Continuing Rest Room report by N.

In order to accomplish a thorough assessment, I did seek out and find the public rest room in Dubrovnik, Croatia. Strangely enough, this rest room is located outside the wall of the old city. With all of the 2,000+ cruise sightseers on the inside of the walled city, the rest room was virtually vacant. But what a joy to behold. The two doors leading into the rest room at opposite ends clearly denoted gender, however upon entry into the men’s side, I found 8 urinals on opposite sides of a partition, with a large entry into the toilet stall area. The stall area included both men’s and women’s stalls, again, clearly denoted by the universal symbols—2 boys and 4 girls. The two men’s stalls were clean, had toilet seats and toilet paper. Three out of the four women’s stalls were unoccupied and the doors were open. And I can testify to the fact that there was NO TOILET available—only a ceramic covered hole in the ground. I started to take a picture, but heaven only knows the trouble a man might get into for photographing women’s rest room facilities.



This picture was provided by fellow travelers, The Burgers. Thanks for sending it.

I cannot testify to the toilet paper situation as I did not enter that area. It seems upon further investigation that these are referred to as “Turkish” toilets (remember the part of the world we are in) and apparently they are quite common. It just seems strange to me that the men can sit, but the women have to squat. I will make one final investigative report in Venice on May 11. I am thinking about a possible Master’s Thesis on the subject. What do you think?

Sunday, May 10—Mother’s Day

Dubrovnik, Croatia

We visited the walled city of old Dubrovnik, which is about a half-mile square. The main things we wanted to accomplish at this stop were using an Internet café and walking on the wall that goes around the city.



Daniel, our Collette guide, is not supposed to “guide” us when we walk around the city. He is not licensed here to do that and the locals can get upset if he is “guiding” unlicensed. As we were walking through he mentioned places and things that he had told us on Saturday when we had our Dubrovnik history lesson. I suppose his voice carried a little too far, because one of the local guides chastised him and warned him that he was not licensed. He promised to be quiet and we proceeded. The city has several Catholic churches, a mosque and a synagogue. Most of the area is Greek Orthodox, but not Croatia. Because the Pope crowned a king in the 11th Century, Catholicism is predominant. Various groups--Romans, Saracens, Richard the Lionhearted, Turks, even Napoleon, have ruled Croatia. In 1991 when the Croatians fought the Serbs, the bombing and shelling destroyed 60% of Dubrovnik. Most of it has been rebuilt.

I mentioned that there are various churches here, we arrived about 9 am on Sunday morning and bells were heard from all different directions. From the main bell tower of the town, from the Jesuit church, the Franciscan church and the “Main” Cathedral. Reminded me a little of Poe’s poem, Bells.


Flowers growing out of the top of the Dubrovnik city wall



After our mini-tour of the town, we headed out of the walled city to the newer area and the INTERNET CAFÉ. Got all our stuff downloaded and checked some e-mail. Hoped to find out about the storm that had hit Bwd in the last day or so, but only one person mentioned it and that was not in much detail. Hopefully, when we log on in Milan, we’ll have more specifics to report. Interesting thing about this Internet café was the keyboard. A few letters were rearranged and for a touch typist that is difficult. The “Y” switched places with the “Z”, the apostrophe was nowhere to be found, and the question mark was above one of the numbers—not sure which one. Anyway, it got done and N and I both checked e-mail.

After using the computers, we climbed up the many many stairs to walk on the city wall. The fee to make this trip was 50Kona or 7.5 Euros. We walked and walked and took pictures and climbed and walked and took more pictures.


Not sure which was the more strenuous activity, the Acropolis on Rhodes or climbing to the top of and around the wall of Dubrovnik.





We found an ice cream shop and got a cone and sat and waited for the “tenders” to come and take us back to the Fortuna. I didn’t shop at all, guess I’m all shopped out of hand embroidered stuff.

One last bit of information to impart—the Bosnian/ Serbian/ Croatian problems are all rooted in their religious differences. As I mentioned before Croatia is Roman Catholic, Serbia is Orthodox and Bosnia is Muslim. Why can’t we all get along?

