The Trip

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I will start with the narative now, but it may be awhile before i can post any pics.

We flew from Phoenix to Atlanta then onto Barcelona, Spain. We boarded the ship there and decided the best way to deal with the jetlag would be to drink and gamble for the next 7 hours. Roulette was kind to me, Black Jack wasn't so great, but what the hell, the Guiness was gooood.

We made it back to the cabin around 1am and realized that even with some drinking and fun behind us, our bodies were still convinced it was only 4pm. so, up to the pool deck we went to watch the people and drink some more. All was well in the world.

7AM found me in the shower thinking to myself "great! no hangover, just a little tired." soon we were in the dining room with a good sized breakfast in front of us to prepare us for our day in Marseille. I ate a little bit of french toast and out of the blue my eyes started rolling in different directions. right about the same time my wife announces that she needs to go lay down. Whether it was the jetlag, the drinking, or being out to sea - we weren't doing well at all. a 3hour nap fixed us up and finally we made our way into Marseilles. The Cathedral was beautiful, so was some college. We decided to catch the ferry over to the island where the locals go to sunbathe. on the way i overheard a tourguide telling his group that the incredible structure to our left was the prison from The Count of Monte Cristo. true or not, i don't know. we walked the island and then sat down for lunch. chose to skip out on the food when the cook (in clear view) proceeded to stick his hand down his pants and scratch around for awhile before using the same hand to put the bread on the plate. no thank you. so off we go. we walked around for a little while longer and then headed back to the ship. We had a formal dinner that night. The men in our group were wearing suits or tuxes, the ladies were stunning. The casino was kind to us, but i switched to Red Stripe as the weather was warm.

7AM rolls around to find us sitting on a bus in the port of Villefranche. We are pretty excited about the tour of Monaco/Monte Carlo, going through Eze and Nice. Sitting in front of us was a couple from Boston. let me rephrase that THE couple from Boston. They were actually very nice people and we did chat with them a bit throughout the day, but they were the stereotypical loud, over the top, jewel encrusted Bostonians. you know the SNL skit with Jimmy Fallon as the Boston kid with his g/f? this was them. on the other side of the aisle was another couple who turned out to be Boston's counterpart. except they were from NYC. wow. nice people, but my eardrums hurt. seriously, if there is nothing meaningful to say - silence is ok. not every stone building requires one to say "that is wicked old" or "that water is fuckin byootiful".

Monaco was beautiful. cost for a home in Monaco? $8,000-$20,000 per square meter. That is in Euro, so multiply your dollars by 1.3 or so. The Cathedral was beautiful. Princess Grace's tomb was covered in fresh flowers.

Monte Carlo was beautiful if only for the cars that were on the streets. $$$$$. i will post some pics of the yachts later.
The view from the upper corniche overlooking Nice was amazing - i will post those pics too.
Back to the ship we go. we decided to cancel all the rest of the tours we were on and just wing it.

7AM rolls around and we are at the train station buying tickets to Florence. a couple that we knew has friends who live in florence. we toured the city with them and we loved it. the art, the museums, the history, the jelatto. ah, jelatto - the role model for our puny little little ice creams.
we made it back to the ship with half an hour to spare absolutely exhausted, unable to take another step. there was, of course, only one thing to do - get cleaned up and head to our favorite piano bar on the ship for some lovely beverages.

7AM shines upon our faces while we are buying train tickets from Civeteveccia (sp) to Rome. a newlwed couple in their early 20's asks us if we speak english and nearly cry when we say yes. they are from Ohio and on a different ship, by themselves, and didn't know how to get around. they want to go to Rome and they are afraid of getting lost in the Italian countryside - we made some very nice friends. That day we walked to the absolute top of Il Duomo at St Peter's Basilica. not intentionally-if you see stairs, don't automatically start walking up them, because once you start there is no turning back. VERY VERY VERY bad if you are claustrophobic. i'm not and it started getting to me when my shoulders were brushing each wall and there was no end in sight. We toured the Colliseum, The forum, The Spanish Steps, and the Trevi Fountain. The line for the Sistine Chapel was more than three blocks long - we passed. We did however have the best pizza of the trip right around the corner from the Sistine Chapel.
We managed to use every form of public transportation in Italy. Taxi, Subway, Train, Metro, and bus. very exciting trying to read the maps. We headed back a little early to get the other couple on their ship and then we returned to ours. We skipped dinner and went to sleep around 5PM. we woke up at 10PM and ordered room service then went back to sleep vowing not to run so hard the next day.

8AM finds us in Naples, mystified at the filth surrounding us. We get into an argument with the cab driver who wants to charge me $130 euro to go to Pompeii but i keep insisting that he take us to the train station. what should have been a $5 euro cabride he says was $20. i hand him $10 and tell him to get lost. We buy our train tickets for... $4Euro. let's see now $10 euro for the cab, $4 Euro x2 = $18 Euro gets us to Pompeii vs. the $130 he wanted to "save us from the 2 hour hell that is the train". oh yeah, the train ride was 35 minutes.

Pompeii was awesome. I've got quite a few pics I'll put up later. i still think the Brothel street was too cool. a whole street of whorehouses. (if they had televangelists, they would know that Mt Vesuvio erupted to cleanse their sinful streets ) anyway, the markers to designate the whorehouse district? penises. yep, penises carved into the cobblestones, the heads pointing the way.

We spent a few hours in Pompeii then headed back to Naples. There we found the cleanest sidewalk cafe to eat in and relaxed with some people. i had to restrain my wife from screaming at a local family who were so enthralled with their cigarettes and wine that they couldn't be bothered with watching their child. we are talking about a baby that could barely crawl that kept crawling away and they weren't even watching. the very busy street was only 4/5 feet away and they wouldn't get up until the baby got to the edge of the sidewalk. the kid was chewing on cigarette butts.
We walked away and toured a 13th century castle. that was pretty darn cool. It was called "New Castle" because it was the newest of the castles there when it was started in 1297.

We went back to the ship and lounged by the pool sipping on some cold ones. Another formal night. Another decent night in the casino.
The next day was out to sea - no ports. Casino and poolside beverages all day. after dinner we went to a show. Swing night - very entertaining.
The next day we were back in Barcelona. 23 hours in planes and airports brought us home. i am still jetlagged, but that is ok.

All in all a wonderful trip. I would not suggest it to anyone else though. I am very thankful that I didn't pay for the trip (the firm picked it up for us). cruises are the perfect vacation for relaxing, but they are not conducive to hardcore sightseeing. they just don't leave you with enough time.
I mentioned earlier that one of the lowlights of the trip was how dirty everything was. I can't explain to you what I mean. America has plenty of dinginess to be found. picture 4-6 inches of cig butts piles up, 4 foot across, 100 feet long. that is a train station. graffiti on EVERYTHING. some of the artists are pretty good in the more rural areas, but it is just plain bad in the cities. personal hygiene is nonexistent. my wife was dressed pretty conservatively but you would think that hers were the first seet of breasts to make their way through Italy. You can't walk away from the region without being depressed. I spend a lot of time in Mexico. A lot of Mexico is pretty dicey. Mexico was cleaner than most of the Med. region.

The history was amazing. the water was the most perfect blue. the people in Monaco and Rome were friendly. The rest... I wouldn't take that particular trip again. If that makes me an ugly American, so be it.