Dubrovnic and finish of Cruise in Venice

Sunday 26th August 2007 – At sea off the coast of Greece

Had a lazy day at sea today. Caught up on diary and postcards, had a swim, ate too much! Watched the show at night called Classique which was performed by the Celebrity Singers and Dancers who have some real talent.

Monday 27th August 2007 – Dubrovnik Croatia

During the night Paul was sick and vomited a couple of times. There has been a bug going around the ship with 170 reported cases some apparently quite ill with drips up. If you do report in sick they quarantine you and you can’t get off the ship so morning time saw Pammy down at the doctors surgery trying to get something to treat me without actually reporting it. Managed to get some Gastrolite, which I took with good effect. Have gone the whole day on a banana and an apple and am starting to improve now. (10.30pm). Pam loved Dubrovnic as the average height of the women is 5’8” and for the men 6’3”. Made her feel tiny and petite!!! Says she should have come here 30 years ago looking for a husband!!! Dubrovnic had a lot of shade and is surrounded by azure blue water. Probably the prettiest place we have seen. Croatia has seen such a lot of war and it’s sad to think that a lot of it happened in the 1990’s – our lifetime. It was very heavily bombed by Serbia and 3/4of the houses were affected in the old city with a very graphic map depicting the city and every house and facility that was bombed or burnt. It really gave a great illustration (albeit sad) of the devastation this place sustained. Tourism is its mainstay, with liquor, cheese, silk and leatherwork as well as lace following behind.
Dubrovnic it beautiful and had Paul not been crook we would have been off exploring with our Irish friends at 9.00am but as it was he did not get out of bed till 10.30 and we headed into town about 12.30 on the shuttle bus. The old city has a wall that extends around the entire “old City” and you can walk around the top of the entire wall, but I felt too crook. Built between the 11th and 17th century and the city plan dates from 1292. It is the best kept medieval walled city in the world. It is beautifully situated on the Dalmatian coast with waterways similar in many ways to the Marlborough Sounds. The houses are all a light stone colour with orange tiles being the norm. Each house is made from this beautiful limestone coloured stone.
Set sail at 7pm for Venice and as we exited Dubrovnic we commented that it reminded us of the Marlborough Sounds.

Tuesday 28th August 2007 – Venice Italy

Sailed into Venice at 10:30am through the middle of the Grand Canal which was amazing with so many beautiful buildings and over 200 castles lining our route. The people on board commented that Venice had the best port entry in the world, followed by Sydney and Rio de Janiro. As we arrived they played classical music, befitting of our grand entrance. After docked we had arranged with Jennifer to go to the island of Murana for a private tour which included a glass blowing demonstration from the oldest glass factory in Murana. We watched the glass master do his stuff using ovens which were the original ones from centuries previously. The only modern difference was that they now use natural gas rather than the coal and coke of earlier times. We were then taken upstairs to view and purchase the “exclusive range” of Murana glassware, including amazing chandeliers, vases, plates and statues as well as glasses etc. These ranged in price from $A2,000:00 - $A100,000:00!! Having realised that we still need to win Lotto, we went downstairs to the more “cost effective” souvenir section. Back on our little water taxi to the mainland and St Marks Square where Paul and I did our own individual exploring. Pam found many beautiful shops and Paul checked out where our hotel would be when we arrived back there tomorrow for 3 days, and had a look at some other hotels near St Marks Square. Having discovered that the hotel we were booked into was on the other side of the island (some 40 minutes away) we made a beeline back to the ship to get onto the internet to cancel our first booking and re-book closer to the action. The only issue with this was that the children had sent Fathers Day cards to where we were expected to stay (the Sofitel). Paul was most confused when I insisted that even though he had cancelled the Sofitel we still had to go there to collect a “package”! After dinner we walked in the drizzling rain to the Sofitel, had a cup of coffee, collected the envelope and walked back to the ship, talking with Tim on the mobile at the same time only to discover that he had walked this some route when he was here. We then had to pack up all our belongings and leave our cases outside our rooms prior to 12 midnight as we were scheduled to disembark at 8am next morning.