Heck yes we did!!

...is my answer when people ask if we had a good time on our trip.

The trip, minus the jet lag-time adjustment, was amazing.

Day 1 was rough, we flew out of SL to Chicago where we had a 3 hour lay over, then flew on Lufthansa (a cool airline with great amenities) to Germany (GERMANY, VIE GEHTS!!) then a hop skip and a jump to Venice, Italy.. 36 hours later.

By this point we were early into day 2, we boarded the cruise ship, did the awesome orientation that who the heck is going to remember which "muster station" to run to if the boat pulls the Titanic, (Below pic-notice the awesomeness of my airplane hair) and visited the buffet, which was below average and set sail to our first destination, Dubrovnik Croatia.

Dubrovnik was amazing, to be honest, the only opinion I had on Croatia was formed watching E.R., since that's where Dr. Luka Kovac is from. Anyways, I loved this city, we visited the City within the walls, and Cavtat. Cavtat was this little city right next to the ocean, the Mediterranean Ocean was so blue and still, I couldn't believe it. We tasted delicious gelato, italian ice cream, and our first taste of genuine Italian Pizza...

Cavtat

Day 2 was spent on the ship, everyone slept in until 2-ish and it was nice to just take it easy.

Our next stop (day 3) was Ephesus (Eff-a-sus), the Ancient city in Turkey. All I can really say is WOW. Just the thought of how old this place is amazes me, so many of the methods used are still used today, history apon history at this stop.

Our next stop, or rather our first stop in Turkey was the final resting place of the Virgin Mary. This had a historic quality, but I felt no spiritual connection or holiness here. (is that rude?) Below is a water tank or holding area, they also used this for baptisms. I should mention that a majority of the population of Turkey are of the Muslim faith, so their history on stuff varied from what I know. It was interesting though, to see that Muslims were good people, as ignorant as that sounds, I think a lot of Americans tend to think that Muslims are terrorists.

One thing I did love was the 'wishes', they didn't call them prayers, but wishes, you could light a candle and make a 'wish'.

We also shopped in Kusadasi, Turkey. This reminded me a lot of Canal Street in NY, the people are very pushy and the second you let them know you weren't budging on a sale they were on to the next tourist. I guess that's how they roll. Something funny, they 'specialize' in the sale of "Genuine Fake Watches"...

stay tuned for more to come....