Dani said that her final exam went well. It took all three hours for her to do it and check it.
We rented a car and picked up the footstools I bought at World Market, which are very nice.
It’s really a challenge to find a place to park the car, though. I think we’ll use it tomorrow and then return it rather than try to figure out what to do with it until Sunday.
We drove down to little Italy and strolled up and down restaurant-laden Taylor street, finally choosing Francesca’s. Great choice. We had an authentic Italian meal, a great bottle of Barbera, and one of the best desserts I’ve ever had, an ice cream and nut and caramel and Oreo crust concoction that combined salty, bitter, sweet, warm, cold, crunchy and soft all in each amazing bite. The restaurant was packed, with many patrons headed for the same concert.
After dinner, we went to United Center to see James Taylor and Carole King. What a terrific concert they put on. It’s amazing that he’s 62 and she’s 68! They played for three hours, with their original band from their 1971 Troubador show plus many others. I had forgotten how many hits she wrote, all the way back to 1960. The concert had robotic video cameras all over the arena, high def screens, LED walls, and good sound (for an arena). Yet even with probably 20,000 people, it seemed quite intimate, and it was clear that they were really enjoying playing, and enjoying the enthusiastic audience response. Dani really enjoyed it, too.
Dani and I went to see The Sins of Sor Juana at the Goodman Theatre. It’s a drama based upon the real life of a 17th century woman scholar and writer in Mexico. It was directed by the same person who directed a production of it at Northwestern two years ago, and was very professionally done. Afterward we had dinner at the nearby Catch 35, delicious as always.
My diverticulosis has been acting up, this time on my left side, so I took it easy today. We walked up to the theatre to see a student production of You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown. They did a good job with the show, which, given the weak material, was as good as it could be. My side is still bothering me, so we’re getting dinner delivered by Thai Sookdee, (which has terrible food, but this weird dish they call Pad Thai that isn’t Pad Thai but is quite tasty!) It’s hard to get used to being able to order food in at 9:30.
A quiet day today. I walked over to “That Little Mexican Cafe” on Davis for lunch. Decent fish tacos, sturdy chips, very mild salsa. In the afternoon I walked down to a wine shop called Vinica that’s just a block beyond Whole Foods. Nice shop, but not much in the way of high end wines. At Whole Foods I bought ingredients to make Smoked Salmon in puff pastry. It didn’t turn out that great, although Dani was loyal.
Dani and I walked down to Main Street, about a mile south, and explored. We found an impressive rock shop, Dave’s Down to Earth Rock Shop, that had what must be a multi-million dollar fossil collection / museum in the basement. We had a good lunch at a Japanese restaurant, Kuni, and stopped at a delightfully dusty old used book store, Book Den, before picking up some groceries (not the good-for-you organic kind they have at Whole Foods) at Jewel, and walking home.
In the evening we went to what I thought was going to be a play, the first in the Northwestern summer series. But it turned out to be a jazz concert by Luis Rosen and Capathia Jenkins. Dani and I both enjoyed it, and we bought two of their CDs, which they signed. Dani liked South Side Stories for its storytelling, and I liked The Ache of Possibility for its jazz chords and bass riffs.
Afterward, we went to the Celtic Knot for a late dinner. It’s one of the few places in Evanston that’s open after 10pm.
Today was iPhone 4 launch day. Dani’s and mine showed up in a box shipped from my office, because they came a day early but I couldn’t get them sent here. I must say the new display, at four times the density of the old one, is impressive. And it will be nice to have a useful camera.
We had lunch at a new, inexpensive sushi restaurant that is only a block away. It’s called Sashimi Sashimi. You order at the counter, but they make it to order. It’s probably the best sushi in town.
I made teriyaki chicken and grilled brocollini on the barbecue for dinner.
This morning started out rainy, but by noon it had cleared up enough for me to make a run to Whole Foods to pick up chicken breasts, corn on the cob and ground chuck to give us a choice for dinner. While I was out I grabbed a Chicago dog at Wild Dogz. A Chicago dog has mustard, relish, dill spear, tomato wedges and sport peppers on a sesame seed hot dog bun. Not bad.
Burgers, corn in the husk and baked sweet potatoes for dinner, barbecued during a heck of a lightning storm. It went on for hours, giant bolts striking the lake just offshore, and up north of the campus. It’s weird that there’s no thunderhead to go with it, just overcast or torrential rain.
A very busy day. After seeing Dani off to the first day of chemistry class, I rearranged the pantry and fixed some shelves in the laundry, knocked apart the old table on the porch and threw it in the dumpster.
I walked down to Davis and over to the other side of the tracks to the Turin Bicycle shop to get a bolt to fix Dani’s bike. Next door I bought some decent wines at Evanston 1st Liquors. (They have an amazing beer selection, but city code doesn’t let you mix and match bottles, and I don’t want six of anything.) Across the street, at Lemoi Ace Hardware, I bought a washer to try to complete the repair, but I think I’ll need to go back and get a lock washer, too.
On my way back I stopped at Lulu’s Noodle Shop and had a delicious bento box and black currant iced tea. I also stopped at CVS for cleaning supplies.
Back at the condo I cleaned the shower (so you know it must have been bad) and the sliding doors.
Then I walked up onto the Northwestern campus to Norris to deposit some money to Dani’s account for her tuition. I noticed that her old dorm now has air conditioners, but also that there is major reconstruction going on next door.
After some computer time, I walked down to Whole Foods to pick up some lamb chops, Moroccan seasoning, and tropical fruits for dinner. I was looking for flowers or plants to put into the planters on the balcony, but it looks like that will have to wait for a trip to Lowe’s.
Whole Foods doesn’t carry many diet products because they use artificial sweeteners, so I was a bit skeptical when I selected a bottle of Galeos Miso Caesar dressing. It turned out to be the best bottle of Caesar dressing I’ve every tasted! It has almost no calories, since it contains no oil, yet it has a rich, creamy taste, with lots of lemon and garlic. I won’t be making my own Caesar dressing anymore!
Tomorrow will be quieter, because I have to wait for some deliveries.
We headed to the airport this morning to fly (on Southwest Airlines) to Midway Airport. The flight was slightly delayed, but was very quick. In fact, because of some kind of traffic tie-up it took almost as long in the limo (actually a Ford SUV) as the plane. The driver finally gave up on the freeway and drove over to Lakeshore.
Dani spent the afternoon studying chemistry for her summer intensive that starts tomorrow, and I spent it setting up her iMac to be just like mine at home and work. Thank goodness for Dropbox and Mobile Me.
Lunch was sourdough bread and epoisses from Whole Foods, and dinner was Falafel at Pomegranate.
The Wizarding World of Harry Potter opened today at Universal Studios (although the ever-reliable CBS News reported it was Disney World). It uses our HD uncompressed video players for Forbidden Journey, what is now the world’s best theme park ride (besting former title-holder Spiderman, at the same park). There were massive crowds, but the opening was a success, which is great news for Universal, which has had a history of rocky openings.
Completing our busy week of wining and dining, we had a California wine experience dinner at Emeril’s Tchoup Chop tonight. I don’t know if it was Harry Potter that scared them away, but only ten of twenty people showed up, so there was plenty of wine. The most inspired match was a 1995 Littorai Mays Canyon Chardonnay with pineapple upside down cake.
I spent eight and a half hours eating and drinking with Ron and Bev today! I really don’t know how they do it. The occasion was a visit by Allan from Hart Davis Hart, a wine auction house in Chicago. We began with lunch at Capital Grille, and then went to The Bull and Bear at The Waldorf Astoria for dinner with Linda and Dani. There were some excellent wines, but the stunner was my 1934 Clos du Roi, one of those magical old Burgundies that only seem to come along once very few hundred bottles. The wines:
Capital Grille
Ron, Bev, Bruce, Allan from HDH, Andres Montoya from Wine Barn
98 Laville Haut Brion
Tight chalky stone wax toasty citrus flowers melon vanilla candy
96
2006 Aubert Ritchie Chardonnay
Butter citrus acidic
Not as good as the last bottle I had
92
1969 Nuits St Georges Bouchard Pere & Fils
Cherry dried flowers, fading, didn’t stand up well against all the young wines
89
2006 Ramey Ritchie Vineyard Chardonnay
Butter, oak
95
1934 Clos du Roi Chanson Pere & Fils
Great color, Mineral spirits, bacon, cherries, earth
It’s been a while since I’ve had one of these magic bottles. This is why we have cellars.
98
1934 Corton Maison M Doudet-Naudin
Vanilla, sawdust, acidic
90
We drove to Tampa for dinner with Ryan and his family, who are visiting from the UK. Ryan will be here for two weeks of training, but I’ll be in Chicago then, so I wanted to meet him before I leave. He and his family seem very nice, and were suitably wowed by Bern’s Steakhouse.
Almost everyone was back in the office today. Linda is getting a cold, so I fixed dinner, including experimental potatoes au gratin, with the additions of cheese, bacon, onion, and smokey chili flakes. Not bad.
Linda booked our transatlantic cruise on the Crown Princess, which completes arrangements for out September trip to London and back. Cabins B723 and D211.
Tonight we try out the new Victoria Room at Victoria and Albert’s, which serves the Chef’s table menu in our favorite room.
For lunch, Audrey and I went to a new Lebanese place called Habibi, in the Publix shopping center across from the office. The vegetarian platter was excellent.
This food picture was edited with Color Splash, which let me convert the tray to black and white, to make the food stand out.
Linda had to work tonight, so I went up to Aji Sushi in the Winter Garden Mall and sat at the sushi bar. It was busy for a Monday night. I’ve always gone at lunch on the weekend, and never sit at the sushi bar.
Tonight is our Wine Syndicate group’s get together. This is the first time the group has met at Ocean Prime, and we have a private room booked. We’re having trouble scheduling times that don’t conflict with everyone’s (especially my) travel schedules. So tonight is the last meeting until September. This is an unofficial event, so there are guests coming, and rather than drawing wines from the group cellar, we’re each bringing our own flight. I’m taking three 1982s, one from France, one from Italy, and one from California. They’ll be served blind, so we’ll see how people do with their guesses!
Followup: best wine was Ron’s 1982 Grange, 99 points.
We scheduled this extended trip to the UK to coincide with Dani and her friends from Trinity Prep performing at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. Dani departed ahead of us, on Tuesday, July 29th, with her school group. They spent a couple of days in London and then took the train to Edinburgh to prepare for their run in A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum. It’s one of over 2000(!) shows running in this year’s Fringe Festival. Here’s what they did before Linda and I left Orlando:
Wednesday, July 30th Arrival, Half day panoramic tour of London, Check in
Thursday, July 31st Workshop at Shakespeare’s Globe and attend “Billy Elliot”
Friday, August 1st Early train to Edinburgh, sightseeing
Saturday, August 2, 2008
Orlando to London
Linda and I departed on Delta through Atlanta. Dani was already in Edinburgh with the 30+ person group from Trinity Prep, getting ready to perform A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum. We’ll join them in Edinburgh in a few days, although we’re doing our own thing.
Meanwhile, in Edinburgh, Dani and her troup had a Technical Rehearsal.
Sunday, August 3, 2008
London
Upon arrival we took the Gattwick Express Victoria Station, and walked about four blocks to the Goring Hotel. It’s a very nice hotel located very conveniently to Buckingham Palace, The victoria Place Theatre and Victoria Station. I wasn’t feeling well, so we took it easy the rest of the day, and had a late night dinner in the basement bar: roast beef and horseradish sandwiches, and smoked salmon, both delicious.
From Janine Papin, Director of A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum:
A wonderful day. Our group was one of two that got to ride on the top of the open bus and sing as the Cavalcade paraded down the main streets of Edinburgh. They had a great sound system on the bus plus microphones and we had a few tracks that Peter (our sound guy) had recorded after the last rehearsal at Trinity. The crowd clapped along while they sang Comedy Tonight while some of our ensemble gave out post cards advertising our show.
It was a HUGE parade and the streets of Edinburgh were packed! After that we performed on the the Royal Mile, our group sang a few songs and successfully attracted a nice crowd to perform to.
Last night was a big dance (pronounced Kaley, even though it is not at all spelled like that). The kids were taught traditional Scottish dances and had a blast! Our kids were among the last to leave and overall participated more than the other kids in the other schools. I am so proud of all my boys that wanted to learn and were such enthusiastic participants! The kids are excited and nervous but I am sure that it will be wonderful.
Monday, August 4, 2008
London
We met Henry at Le Gavroche for lunch. It was totally forgettable, like a different restaurant from our last two visits, hardly what you’d expect of a Michelin two star. Because of the week dollar, everything in London is very expensive — about double the US price. So it was kind of Henry to pick up the cost of this meal, and we’ll treat him to the show and dinner.
In the evening we walked the two blocks from our hotel to the Victoria Palace Theatre to meet Henry and saw Billy Elliot. We had the front row of the dress circle, which is the first balcony, and it was really neat to be able to see the stage. At previous shows we’d had close seats in the orchestra, but the stage floor was above eye level, which is weird for a dancing show. This Billy was older and slightly darker than the others we’ve seen. His voice wasn’t as high or good, but his dancing was better.
Afterwards we had a delicious pizza at Bella, a tourist restaurant next to the theatre. It was better than lunch!
In Edinburgh, Forum opened and the cast attended another show, too.
Tuesday, August 5, 2008
Edinburgh
We took a cab to Train Station, our first good experience with a London cab driver. The train ride to Edinburgh is 4-1/2 hours, with just a few stops. The track is smooth, the seats spacious, and you have a table to work on, free wireless internet and even electrical outlets. If only air travel were like this!
The scenery was lovely: rolling pastures, farmhouses, cattle, and for a while we skirted the coast. In Edinburgh the Balmoral is adjacent to Edinburgh Station, but if you have suitcases you have to go out and around, up a really steep hill to get to the front door. There were people everywhere, here for the Fringe Festival.
