Corfu, Olympia, Mykonos

It's been an eventful 36 hours since we last posted at Dobrovnik.  As we leave a port we stand on the top deck and watch the town as we leave it and usually hang around until the sun sets.  We have now gained an hour of daylight so the sun sets about 7:15 and is light for another half hour.  We have had beautiful clear skies and beautiful sunsets with a full moon happening tonight.  Tomorrow we will be half way through our cruise as we land in Athens tomorrow morning.  It's going fast!

We've had a great time the last few days with the "FAM".  It has been so wonderful spending this time together and we are so fortunate that we really enjoy each other and have shared some special moments on this trip.  Thanks Mom and Dad.

Some highlights from the last few days:

Bob and I won a dance contest and walked away with champagne and other treasures.

Great day renting a taxi and driver (Christos) in Corfu with Shelley and Jerry and toured the island for 4 hours. Christos told us that 90% of "My big fat Greek wedding" is true - just not the windex!

Great day renting a taxi and driver (Janis) in Olympia with Cindy and Mike for 6 hours.  We ran in the original Olympic stadium, toured a winery, visited a cliff hanging monastery and went swimming in the Ionion sea where the fish ate the callus' off our feet.  People paid for that in Corfu!

We had a great dinner last night - escargot, lobster and champagne.  Our waiters are quite the combination of personalities and they are a riot.

Mykonos today was a huge disappointment as we were unable to land after 1 1/2 hours of trying due to gale force winds.  The captain had to abort and we sailed off in the the very large seas!  I took a pill!  I always wanted to go to Mykonos and there were lots of disappointed people along with me.  Oh well, a restful day at sea.

Corfu

Corfu views

Bob entering Olympic stadium

Cindy and I racing

Winery in Olympia

Fish eating our feet

If it's Wednesday, it must be Dubrovnik

We left Koper, Slovenia on Monday evening at 6pm with clear skies and smooth sailing ahead.  We were all outside enjoying the ride when Mike and Cindy spotted a squall line in the distance and within the hour the storm hit.  We got hard rain, hail, strong winds and then big waves.  Mom, you would have loved it but those of us with motion sickness didn't enjoy it so much!  By the time we were seated for dinner at 8:15 Bob, Jerry and I were a bit queasy.  Cindy took a dramamine at the first sign of trouble and Shelley and Mike were fine.  Fortunately at bed time the seas had eased up.  Tuesday was a wonderful day at sea and we all had fun doing different things.  We of course ate way too much, sat in the sun, went to a wine tasting seminar and got kind of dressed up for formal night.  None of us had the luxury of bringing dress up clothes with our limited luggage.  Bob, however did manage to fit in a 3M tie that he found at goodwill.  It was a big hit with the fam.

Today, Wednesday September 26th we are in Dubrovnik, Croatia.  This is a beautiful town but with tons of tourists from all over the world.  There are at least 4 cruise ships here which brings in 600-2000 per ship.   We started the day hiking the ancient city wall with the inlaws and outlaws and had a great time.  We have since split up and wandered on our own.  We are writing this sitting at a Irish pub having a brew.  Life is good!

Leaving Koper...before the storm

Wine tasting

Inlaws 

Outlaws 

Hiking the wall

Old harbor

Our blogging spot

Venice, Ocean Princess and here we go...

Saturday September 22nd was a beautiful day in Venice and we all had fun walking to the Rialto fish market and buying shrimp and scallops for dinner which Mike made.  It was delicious and of course included some great Italian bread and wine.  We had a fun day just strolling the non-tourist neighborhoods and taking in the sights and smells that only Venice can give.  Combine that with appetizers on the roof terrace, spending priceless time with the inlaws and outlaws and all sleeping under one roof...Life is Good.

We cleaned up the apartment on Sunday morning and walked to the cruise terminal which was about a mile with suitcases in tow.  Thank goodness they now come with wheels.  Check in time was from 1:00pm on but we got there at 11:30 expecting to wait in line until 1:00 but we were checked in and in our room by 12:00.  We spent the rest of the day exploring the ship and relaxing.  It's a small ship with approximately 630 people.  Our stateroom is nice and the food so far has been great.  We all over ate our first meal!

