It's a dirty city. Very industrial. My brother in law, Mike served his mission here, and he told us not to bother spending any time in Marseille itself, so we planned to hop on a train and go to a town called Aix-en-Provence.















We got to the train station about 5 minutes after a train to Aix left. We bought tickets for the next train, an hour and a half later, and set out to find an internet cafe. There had been a hockey game the night before, so we had to check the score. For all we knew, Detroit might have won the Stanley Cup. Ol Eagle Eyes (that's me) spotted a cafe, so we went in and checked. Brian told me not to look, jokingly, in case I jinxed them. But the Penguins won. YAY!!! All tied up at 3 games a piece. We checked e-mails, I got some pics of the landscaping going on at home, (post about that later)and then we went to wait for our train, which was delayed, so when we actually got to where we were going, it was lunchtime. Half the day was already gone. Aix-en-Provence was a pretty town. We saw some churches, cool buildings, busted our butts walking so fast to make the most of everything, and on the advice of my sister, Keah, I got a 1 litre YOP. 1 whole litre! It was awesome. I should have taken a picture. I love YOP. I must say though, it did get a little much toward the end. We got some french pastries to eat on the train ride back. YUM-O! So good. And they came in the fanciest little boxes. I hated to throw them away. They looked expensive. I'm weird like that.

The ceiling of a cathedral. Beautiful.


Stay tuned for Part 2.

March Break trip to Pittsburgh

Let me first begin by saying that I still have a lot to learn about posting. I can't make my pics go where I want them to go, etc. Please be patient with me.

One evening in January, Brian's says "I've got a great idea!" My reply was, "Oh yeah, what's that?" I had a sneaking suspicion that it had something to do with hockey, as he had just come out of the room where he was watching a Penguins game. "We should go to Pittsburgh for March Break!" He then went on to explain that they had 3 home games in 4 days, and that there were tickets still available. I said I'd think about it. The more I thought about it, the more I liked the idea. Not for the hockey aspect, but for the fact that I'd get to shop in the states. Not that I don't like hockey, it has grown on me, but I love shopping in the states. I really started watching when Sidney Crosby got drafted. Just 'cause he's a Nova Scotian and he's actually really good. I was a little hesitant, however, and suggested we take some help with us. If he was going to go to hockey games with Ave and Jake, that would leave me with the younger two, who aren't really big fans of shopping yet. So I suggested my youngest sister, Tangye (pronounced Tan-gee) and perhaps her boyfriend, Ryan.

Here they are in the matching shirts they bought for the game.

They were game, but the clincher for me was that the Yarmouth airport was going to become operational again, starting in February. There was a small airline coming in to do 2 daily flights to and from Halifax and 2 daily flights to and from Portland, Maine. YAY!! I'd been waiting for this. So the plan was to fly from Yarmouth to Portland, Me. on the morning of Friday March 13th, (scary, I know) spending the day shopping in Freeport (LOVE LL Bean) and Portland, spending the night (we stayed at a LaQuinta for $49 USD/per room-can't beat that!) and then caught an early (6am) flight to Pittsburgh (via Newark) on Saturday morning.

Here are Ave and Jake in front of the big boot in Freeport. How cool is that?

Pittsburgh is a beautiful city. Very clean, and it has a lot of history. I was very impressed, and would definitely go back. Here's a couple shots of the city.

The first Penguins game was at 3pm on Saturday. Ryan, Brian, Avery and Jacob went to that one, while Tangye, Izzy, Logan and I went to Burlington Coat Factory, which, by the way, was a disaster. The kids were both tired and cranky and just wouldn't go to sleep in their nice double stroller they were being pushed around in. I'd gladly go to sleep if someone was pushing me around in a stroller. They don't know how good they have it. So we tossed in the towel and got in our rental van and headed to IKEA!!! I had made a list of all the stores I wanted to go to, as well as a list of specific items I hoped to purchase, to keep my spending in check and to use my time wisely. I printed off directions to these places, so I was all set, right? Sure, if you know which way is north, in a city you've never been to before, driving a rental van you've never driven before, and are scared to death you 'll put even the slightest scratch on it. So when the directions said to start out going North on ......, I was like, what the heck? So with cars beeping behind me for me to move, I picked the way I thought, and went for it. Unfortuntely, it was the wrong way. Somehow we got in the lane that is reserved for vehicles with two or more people in it, which was between the right and left lanes. Tangye was freaking right out. After going about 11 miles the wrong way,we were able to find a way off the crazy lane, and got off t an exit, turned around and get going back the right way. It was a little stressful, and it cut into my shopping time at Ikea. Something that's very precious to me. (Anytime we go away on vacation, one of the first things I do is check to see if there's an Ikea nearby. Brian can't stand Ikea, and on past trips has given me 30 minute time limits in the store. He usually stays in the car. As anyone who's been to Ikea knows, 30 minutes just doesn't cut it. It's a tease. You might as well not even bother.) Well, the kids both fell asleep, so it was a pretty good trip to Ikea. Thanks goodness for my list to keep me in check. I also spotted a JoAnn Fabric store, so I nipped in there for a few minutes, to feed my new obsession of bowmaking. Izzy was not a happy camper, so it was shortlived. In hindsight, that was probably a good thing. The next day was Sunday. We had looked up the nearest church, which started at 9am, so we go up got breakfast (which was included with the room rate) and left. Just before we left our room, I said, "I think Logan pooped." Brian said, "You'll have to change him when we get there. We're going to be late as it is." So off we went, and we were only 5 min late. So after the opening song and prayer, I took him out to change him. What I beheld then, I hope to never ever see again. I took off his overalls and there were "chunks." Oh, and for the record, they were nice overalls. Churchworthy overalls, not denim, in case anyone was wondering. There was poop on his shirt, so I whipped that off. Unbuttoned his onesie, and all the way up to his freakin shoulderblades, there was a mess. That kid had the biggest poop of his entire life. Why he had to do it while we were on vacation, and at church (where I didn't have an extra change of clothes) is beyond me. So I folded up the soiled clothes, and brought poor Logan back into church in only a diaper and his socks and sat down. Fortunately, we were seated in the second to last row, so I didn't have to make a big production coming back in. I tucked the poopy clothes into the front pocket of my bag, (which thankfully had a zipper), which I hope diffused the smell somewhat. I felt bad for the poor missionaries sitting right in front of us. So Brian whispered, "where are his clothes?" and I whispered back, "They're full of poop" to which he made a funny, wrinkled up face. I put Logan's coat on, so he could be a little bit more decent. The rest of the meeting went well. There were some great talks. We just stayed for Sacrament meeting and then went back to the hotel.