The Balmoral is an exceptional hotel. The staff are extraordinarily helpful, and our room is spacious, and has a great view of Edinburgh castle. It’s really expensive, thought, so after four days we’ll move to The Knight Residence, where we can also do the laundry for the second half of the trip.
In the evening we had dinner at the Balmoral’s Michelin one star, restaurant Number One. It was the equal of any dinner we’ve had. The Chef’s seven course tasting menu was creative and superb, light enough not to be overwhelming, and at fifty pounds it was a bargain. The wines with each course were the most perfect food pairings we’ve ever experienced.
From Janine Papin:
The days are so busy and wonderful! We opened Forum successfully and the the kids did beautifully! We climbed Arthur’s seat (a inactive volcano) and saw the Military Tattoo at Edinburgh Castle. We have seen more shows, shopped, had afternoon tea, and have spent time laughing and talking.
Wednesday, August 6, 2008
Edinburgh
Dani called this morning (well, she woke us up at about 11:30!) and we got caught up. It sounds like they’re having a great time.
The day was drizzly. We walked a few block to a restaurant out concierge recommended called The Dome. It’s actually a converted home, if you classify the Parthenon as a home. There are two restaurants there. The Grill Room is fancier and has a glass dome. We ate in the cozier Club Room, where we had that traditional Scottish dish, Nachos. They were excellent and huge, so we didn’t order anything else. We ended up in a long conversation with a delightful English couple whose daughter lives in Edinburgh. They were very well traveled, and we spent an out or so swapping stories.
On the way back, Linda did a bit of shoe shopping at the decrepit Princes Mall next to the hotel. About 60% of the storefront are vacant, and the rest are closeout places. Weird, in such a central and upscale part of town.
For dinner we went to Martin Wishard, the eponymous restaurant of Scotland’s number one celebrity chef. It’s also a Michelin one star, so we were expecting a lot, but it failed to deliver. Although there were a couple of notable dishes, the chef’s tasting menu paled in comparison to last night’s dinner at Number One, and the wine matching can only be described as oafish. Not only were the wines odd, the wine service was bizarre, with the wines poured in the kitchen and then described by someone with a thick German accent. Not recommended.
Our cab driver for our return trip was a lot of fun. He was really the first person we’ve encountered with a Scottish accent thick enough that we couldn’t completely understand him. Most of the service industry people we’ve encountered have actually been Eastern European, a reflection of the service level skilled labor shortage in the UK.
Meanwhile, Trinity performed Forum at 6pm to rave reviews:
A review of Forum:
Roman Farce Unleashed with Youthful Zeal
4 Stars A Funny Thing Happened On the Way to the Forum
(2008) American High School Theatre Festival Church Hill Theatre. 4th-8th August. Various Times (1h30)
A strong old Broadway warhorse,”A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum” originally opened with Zero Mostel in the lead followed by Frankie Howerd in the UK. A mixed bag of plot lines from Plautus are woven into a finely honed hit – it ran for years.
This production from the American High School Theatre Festival deserves to run just as long. It’s a bubbling, vibrant production played with consumate skills by actors still in their teens. Every farcical device is employed – cheating on wives, transgressed taboos, desire – and what could easily turn into a confused mess is neatly and cleanly played out.
The performance bubbled with energy, the direction was tight and inventive and the choreography caught the spirit of the piece. James Everett as Pseudolus directed the traffic of the piece with fine comic timing and Alex Ferguson as Lycus was outstanding.
Ian Billings
An audience member writes in review:
Look at the way it is today, things are getting out of hand – there’s no decorum in the forum 07 Aug 2008
Frankie Howard would have loved this. The vaudeville elements were performed stunningly. The best scene? Everybody Ought To Have A Maid – it was fantastically impressive. I’ve never seen the play before but now that i have the film and the CD pales into insignificance. James Everett as Pseudolus held the story together masterfully. Alex Ferguson as Marcus Lycus was brilliant – move over Phil Silvers. And Gabe Gonzales as Hysterium – well, he was just amazing. A comic actor of the highest order. Other special mentions go to Christine Pappas as Domina and Kyra Bloom as Philia. Great actors and wonderful singers. All in all a great show. It was certainly worth getting soaked to the skin in the Edinburgh rain to watch this.
reviewer: Yahadriel, Cornwall (yeah i know we haven’t got independence yet but it’s a matter of time)
The review from The Scotsmen, Scotland’s number one paper:
Musicals & Opera: A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum
4-Star Rated
CHURCH HILL THEATRE (VENUE 137)
I DON’T know about the forum, but plenty of funny things happened on stage, courtesy of Florida’s Trinity Preparatory School. These are schoolkids? Never mind the voice, you have to be pretty bright to get the best out of a Stephen Sondheim score. And many a professional actor has fallen flat on their face tackling farce.
But not these teens – they stride on to the stage with huge self-confidence and make the 2,000-year-old tales of Plautus live. Songs aren’t so much delivered as presented with flowers and chocolate. It helps that the script, by Burt Shevelove and Larry (M*A*S*H) Gelbart, has zingy one-liners by the score.
James Everett as Pseudolus the slave is terribly funny as he drives the action. Matthew Prast is dashing and Kyra Bloom sweet as young lovers Hero and Phylia. But stealing a show in which there’s no weak link is Gabe Gonzalez as Hysterium, the loyal house servant and reluctant cross-dresser.
A presentation of the American High School Theatre Festival, this is a tad away from the centre of the Fringe, but if you like musicals even a bit, make the effort. The cast, band and crew will make your day.
Until today, 6:15pm
Martin Gray
Thursday, August 7, 2008
Edinburgh
We rose early — well, early in the afternoon, anyway — and decided to return to The Club Room at The Dome, as it’s one of the few nice places that serve lunch at 3:00 in the afternoon. It was still drizzly, so on the way back we spent an hour at the Royal Scottish Academy, which is almost next to our hotel. They have a special exhibit of impressionist paintings, and it was almost overwhelming to see so many paintings by all of the master impressionists. I was actually most impressed by a painter new to me, Sir John Lavery, an Irish Impressionist.
We had a casual late dinner at the hotel’s Hadrian’s Brasserie. Nothing special.
Friday, August 8, 2008
Edinburgh
I hadn’t quite drifted off to sleep last night when the fire alarm summoned everyone to the lobby for an amusing pajama party. After about fifteen minutes it was determined to be a false alarm. The hotel sent out a note of apology in the morning.
We picked up our tickets for tonight’s final performance of Forum and then walked to Oloroso, a restaurant on top of an office building in New Town. I’d made a reservation for inside, but since the rain had cleared off we ate on the terrace, which had a more casual menu that was fine but nothing special. But the weather was great, with occasional sun, and temperatures in the high 60s. The terrace has a wonderful view in almost every direction including Edinburgh Castle.
In the evening we took a cab a few miles to the Church Hill Theatre for the closing night performance of A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum. Because of the good reviews, word of mouth, and the patronage of other American High School Theatre groups, there was a good crowd of about 150 people. The theatre was perfect for the show, with a real orchestra pit and excellent acoustics.
Both the show and audience were high energy, feeding off of each other, and it was easily the best of the run, with thunderous applause and cheering after many of the numbers. Outside the kids received more cheering as they emerged from backstage to board their bus. I’m sure there were many bittersweet moments as they realized they’ll never perform together again, as much of the cast disperses to different colleges across the country in a few weeks. But what a great way to go out!
Saturday, August 9, 2008
Edinburgh
We checked out of The Balmoral and took a cab from New Town to Old Town, where we checked into The Knight Residence. What a fabulous place for an extended stay! It’s too bad we’ll only be here until Monday.
The building is brand new, with 19 lovely flats. Ours is a spacious one bedroom. It’s beautifully decorated and comes with CDs, DVDs, breakfast foods, a fully outfitted kitchen, teeny washer/dryer (our reason for staying here) and more. The charming Christopher runs the front desk. I had previously corresponded with him by email, and he was every bit as gracious in person. At about one third the price of the Balmoral it’s a real find.
The Knight Residence is in an interesting area. It’s just a couple of blocks from the Royal Mile, the concatenation of four streets that run from Edinburgh castle to The Palace of Holyroodhouse. In the same block as the hotel are six antique books stores and three strip clubs (yes, there’s lap dancing in Scotland).
Indeed, it’s very close to Edinburgh Castle. We strolled through the Grass Market, where they were having a rummage sale, and climbed the hill to the castle. The road is lined with old stone buildings that are now tourist shops. The street was filled with Fringe performers and visitors. Near the entrance to the castle is The Witchery, a fine dining restaurant where we had a cordial but not particularly noteworthy lunch. The couple next to us happened to also be American parents whose daughter is in another of the high school productions. Small world.
Next to the Witchery is the Whisky Heritage Centre, where we went on a dark ride called The Scotch Whisky Experience. The story was well conveyed, with good on-board audio and well done lighting and set decoration. The vehicles were wire guided, and moved only about 6 inches per second. It was surprising that many of the set pieces — including some quite delicate objects — where within inches as we passed, yet everything seemed to be unmolested. Afterwards we were served a dram of Tormore 12 year old Speyside Single Malt, which was excellent: caramel and fruit nose, very smooth. Even Linda liked it.
After a quiet afternoon experimenting with the washer/dryer (we found French and German manuals online — it’s very complicated) we strolled through the rain to the Grass Market, where we had a pleasant Italian meal. Things were still hopping well past midnight.
Dani Spent the day with her group, sightseeing outside the city.
Sunday, August 10, 2008
Orlando
In the morning we took a cab over to Pollock Halls and picked up Dani’s luggage. We had lunch at a baguette shop and Linda spent the afternoon doing one teeny tiny load of laundry after another.
We enjoyed an authentic French dinner at Petit Paris, a small bistro at the Grass Market.
Dani attended the closing ceremony for the high school groups, where she was selected to deliver a speech to all of the various schools participating, and then went to Fringe Sunday at the Meadows and had dinner with her friends before we picked her up near midnight.
Monday, August 11, 2008
Edinburgh to London
We sort of slept in, although this being Monday, the construction site across the street was gearing back up. We checked out at noon and took a taxi to Waverly Station for our return trip to London. Once again I was able to get a lot done on the train. We arrived at King’s Cross Station at 6:30pm — a good time, because the cross town cab ride took only about 20 minutes to get us to Hammersmith, and the Novotel London West. It’s an enormous and fairly nice hotel in a great district for restaurants.
We walked about a mile down King Street to Indian Zing, a place I found online, and it didn’t disappoint. The weather was temperate and it was a great evening for a stroll.
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
London
Dani has a bit of a cold, so we spent a lazy day in Hammersmith. Linda and I walked a couple of blocks to a pub for lunch, and then in the evening we all took the tube to see They’re Playing Our Song at the The Menier Chocolate Factory, a converted factory building in the interesting district just south of London Bridge. Linda and I saw this show with the original Broadway cast, Kevin Klein and Lucy Arnaz, when we were first married, thirty years ago, and it’s always been one of my favorites. Although it’s never been revived, we all knew the music and were anxious to see it.
The Chocolate Factory is an interesting place. You enter through a restaurant, and then negotiate a random assortment of steps, up and down, to access the theatre, an intimate space with padded bleachers that seat about 150. Despite a tepid review, the show was sold out. Most of the audience were in their sixties, and seemed to have seen the show in its original London run almost thirty years ago.
The show was performed as a period piece. I felt the material held up well, although the two leads lacked the comedic timing to make it funny. However their singing was superb, and the staging, which used the floor as a giant revolving LP, was inventive and fun. It was definitely worth the reasonable 25 pound admission price.
Back at the hotel, Linda and I had a late supper in the bar while Dani went off to bed.
Wednesday, August 13, 2008
London
We decided to skip the city tour of London and relax today so that Dani can get over her cold. It’s not like we haven’t seen St. Pauls, the changing of the guard and so on. In an effort to avoid pub food, Linda and I walked to a Thai restaurant for lunch.
On the spur of the moment, we decided to see if we could get tickets tot he new musical Zorro. Somehow we ended up in the fifth row, even though the show was sold out. It was lavishly staged, with great talent and excellent songs. Somehow it didn’t quite work for us, but it seemed fixable. And since it received four stars from virtually all of the press, and it’s sold out on a Wednesday night, it may do well. It just needs more story and a bit less Flamenco stomping, but the talent is certainly there.
Thursday, August 14, 2008
Bath, Bristol
Today we met our Globus tour group and our guide, Liz, and set out on our tour. It’s easy to see whose currencies are up and whose are down: the tour is more than half Australians and New Zealanders.
The first stop was Henry the Eighth’s old house, Hampton Court, where we walked through the gardens.
Then it was on to Stonehenge, which Linda hadn’t seen before. None of the stones had moved since our last visit.
We retraced our steps to Salisbury for a mediocre pub lunch. It would have been better to simply press on the Bath, which was our next stop anyway. The Roman baths are really interesting, and we spent almost two hours on the self guided tour, leaving just enough time for some scenic portraits overlooking the Avon.
It was a short drive to Bristol, where we had a lovely room at the Jury’s hotel overlooking the water. There was a welcome dinner for the group (let’s just say it was food as only the English can prepare it), and then we called an end to a long day.
Friday, August 15, 2008
Waterford, Ireland
This morning I had lots of catching up on my online classes, and a high speed Internet line, so I skipped breakfast. We left the hotel at 8am for the drive to Cardiff and a fairly pointless stop outside the castle, plus a stroll through the mall, just like 500,000 other malls. Then we crossed into Wales. Southern Wales is a country of rolling green hills, scattered farms and villages, and many cows.
Gaelic is the official second language of Wales. Although we didn’t hear it spoken, the government certainly is promoting it, with mandatory education. It’s also a second language on all the highway signs. Its absence from all commercial signs and billboards is telling, though.