Another observation—many in our tour group have commented that some of the people on this Cruise ship are the rudest and pushiest people we have ever met. The majority of these pushy folks are speaking Italian as they shove you aside to get ahead in a line or on the elevator. A woman who was chattering in what sounded like Italian pushed me away from a toilet stall when we stopped at the fancy hotel for lunch on Rhodes. One of our group who is from New York, told me just to push back. That’s not me.

This N That

Saturday, May 9

This ‘n’ that from the entire trip.
I’ll be posting this in Dubrovnik tomorrow, so HAPPY MOTHER’S DAY tomorrow, to all my friends.

I forgot to mention a sighting that I witnessed in the square in Como the second day. Vendors were selling various types of art and a lady was making balloon animals for children. Between these areas was a young person in an unusual costume. It seemed to me she was pretending to be a statue. But she wasn’t being very still; she waved and talked to the children passing by. People would give her a coin as they passed by and would take photos with her.





On the cruise ship we have two different styles of dining. The sit down dining room which is very structured (7 courses for supper) and the buffet which can became a “free for all” if everyone hits there at once. The buffet is very unstructured, serve your self, find your own table, and leave when you are ready.
Every night we have been on the ship we sit with the same group and have the very formal service and too much food—although’ I have cut down from 7 courses to 4. The food is fussily presented and usually looks really pretty.
Up to today (5 evening meals on board) we have been offered and accepted veal, beef, chicken, meatloaf (veal), swordfish, shrimp, duck, quail, lamb, and octopus. These were either in the entrée, the salad, or the soup. N had a lobster soup that was not bisque, but a thin soup, which he enjoyed. Some of the best soups I’ve had are the cold fruit or melon soups. It is hard for me to realize that something made with oranges and is served cold is a soup. I’d like to just drink it from a cup or glass, but I’m being good and using my spoon. We did mention that N had calamari at the restaurant in Mykonos. He said it was very good, not rubbery at all. Desserts have not been as decadent as I remember the ones on the Alaskan cruise ship. Sorbets and gelato abound and a time or two we’ve been served a good cake.
Last night’s pasta that N. ordered was ravioli which everyone at our table said was really wonderful. (Not Chef Boy-R- Dee at all)

We’ve been off the ship for most lunches, either going without (like that is going to hurt us), or getting something ashore. We ate in the fancy dining room today and were seated with a group of French people. Their eating style is very different. They went at it two-handed w/ fork in the left hand and knife in the right. They pushed their food onto the fork w/ the knife and turned the fork so the tines pointed directly at their mouth. The two women at the table made designs with the crumbs/ items left on their plates. They were pleasant enough, but didn’t try to communicate at all. I think they were a little miffed that we were placed at their table. I could be wrong.

The service in this dining room is not slow, but controlled and involved, so we almost missed our meeting at 2.

We’ve had all our breakfasts in the buffet and have become very familiar with where things are and the way to proceed. Two things N has really enjoyed for breakfast are the “blood orange” juice--tastes a little like Mango to me. And he raves about the coffee. He was thinking it would be dark and strong like European coffee is sometimes. Instead, he has found it to be very smooth and “non-bitter”. I have even found some decaf tea and these folks do believe in lemon in hot tea. A huge assortment of breakfast breads is available along with eggs, specially made omelets, meat, cheeses and cereals of all kinds. Also available are hot and cold milk for different uses.

Tonight is our formal dinner, so no telling what will be served this evening.

I mentioned sitting w/ the French people. We were told that announcements are made on board ship in 5 languages. Their order depends on the percentage of people speaking that language. So far we hear Italian first, French second, German third, Spanish fourth and English fifth. All of our local guides speak English, obviously, but their facility with the language varies. The young woman in the Olympic village seemed to be working very hard to speak English, while for the gentleman in Rhodes it seemed to be effortless. I just admire all who can and will converse in another language.

I think that is all the miscellaneous information that I forgot to include in the other posts.

We’ll be home soon—Early morning of the 13th. See ya’
Hope to post one last time in Milan.

Traveler’s Guide to European Rest Rooms by N P

Being bladder challenged, I have always tried to follow the philosophy when traveling to “never pass up a chance to pee”. On this particular trip, that philosophy has developed into some unique observations. During our first night’s stay in Stresa, Italy, our hotel bathroom was equipped with a bidet. If you are from the US don’t expect instructions on its use.

