OK, the cruise was plagued by mishap and weather so part of what I relate here will be the horrors of traveling!

Let's start on October 10, with a red-eye to Venice, via Amsterdam's Schipol Airport. We sat on the ground for two hours waiting for mechanics to find a bonding strap which apparently is essential for proper function of the forward landing gear! And there wasn't one in the airport NOT already part of a plane! So they finally cannibalized another plane and we got off the ground around 8PM Detroit time… The problem here, besides sitting there in the plane for two hours, was that we only had a 90-minute turnaround at Schipol. NOT my idea but apparently travel agents aren't into long turnarounds! SO we were going to miss our connection and we had no idea whether or not there were frequent or even daily flights from Schipol to Venice. Not a pleasant way to spend the night…

We arrive at Schipol to find a greeter who is escorting us through security (you land at Schipol from the US and it's the international terminal; you leave Schipol for anyplace in the EU and it's a domestic terminal --- that means passport control and security screening all over again!). Well, all went well until security screening where this little twerp said my handbag needed to be rescreened. But he didn't rescreen it. He sat it on the floor, with three other ladies' bags. And refused, flat out refused to look at them! 25 minutes! They are holding our plane and the security is playing power plays here. It turns out, when he finally looked into my purse, that he felt the need to check every single coin in it. And others on the plane had the same experience.

Made it to the plane as they were closing the door and we find that DH has LEFT his camera case (two cameras, iPhone, car keys, house keys…) at security and if he gets off the plane, he won't fly! Luckily, the gate agent calls back to security, they find the case and send it to lost and found… Off to Venice an hour late (ever heard of ANY airline holding a plane for an hour for 21 passengers?) which means, of course, we are late on board but luckily we weren't signed up for any $$$ event that night… DH talks to our cruise director who introduces DH to the head concierge who, in turn walks him through ship-to-shore communication with Schipol Los & FOund. Naturally, they are red-tape bound and won't let anyone BUT DH pick out up and we aren't going back through Schipol! SO, for $$$, we change flights… All this in the first day! And DH will have to settle for taking "inferior" quality photos with my little 6 mega-pixel Olympus camera!

First excursion, October 12--- St. Mark's Square in Venice. WE walk through the Doge's plaance, exiting over the bridge of sighs (actually, within the Bridge of sighs --- so named because it was the route taken by condemned prisoners from the palace to the prison next door!), back to the square to walk through the Duomo… FIrst impression --- St. Mark's is a LOT smaller than you would think form pictures you might have seen (they must use wide-angle lenses in all the photos I've seen!). Second impression --- those doges could spend money! And 3rd impression, it DOES flood in St. Mark's Square at high tide --- we had to walk on board walkways in the Duomo to avoid wading!

Second excursion, October 13 - Dubrovnik, Croatia and Cavtat, a resort city south on the coast. We were bussed to Cavtat and walked the waterfront where the sun was out and it was beautiful. Not a lot to do there but bask in the sun and eat gelato… Back to Dubrovnik to tour the walled city. We entered through the Pile Gate in the old city wall and toured two active monasteries --- a Franciscan one with the world's 3rd-oldest functioning pharmacy, still open and selling potions and creams made on the premises, and a Dominican monastery. In between, walked narrow streets which climb impossibly steep hills. Our guide spent a lot of time pointing out the shrapnel and bomb craters still evident in buildings --- Dubrovnik has done a remarkable job of rebuilding after that master Serbia/Croation/Bosnian war but it's still evident.  the end of the tour, while still in the Dominican monastery, we hear thunder. Whoops --- our hour of free time turned out to be spent standing in water i the city square under an nice-cream parlor's umbrella while the rain PELTED down. By the time we caught a shuttle back to the boat, we were all drowned rats, water was ankle deep in the street (and hub-cap-deep near the port). Needless to say, we didn't do any sightseeing on our own -- we just got wet!  The crew welcomed us all back with beach towels! And the weather was so bad, the port was closed and our ship wasn't allowed to leave for our next port, Kotor, Montenegro. We were still tied up at the dock the next morning!

So, October 14, at sea on the way to Corfu, Greece. And to fill this unexpected free day, they held a needlepoint class (I went) and a cooking demonstration by two of the ship's many chefs (both DH and I went). Oh, and they had an artist-in-residence --- a photographer named Joe DiMaggio (a remote cousin of the baseball one)  who taught free evening classes every night --- DH went to these!).

Third excursion, October 15 - Corfu and Paleokastritsa, which is on the other side of the island from Corfu Town. Paleokastritsa is a scenic beach resort but I have to say I don't remember much about it. In Corfu Town, we followed the guide through the narrow streets but all I truly remember is it was raining, still --- not heavy like at Dubrovnik, but steady.

Next port of call was SUPPOSED to be Taormina with an excursion to Mt. Etna. BUT… the weather was such that we couldn't tender ashore at Taormina so we diverted to Messina (where we had been on our cruise last year) and were bussed back to Mt. Etna. THIS resulted in an extra hour each end of the excursion…

Fourth excursion - October 16 - Mt. Etna. Now it was beautiful all along the bus ride to Mt. Etna until we started past the last village on the mountain's slopes (where they were having a market festival!). And what do you suppose we found when we reached the lowest three carters (which last erupted in the 1800s)? A CLOUD! A THICK cloud! We were at the craters but we couldn't prove it by our eyes! We did have a good cappuccino at the cafe  there though!