After a long drive and a snack at a rest stop we finally arrived on the western coast town of Fishguard where the entire tour bus drove onto the ferry. The crossing was calm, and we spent the time in the sports bar ignoring the Summer Olympics. Dani has started work on a second novel, now that she’s finished The Last Telepath. In just a few hours she’s almost finished structuring it, defining characters and writing her outline.
Three and a half hours later we drove off the ferry in Rosslare on the southeast coast of Ireland. Ireland is a country of rolling green hills, scattered farms and villages, and many cows.
An hour’s drive brought us to the city of Waterford, Ireland’s fourth largest. Our hotel is the somewhat seedy Tower, although our room is spacious by European standards and overlooks the river Suir (pronounced ‘shus,’ not ‘sever’) and the historic Tower for which the hotel is named. (Gaelic is also prevalent in Ireland. ) Dinner was decent, and we made it an early night after a long day of driving and many cows.
Saturday, August 16, 2008
Waterford Factory and Blarney
We set out on a rainy morning for the nearby Waterford Crystal Factory. Having visited artisan glass works in Oslo and Venice, I was expecting more artists and less factory, but Waterford is indeed a factory. Although there are artists there who do custom engraving, most of the 700 workers are dedicated to churning out the stuff you see in department stores, which looks clunky and dated compared to the fine art of, say, Murano glass.
We then had a long drive through a country of rolling green hills, scattered farms and villages, and many wet cows. Reaching the west coast, we passed through Cork, Ireland’s second largest city, and on to Blarney Castle.
We were lucky, and the rain abated for our exploration of Blarney castle, where Dani enjoyed exploring the twisty stone stairways, cramped tunnels and caves. At the top of the six story climb she leaned out over the parapet backwards and kissed the Blarney stone, which is supposed to impart the gift of eloquence.
Afterwards we had lunch in the nearby pub and then drove on to Killarney in County Kerry, and an afternoon check in at the Scotts Hotel. There are many, many towns in Ireland that start with ‘kill’ because the Gaelic word for church is ‘cil. ‘
Much of our tour group went to an evening folklore event, but we’ve learned over the years that we’re allergic to contrived revelry, so we walked to Foley’s, a nice fish restaurant a few blocks away. In fact, we’re skipping all the optional excursions on this trip except for a tour of the royal yacht in Edinburgh.
Sunday, August 17, 2008
Killarney
Linda has Dani’s cold, so she opted to rest today. Our group set out on an approximately 100 mile loop called the Ring of Kerry, which circles County Kerry. The weather cooperated at first, and we got some nice vistas of lakes, mountains and rivers. But by 11am rain and mist had settled in.
The sheep didn’t mind. We passed thousands of them. Most looked a bit odd, because they’ve been spray pained with red or green markings to indicate ownership and parentage. We also passed several bogs, and saw peat that had been cut and stacked to dry.
After an ill-conceived lunch stop at a village with no open restaurants, we continued on to “the best view in Ireland,” which today consisted of a post shrouded in fog. Allegedly there was sea, peninsulas and islands somewhere out there. The drive back to Killarney was through much rockier terrain, as the road twisted down the mountains (at 3000 feet, the tallest in Ireland) and through the national park, where there were many scenic views of rivers, fairly large pines and oaks, and three large lakes.
We had a delicious dinner at a restaurant upstairs next to the hotel. It was called Lemon Grass, and offered a fusion of different Asian cuisines. My sushi appetizer was some of the best sushi I’ve ever had.
Monday, August 18, 2008
Limerick, Tiperary and Dublin
Today we drove across Ireland, from Killarney to Dublin, in just a few hours. It was another wet day. This is the wettest summer in Ireland, perhaps ever, and there were signs of flooding in several spots, and many swollen rivers. Last Saturday alone they got a whole month’s rainfall in a couple of hours.
We drove through Tiperary and Limerick (yes, there really are such places), and watched the names on the businesses alternate between all the cliche Irish names you’ve ever hear.
After another annoying lunch stop in a town with no open restaurants we drove on to the Irish National Stud, where we learned about thoroughbred racecourses and the economics of breeding them. A few of the random things I learned:
All horses change age on January 1st, so if you’re racing, say, two year olds, the could b anywhere from 731 to 1094 days old. So it’s a big advantage for your horse to be born right after the first of the year. As a result, they breed the horses in the first quarter, they foal in January, and then immediately are impregnated again.
Artificial insemination is not allowed. A stud will impregnate up to 190 different mares during the three month season.
One of the studs we saw has sired so many winners that his stud fee is $75,000. This is payable if the mare is pregnant on October 1. That particular stud was worth $60 Million, because he has about 15 years of service left.
As we drove on into Dublin we reached the first road that could be called a highway, with three lanes in each direction. Almost the entire rest of the country has been narrow two lane roads.
Ireland is definitely not the backward country it once was. In fact, it has been enjoying a real economic boom the past decade. This really started with the move into technology in the 1970s. In fact, after centuries of emigration, Irelands population is now growing through immigration, and is about 10% recent Polish arrivals!
The Hilton Dublin Kilmainham is a nice, modern hotel, with much better furnishings than most Hiltons. It’s across the street from the prison where the Irish rebels were executed in 1916, but it’s far from city centre.
It was really raining hard in the evening, so we had dinner at the hotel’s Cinnamon restaurant, which was surprisingly good.
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
Dublin
This morning we drove around the centre of Dublin. We had a different driver, as Bob was required by European driving laws to take the day off. Our replacement driver didn’t really have any experience with a manual transmission coach, so it was an interesting ride. The weather continues to be intermittently drizzly.
Dublin is a modification of Gaelic words that mean ‘black pool’. Dublin seems to be the only real ‘city’ in Ireland, as it looks typically European, and everywhere else we’ve been has been more along the lines of a village.
We visited a number of areas including statue-lined O’Connell Street, a couple of Georgian squares, St. Patrick’s Cathedral and Trinity College, where we saw the 1,200-year-old Book of Kells and the Old Library. We then walked into the Grafton Street shopping district and found a tiny basement wine bar and French restaurant called called La Cave, where we had a nice traditional French lunch.
We returned to the hotel for the afternoon and relaxed, then walked to a nearby Italian restaurant, La Dolce Vita, for dinner.
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
Chester, England
We took a high speed ferry back across the Irish Sea from Dun Laoghaire to Holyhead on the Welsh Isle of Anglesey. This ship was a catamaran design, and made the crossing at a top speed of 40 knots, taking only two hours. Our first stop was at Llanfair(. . . ), a town that is a tourist attraction simply because its name contains 58 characters!
We drove along the scenic North Wales coast past abandoned shale mine, and rocky beaches. Its much more rugged than Southern Wales. Just across the boarder in England the Welsh disappeared from the highway signs. We stopped for a walk around Chester, a charming medieval walled city with some Roman remains, and many black and white halftimbered buildings. An unusual feature of the main street is the two-tiered arcades called the “Rows. “
We spent the night back in Wales at St. David’s Park, a nice hotel. The power to the whole area went out for a couple of hours just after we checked in, but the hotel rose to the occasion and catered sandwiches in the bar on the spur of the moment and it was really a fun evening.
Linda is recovering from her cold, but I have it now, hopefully not for long.
Thursday, August 21, 2008
Lake District, Edinburgh
We took a beautiful drive through the Lake District, where we cruised for a half hour on Lake Windermere, namesake of our hometown. The town and surrounding hills are much more scenic than our own, with forested slopes and quaint stone buildings. In Grasmere we dodged rain and had a quick lunch, then returned to the motorway for the drive into Scotland. Just across the border we stopped at Gretna Green, where the blacksmith used to wed runaway couples. The scenery became progressively more beautiful as we made our way through the Lowland Hills to Edinburgh.
The Edinburgh Thistle is conveniently right across the street from the Balmoral, so it was easy to walk across for our dinner at Number One, which was superb, and virtually identical to our previous visit. They treated us like old friends.
Friday, August 22, 2008
Edinburgh
Dani and I skipped the morning city tour but Linda went with the local guide on a visit to Edinburgh Castle and Holyrood Palace, both of which she enjoyed.
Dani and I had a walk down pedestrian Rose Street, and lunch at a Thai place.
Then we caught our only optional tour of the trip, a visit to the retired royal yacht Britannia, which was very well done. It was followed by a group dinner at a hotel on the Grass Market and a climb up the steps to the castle to see the ‘Tattoo,’ a marching band and bagpipe show that was much better than I was expecting. We were only briefly rained on during the show, and we were squeezed in so tightly there was no place for the water to go.
It was dry for the walk back to the hotel.
Saturday, August 23, 2008
York
For the first time in a month IT DIDN’T RAIN TODAY! This has been the wettest August in UK history.
Our drive southward began with a stop at Floors Castle, an enormous house that is still lived in seasonally by the family of the Duke and Duchess of Roxburghe. It’s how the other 0. 000001% live. Their backyard is about 65,000 acres.
W drove past the abbey ruins at Jedburgh and the house of Mary, Queen of Scots, and stopped near a section of Hadrian’s Wall, the Roman coast-to-coast defense against marauding northern tribes. It used to be 75 miles long and 15 feet high, but this fragment wouldn’t keep a sheep out.
Lunch was another ill-planned affair at a rest stop.
York is England’s most complete medieval city. It’s surrounded by its original wall, and it’s crammed higgledy-piggledy with oddly constructed buildings of all types, leaning and packed together at crazy angles. The main street used to be lined with butcher shops, and you can see the gutters designed for the blood to run down. Of course, now every building is a Starbucks, but the ambience is neat.
We stayed at the York Ramada, which is fairly nice, and had a decent group dinner.
Sunday, August 24, 2008
Stratford-upon-Avon
Another almost rain-free day. We drove past Robin Hood’s Sherwood Forest on the way to Coventry, where the ruins of the original cathedral were of some interest to Dani and me, because they feature in one of our favorite books, To Say Nothing Of The Dog by Connie Willis. The city was bombed in World War II and the cathedral burned. Iron girders, installed in the late 19th century melted in the heat and pulled down the upper part of the structure. Most of the stone walls, and even some of the stained glass survives. The ruin was left in place, and a new cathedral built next to it. An ironic aspect to the story is that the British had broken the German code, and knew the city was to be bombed, but could do nothing about it without giving away their secret.
We stopped briefly for a photo in front of the thatched roof cottage where Shakespeare’s wife, Ann Hathaway, lived, then drove on to Stratford-upon- Avon, where Dani was fascinated by a tour of Shakespeare’s birthplace.
We spent the night at the very conveniently located Holiday Inn, which is right next to the Royal Shakespeare Theatre. Had we known, we should have booked tickets.
Monday, August 25, 2008
London
It’s less than a three hour drive from Stratford to London. Along the way we stopped at spectacular Blenheim Palace, home of the 11th Duke of Marlborough and birthplace of Sir Winston Churchill. It was built by John Churchill, the first Duke of Marlborough, a man with an ego even bigger than the palace. It’s filled with tapestries he had mad commemorating his victory over the French in the War of the Spanish Succession. That’s why Queen Anne gave him the property, although she refused to give him the 60,000 pounds of cost overruns on his palace.
It was saved from ruin in the late 19th century by the 9th Duke’s loveless marriage to American railroad heiress and renowned beauty Consuelo Vanderbilt.
We arrived at the Hilton London Metropole at 2pm. It’s a comfortable and well located hotel where we’ve stayed several times before.
For dinner, Linda picked a fantastic restaurant, Zaika, on Kensington High Street. We had a nine-course tasting menu with an Indian slant, and some interesting matching wines.
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
London
We took advantage of our first chance to sleep in for two weeks. Then we spent the afternoon at Harrods. where we had a very overpriced sushi lunch and a late afternoon tea at LaDuree, which was good, but not as good as the Paris original.
After a convoluted tube ride back to the hotel due to a rush hour closure, we made our way to the Open Air Theatre in Regents Park for its wonderful ambience and a fabulous production of Gigi, starring Topol and the lead we saw last year in Mary Poppins. It was terrific, and we were in the front row, almost close enough to touch the actors.
Then it was back to the hotel for packing and a short sleep.
Wednesday, August 27, 2008
London to Orlando
It takes a long time to get to Gatwick from London, so er were up at 5:30 for an 11:100 flight, and a five hour layover in Atlanta (a good thing, since it took an hour to get the bags) meant we didn’t arrive until 10pm. It was nice of Chastity to pick our remains up at the airport and rive us home for a long rest.
Thoughts About The Trip
I have mixed feelings about this trip. It was impacted by rain almost every day, but on the other hand, we were lucky, and were rarely out in it. On the third hand, it limited what we chose to do and see, especially in Ireland.
I was disappointed in Ireland. It’s a beautiful, green country that is much less developed than the rest of Europe, and it is enjoying an economic boom. But there were few ‘show stoppers’ in the week we spent there. Blarney Castle near Killarney was neat, and Dublin seems a nice city — the only city, really.
On the other hand, I loved Edinburgh. Even without the Fringe, it would be a great place to visit. It’s a great mix of new and old, and Scotland is geographically more diverse than the rest of the UK.
York might be a good stop for a couple of nights. It’s historical buildings are neat, but it’s basically a giant tourist mall.
Wales was just a place to drive through.
London, as always, was a mixed bag. It’s a great city to get around in via the tube. And with over 300 shows running every night, it’s a theatre lovers dream.
Food-wise, the UK is very odd. The vast majority of food is simply awful. And yet there are some amazing culinary treats, if you take the time to search them out, and are willing to pay for them.
And paying for them is a big part of the problem. All the prices looked reasonable — if only that pound sign were a dollar sign! But at worse than a two to one exchange rate, doing anything in the UK is very, very expensive. So while the tour, with its many included meals, was a good deal, nothing else was.
Finally, as we’ve noted in past years, this trip was a bit too long, especially for Dani, who was away for more than a month. The solution might be to bite the bullet on airfare using direct flights from Orlando, which make it easier to go more often for shorter periods.
