Last stop of our holiday adventure ... Athens

The end of our cruise ends in Athens.  We decided to stay an extra couple of days to see a bit of Athens.  We're really glad we did...so much to see and do.

We've arrived.  Took a while to get a taxi to our hotel.  There was a long line of several people doing the same as we did.

View of the acropolis from our hotel

While we were waiting for our room to be ready, we explored the acropolis

The reconstruction of the stage of the Odeion of Herodes Atticus

Ruth leading up the stairs to the reconstruction of the Parthenon

Seeing the height and the reconstruction of these pillars is overwhelming to consider how this was built originally.

The reconstruction of the Erechtheion.  The temple takes its name from Poseidon Erechtheus, the mythical king of Attica, but is actually the temple of Athena Polias (guardian of the city) and it is also the place of worship of other ancient deities of Athens.

Looking down from the Acropolis

Growth coming from the stone pillar

Our second day in Athens had us doing some geocaching and the National Archaeological Museum.

More flowers by the Museum

and fruit

The National Archaeological Museum is one of the top ten museums in the world.

Lots of prehistoric pottery

This vase was about 600 BC

We were very impressed with this museum.  

All in all, we had a fabulous holiday adventure.  Thank you for sharing it with us.  My next challenge is to condense these pictures to 25 (so Arthur will be happy) when I do a presentation for the Friendship Club at our church.  Wish me luck!!!

Mykonos, Greece

Our tour into Mykonos wasn't until the afternoon so we got to take it easy on the ship in the morning. We went to a cooking show and a tour of the galley kitchen ... very impressive.

The show was very humorous and educational.

There is a lot of work that goes on behind the scene for our great meals.

This is our view of Mykonos from our port

The first thing I noticed as we headed to the monastery was this this Super Flora Market.  Again, my mother's name was Flora.  First, our hotel in Rome was Flora Hotel and now we pass Super Flora Market and before we left we passed Flora Fish and Tavern.

The bell tower at the Monastery.

This icon was found in town and was the reason for building the monastery where it is.  They would take the icon and put it in the monastery and every night the icon would mysteriously disappear back to where it was until the church was built.

Impressive pulpit

At our first beach stop we found these goats

The sand was very rough and rocky, not a nice sand.

Our next stop is a visit to the Paraportiani Church

The view from the Church.

Beautiful views on our way to Little Venice

Little Venice

and beautiful flowers on our way back to our bus.

Mykonos was one of our favourite places I think because it is so unique with all the white washed homes.  There is a rule that all houses have to be white and a certain design.

Istanbul

View of our ship as we were entering port in Istanbul

View of the Blue Mosque as we entered the port.

The Blue Mosque as we know it is called The Sultan Ahmed Mosque.  We were told beforehand to have a head covering and our knees and shoulders were to be covered.  We came prepared but there was also coverings available if people came unprepared.  We were also prepared to remove our shoes on arrival.  Our tour even gave us bags for our shoes.

Ruth in front of the main area of the Blue Mosque

The men's praying area

Some of the domes

The women's praying area - a little cubby hole compared to the men's area.

We then crossed the road over to the Hagia Sophia which is a multitude of domes and semi-domes and over 20,000 shimmering blue Iznik tiles in more than 50 different tulip designs and 216 stained glass windows on the interior.

This dome has angels on the side and the angels without faces are thought to be the originals as the faces would have been removed.

Special floor of presentation for special events.

And then we were off to the Topkapi Palace

Quite the bed, eh?

Dome in the bedroom

View from the palace.

We saw lots of stray dogs.  In Ephesus it was stray cats.  Here it was dogs.

Beautiful flowers

Then we were treated to lunch on site here.

Then a visit to St. Irene Church which is a Byzantine Church that dates from the 6th Century.

Dome at St. Irene Church that had a screen covering it.

We ended our tour by heading back for an opportunity to shop in the Grand Bazaar, the largest market in the world with over 4,000 shops.

And as we headed back to the ship we had our second formal night so another photo opportunity LOL!

We are just standing in front of a backdrop but I like it because it has the gondola just behind us which was the beginning of our trip and the cruise ship behind us which was the last part of our trip.