On day 2, we took an excursion to the beautiful glacial lake resort of Como and were told by Danny, our tour guide, that there were NO public rest rooms available and only two businesses with facilities. Using the above mentioned philosophy I checked out both of them. The first was located in the local McDonalds, which is one stall, unisex, with a ten to 15 minutes wait because of the long line. Keep in mind that handicapped accessibility is not a consideration in Europe – this rest room had a person going down a long narrow hallway. Upon arrival I found no toilet paper, but some clever patron has brought in a 2-inch thick pad of hand paper towels from the washbasin. There is also strangely enough no toilet seat. The second rest room in Como is located in the local silk store (silk clothing and scarves, etc). This one is in relatively good shape—clean, unisex, t.p, available but no toilet seat.

On the road from Stresa to Venice we stopped at a travel plaza for lunch. This would be the equivalent of a Petro truck stop in Texas, but much larger.
Now we’re getting “uptown”. There are 4 stalls in the men’s rest room, but no urinals. Two stalls have t.p.; two do not—and three out of 4 are missing toilet seats.

We arrive in Venice; unload our luggage at the dock to be placed on the ship and head into the embarkation building. Here we have two stalls for the men, both with t.p., but neither have toilet seats. Are you beginning to see a pattern, here? I’m curious enough at this point to ask Danny, our tour guide about it. And he says that he doesn’t know why, but toilet seats are missing all over Italy and Greece. I ask him if it’s not a possibility that some society is trying to get the world’s largest collection of toilet seats and toilet paper in the world.

With the ship in port at Bari, Italy, we took a tour out to see the trulli houses and found at the bus parking area, public toilets were pay as you go. The adult charge was .50 Euro—equivalent of 70 cents American. There is a lady sitting at a table outside the bathroom area collecting the money and regulating the flow of traffic. The ladies, as usual, had a long waiting line, but after paying my money, I was able to get in immediately to find (guess what!)- despite the price) NO TOILET SEATS. At least paper was available.

Olympia, Greece and a tour visit to the 2500-year-old Olympic village was absolutely impressive. There are two public rest room facilities available and with 3 Cruise ships in the harbor approx 6000 adults of which at least half had to be in the village when we were there. The waiting line was about 30 min, --both toilets were unisex, neither had toilet paper. The ladies were passing out Kleenex and warning others of the conditions. NEITHER HAD TOILET SEATS.

From there we had a short walk up to the Olympic museum. They had some of the most impressive statuary that I have ever seen in my life. The building was very modern and immaculate. The men’s rest room had 3 or 4 stalls and all had toilet paper and ALL HAD TOILET SEATS.

The morning tour to the picturesque city of Santorini, Greece was short and I did not have an urgent need to find a public restroom, however, after reaching the top and waiting in a horribly long line to catch the cable car down, I was certainly wishing I had found one before boarding the tenders taking us back to the cruise ship.

By afternoon we are in Mykonos and walked up the hill to find the Internet café. After an orange juice and a beer at the café, I asked for the facilities and was directed to a half sized door in the alleyway outside the back door of the establishment. There was no lock on the door, so one would have to keep a leg against the door to insure privacy. This one had a flush tank above the toilet with a chain that was pulled. Paper towels, soap, and toilet paper were available, but NO toilet seat.

I thought things were going to change in Rhodes. As we went to the Acropolis with its 500+ steps up and then again down, and found the facilities to be in excellent condition including toilet seats. We stopped for lunch at an elegant hotel resort and the facilities were superb. However just prior to boarding the bus to go back to the ship, I checked out the facilities in the medieval city and VOILA! They were indeed medieval, no seats, no towels, no toilet paper.
We’re on board all day and by the way we have excellent facilities both in our cabin and wherever you might find yourself out and about on the ship.

And we have Croatia to go—I will keep you posted. As soon as I return, I will go on E-Bay and do a search for slightly used, excellent condition European toilet seats and see what the going rate is.

A Festive Evening

Friday May 9,
A festive evening—




After our tour of Rhodes we rested and then went to supper. The meal had been designated as ITALIAN NIGHT and the wait staff were decked out w/ bow ties of red and green. At a certain point toward the end of the meal, extremely loud Italian music came on some that we knew and some we didn’t. During this music waiters and waitresses danced with the patrons, ending with a chain dance with lots of folks hands on the sholders of the person ahead dancing around the room. Just as many people were up and in the middle of the room, several members of the wait staff- put on a lip sinc-ing show on the upper level. Very energetic and appreciated by all. These young people who wait tables work very hard and seem tireless. They also each bring a quirk to their service. Our waiter, Jerry, has a tossing trick with grated cheese for pasta. And he never seems to spill it.