The bottom line is that for those looking to explore the British Isles I think I’d look at a cruise, or just a Killarney/Edinburgh/London trip.
Handy Travel Packing List
Books Camera, interface cable, charger Clothes, short and long sleeved Dress Clothes, Sport coat & Tie Ear Plugs Electrical adapters, Extension cord Euros Folding Tote bag Guidebooks, Pocket Maps Hat Laptop, Ethernet cable, Broadband modem Mini London Map Microphone New shoes Passports, Travel Docs, Theatre Tickets Phone/iPod & charger Purell Robe Shoulder bag Sunglasses Sunscreen Toiletries Umbrella Vitamins, Medicine, Coldeez, Advil Warm Jacket Ziploc bags
For Dani’s 16th birthday she asked to take her friend Christina, to Europe. This is the journal of that trip.
The only time Christina has been out of the country was on Dani’s 13th birthday cruise to Nassau, so this will be an adventure for her. We picked her up Friday evening and headed for the airport to catch our nonstop Virgin Atlantic flight to Gatwick airport south of London, connecting on British Air to Rome.
The Virgin flight is one of the few nonstops from Orlando to Europe, and they offer premium economy, which has better seats than coach but is much less expensive than business class. The food is still English, though.
Saturday, June 30, 2007
London to Rome
The girls didn’t get much sleep to speak of on the plane and I got none (my own fault since we were all wearing our ipods, and I was listening to the lyrics).
The plane got into Gatwick a little late but we had a five our layover. Good thing! What a mess it was! At first the immigration line simply wasn’t moving, and there were hundreds of people in front of us from several large planes. But finally, after they processed all the EU people, they must have put more people on the non-EU line. Still, it rook more than an hour to clear immigration, Another hour to get our bags and get checked in at British Air, and then more time to clear security back to the gates. We had to run a gauntlet of eight guys with assault rifles (they must have had some inside intelligence since there was a problem later at Glasgow airport), do the normal X-ray, and then X-ray our shoes separately in a small, shoe-sized X-Ray machine. Gatwick really is broken. The flow and policies make no sense. I don’t know if I’d try to connect through there again or not.
For lunch number 2 (or was it 3?) the girls picked a revolving sushi place that was excellent. That’s where there is a conveyor belt and you take what you want, and then pay according to the stack of empty color coded plates.
Then the plane for Rome was delayed an hour getting into Gatwick. We were dragging by this time, But we had hot chocolate and got our second wind.
The main problem was that the entire population of Western Europe was at the airport. I suspect that’s because it was the first Saturday of summer and everyone was headed for the Mediterranean. Given the cold, rainy weather in London I can see why.
By contrast the Rome airport was a breeze. First time I’ve seen someone stamp passports without looking at them at all!
Our driver was waiting for us and the trip into Rome was quick. We rode with another threesome embarking on a different Globus tour from a different hotel. They are from San Francisco and just spent two weeks in Spain.
The hotel is in a great location, just a half block from St. Peter’s. It’s fairly newly refurbished with nice wood flooring and trim and new furniture.
It was so late the girls didn’t want to nap, they just wanted dinner and bed, so we walked the half block to the edge of the Vatican and had pizza in a local hangout – located literally within the thickness of an ancient wall — that sold it by weight from a deli case. Then we crossed the street and had the best chocolate gelato I’ve had since the last time I was in Rome. The weather was great. 77 degrees.
Now I need to answer a pile of ed2go postings and get to bed.
Sunday, July 1, 2007
Rome
I was awakened by the phone this morning. It was Dani informing me it was 11 AM! Admittedly, I was up until midnight doing email, but I was surprised how late I slept.
The weather was beautiful today, mid 80s and a slight breeze. We slathered ourselves in sunscreen and set out to walk across the city.
We passed St. Peter’s square at noon and saw (a teeny dot in the distance) and heard the Pope speaking to the multitudes. Then we crossed the Tiber, bought some postcards in an antique book shop (Dani’s postcard torrent begins) and made our way to the Pantheon.
In the square there we had lunch at the same outdoor cafe as on our last visit, then ventured into the immense coolness of the Pantheon.
I didn’t bring a guidebook on this trip, so I had to wing it, but I think I got most everything right except possibly the part about it having been built by Haliburton.
Next stop was the Trevi fountain, where we all threw coins in to guarantee our return to Rome on a future visit.
On our way back we spotted the Roman ruins (pictured on many of the local postcards) where there are hundreds of cats fed by local cat ladies. Then we meowed for a taxi and caught a ride back to the hotel. A very successful day.
We met our tour group this evening in the lobby. They seem very nice. The demographics are interesting. It’s a much younger group than usual, with 8 of the 44 being teenage or recently teenage girls. This is nearly everyone’s first visit to Europe.
Out Tour Director is Lia, short for Cornelia. She is a middle aged Dutch woman with a great sense of humor.
Dinner was at “The Grotto of the Emperors,” a basement restaurant similar to all the other basement restaurants that cater to tourist groups. The six course dinner and free wine were tasty, and the entertainment by a trio of accordion/guitar/opera singers was. . . clearly audible.
By the end the group looked ready for bed, but we felt completely on schedule. Good thing, because our wakeup call tomorrow is 5:45 AM.
Monday, July 2, 2007
Rome
The early wakeup call wasn’t all that bad. After a traditional European hotel buffet breakfast we took our coach around to the other side of the Vatican to queue for the tour. We arrived about 40 minutes before the group opening at 8 AM, which was a good thing, because I’ve never seen the Vatican so crowded. This was because Friday through Sunday it was closed for a holiday.
Our local guide, Patricia, spoke exceptional English, but the microphone on her Whisper audio system wasn’t picking her up all that well. When she narrated on the bus it was great, though.
That’s a painting on the left, not a sculpture!
At the Vatican Museum we toured the Roman sculpture gallery, the tapestry gallery, and the map gallery. In other words, the usual hallway that leads to the Sistine Chapel. Patricia provided an excellent explanation of the history of the frescoes in the chapel before hand, since there is no talking (only mooing) allowed in the chapel. We found an uncrowded corner with only about 400 people in it and admired the art for 20 minutes.
Then it was next door to Saint Peter’s Basilica, the largest church in the world. The dome in Saint Peter’s Basilica is so high the 34-story Sun Bank building in Orlando would fit in it. Our exploration was somewhat cursory compared to the private tour Linda and I took a couple of years ago, but everyone’s feet were tired anyway.
We walked across St. Peter’s Square (it was hot!) to a (you’ll never guess) Vatican gift shop. For the past two days I’ve been trying to cash a 500 Euro bill, but the hotel never has enough cash. But guess who does? Yup.
The girls bought Vatican stamps to mail their first pile of postcards, we had a soft drink, and then entered a tunnel that led to an amazing parking garage designed for tour buses. Next stop: the Coliseum.
We got a nice break in the weather, as it began to cloud over and a breeze came up, and there were even a couple of sprinkles. By the time we reached the Coliseum. it had probably cooled off ten degrees.
Did you know that “Coliseum” is only a nickname, because it had a colossal statue in front? Unfortunately, like every other piece of metal in ancient Roman it has long since been melted down. But the name stuck. I guess “The Flavian Amphitheater” didn’t have much of a ring to it.
It was a lightning fast tour, but it worked (Linda would have been frustrated, though). Then we climbed the hill to overlook the forum.
There is an exhibition being put together, and they have erected stark white plastic(!) columns in the places where the original columns are missing from the temple that overlooked the Coliseum. That gave us an interesting impression of how big the thing was.
We arrived back at the hotel around 1 PM, freshened up, and strolled a block toward the Tiber, where we had lunch in an outdoor cafe down the street from St. Peter’s Square. As we walked back, it was beginning to sprinkle lightly.
Nearly all of our group went back out again at 3 PM for an optional $80 tour, to do what we did on Sunday, followed by another group dinner (but will there be another demon accordionist?) We, on the other hand, got to relax, do postcards, journals, and naps. At 8 PM we went out and wandered around the neighborhood until we found a trattoria that suited us and had a leisurely dinner. Then we walked back to our gelato place for desert.
I’m really glad we had the extra day. We got to touch on all the highlights of Rome without overdoing it.
Olives!
Tuesday, July 3, 2007
Rome to Florence
We left Rome at 8 AM and had an easy drive to Florence, entertained along the way by Lia’s sense of humor, and arriving a bit after noon.
We had a fairly poor lunch at the Grande Café at San Marcos Square and then queued for the Uffizi Gallery. It takes a month to get reservations, so I had never seen it. Our local guide was fine, but took us only to a room of religious icons and to see Michelangelo’s David. I explored an extensive and ornate musical instrument exhibit and quickly walked through a sculpture hall while she prattled on the headset.
David looked just like the exact replica of him in Piazza Signoria. I really don’t see what all the fuss is about David. His head’s too big for his body and his hands are too big for even his head.
We then walked to the cathedral to view Brunelleschi’s Dome (only from street level, although some brave soles had climbed 34 stories) and the brass doors of the baptistery (which are copies of the originals).
Next we walked to the Piazza Signoria where we saw the Rape of the Sabine Women (not the actual event, a sculpture). We had seen the plaster model for this at the Uffizi, and it looked just the same only cleaner.
Finally we walked to the Piazza San Croce, where we met up with Lia, who ushered us into a gold and leather shop. Expecting one of the normal hard sells, I was pleasantly surprised by the brief and entertaining presentation about Florence gold. But what was really good was the leather presentation, which was very funny and informative. A number of the people on the tour got to model the coats for us, most amusingly, and Dani actually ended up buying a very nice (i. e. expensive) leather coat that looks great on her. Since she spent her schoolbook refund money on it, I like to think she’s wearing everything she learned this year.
By the time we walked to the bus (did I mention they’re not allowed anywhere in the old city?) we were ready to sit down. Florence is cute, and has some nice art, leather and gold, but for me, five hours was just the right stay. It’s not a place that excites me, the way Rome does.
Our hotel, the Cosmopolitan, is a bit west of the city. It’s very new and European chic, with proximity switches at the door. The group dinner on the third floor was okay, and the Montipulciano was excellent. .
Wednesday, July 4, 2007
Florence to Venice
We left Florence at 8 AM and header over and through the Apennines on the fours hour drive to Venice. The scenery along the way was initially green mountains with a sprinkling of houses and olive groves, but near Venice it changed to pastureland. The weather in Florence looked threatening, but in Venice is was mostly clear and about 90 degrees.
A water bus took us from the end of the bridge to Saint Mark’s square. With a little time to ourselves, we strolled along some of the smaller passages and had some delicious sandwiches and calzones at a snack counter. Then we met our local guide back at Saint Mark’s for some information about the history of Venice.
While we waited to enter the cathedral we noticed water coming up from the drains as the tide came in, driven by a strong wind. Before we could enter they had to change to a door at a higher elevation. Inside, the cathedral is fairly ugly, although it is admittedly almost 1000 years old. The tiled floor rolled like the sea due to settling.
The local guide dropped us off at the Murano Glass shop — not the real one on the island, but a huge shop a block or two from Saint Mark’s Square, with many floors and many rooms on each floor. We saw a demonstration of glass blowing, where the craftsman mad a fairly elaborate vase in about three minutes. It was really impressive and fun to watch as always. Afterwards we shopped for glass thingamabobs and wandered the narrow passageways until it was time for our gondola ride.
Unfortunately, it was also time for a storm, and it got cool and began to pour. On the bright side, we weren’t already in the gondola.
Instead, we went to one of the cafes off of the square where we paid extortionist prices for espressos and listened to live jazz.
After about thirty minutes the rain stopped and the girls ventured out to feed the pigeons. One of the decided to go for a ride on Dani’s head, and was content to sit there as we strolled about a block. It must have been migrating.
A few people did stick around and got a gondola ride, including a couple celebrating their twentieth wedding anniversary. Last year she lost the stone from her wedding ring and has been wearing a cheap replacement. On the ride he took her ring, threw it overboard, and gave her a nice new one.
Then we caught the water bus back to the land bus to our hotel. The Hotel Anthony is not far from the bridge to the island. It’s an older hotel in fairly good shape, but it’s the kind of place where the shampoo comes in a Taco Bell hot sauce packet. Definitely not four star. My first stop was the front desk, to pay three Euros for the “free” wireless Internet service.
We had a group dinner at the hotel that was fine, and shared our Ferrari Spumante (fairly dry, like off-dry Champagne) with the anniversary couple.
Thursday, July 5, 2007
Venice to Lucerne
We spent Thursday on the bus from Venice to Lucerne. Leaving the hotel at 7:30, we took a wrong turn at Milano and so had lunch in a truck stop. It was delicious! Unfortunately, this cost us an hour or two of extra driving time.
Our morning drive paralleled the Dolomite Mountains. After lunch we turned north and began to climb up into the Alps.
The buses here record the driver’s hours on a paper disk (to become electronic next year), and the drivers have lots of restrictions, including a 45 minute break every four hours. (In fact, tomorrow our driver isn’t allowed to drive at all, hence our two-day stay in Lucerne. )
We stopped in Lugano for one of these breaks. It’s where the home office of Globus is. Lugano is a beautiful and pricey shopping area and resort just past the Italian/Swiss border.
It seemed strange to have to stop at the border at all, but of course Switzerland isn’t part of the EU (which means we’ll need some Swiss Francs, too).
After Lugano the road climbed steeply, and we entered the most picturesque scenery I’ve encountered. Sharp, snow rimmed peaks towered above us, their bases blanketed by emerald grass. Cows with placid brown eyes and real cowbells around their necks grazed on the steep slopes, well above the treeline.
We stopped at 6000 foot Gotthard Pass to take photos and discovered the temperature had dropped from 90 degrees to 50 degrees during our half hour ascent.