Mellon Arena from our hotel.




The second Penguins game was at 3pm that day, and we were all going to it. We couldn't have picked a better game to all go to. It happened to be their 100th consecutive sellout, so we all got a special program and the kids all got a stuffed penguin to commemorate the occasion. When we actually had a good look at them, we saw that they were actually Webkinz. Pretty cool. Avery named his "Piplup" after some penguin Pokemon character, Jacob named his "Malkin" because his favorite player is Evgeni Malkin, Izzy named hers "Iceburgh" after the Penguins mascot and Avery named Logan's "Crosby" for obvious reasons. Wow, this is turning into a really long post. I hope I'm not boring anyone.

Monday, there were no games, so we headed up to Grove City, which has Prime Outlets. It was about an hour drive, but if there's anything I love more than shopping, it's outlet shopping. Everyone got some good buys. Can I just say how much better Payless Shoes is in the states. Love it! And I was reminded of how much I love J.Crew and Bath and Bodyworks. Thanks to my sis Keah for turning me on to B and BW.

Tuesday's game wasn't until 7:30pm. Brian and the two older boys were supposed to go, but Jacob insisted that "Three hockey games is too much!", so Tangye and Ryan offered to stay at the hotel with Jacob and Izzy while I went to the game, but I had to bring Logan.
Our seats were wicked!!! Four rows from the ice, right next to the middle section. Awesome!! And they won too!! It was a great game. Oh, I forgot to mention the scores of the other games. The first game the penguins lost in a shootout, 4-3 I think. I say it was because I wasn't there at the game, as they won the next two, 6-2 and 6-4. So during the day on Tuesday, we decided to check out the Heinz museum. Yup, that's right. Heinz ketchup's birthplace was in Pittsburgh. The exhibits weren't as good as I thought they would be. We got a late lunch, or early supper (depends which way you look at it) at "Olive Garden". Holy cow, how I love "Olive Garden" I want to open one in Canada. More specifically in Yarmouth, so I can go whenever I want to. We had some real good eats.

We headed for home early Wednesday morning. And I mean early. Our flight left at 6:18am. I checked the website to see what the recommended time was to be at the airport, and it said between 1 and 2 hours. We checked in online the night before, so we had our boarding passes, we just needed to check our bags. We had alarm clocks set for 4:30am and wake up calls too, just in case. But we didn't end up leaving til 5:15am. I forgot to account for the time it would take to get everyone awake and dressed. I was freaking out when I looked at the clock in the van as we left the parking garage. It was about a half hour drive to the airport and we had to return the van too. I was praying the whole way there, and Brian drove as fast as he safely could without drawing unwanted attention to us. Boy it was close, so without going through all the stressful details, they were doing a final boarding call for our flight just as we got to the gate. But at least we made it. We arrived in Portland at 10:35am but out flight back to Yarmouth wasn't until 7pm. So we hopped on the city transit and took the roundabout way to the Maine Mall, then walked to Target. Another one of my reasons why I love to shop in the states. I can't even begin to tell you how much I love Target. It was a bit of a hike, but soooo worth it. Unfortunately for me, it was raining when we came out. I had wanted to go to Burlington Coat Factory again, since my first visit didn't go so well, and I wanted to go the Maine Mall to go to this store called Forever 21. Nobody else wanted to humor me. They all wanted to take a cab back to the airport(which was only 3 miles away) and just wait til our flight and get something to eat. I finally caved, (after actually considering walking the 3 miles back to the airport, pushing a double stroller in the rain by myself) and took one for the team. We went to the airport and ate supper, paid way too much for it, and went to the building where our flight was to leave from. Since it's a small outfit, and the airline departs out of the same place where private plans leave. We didn't have to go through security or anything. It was great. And the airline service was superb! We will definitely fly with Skylink Aviation in the future. Well, that's it. It was fun, overall, but we won't be taking any family vacations again anytime soon. It's a lot of work and very stressful at times. Maybe next year.

-Tamara