After supper we decided we’d take in the “In Concert” show with the 2 singers and 11 dancers. All sang and all danced, but there were two featured singers and 2 featured dancers and then the chorus. The show began well and was very energetic. Set change technology was top notch, costumes, altho’ skimpy were creative. The choreography seemed inventive for the most part, but “robotic” for some numbers. My guess is that the beginning was done for the guests (Elvis, Frank Sinatra, Liza Minnelli, Aretha Franklin music and imitators), then the dancers and singers chose some more “modern” stuff to please themselves. The imitation of the Rolling Stones was awful, in my opinion. Needless to say, some of the music was in French, Spanish, Italian—don’t remember any German—and one number featured belly dancers- kinda’ modernized. But the majority of the music was American. I guess that is the one area of our culture that is embraced by most of the world. An interesting show, lasting about 45-50 min.

Came back to the room knowing that we don’t HAVE to get up any special time in the morning, since we are AT SEA.
I woke up at 8- guess I needed the sleep.
Showered and went up to the internet café where I spent about 16 minutes catching up on e-mail. I learned that B is painting the baby’s room—not sure what color and that the baby’s name is still under consideration, with several possibilities being mentioned.

Came back down to the cabin and N was up and showering. We had a leisurely breakfast and explored the ship a little. Went out on deck, but didn’t stay long because the wind was blowing really hard. Found several places we’d been wondering about. I shopped a little for amber jewelry which is 10 and 20% off today. Didn’t buy anything, but I did see some really pretty things.

Different areas of the ship







That’s all I have to share for now. Nick is planning his “bathroom essay” so it will probably be next. Bon Jour

Rhodes

Friday, May 8, 2009
The Island of Rhodes




Our itinerary for the day is to go to the city of Lindos first and climb to the top of the Acropolis, have a sumptuous lunch in an elegant hotel, and then to travel to the walled city of Rhodes.

We traveled over a 2100 year old bridge made of stone, which holds tour busses just fine.

We learned about many English words that come from Greek, beginning with Necropolis and cemetery. The first meaning "place of the dead" and the second (with the coming of Christianity) "sleeping place". Then there was thesis, followed by synthesis. And antithesis.

An interesting fact about people who own land in Rhodes-- before anything can be built here, archaeologists must evaluate and excavate the land to be sure nothing of importance will be damaged. Our guide had to adjust his house plans because on one corner of his land, some tombs were found and they could not be “built over”. It is irritating, but “heritage is a precious thing”, he said.

Until last year, it was illegal to scuba dive in Greek waters because of the many treasures to be found in the area. Those who do find treasures and turn them in to the dept of antiquities are rewarded with half the value of the item. However smuggling of Greek antiquities is a flourishing business.

Our local guide, Tony, mentioned that they experience 300 days of sun a year. Many houses have solar panels and they also have “wind farms”.
There are myths to explain everything in Greece and we were told why, according to the stories this island in Greece has so much sun. This is where the sun God Helios chose to live. He pulled the Greek Isles out from under the ocean.

The land we traveled through reminds me of the area where I grew up around Alpine and Marfa, TX.--all the way to Van Horn.

It is a dry looking rocky/mountainous terrain covered with olive trees. Small plants grow out of the rocks themselves. I was wondering if olives would grow in West Texas—probably not enough moisture. Remember, Rhodes is surrounded with water.

The city of Rhodes is 2417 years old and in ancient times was the seat of education, with philosophers traveling from Egypt, Rome, Athens, and most of the civilized world to study here.

The Colossus of Rhodes was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World—These 7 wonders were the largest and most impressive man made objects in existence at the time. The Colossus was a statue about the size of the Statue of Liberty and this statue of a man straddled the harbor of Rhodes. It only lasted 65 years because of an earthquake.

In Lindos we headed up to the Acropolis, which just means the highest point. This trek was supposedly 300 steps (some said 500—doesn’t matter-- it was high) up to the top of this temple. We climbed and stepped, and climbed and finally got to the very top.