On the other side of the pass, rivulets collected in a small pond, flowing out in a gradually increasing stream — the headwaters of the Rhine. It twisted between grass-carpeted shoulders and rocky outcroppings.
Passing through the narrowest gorges, the scenery resembled a model train layout, with its exaggerated topography, crisscrossing railroad and foot bridges, and cascading waterfalls. In many spots the road was covered to prevent avalanches or rock slides from scraping the cars off. Occasional outposts or solitary cottages appeared unexpectedly around each bend.
As we descended we passed from the Italian-speaking part of Switzerland to the Swiss-Deutsch part, which represents 70% of the country. The road curved through many tunnels, the longest of which was 9 kilometer. There is a far longer tunnel that bypasses the pass, but we didn’t take that one because we would have missed the scenery.
We arrived in Lucerne at 7pm, after almost 12 hours on the bus. Good thing it’s a comfortable bus and Lia is so entertaining! The temperature was back up to 80 degrees .
Our hotel, the Astoria, is in the center of downtown. It has many restaurants, and there is a lot of shopping nearby, and it’s a short walk to the lake. The hotel is the poorest of the trip so far, but is, frankly, more like what I was expecting. The soap is literally less than a square inch, and comes in its own hot sauce packet.
The hotel’s atmosphere isn’t helped by major construction of a meeting hall. The view outside my window is of a twenty foot square concrete room, and their is scaffolding inches from the glass. On the other hand, the street noise we were warned about won’t be a problem in this room!
Anyway, it’s nice to be off the bus. Most of the group was going to a folklore dinner, but we weren’t really in the mood for something so touristy, so we strolled across the historic wooden bridge to the other side of the river and had fondue and dinner in an outdoor cafe at the Hotel des Alpes.
I stayed up until midnight doing my journal, responding to students and trying to upload files through the lame Internet service at the hotel. I was sitting in the temporary lobby when our well-oiled group returned from the folklore dinner. Reports were enthusiastic, but I’m not really into events that include a beer drinking contest, so I’m glad we skipped it.
Friday, July 6, 2007
Lucerne
Another 6 AM wakeup call, for an early breakfast and ride on a coach borrowed from another group. We were the first ones to to board the cog wheel railway that ascends Mount Pilatus. The weather at the base was mixed sun and overcast, so we weren’t sure what it would be like on top.
Legend has it that after Pontius Pilate committed suicide the area where he was buried was cursed. So the Romans moved him to the most remote spot they could think of. This was it. (Personally, if I’d been assigned to do that, I would have dumped him off a bridge and just claimed I buried him on top of a 7000 foot mountain, but hey. ) There was also something about a dragon guarding it, but I missed the connection somewhere.
Anyway, Globus gave us these really nice embroidered caps with the dragon on them, so our entire group looked like a coed baseball team.
The cog wheel train ascends the mountain at a steep angle, near 47 degrees in most spots, so the trip up was spectacular. Towering fir trees gradually gave way to grassy slopes broken by the occasional slide of gravel sliding down a sheer face, or rivulets splashing over jagged boulders. Halfway up we passed a farmhouse. The farmer had already taken his cows even higher on the hillside, and in another few minutes we heard their cow bells ringing, and then passed them as they grazed. (I’d love to have heard the conversation: “Hey, look at that really tall mountain. The top of that would be a great place to graze cows. “)
At the top we passed into the underside of the clouds, so except for occasional glimpses, visibility was near zero. It was about 40 degrees, with a stiff wind blowing. Stiff enough that we couldn’t take the gondolas down, which is too bad, I’m sure it would have been amazing. But we enjoyed the ride down on the cog wheel train, too.
Back downtown we visited the Lion sculpted from the rock face, the most famous site in Lucerne. It commemorates the Swiss Guards killed while unsuccessfully defending Marie Antoinette during the French Revolution. If you look carefully you can see that the sculptor played a joke on his patron, who he thought was a pig. Look at the outline of the opening.
Nearby we stopped at Bucherer’s department store to use some vouchers for free spoons and buy some chocolate. Nice jewelry and Rolex watches here. The prices aren’t as outrageous as the rest of Europe.
Near the lion sculpture is a restaurant Lia recommended called The Old Swiss House. Its traditional architecture in the midst of the modern city makes it look a bit like a tourist attraction, but the three of us decided to try it. Wow! What a fabulous meal. The gazpacho was the best I’ve ever tasted (sorry Linda) with fresh diced ingredients served on the side to dump in to your taste.
Weinershnitzel was prepared tableside. Let’s just say a serving for one involved two sticks of butter. And the creme brulee (called burned cream catalan here) was possibly the best I’ve ever had. Best of all, I discovered they were a Wine Spectator Award of Excellence winner with a very deep list of old Bordeaux at crazy prices. Would you believe 1961 Ch. Croizet-Bages for $130? I couldn’t resist. What a fantastic bottle of wine that was! On the way out the proprietor pointed out their Mouton vertical — every vintage back to the 19th century! Because every year’s label is unique, the worst years are the most expensive, since those bottle were not laid away. So the 1946, which I’m sure would be undrinkable, set them back $12,000! Anyway, it was an amazing experience, and all three of us really enjoyed it.
After lunch we did some tourist shopping. While the girls were in a bookstore I found an inexpensive digital camera as a gift for Christina. Her camera has been eating batteries like a demon, so I think she’ll have a lot more fun with this one.
We strolled back to the hotel and had a restful afternoon, then a group dinner (tasty sauteed fish with a lemon sauce) in the dining room.
Saturday, July 7, 2007
Lucerne to Paris
We spent most of Saturday on the bus. Almost as soon as we left Lucerne, the scenery changed to rolling hills and farmland. We skirted a few outlying vineyards in Burgundy, but the most memorable sights were the many vibrant colored fields of sunflowers. Several truck stops provided breaks and lunch, and we arrived at the Holiday Inn Republique around 5 pm. Dani and I stayed here once before, but it has been remodeled since then. It’s a large, older hotel with nice rooms. They serve a full complimentary breakfast and the worst (i. e. American) coffee in Paris.
After a couple of hours rest we headed back out for an evening sightseeing tour. We’ve only purchased two of the optional excursions on this trip because we know our way around these cities. This tour was particularly popular, with 100% enrollment by the group.
Because Miguela couldn’t drive any more that day, we borrowed a bus from another group, a Trafalgar tour. This bus had 52 seats compared to our 44, and would have been very uncomfortable for daily use.
We began by passing through one of the seediest parts of Paris, an unlikely combination of wedding shops and sex shops. We disembarked in front of the Moulin Rouge, which I hadn’t realized was in the midst of this detritus. A tourist tram took us up the hill that is Montmartre. The district turned first trendy, then touristy as we reached the top, where Sacre Coeur overlooks the city.
Searching for a non-touristy restaurant we walked away from the square and tried a restaurant called La Bonne Franquette. Unfortunately it turned out to be just as touristy as the rest, and they tried to pull a bait and switch on the wine I tried to order. The food was mediocre by French standards, but certainly adequate.
After dinner we purchased chocolate and Nutella crepes from a take out window and strolled back to the tram stop.
It was now past 10 pm and the lights of the city began to come on. We drove around the city admiring the lights along the Champs Elysee and then stopped at the Eiffel Tower, where Lia convinced everyone someone was going to jump off. Of course what we were really waiting for was the strobe light illumination that occurs for ten minutes at 10 pm, 11 pm and midnight. This is part of the system installed for the Millennium, and recently put back into use.
On the way back to the hotel we drove past Notre Dame and through the Marais district, with its bustling gay bars.
By the time we returned to the hotel and I did some email it was nearly 1 am, not leaving much sleeping time before our 6 am wakeup call.
Sunday, July 8, 2007
Paris
The streets were nearly deserted Sunday morning, a big contrast to Saturday night. Our local guide, Isabella, took us, past Notre Dame and the Sorbonne, then to the Eiffel Tower to get into line early, before its 9 am opening. We had tickets to the second floor, but considered leaving the tour and going to the top. In the end we opted for convenience and stayed with the group, getting dropped off on the Rue de Rivoli outside the Louvre. We had a late breakfast or early lunch at Angelina, a tea room similar to our favorite, La Duree. Ahh! at last! French food. Baguettes, cheeses and super rich hot chocolate.
We walked to the pyramid and entered the Louvre, which was perhaps a bit less crowded than on our last couple of visits.
We spent about two hours doing the highlights, including the medieval castle they unearthed when digging the new basement, the Venus de Milo, Mona Lisa and Winged Victory of Samathrace.
We probably spent the most time in the 17th century Flanders galleries. All told I estimate we walked though about five percent of the Louvre.
Back on the Rue Rivoli we had drinks in a sidewalk cafe and the girl went to the nearby fun fair and rode one of those rides with the swings around the edge.
Henry, the director of Alcorn McBride sarl, picked us up a bit before 5 pm and took us to the Champs Elysee for dinner. His son Zacharie came along tool. Zacharie is now fours years old, a handsome little boy.
Originally we had intended to hang out for a while and then go to dinner later, but we were all tired and Zacharie was feeling a bit under the weather, so we decided to have an early dinner at Fouquet’s, a famous restaurant across from Louis Vuitton on the Champs Elysee.
The food was surprisingly good for a touristy place, and we enjoyed having a chance to relax and chat with Henry. We were back at out hotel before 8 pm, and enjoyed a good night’s sleep.
Monday, July 9, 2007
Paris to London
After breakfast we took a short bus ride to the Gare de Nord, where we said goodbye to our driver, Miguela, and caught the TGV train. Once on the outskirts of Paris, the train accelerated to over 200 miles per hour, and the French countryside raced past.
It goes slower in the chunnel, because of the amount of air is displaces as it moves through the relatively constrained space. The chunnel transit took about 20 minutes. When we emerged in England we traveled slower, because the track is not as good. We arrived at Waterloo Station shortly before 1pm, with a one our time change.
A bus ride across London brought us to the Hilton Metropole, a large convention hotel that is quite comfortable. We said goodbye to our tour director, Lia, and were handed over to the Globus representative who work in the office at the Hilton. We didn’t sign up for any of the optional London tours, so we’ll be mostly on our own, now.
Dani and Christina took advantage of the comfortable beds and had a long nap. For dinner we rode the elevator up to the 23rd floor and had a nice Japanese meal at Nippon Tuk (is that name a joke?)
Tuesday, July 10, 2007
London
We were extremely lucky with the weather today It has been raining in London for a month, but today was lovely, with scattered clouds and temperatures in the mid seventies. More importantly, it was a lovely evening for the open air theatre.
Our day began with the last Globus event, a city tour around London. We passed all the usual sites and then stopped at St. Paul’s where we left the tour and walked across the Millennium Bridge to Shakespeare’s Globe theater. Dani and I saw Coriolanus here on our last visit, but this time we just took the guided tour, which was quite interesting, and gave us a chance to experience to view from the yard and the lower seating. We discovered that the second tier seats have more legroom than the third tier seats we sat in last year.
A couple of performers in one of the current shows were rehearsing while we were there, and they seemed to be fairly mediocre.
After the tour we crossed back over the Thames and caught the underground to Embankment, where we had fish and chips and curried chick for lunch in the cafe in the park. There are many fewer pigeons in London than there used to be because it’s now prohibited to feed them. They seemed quite put out about this.
We walked to Trafalgar Square and spent an hour in the 18th century painting wing of the National Gallery. It was quite impressive to see rooms full of paintings by Monet, Renoir, Degas, and Van Gogh.
I think everyone’s favorite painting was “An Experiment on a Bird in the Air Pump,” in which artist Joseph Wright perfectly captured the varied emotions of each person present.
Our next stop was Harrods, which is more like an entire city inside one store. Dani wanted to proved to herself that you can even buy bridles for your horse in this department store. You can. But like almost everything else at Harrods, they’re expensive. Our purchase was sandwiches, bread and cheese for tonight’s picnic.
Back at the hotel the girls took a long nap and then we took the tube to Regent’s Park. Outside we picnicked under the tents, but the girls didn’t like the yellowjacket that was interested in our sandwiches. Ah, the joys of outdoor dining.
Macbeth was interesting. It was staged very similarly to Trinity Prep’s production, using a mixture of modern costumes and traditional plaid. The set was several large cargo containers.
All of the performers were either marginally or significantly better than their Trinity counterparts, with one glaring exception: Lady Macbeth. She played only one emotion — ruthlessness — throughout. And her sleepwalking scene was completely emotionless. I could feel Dani next to me, struggling not to jump up and show her how to do it.
After the show we walked back to the tube, and were back at the hotel by 11:30.
Wednesday, July 11, 2007
London
We took advantage of a rare day with no wakeup call to sleep in, and nearly missed the 10:30 cutoff for breakfast. Then we took the tube across town to The British Museum, where we spent a couple of hours looking at all the stuff the British stole from Greece and Egypt.
Avoiding the mediocre Indian restaurant we tried last time, we found another a half block north, called Chambeli, and enjoyed a leisurely four course lunch before returning to the hotel for naps before the show.
Linda had arrived for her day and a half in London, and was napping, too.
In the evening we went to the West End to see Mary Poppins at the Prince Edward Theatre. The staging of the show was amazing, with an entire house moving up and down, the attic and roof top expanding as needed, and lots of ‘magic. ‘ It used the original songs from the movie to great advantage, but more closely followed the book. The performers were all terrific, and the audience loved it.
I like act 2 better than act 1, because it does a better job of finding the story, which is about the father. The new songs they added are formulaic, and don’t measure up to the originals, but there aren’t many of them. It builds to one of the best endings for a musical I’ve seen.
After the show we crossed the street and had an Excellent Thai meal at Patara. We got back to out hotel a bit after midnight, answering the question: “Do underground day passes really expire at midnight?” Not if you’re already inside the turnstiles.