Bob and I left the ship early this morning and did some exploring on our own.  The stop is Koper, Slovenia and we hopped a bus and went down the coast to a mid-evil town called Piren, hiked around for a few hours and caught the bus back.  We are now exploring Koper and found a cafe with wifi.  We need to get back on the ship at 5:00 and head for Dubrovnik, Croatia and we will get there on Wednesday.  Our day at sea we plan on exercising, eating and a wine tasting event with a formal dinner to follow.  Sounds like a good day!

The girls- Sherri, Shelley & Cindy

Bellisimo

Grand canal

Our ship

Our stateroom

Piran, Slovenia

The best hike ever

We had the most fantastic day hiking in the Dolminites.  We did a 14 mile hike to the top of the Schlern which was the top of the mountain in the Alpine de Suisi.  This alpine meadow is apparently the largest in the world and is a world heritage site.  It was beyond beautiful and we kept saying wow, wow, wow!!  This hike we rated up with the Inka trail in Peru as one of the best we have ever done and we had clear skies and could see to the Swiss and Austrian alps.

We left Castelrotto on Friday morning for Venice to meet up with Mike and Cindy at the apartment they have rented for the week.  We were all glad to get rid of the car, especially Bob who has had it with the Italian drivers. It feels good to be back here in Venice and we are looking forward to spending the day wandering the back streets and getting lost.  As I write we are sitting on the roof top terrace having our morning  coffee.  I will hopefully add a picture.  Sometimes I don't  do this computer stuff very well?  Tomorrow we get on the ship and start our Greek journey.  We will post when we can.

Almost to the top

Lunch at the top

The Schlern 

Resting hut half way up

Roof top terrace in Venice

Bellaigo to Castelrotto

It's Wednesday night, September 19th and we are writing from Castelrotto in the Dolminites, which is in northern Italy in the Italian Alps.

Shelley and Jerry arrived to Belliago on Monday afternoon in a semi crippled car.  It did fine on the flat roads but not so good on the hills.  Anyway, they made it and we enjoyed a beautiful sunny, warm afternoon and evening. The only mishap was that Bob got stung by a VERY large bee and had a terrible reaction which took 2 days to get better.  He's good now.

 Lake Como is breathtaking.  The mountains jut up out of the water with villages dotting the shoreline.  We didn't expect it to be so beautiful.  It would be nice to spend more time there exploring but it was time to move on Tuesday morning.  We expected a 3 hour drive to Castelrotto through the mountains but it soon became apparent that the car would not accelerate and definitely not up hill which caused huge problems with the Italian drivers!  It also caused tremendous stress to Bob and Jerry who had to take turns driving this very unsafe vehicle.  After 4 hours of driving we got to Verona to exchange the car and after a total of 9 hours we finally made it to Castelrotto.  The good news is we love it here.  It feels and looks like Austria and German is the primary language which is good since Shelley speaks it well.  The area looks like it's part of the "Sound of Music" movie and the landscape is full of chalets, meadows and flower boxes in full bloom everywhere.  This area is know for its hiking and skiing and we plan to do a 12 mile hike tomorrow if the weather allows.  It was raining today but we did see the sunset so we are hopeful.  If we survive the hike we'll post again soon.

Bellagio

Bob's bee sting

Hotel in Castelrotto

Flowers everywhere

The Beginning in Bellagio

After flying into Milan Italy we quickly found a bus to central Milan to catch a train to Varenna where we took a ferry to 

Bellagio on Como Lake.  Plane, bus, train, ferry and we finally arrived!  We had no idea how beautiful it is here.  We have a few days to explore the area as we wait for my sister Shelley and husband Jerry to arrive.  Our blog title the "outlaws and inlaws"  refers to the 6 of us traveling together.  Shelley, Sherri & Mike (siblings) are the inlaws and Jerry, Bob & Cindy are the outlaws.  We are excited about this trip that our parents gave us.

This is how we looked after being up for 30 plus hours

View from our room

Streets of Bellagio