We didn't have a paid excursion on October 17 --- instead we tendered ashore and walked the streets of Amalfi, Italy, just like we did last year. And found it just as charming. DH TRIED to walk up the side of the hill to get a good view down but he found that all streets up were walled with houses! So no over-all pictures except from the boat!

Fifth excursion, October 18. Florence! WE LOVE Florence. And we got to see the ORIGINAL "David" this time, in the Academia, but no pictures allowed so… Then we ended up in the same walking tour we took last year but at the end, we got to go inside Santa Croce to see the tombs of Galileo, Michaelangelo and Machiavelli! And the guide took us up a hill to a city park (Piazzale Michaelangelo) where a panoramic view of Florence was possible…

Florence tours are 10 hours long or longer and needless to say, exhausting. But they welcomed the buses back to the boat with a jazz band, hot towels and drinks!   Fantastic!

Next stop. La Spezia form which we were to take a cruise of the Cingue Terre villages (pedestrian only) BUT… the cruise was cancelled due to bad weather so, we stayed on board and recovered from Florence!

October 20 was Monte Carlo. Can you say "Way too much money in vested in yachts?" We didn't have a paid excursion so we walked around on our own, with a map from our tour director.  We headed west to Monaco Ville where we saw the oceanographic museum (Jaques Costeau founded it, DH thinks), a beautiful little city garden (Jardin Saint-Martin) and the Catherdral where Princes Grace and Prince Ranier (among other Monacan royalty) was interred.

October 21 -- we disembarked in the wee small hours, boarded a bus, met a tour guide and headed for Rome. Except for getting out of the bus at St Paul Outside the Wall (where St. Paul is thought to have been buried), the Coliseum (which we couldn't go into, despite our tickets because it was a storm of the century the day before, Rome flooded and of course, the Coliseum was filled with water and the electric systems were out!), Trevi Fountain (where we had pizza!), the Spanish Steps, and the Vatican… pretty much most of what we saw of ancient Rome was through a moving bus window… My impressions --- I didn't know that Trevi Fountain wasn't free-standing. The Spanish Stps are STEEP and go on forever. And the Vatican was so crowded that I didn't see much of anything (sorry, Michaelangelo, but when you are in a small room with what felt like 20,000 Japanese tourists, all talking and breaking every rule in the books by taking flash photos, you can't really SEE the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel! And it was too dark in St. Peter's to get ANY pictures of the Pieta in focus! St. Peter's Square was  a disappointment because it was filled with folding chairs because there was a beatification service that Sunday and they were getting ready for it. Rome disappointed, sad to say.

OK, another early flight in the Am on the 22nd, and the concierge can't find out new flight number at the airport so we don't know which terminal. This wonderful van driver went to every terminal and walked in with us to find the right one for us! BUT… the ticket kiosks didn't recognize the flight either. It seems that, when delta and NW merged, they could talk to each other but their flight partners (Air France, Alitalia and KLM) couldn't talk to them! SO our flight, which was co-numbered with AliItalia. was invisible! We finally got checked in manually, but they couldn't talk to delta in Schipol either so no boarding pass there. And of course, we are going Schipol because we have to go in person to Lost & Found… (remember, camera case, two weeks earlier?). Well, EVERYONE knows where Lost & Found is (this according to Aiprot information desks all over Schipol ---w emus have asked at four or five!) , but no-one knows how to tell you how to find it so that took an hour. Then another hour dealing with "take a number" at a transfer desk to try to get a boarding pass because the kiosks at Schipol didn't recognize us either! Turns out w were on STAND-BY, despite the paperwork that said "confirmed".  So we sit at the gate (luckily we had a five-hour layover just because we knew that we had to pick up that case) and charge the security as soon as they opened so we can get to the desk and see what is it about being Stand-By. Well, no luck in being bumped up a class --- but we did get on. And we get the middle seats in the middle of the plane.  Nine hours in the most uncomfortable seat I have EVER sat in! And we are in two hours later than we originally had told BIL we would arrive (but luckily, we had been able, for $1 a minute to email him that we would be late), and he was waiting the cell-phone lot for our call (of course, everything was in the case but --- DH's cell phone battery had run down so he had to find a plug in arrival, plug it in and call while charging --- because MY iPhone didn't have BIL's number…). We got home nearly 24 hours after we left Rome... and we are still recovering!

So, what kind of trip? Well, the connections to and from sucked and the weather was horrid but we did get to see our favorite Italian city (Florence) and our second-favorite Italian City (Amalfi).  Will we go back? No, we've had it with the Med in October. But we are suckers for cruises --- we have already signed up for one form Stockholm, Helsinki, St. Petersburg (3 days), Tallin estonia, Riga Latvia, VIsby Sweden, Gdansk Poland, Copenhagen, Berlin, The Kiel Canal (transit), Amsterdam (we've been there before!), Bruges and LOndon --- and we hope to stay in England for a few days to visit friends there before heading home. Next September 19 --- already paid our deposit! Are we nuts? For sure! 

You can find the slide shows for this cruise here: http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v29/thatyank/thatyank%20siggies/Mediterranean%20Cruise%20-%20October%202011/Med%20Cruise%20Slide%20Show/