Thursday, July 12, 2007
London
We slept in, then took a rather circuitous three segment underground ride to Marble Arch, a nearby place that’s hard to get to from our hotel. Today was the culinary highlight of our trip, a visit to Le Gavroche, London’s first 3-star Michelin restaurant (although now two start, since the original chef retired and his son has taken over.
Lunch consisted of eight courses:
Rare peppered tuna
Asparagus tips with truffles
Wild salmon with crispy skin
Fois Gras and a duck pastry
Rack of lamb
Cheese cart with about 50 selections
Chocolate Gateau and sorbet
Floating Islands
Yes, there were two desserts. Plus petits fours! Oh, and an amuse bouche to start. Oh, and hors d’oeuvres upstairs before hand.
There were about as many employees as guests, and the service was orchestrated like a ballet. Linda and I had the wine pairings with the lunch, and shared a taste with the girls. All eight wines were top notch, and brilliant matches to the food. The standout was a 1928 Maury Solera. The wines:
Liefmanns Kriek Cherry Beer (amazing!)
Don Jose Sherry Olorosa (bone dry)
Puligny Montrachet, “La Truffiere,” Morey, 1999
Tokay Pinot Gris, Beyer, 1997
Ch. de Villegeorge 1999 (Haut Medoc)
Le Soula 2002 (Rhone)
Maury Solera 1928
Vin de Constance 2001 (muscat)
I particularly enjoyed the Boulette d’Avesnes, an orange pyramid of cheese that we also had at L’Arpege, the 3-star Michelin in Paris.
It was an amazing three hour lunch.
To complete our European spree we headed for The Victoria Theatre and London’s greatest musical, Billy Elliot. It’s a particular treat to see this show, because it will probably never play in the US, due to its apparent appeal to young people but its extremely salty language. Dani and I saw it last year, but Linda wasn’t with us. This show is the reason for her whirlwind trip.
The show was terrific, but not as good as when Dani and I saw it last year with the original cast. This Billy was perhaps a better actor, and had a more modern dance style, and his enthusiasm made us suspect it was one of his first shows. They made some staging and dialogue changes that sometimes worked better but other times didn’t. The final half hour was particularly good, though. The show has a unique way of dancing through the bows that it quite exciting.
All in all, a very fine last day to our trip.
Friday, July 13, 2007
London to Orlando
We took advantage of Globus’ transfer service to get to the airport. It’s a really easy and economical way to do it. Meanwhile Linda headed off separately with a driver to catch her Delta flight.
Gatwick airport wasn’t the madhouse it was two weeks ago, although security was very, very tight. The only complication was that our tickets were for the next day(!) I’m not sure how that happened, but an extraordinarily helpful Virgin Atlantic agent at the baggage counter took care of getting our tickets changed, and we were all set.
I dozed during the nine-hour nonstop to Orlando, and Dani read Margaret Atwood’s Lady Oracle, about her tenth book of the trip.
We cleared customs in record time, and despite a jam on I4 dropped Christina at home before 7pm. Linda arrived shortly after 9pm.
Christina’s Favorites
Venice
Billy Elliot
Dani’s Favorites
First Day in Rome
Mary Poppins
Steve’s Favorites
Mount Pilatus
The Old Swiss House
Dani’s final postcard tally for the trip: 43.
Some Tips for Next Time
Globus buses seat 44, while Trafalgar buses seat 52. That would be a big difference in comfort over a week or more.
The little, laminated, folding map of London is great.
Chambeli is a good Indian restaurant on Southampton Row between the British Museum and the Russell Square underground station.
There also is a large Indian restaurant on the circular road around Regent’s park, a bit west of the south entrance.
When in Lucerne — even passing through at noon — eat at the Old Swiss House.
Consider avoiding connections in Gatwick. Orlando to Miami/Atlanta/JFK to Rome would be better.
Best seats for Billy Elliot would be front row of the balcony, because nearly all of the orchestra puts your eye level below the stage floor, so it’s hard to see the tap dancing.
Hotel Ratings:
Rome – Starhotels Michelangelo **** Florence – Cosmopolitan Hotel ***** Venice – Alberghi Antony Hotel *** Lucerne – Astoria Hotel ** Paris – Holiday Inn République **** London – Hilton London Metropole ****
Ron and Bev invited us to Victoria & Albert’s chef’s table in Disney’s Grand Floridian. We were joined by Philipe and Audrey. Chef Scott was in town (at last!) and provided an amazing meal, with several new creative touches. The menus were slightly different for the men and ladies. Here’s mine:
Tasting Notes
Flight 1
NV
Krug Champagne
Youthful color, nice effervescence, surprisingly nutty and toasty.
88 points
Flight 2
1961
Ch. Hut Brion Blanc
When I went to pull this wine from my cellar I was surprised to discover it was a white that had been misfiled in the reds! Since we love Haut Brion Blanc, this was indeed a pleasant surprise. This is the oldest vintage of Haut Brion Blanc I’ve tasted, but I would have gueesed itwas from the 90’s. Light straw color, intense lemon nose, later becoming intense crushed mint leaves, dust, bees wax, soap, youthful floral finish. The nose continued to improve for hours. After three hours: lemon sherbert-coated vanilla ice cream bar, a hint of smokiness. Probably the wine of the evening.
98 points
1934
Ch. Olivier
Clear but somewhat orage. Oxidized nose but pleasant, nutty, balanced mineral and citrus flavors.
83 points
2000
Ch. “Y”
Pale straw, floral, white pepper, honey, vanilla, banana creme brule, dry but really fruity, bubble gum finish(!). Fabulous wine.
96 points
Flight 3
1961
Richebourg Paul Bouchard & Cie.
Good color, big fruit nose, bacon fat, meat, youthful fruit finish, wood, citrus, cherries, mint, long, balanced, great match to pork reduction.
94 points
1929
Romanee St. Vivant
Cloudy, plummy nose, caramel, sour cherries
88 points
Flight 4
1938
Ch. Mouton Rothschild
I wasn’t expecting much from this, but it’s way better than the ’38 Cheval Blanc. Youthful, fruity, cherries, mushrooms, wood, mint, amazingly youthful, shoe polish, lead pencil, licorice, very focused.
97 points
1947
Ch. La Fleur Petrus
Somewhat corked, mint, big fruit, herbs, chewy, very young, vanilla, long fruit, wood.
97 points
Flight 5
1968
BV Georges de la Tour Private Reserve
Redwood nose, huge, chewy, mint, vanialla, big fruit, perfectly youthful, cherries, great match to corn and lamb confit. Nose later became pronounced curry. Fabulous bottle of a great wine.
95 points
1985
Camymus Special Selection
Dusty, big fruit, still needs time.
92 points
Flight 6
1970
Ch. Caillou Creme de Tete Sauternes
Ice wine from Barsac. Really interesting, and right up there near Yquem. Vanilla, figs, marmalade, medium to low acid.
92 points
1996
Ch. Suideraut
Botrytis nose, very low acid
88 points
Flight 7
1990
Gaja Barolo
Very corked. Velvety fruit
Not rated
1982
Barbaresco Nicolini
Medium ruby color, floral / meaty nose, sweet candy finish
A few months ago I tried to book Victoria & Albert’s chef’s table in Disney’s Grand Floridian for Linda’s birthday, but they had no openings. I asked Israel, the manager, to wait list us. Margaret from V&A called on Wednesday and unexpectedly asked if we’d like to take over a cancellation Saturday night. We called our friends Ron and Bev Siegel, and set up a dinner and tasting. Chef Aimee provided us with great food and Israel was a terrific host and sommelier. We learned that Chef Scott and Israel go on some very high end restaurant scouting missions around the world, spending thousands of dollars of Disney’s money on dinners at restaurants in Paris, Barcelona, Chicago and New York. That sounds like a dream job for a Maitre d’.
The Line Up
Menu
Tasting Notes
Flight 1
1995
Taittanger Comtes Champagne
Youthful color, clean citrus and pear nose, nice effervescence, good match with the four different amuse bouche items.
93 points
Flight 2
1923
Musigny
Dark garnet, leather and mineral nose, classic old burgundy, sour cherries in the mouth. Lasted about twenty minutes before going sour on the palate, but the nose continued to improve for hours.
93 points
1947
Chambertin Jaboulet
This was a much more youthful wine that the ’47 we had last December. My notes for that wine were: Medium brown, sweet, earthy, leather and bacon fat in the nose, medium body, a floral, woody finish. This one was more garnet in color, with a very minty nose, tending to smoky bacon later. The wine was surprisingly fruity in the mouth, belying its age. It was a very tight competition between all the wines at this dinner, but this was probably the favorite.
96 points
Flight 3
1961
Hermitage Chapoutier
Probably my favorite wine of the evening. A classic, still youthful Rhone, complex, with mint, cherries and a mineral finish.
96 points
1968
Grange
The first Grange I’ve had that was ready to drink.; Balanced between syrah fruit and wood with a soft mouthfeel (surprising for Grange) and vanilla on the finish.
95 points
Flight 4
1993
Ch. d’Yquem
Not the greatest Yquem ever, but a steal I picked up at K&L for $94 in a 750ml. Good match with the fois gras. Phenolic, waxy, not blindingly sweet, possibly due to high acid.
90 points
Flight 5
1928
Ch. Lafite
This was the wine in our cellar we’ve had the longest. Linda bought it as a birthday present for me in 1984 for $400. At the time, it had just been released from the winery, so the label looks brand new. The wine was classic Lafite, with lead pencil and wax in the nose, and still appealing fruit on the palate. I would have guessed it was from about 1970.
93 points
1959
Ch. Baron Pichon Longueville
Very youthful, quite fruity and floral. Another true to form wine.
93 points
Not opened: 1973 Heitz Martha’s Vineyard, making this perhaps the first tasting I’ve ever done with no California wines in it!
As you can see, the wines were all in good shape, and true to type. Since my preference has migrated to old Burgundy, the Bordeaux seemed a bit anticlimactic, so I might reconsider the order in future events with old wines like these.
It was an easy trip. We took off about half and hour late for unexplained reasons, so arrived about the same amount late, shortly after 7am London time. The “premium economy” cabin on Virgin Atlantic was spacious. It occupied the top deck of a 747, with only two-and-two seating, plus a wide center aisle and side storage bins (since the overhead bins were small). There was lots of legroom, but the seat was narrow and the hardness of a church pew. Worth twice economy? Hmmm. . . that’s a close call. Which I suppose means they’ve priced it just right, from a business standpoint. I did get a few hours restless sleep, between trying to find new positions for my tailbone. I’m not sure Dani did. Alcohol flowed freely. These Brits like their booze. The food was also tasty, with beef stew turning out to be pot roast in barbecue sauce. No mistaking it for Air France, though. The lack of a connection and quickness of the flight were certainly selling points.
Immigration was slow. Our plane only had a dozen or two Americans. The English breezed through, while we got stuck in the midst of two planeloads from Ghana. As we waited in line we discovered we were next to a family with a seventh grade son in Trinity Prep!
Thursday, June 8, 2006
Gatwick
The Renaissance Gatwick is a good choice for the stopover. It’s next to the airport, has spacious rooms (by Europeans standards) and they let us have the first room that got cleaned, so we were able to get settled after only a half hour wait in the lobby. We were napping by 9:30am.
When we awoke we hooked up our Gordian knot of electrical cords to get everything recharged. In the afternoon we had a room service lunch of fish & chips and cottage pie. English food is amazing. It’s the only place in the world where they brag about your meal coming with “mushy peas”. The fish was actually decent, if greasy. There’s a bit of sticker shock here, though, as the exchange rate is $2 to one pound. So lunch was about $70.
Tomorrow’s flight leaves at 7am, so I arranged for the shuttle at 4:45am (ouch)! I guess there’s no point in even trying to get on local schedule quite yet. Our goal is just to get plenty of sleep and then hit the road again.
Friday, June 9, 2006
Monte Carlo
We arrived in the lobby at 4:46 for our 4:45 shuttle and discovered it had left. But the 5:15 shuttle got us to the airport in time — thanks to kiosk check-in — to have a pretty awful bagel while waiting for our gate to be assigned. The bagel was nothing compared to the almost indescribable snack served on British Airways, which was rendered all the more appalling because I suspect it turned out exactly as intended. Picture a stale dinner role with a slice of hard-boiled egg and a fragment of half-cooked bacon, and you’ve got the picture.
Air transit has suddenly become competitive in Europe, and even British Airways has been forced to drop their prices. A table in the flight magazine compared the rates from 1996 with this year: London to Nice – 239 pounds vs. 39 pounds.
The approach into Nice was beautiful, with clear, temperate weather to enjoy the view: golden beaches and Mediterranean villas, dotting the San Diego-like coastline.
Quite a few of our fellow passengers arrived on the same flight or about the same time; a whole herd of them were loaded onto buses. Since we didn’t book our airfare through the cruise line, I’d asked our travel agent to arrange a private van. This worked out well, as Dani enjoyed testing her two years of French on our driver, her first opportunity to try communicating in the real world. It seemed quite successful.
The trip from Nice to Monaco takes about thirty minutes. The road crosses several long viaducts and passes through a dozen or two tunnels, the last of which is nearly one mile long. After winding through one final French village, we arrived in Monaco, a country comprised of one bay, filled from edge to edge with the city of Monte Carlo. We threaded our way past the famous casino and fancy hotels on a narrow street still lined with barriers from the grand prix, held two weeks ago. By 11:30 we arrived at the Hotel Meridien, where a continental breakfast was provided during our two-hour wait for transport to the ship.
Since there’s no terminal in Monte Carlo, check-in was on-board. Everything went speedily — possibly because of the total absence of any security screening — and we were soon in our cabin. It’s the farthest cabin toward the stern on deck seven, so there’s some engine vibration, but this was the price we paid (or didn’t pay) for not having a pre-assigned cabin. At a savings of $1800, it was a good decision.