From there we could see the harbor where St. Paul supposedly sailed into when he visited Rhodes.



Let me stop here to mention how wonderful the weather has been for this entire trip. We have had sunny days, breezes to cool us, and only a hint of rain, with a few claps of thunder. We couldn’t have asked for better weather.

If you’ve seen the movie THE GUNS OF NAVARONE, it was filmed at this Acropolis. The sights that are seen looking down from this height, were in the movie. I guess we’ll have to rent it to see how they used the area in that movie.

After leaving Lindos, we traveled to Archangelos, which is a town of potters. As we stopped at a family pottery business, we saw zillions of locusts (teeny grasshoppers) swarming all around. They seemed to be on a mission/ headed somewhere.

We watched a potter effortlessly create a lovely shaped vessel in just minutes.


Then we were invited into the shop to watch the ladies decorate various kinds of pottery.


There was a really clever drinking cup which when filled to the appropriate line is quite functional, but when “over filled” simply drains out the bottom. I would have loved to bring one of these cups home, but I was not sure I could get it home without breaking it. I could have had it shipped, but that doubled the price because of shipping, insurance, etc. So I didn’t buy anything here, but several of our fellow travelers did.

Lunch was an elegant buffet with really good food, although I’m not sure what we ate. There were no labels, so not sure but I think I had the spinach pie and I know I had baklava. A welcome, quiet respite from the hurrying and climbing of the morning.

The afternoon was spent in the Medieval Walled City of Rhodes. We looked through rooms with mosaic floors



and artifacts from the Roman era in the area. Just a bit more climbing of stairs, but at a leisurely pace.



We heard about the Knights of St. John, who were hospitaliers. They had nothing to do w/ healing the sick, the word was a form of hospitality—they provided for pilgrims traveling to the Holy Lands and they also had to be soldiers to protect the area. Eventually they weren’t able to protect it, and they were ousted by the Turks and went Malta. We were given time for shopping and N and I found an ice cream shop. (Today, I did not follow my cruise rule —to have only one dessert per day—yes, I’ve had more than one, but all the stairs made it necessary to keep up my strength)

This was a really LONG but informative and interesting day. We’re back on board the ship and will be headed to Croatia. Tomorrow is a DAY AT SEA. I will catch up on the miscellaneous items I want to blog about then.

Mykonos

May 7, Thursday- Mykonos




This afternoon we got information about Mykonos and what we will do/experience there. Our tour guide, Daniel, told us some stories from mythology—Demeter and Persephone, the Minotaur /Aegeus, and others. We will spend some time wandering the area (small alley type streets, but beautifully paved. Shops are everywhere with clothing, jewelry and also tourist stuff. We talked some about the split between the Orthodox and Roman Catholic churches which happened in 1054. People in Greece do not celebrate their birthday, but their “name” day. So if there were a saint Earlene, I would celebrate that Saint’s day---I guess I’d have to settle for St. Katherine.

We took the “tenders” (motor boats) to the Island and got some instructions. Restaurants were pointed out, as was the way back to the boats. Then we were on our own. We headed for @ngelo’s Internet cafÈ up the hill by the windmills. I wish I could take this place with us on the rest of our travels. The young man working there had wonderful English, was very helpful and pleasant and seemed to want to be of service. We bought fruit juice and beer and an hour of Internet time for 4 EUROS (for the internet—the juices were 1 euro each, the beer was 4 Euros) All in all a very easy and inexpensive place to use. Hope I can find similar places in Rhodes and Dubrovnik. There were 22 stations at this particular cafe and they also sold Cuban cigars, which ranged from 1 Euro to 8 Euro.

Places we saw---











We moved down the hill to a cafe called Alefkandra’s. It was right on the water overlooking the Aegean Sea. N ordered calamari and I had a roast beef dish. We split an order of Baklava. Wonderful, but way, way, sweet.

After supper, we shopped a little, and made our way back to the tenders. Each time we return to the ship, we must show our passport and room card. At least we are assured of getting to the correct boat.

Nothing unusual in the trip back, no long lines to stand in, no turbulent water, no pushy folks trying to get in front. Just a nice leisurely boat ride back.
Tomorrow is also an early day, so…………..Kalinfchta which is Good Night in Greek.