This day included (mostly) the bane of all long-haul Euro-travelers, the WAIT. Unable to get suitable accommodations for Saturday night’s ferry we have to catch it today, Sunday (tonight technically the actual sailing is at 11:59 PM). We wait and read in the hotel lobby and I explore the city some more on a few jaunts to take in the last bit if Greece we will experience on this trip. We opt to not travel to the winery as it is 4 miles outside the city limits and taxi fare and luggage storage don’t appeal either... so we wait and read. Fortunately we have a stash of Dan Brown novels with us to enjoy and pass the time. I have read ‘The DaVinci Code’ and 1/2 of ‘Angels and Demons’ (which I plan to finish) and will read ‘Deception Point’ (which Michele is currently reading) all on this trip. What a great author! I highly recommend him.
The ship has sailed and we are settled into our little cabin :)Good-bye Greece, hello Venice on Tuesday AM very early...
~S
We woke this morning and began our day of waiting... waiting for our ferry boat back to Venice, our favorite city visited on this trip. Our ferry departs at 23:59 tonight, and so we have MANY hours, minutes, and seconds to wait before we can board. After getting ready, we head downstairs to enjoy a buffet breakfast. The breakfast in the Hotel Astir is rather delightful with many options of assorted breads, fruits, cereals, sausages, eggs, etc. They even had some sort of a Greek pastry that vaguely resembled my favorite pastry from Portugal.. a Pasteis de Nata. Mmm... Back up to our hotel room, with about an hour to kill before check out... we stand on our sixth floor balcony watching the street and the goings on below. Well, that hour is passed... let’s head downstairs to the lobby!!! We find a cozy spot in the corner on their fabulously comfy leather couches and hunker in for at least a 3 hour wait so that we can get full value out of our $9 euro (3 hour allotment) prepaid wireless card. Stanley reads while I upload pictures, create photocasts, check my email, do internet’y things, etc. during this 3 hour block. Air conditioned and feeling comfortable, the time passes with ease.
The internet card finally expires and Stanley heads out to find a market, some treats for our trip and misc things he’s been looking for while I sit and finish the last 100 pages or so of The DaVinci Code. Four more hours down... eight more hours to go :)
Stanley found a little cafe and gift shop up the road toward the ferry terminal, so after we killed another hour in the hotel lobby, we packed up and headed in that direction. We found a cool swag shop along the way and then stopped for a bite to eat in the cafe before making our way to the terminal. Finding a spot in the terminal, it was finally now 7:00pm, so we find a spot to park our bodies and read until it is time to board at 9:30pm. I had finished my DaVinci Code book and Stanley is reading my Angels & Demons book (same author), so while Stanley was out and about he found an excellent find... Deception Point by the same author (Dan Brown). Very cool find and he gives the book to me to read while he’s finishing Angels & Demons. This author is SO GREAT! I love his writing and I love his books, so while sitting in the ferry terminal killing two more hours before boarding, I read the first 60 or so pages of Deception Point and Stanley read his book. A great way to make the time pass.
It is time!!! We can board!!! Whoo-hoo!!! Yippee!!! Hooray!!! Hoorah!!! La-Dee-Da!!! What a day of waiting :) We board, they take us to our cabin... it is nice and much bigger than our ferry ride here. It has four beds, but the two upper bunks on either side of the room are folded up to make it a two bed cabin. Nice. At first I was a little worried that maybe they would put two more people in the room with us, but Stanley assured me that we paid for a two person room (A2), not a four person room (A4) and that there was nothing to worry about.
While sitting in the cabin I start to feel sick (I’ve had several moments on this trip when I’ve felt sick to my stomach, usually after eating, and it usually passes quickly and isnt terribly strong, but this time it was really strong and lasted a while so I was a little concerned I had maybe eaten something bad. I relaxed on my bunk and managed to fall asleep for a bit which helped... phew - no barfing for me today! :)
It is just now midnight and we are moving our way out of port at this very moment :) Stanley is up on deck smoking a cigar and enjoying the night breezes while I write to all of you. I am looking forward to a nice nights sleep and a wonderful day of reading fabulously suspenseful Dan Brown thrillers while we make our way back to Venice. ~M
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