The cabin is pretty much the lowest category on the ship, yet it’s as nice as almost any we’ve had: a bit larger than category AC on Royal Caribbean, and outfitted in the same quality as that ship’s suites. In fact, the vast majority of cabins on this ship are identical to this one, and some of the suites have no more square footage, so this is an excellent buy.
Our cabin stewardess is a Pilipino (of course!) named Priscilla. She’s very cheerful and super efficient. Throughout the cruise she would anticipate our needs and adapt her housekeeping to the way we used the cabin. She certainly wasn’t unique, though. During any walk down the hall we were likely to be engaged in conversation with several stewardesses. It’s a surprising result of the no-tipping policy, that every employee has a stake in every passenger enjoying their entire cruise. The ship carries 700-odd (well, actually “old”) passengers, but doesn’t seem tremendously smaller than the Coral Princess. Service is extremely polite, interesting since there’s no tipping. We had a salad and burger for a late lunch on the pool deck, and the food seems typical.
Wireless Internet in the cabin seems solid, although the actual connection to the internet is iffy, so we’ll see how this goes. . .
We thought lifeboat drill would be more pleasant than usual because our muster station is the upscale Signature restaurant, but after gathering there we had to march outside single file with our hands on each others’ shoulders to our lifeboat stations. Princess and NCL seem to feel this step is unnecessary. I wonder if our captain is a pessimist.
Dani got a much needed — although unintended — nap, and then we we had dinner in The Compass Rose, the ship’s main dining room. An oddity of this ship is that all the dining areas close at 9am, so the only food available after that is from room service.
The dining room was very busy, but we were cheerfully greeted and offered our choice of several nice tables. The menu degustation was a multi course affair consisting of a shellfish assortment, consume, mussels, intermezzo, chicken cordon bleu, and dessert. The food all looked spectacular, but its taste was, in general, typical of cruise ship food — nothing spectacular. The standout was actually the Kahlua sorbet served as the intermezzo. For dessert I had a cheese plate which has some nice cheeses including L’explorateur and Maytag blue, although they were much too cold to really taste. I’m not sure why this was the case, as on subsequent night a real cheese cart was available, with room temperature selections that changed each day.
Service was beyond excellent — this continued to be the case throughout the cruise — and the wines that accompanied dinner were very nice, including an interesting South African sauvignon blanc and a superb California pinot noir from Alapay.
Dani took a break in the middle of dinner to attend the organizational meeting for teens. She reported that there are about fifty kids on board, including many seasoned 13-year-old travelers, but almost no one 14-17.
Saturday, June 10, 2006
At Sea
We slept late, but I awoke in time to shower and dress before our 9:30 room service breakfast arrived. It’s temperate but overcast today, a pleasant day for sitting on the balcony and watching the waves, or working on my new writing class.
In the afternoon we walked around the ship. All of the public areas are on decks 4, 5 and 11, which is similar to the design of the newer Princess ships such as the Coral Princess. Although the ship is scaled down from that size, it stills seems fairly large, and since there are only 700 passengers, it feels deserted. Perhaps it was deserted — everyone we saw was younger than 60, which is not representative of the demographics in the dining room last night.
The fit and finish are certainly better than any other ship I’ve been on, with tasteful decorating and top notch materials. It doesn’t handle that well in rough water, though, and even today’s swells had us weaving in the corridors.
There are some very nice spaces on the ship, including a piano bar, coffee and espresso bar, and a cigar room. All but the coffee bar were deserted this afternoon.
We ordered a late room service lunch and ate on our balcony. Delivery was prompt and the food quality was as good as if we’d gone to the dining room.
I had been meaning to have some pants taken in before the cruise, but didn’t have time. The onboard tailor did a top notch job in less than 24 hours, and at a bargain price.
At 8:30 we dined at Signatures, the ship’s top restaurant, which is operated by The Cordon Bleu. Dani looked lovely in one of her new outfits. In general the passengers were better dressed than on other ships’ formal nights, although there were not that many tuxes.
The food was certainly better than on other ships, with fois gras, freshly shaved truffles and a real cheese cart. It wasn’t exactly a gastronomic experience, but it was certainly good. And true to their word, we haven’t yet spent a cent on this ship.
We did discover that fresh mint leaves and Rousanne wine are an amazingly horrible combination!
After dinner we went to a show in the ship’s main theater. This is a very nice two-story space that seats perhaps 200 at individual cocktail tables. The show was a credible Broadway review, with sets of songs from 42nd Street (of course!), West Side Story, South Pacific, Cats, Les Miserables and more 42nd Street. In typical cruise ship tradition, the women were all about 15 years too old and the men were all the wrong sexual orientation. A pleasant hour, nevertheless.
By 10:45 the public areas, including the piano bar, were deserted. All the 20-somethings were easy to locate, though. . . in the Internet cafe.
Sunday, June 11, 2006
Málaga, Spain
We docked in Málaga, Spain about 8am and after a light room service breakfast ventured onto the pier for our tour. There were about a dozen tour buses bound for various destinations including Costa del Sol, Granada and the Alhambra, but we opted for a half day visit to the local sites.
Málaga is a charming city, a mixture of styles from the past few centuries. Adjacent to the port is a beautiful beach, lined with thatched huts and seafood cafes. The season hasn’t quite arrived (although it was certainly a gorgeous day), so the beach was nearly deserted, but Málaga plays host to 11 million tourists a year, mostly in July and August.
The main street is lined with tropical palms and flowering shrubs, and there are scenic parks and fountains at every major intersection. It almost never rains here, so the river is dammed in the mountains to collect the water needed to support the city. But the riverbed isn’t completely dry, as seawater is let in to flow down the last mile.
Our first stop was at the Alcazaba, a fort constructed by the Moors in the 8th to 11th centuries. It sits atop the hill overlooking the city. Now in ruins, it was destroyed by French troops when they burned their munitions dump prior to withdrawing from the city in the 1820s.
The view of the city was spectacular, with the Málaga bull ring prominent in the foreground, and our cruise ship in the distance.
Our next stop was at the bull ring, which looked exactly like the one in The Three Stooges short. We watched a short demonstration put on by an aspiring bullfighter (the guy in blue) and his friend, who played the bull. The only difference was that the friend wasn’t actually killed at the end of the demonstration.
The aspiring bullfighter then had to rush off to his afternoon match in another city. Since he isn’t yet famous, he won’t be paid, but maybe they’ll let him keep an ear. Or, if the bull wins, may it gets one of his ears.
After visiting the bullfighting museum and enjoying some photos of the injuries bulls can inflict on the long-suffering matadors (although there seemed to be a general lack of sympathy among the viewers) we had a sample of the local wine, Moscato Málaga, which was quite nice. Made from raisins, it is fairly complex, reminiscent of Tokaji.
Our final stop was at Plaza de la Merced in the old city, for a short walk through the narrow pedestrian streets. We started at the birthplace of Málaga’s most famous native son, Antonio Banderas– er, I mean Pablo Picasso. A short walk took us past the Picasso museum (mostly early sketches) and the cathedral. Since it’s Sunday, the shops were closed. But church was open. Fortunately, it wasn’t open to tourists.
Across from the cathedral we sat in an outdoor cafe and had Perrier and a sort of French bread pizza, then bought some postcards before returning to the ship.
I would definitely come back to Málaga. It has the same relaxed feel as Barcelona, but in a more intimate setting. I guess that’s one of the nice things about a “positioning cruise” like this one — it takes you to less-frequently visited ports.
We spent the afternoon in our cabin discussing Dani’s book, which is tentatively titled The Last Telepath. She actually started planning this book two years ago, but it has gone in fits and spurts. After a five-hour brainstorming session, she had completed a pretty tight outline of her 88 scenes. I think she’s about ready to start writing the long form.
After a surprisingly mediocre dinner in the main dining room (which I think was the fault of the guest chef, Norway’s “leading” chef, not the ship) we headed back to the cabin, then realized it was already after 10pm, and we were scheduled to be passing Gibraltar. We hurried up on deck, and sure enough, there it was, wrapped in a halo of fog. Very eerie, looming up out of the dark.
That’s one big rock.
Monday, June 12, 2006
At Sea
The seas were 6-8 feet today, so the expression “bounding” comes to mind, but we spent a pleasant day in the cabin, writing. Buffet breakfast on the rear deck outside the Veranda was very nice. I don’t think the outside temp has varied by 2 degrees from 69 since we sailed. At 4pm we docked in Lisbon, but we won’t go ashore until tomorrow. Today is a special holiday, and we understand the partying is pretty wild.
Dinner in the main dining room was the best meal of the trip so far — sushi and duck a l’orange. In the evening we checked out the DVD of Lethal Weapon. I’d forgotten how funny it was, and it was amusing to see Mel Gibson trying to conceal an Aussie accent.
Tuesday, June 13, 2006
A Taste of Lisbon by Coach and Tram
Lisbon is a jumble of buildings that sprawls across many hills on the northern shore of the Tagus River, one of Europe’s best natural harbors. The city was destroyed by earthquake in 1755, so most of the buildings date from that year or later, which is coincidentally the last time any maintenance was performed on them. The historic port district of Belém (Portuguese for “Bethlehem”), located in the southwest part of the city, is in a particularly decrepit state. Here the building coloring choices are natural stone, pink, yellow or graffiti.
Our vivacious tour guide, Christina, met us at the pier and gave us a thorough — and interesting — history of Portugal and Lisbon. Her vocabulary was inventive, to say the least, and words like “touristical” kept us informed and entertained. Portugal rightfully regards itself as the nation at the forefront of 16th century world exploration. At one time they owned or had trade monopolies with much of Africa, China India and South America. I had been unaware that England’s involvement with India began when they received it as part of a dowry. Of course, now Portugal is pretty irrelevant, and the Portuguese seem pretty content with this. They even missed World War II.
Our first stop was at the Monument to the Discoveries, an impressive obelisk erected in 1960 to commemorate the 500th anniversary of Henry the Navigator, who wasn’t a navigator, but did start a school for them. Constructed in the waning days of Portugal’s dictatorship, it looks like 1930’s propaganda art.
A mosaic map in front of the monument highlights Portugal’s discoveries around the world, of which there were many. The stop afforded Dani an opportunity to brief me on the history of trade, about which she knows a great deal.
Next was the Torre de Belém, built in a mish-mosh of styles called Manueline. Constructed in the harbor as a sort of check-in point for visiting ships, it’s now high and dry due to the river’s sedimentation.
Nearby was a bronze of the first airplane to cross the Atlantic, from Africa to Brazil, in 1924. Don’t get too excited. It took them three months. I guess they should have used wood instead of bronze.
The Mosterio dos Jerónimos was both a monastery and a cathedral. Conceived by Dom Manual I in 1502, it was financed with the riches brought back by explorers such as Vasco de Gama, who is now entombed there. The influence of these explorations is further in evidence at the tombs of Manuel and other kings and queens, which are supported on the backs of marble elephants. Successive kings were less enthusiastic about the project, leaving bare the columns and niches originally intended for statuary.
Departing the cathedral, we drove over jacaranda-lined streets to the new part of the city on the other side of the hills. This area — especially the Avenida de Liberdad, lined with four rows of trees and one row of Armani-type shops — is particularly nice. Continuing east we came to the oldest part of the city, a tangle of little streets on steep hills reminiscent of San Francisco. Here we boarded an electric tram for a tour of streets far too narrow for our tour bus.
This area was really quaint (if somewhat ramshackle) and the ride, although much too long, was fun. Along the way we were served some tasty ruby port and delicious Pastelle de Belém, a crispy pastry filled with custard. Throughout our day in Lisbon things were eerily quiet, as yesterday was St. Anthony’s Day. As the patron saint of the city, this of course requires observance with massive consumption of alcohol and all-night revelry. In fact, we understand most residents don’t make it to work all week.
We arrived back onboard in time to sail (barely) under the harbor bridge, which looks very much like the golden gate bridge. This is not surprising, since it was built by the same contractor.
Out on the open seas be resumed our bounding course northward. I suppose it’s just the combination of a smaller ship and being at the very back, but the ride — even on very slight seas — might definitely be a problem for some passengers. Fortunately it doesn’t bother us.
Our dinner reservation was at Latitudes, the ship’s Asian-themed restaurant. It’s an attractive space, with only about fifteen tables, which were never all full. Food presentation was beautiful (as with all the food on the ship) and many of the items were excellent — particularly the lobster curry. There were a few too many fried items in the appetizer assortment, but it’s one of those restaurants where they serve you some of everything, so there were many choices. Service was perfect, as has been all service on this ship.
Wednesday, June 14, 2006
At Sea (with stops at Vigo and La Coruna)
This morning we sort of slept through a brief stop at Vigo, Spain. The only way I noticed was that my bed stopped swaying like a hammock, and the stillness woke me up.
The purpose of the stop at Vigo was to let off passengers wanting to make the pilgrimage to the alleged final resting place of St. James. In the 12th century, 11 million pilgrims did; but last year it was down to 19,000. Apparently these days it’s harder to find people who believe that, after being beheaded, his body magically floated along the river in a stone coffin filled with scallop shells. Or something like that.
A brief afternoon stop in La Coruna is planned, to pick up the survivors.
Today the ride has been slightly rockier than in the past, but then we learned from the navigator that there has been a 100 kilometer per hour wind and 30-36 foot swells all day. Given that, I’d have to say the ship is doing quite well. In fact, the passengers seem to be doing pretty well, too. I wouldn’t want to have to use a cane to get around this ship with the deck pitching ten feet.
Here are some interesting tonnage figures Linda sent me:
Regent Seven Seas Voyager – 46K NCL Norwegian Dream – 50K NCL Norway – 70K NCL Pride of America – 81K Coral Princess – 92K Star Princess – 109K Royal Carribean Explorer of the Seas – 138K
During the day we had a nice lunch in the main dining room (we sort of missed breakfast) and then did a lot of writing. In the afternoon we played trivia, and would have won if we’d known how many stripes on an Israeli flag, which ear you can hear better out of, or which part of the body is most often bit by insects. (Two, right, foot. )
After we rounded the north west tip of the Iberian peninsulas the seas calmed a bit, and the gray skies began to lighten as we docked at La Coruna, Spain. It looks like a fair sized, rather non-descript city.
