Spring Break in the Mediterranean-part 1

Oh wow!  What a week!!   I took over 300 pictures and I am having a very difficult time in selecting a few choice ones from each destination to put in the blog.  I may have to do this in parts...part 1, part 2 etc..   So bear with me and I will take you along for a cruise through the Mediterranean!

We were invited to join a few other families on this cruise and the ports looked very interesting and Travis would have some friends to hang out with, so we cancelled a cruise to Greece we had booked for fall and signed up for this one.  The families that went were: The Jasters-Rock, Karrie and daughters Kailey and Jessica; The LeForts, Steve, Jennifer and daughters Sam and Sabrina; The Abbotts, Kent, Lisa and 4 kids and McGraths, Missy and son Chris; and us!

We left Spesbach on Saturday morning at 7:00 am with Missy and Chris and the five of us all crammed in to the BMW diesel sedan.  We traveled south through Germany, Switzerland and ended the day in Pisa, Italy.  It took us about 10 hours.  We stayed at a very nice hotel called My One Hotel Galilea right outside of Pisa.  We relaxed for about an hour and then decided to drive around and find some place to eat dinner.  We found a very cute restaurant named the Cafe de Iganco not too far away and had a wonderful meal of pizza, spaghetti and gelato.

The next morning we woke up excited to go see the leaning Tower of Pisa.  After a nice free breakfast with some amazing pastries (Missy said the chocolate croissant was one of the best she's ever had) we went outside to get in the car and were met with pouring down rain.  NOT a little shower, mind you....but POURING down rain!!  But what else can you do when you've come that far to see a famous landmark but laugh and run through the puddles in your flip-flops :)

Okay...so we missed getting a good shot of us holding up the tower...we were laughing too hard and trying to just run out there for a few seconds at a time to get the shot.

It was early Sunday morning and there weren't too many people around but those that were there, were thinking "those crazy american tourists"!!

We then jumped back in the car and began our 2 1/2 hour drive to the port of Savona, Italy.  The drive is mostly along the coast and can you believe we drove through 98 tunnels between Pisa and Savona.

We met all the friends in the terminal and waited for about 2 hours until our turn to board the ship.  It was very nice.  A bit too colorful for my taste, but it had a definite Italian flair to it.  We went to the buffet and got a late lunch, then went to check out our room.  Cabin number 7249.

That night we had dinner in the dining room and realized everyone from our group was at two tables side by side except for us.  We were at a table with a family of six that wasn't part of our group.  After visiting a few minutes we realized he was a dentist stationed at Ramstien and they live in Spesbach!!   Small world, isn't it??   They are the HanLee family...Jay, Stephanie and kids, Sydney, Taylor, Luke and Marcus.  We really enjoyed getting to know them.  The two girls go to Ramstein High and Travis knew Taylor a little bit.  But we are so sad because they are moving to Japan in a little over a month.  After being here six months we are starting to understand this sad part of military life.  

                                          Travis, Taylor, Sydney and Luke.

Our first port was Naples, Italy.   Some of the group wanted to go to Pompeii and some wanted to go to a less touristy and more compact and better preserved city that had perished in the Mt. Vesuvius eruption in 79 A.D.    We decided to go with part of the group to Herculanuem instead of Pompeii

  Mike and Rock haggled with the Italian taxi cab drivers to find a good deal and then were off!   Oh WOW...was it a crazy drive through the streets of Naples.  I had to close my eyes more than once.  The other taxi even hit a motorcyclist and the motorcyclist didn't even care!

It was a perfect day to wander through these ancient streets and try to imagine life in this affluent little city before the volcano erupted.  The mosaics and murals were still colorful and clear.  They even had "fast food" restaurants where they served food from these deep pots set into counters facing the streets.  

This little city was completely covered and then built on top of.  When they began excavating they had to dig from the top down.  It sits qutie a bit below what is now street level.  We were able to watch them work as they continue to excavate more and more.  

After a couple of hours here, we were given a taxi tour through Naples by our taxi drivers, Chirro and Pepe.  Then they dropped us off a couple of blocks from the ship so we could find some world famous pizza from Naples and of course more gelato!

Well that's about it for this entry.  I will continue tonight when Mike and T.J. are at scouts.   I can see that I will have to do this in several parts, so stay tuned....

Love and miss you all, 

-corri