When our pilgrims returned from Santiago de Compostela at 7pm we sailed for Santander .
Dinner in the main dining room seems to improve each night. There were some excellent selections this evening, accompanied by a white wine from Provence that was quite pleasant. The wine selections on the ship have been almost entirely sauvignon blanc and pinot noir, or their cousins. I think this is an attempt to match as many foods as possible, but Linda would be disappointed in the lack of buttery Chardonnays. Of course, they have an extensive list of high end wines that I have even looked at, since it would be a waste to order an expensive bottle when Dani only has a sip. Drinking age onboard, incidentally, is 18, although it’s 16 in most of the ports. But no one really cares here in Europe.
Thursday, June 15, 2006
Bilbao and Guggenheim Museum (Santander)
We docked at Santander (even accent on all three syllables) this morning. Santander is a non-descript city that hugs the coast of the Bay of Biscay. At 9am we joined one of six coaches headed for Bilbao, about an hour and a half north.
Bilbao is in the Basque region of Spain, which is a culture different than Spain or neighboring France. The main language is Basque, which looks really weird, with lot’s of X’s. The sign are all in Basque and Spanish.
Bilbao is an absolutely beautiful city of tree-lined (and traffic-clogged) streets, beautiful parks, and daring architecture. It’s hard to believe just twenty years ago it was a depressed industrial port. Now the entire waterfront area has been turned into cutting-edge buildings. The whole city is a vital, walkable place, with inviting shops and restaurants, lots of foot traffic, and beautiful old buildings lining streets that radiate from dozens of lushly landscaped squares. There are construction cranes everywhere. Leading this renaissance of new architecture was the Guggenheim. It was designed by Frank Gehry, and opened in 1997 at a spot that used to be part of the industrial riverfront. It’s really a fantastic building, three stories inside, taller outside, with every surface covered in either limestone or titanium, and no flat surfaces or right angles anywhere. Much neater than it looks in a photo.
Our extraordinarily knowledgeable guide provided an architecture and art history tour of the museum for 18 of us. I was concerned this would bore Dani, but her World history classes brought new meaning to what we saw and heard.
Two of the permanent exhibits in the museum were particularly memorable. One was comprised of nine multi-story columns of scrolling LEDs, red on one side and blue on the other, that told a rather surrealistic story/poem in many languages. Sounds dumb, but it was quite effective. The other was a room larger than a football field, filled with twisting walls of rusty steel, fifteen feet high, two inches thick, and sometimes over 100 feet long. I’m glad I didn’t have to install them! These shapes formed spirals, twisting walkways, and concentric notched circles– all very clear when viewed from above, but a completely different experience as we wandered around inside them, a living part of the exhibit. Again, it sounds dumb, but it was neat.
The bulk of the museum is currently filled with art on loan from The Hermitage in St. Petersburg. In fact, I recognized several pieces from our visit there two years ago. Here it has been better arranged, and we were able to trace the history of Russian art and art collecting from the 12th through 20th centuries, in chronological order. It was fascinating to watch religious icons morph into romantic oil paintings, then impressionism, cubism, and op art. One small room by itself contained two Picassos, two Matisses and a Gaugin. Two and a half hours was only enough time to walk past everything; then we headed back to the ship, arriving about 3pm. Ravenous, we sat on the pool deck and had a grilled salmon burger (me) and hamburger (Dani).
The weather has been temperate but overcast, but it’s supposed to improve this evening.
A few hours after sailing we were out in the middle of the Bay of Biscay on the way to Bordeaux. The sea was almost glassy. A strange change from Wednesday.
Dinner in the dining room was excellent. The South Africa pinotage was an eclectic wine offering, but it seemed oxidized.
Friday, June 16, 2006
Bordeaux, France
Today I found a way to use the $200 shipboard credit Vacations To Go gave us when we booked the cruise. The self-service launderettes on this ship are free but completely inadequate — I’ve seen seven people crammed into the room waiting for two washers. I did manage to get a load done a few days ago before everyone else started running out of clothes, but today, even though I was there at 7am, there were already people waiting. It would help if they were open 24 hours instead of 7am to 10pm. Anyway, we’ll just have the ship do our laundry and dry cleaning. It’s only slightly cheaper than buying new clothes, but hey, who wants to spend their vacation in a laundry room?
This morning we sailed up the Gironde River and then into the Garonne, traveling 100 kilometers to reach Bordeaux. I didn’t realize how far inland it is. The land is fairly flat, and the banks are lined with agricultural and industrial facilities, but when we reached Bordeaux it was a complete surprise. I was expecting Bordeaux to be a collection of villages and vineyards. Instead it is a beautiful city, a sort of miniature Paris. Best of all, the ship docks along the quay in the exact center of town. It is as if you’ve pulled up between the Louvre and Notre Dame! Everywhere there are 19th century facades, their wrought iron balconies and sloping roofs lined up just as in Paris. The streets are lined with shade trees, and brasseries spill out onto the sidewalks.
I watched as the ship extended its gangway from deck 4 and then puzzled over a crane truck that drove up and installed another gangway from deck 5 to the quay. This latter gangway was at about a 45 degree angle, and would have made a good water slide if it hadn’t ended on the concrete. What was that all about? Later in the day my question was answered when we learned that even though Bordeaux is 100 kilometers inland, the Garonne is still a tidal river, with a difference of 16 feet between low and high tides every six hours! By the time we returned to the ship in the afternoon, deck four was below the quay and the other gangway was nearly horizontal! In fact, the ship sailed both in and out near high tide, and with the current in each case.
When I say the ship is in the center of town, I mean it. You can almost step off the gangway onto the sidewalk of the boulevard that runs along the river. The absence of security was either refreshing, amazing, alarming or simply French — I’m not sure which.
In the morning Dani and I ventured ashore and strolled the streets of Bordeaux, covering a lot of territory. We ended up at a circular building in the center of town called Grande Homme. On the top floor was a giant toy store, the middle floor was upscale shops (and a tobacconist where Dani stocked up on postcards), and the subterranean lower floor was a supermarket and food court. When I say food court, I don’t mean an American food court. Instead it was a collection of tables surrounded by the market’s bakery, fromagerie, charcuterie, plus prepared salads, Asian food, and so on. We purchased a loaf of bread, a pain au chocolate, and an epoisses (my favorite stinky cheese), then strolled back to the ship to construct our own bizarre lunch in the cabin. The bread was, of course, the best we’ve had since the last time we were in France, and amazingly, Dani discovered she likes epoisses. A home run!
At 2 pm we met our tour group on the dock for a trip around the city and then an excursion to a local winery. I was surprised to see how much of the city we’d discovered on our own, although the driving tour did reveal a really neat pedestrian street, Rue Sainta Catherine, filled with shops and bistros that runs 2 kilometers through town. We also passed the WWII German sub base. This concrete bunker is divided into 11 bays, and its ceiling is 25 feet thick, making it impossible to get rid of.
Then we headed out of the city center to the selected winery, which turned out to be Chateau Smith Haut Lafite, a Graves grand cru that has been totally renovated since changing ownership in 1990. In a few kilometers we were in wine country, and is wasn’t more than twenty minutes before we arrived at the chateau, passing Chateau Bouscat and several other properties I didn’t recognize on the way. The area is fairly similar to Santa Ynez, but not quite as arid.
The tour, conducted by the winemaker, was the best I’ve experienced. The winery has beautiful new pneumatic presses, stem separator conveyors where twenty people hand select berries, and extensive cellars. They also make half of the approximately 800 French oak barrels they need each year. Every detail of the white and red vinification process was described. Here are just a few things I remember:
White: 90% sauvignon blanc, 5% semillon, 5% grey sauvignon. Fermented in 50% new oak and lees stirred for 12 months. Sold upon bottling.
Red: 55% merlot, the rest cabernet sauvignon and cabernet franc with sometimes a trace of petite verdot. Fermented in open topped stainless tanks for seven weeks, pumped over three times a week. Aged 18 months in 80% new oak. Sold upon bottling.
After the tour of the vinification area we descended into the (chilly) main cellar for a tasting of the 2004 white (peaches, grapefruit and black pepper, very balanced, no malolactic fermentation 92/100) and 2002 red (very smokey, blackberries, complex finish 93/100). Wine was available in the small boutique, and the winemaker himself processed the transactions. But there was no pressure to buy, and few people did (including me, although I eyed a double magnum of 1982 at 200 euros) as it was too hard to transport. I assume the winery was well-compensated for this terrific tour, though. (By the way, in addition to the winery, there is a beautiful spa resort on the property. )
Even in Friday afternoon traffic we were back at the ship in half an hour. Dani and I strolled through the city, trying to keep out of what had turned into a hot late afternoon sun, to the Rue Sainta Catherine, which was nice and shady. We looked for an open bistro and browsed the shops. No luck on the bistro. There were lots of great menus, but no one serves food until 8 pm, and we were to sail at 9 pm. At fnac (think trendy Best Buy) she bought some manga in French and then we headed back to the ship.
We had an excellent dinner in the main dining room. High praise in the face of the on-shore competition in France! My opinion of this ship’s food is going up. I think the trick is to avoid the guest chef’s menus. As always, service was Perfect with a capital ‘P’.
Wine selections were an oxidized Woodbridge Chardonnay (first chardonnay of the cruise) and a weird Zinfandel that still had one or two percent residual sugar. It grew on me, though, as it went really well with the little pieces of braised shortribs under the seared tuna appetizer. Who on earth came up with the idea to combine those two things?! It was excellent, though.
This morning’s 48-hour dry cleaning submission was already hanging in our cabin when we returned.
Saturday, June 17, 2006
At Sea
It’s a long way around the part of France that sticks out into the Atlantic. We’ll spend today sailing up the coast, and then turn the corner into the English Channel this evening. Seas are smooth.
So smooth, in fact, that this afternoon they opened the bridge to guests from 1 pm to 5 pm. This is an opportunity you never have on the huge Caribbean ships, but Voyager’s bridge is no less complicated. The ship’s propulsion is by azipods on the hull, which can be swiveled 360 degrees. Even with these, we learned that yesterday in the Garonne they used the anchor to complete their 180 degree turn without danger of being washed by the tide into the 17-section stone bridge that marks the end of the navigable channel.
The ship was running on autopilot when we visited today, as it usually does, except when in harbor. A tiny wheel, smaller than what you’d find on a go-cart, is the only obvious control. We visited just as the ship was completing its turn into the English channel, a turn that occurred over a distance of eight miles, and required only a one degree adjustment of the azipods.
Oh, and in case you’re wondering, at top speed the coasting distance is half a mile if they don’t reverse the pods.
Dani looked lovely in her new blue gown for our final formal dinner aboard the ship. We had a lovely table and delicious meal. They brough out the good wines, tonight: Pouilly Fuisse by Lois Jadot, and an excellent Chianti Classico by, I think, Binti.
After dinner we caught the last half hour of the show, a Broadway review by singer Amy Baker, and bought a couple of her CDs. Amy has been mingling with the passengers all week, and has quite a following.
Sunday, June 18, 2006
Honfleur, France
The approach to Honfleur took us up the Seine a few kilometers, past the industrial port of Le Havre. We were docked by 8 am. Although only 64 degrees in the morning, the day promised to be sunny and hot.
Dani surprised me with some Father’s Day gifts this morning, and a card from Linda, who sent me an email greeting, too. Originally we had scheduled a hike and visit to a goat farm today, but there weren’t enough others interested, so our tour was cancelled. We decided to explore the village of Honfleur on our own, rather than make the trek to see the Bayeau Tapestry.
What a great plan that turned out to be! Honfleur is a captivating small town just a few minute shuttle ride from the dock. At first it looks too cute to be anything but a tourist trap, but just a block from the waterfront the streets are filled with the “real” France: boulangeries, charcuteries, and wine shops. The local residents come out to walk their dogs and dally over lunch in the hundreds of sidewalk cafes. Heaven.
As in Bordeaux, it was great to blend into the crowd of locals — plus the weekend visitors from Paris — rather than be part of a storm surge of American tourists. That’s probably the biggest advantage of a smaller ship visiting smaller ports.
Dani spent the morning buying a few gifts for friends and more postcards — 37 sent, so far — as we strolled through the backstreets. Most of the tourist shops sell paintings by local artists, gourmet foods, cooking supplies, and souvenirs. The church here is wood, and was built in the 14th century. It looks faintly viking.
At lunch time we pretty much at random selected a sidewalk cafe overlooking the harbor and had a wonderful meal, of salad (lettuce, endive, sun dried tomatoes, and lots of other great stuff) and galettes. A galette is like a crepe, but made of buckwheat and browned with the ingredients in it. Dani had ham and cheese, and I had seafood. On top of mine were the most incredibly delicious baby mussels, a local specialty. Amazingly wonderful food. We dawdled over lunch, enjoying our favorite water, Badoit (two liters! Hey it was hot. ) After lunch we continued browsing, and made it four blocks before we had to stop for chocolate crepes. Yum. Then it was time to head back to the ship and pack. Sigh.
What a great place Honfleur is!
Leaving the harbor, we had a great view of the Pont de La Normandy, a two kilometer long suspension bridge completed in 1995. We also passed the Normandy beaches where the D-Day invasion occurred, which where filled with sunbathers on this beautiful, sunny day. Unfortunately we were too far away to determine the dress code.
We played tea time trivia a couple of times during the cruise, and due to our terrific skill (and considerable leniency in the interpretation of the rules) we won five cruise tokens. So this evening Dani visited the table on the shopping promenade and redeemed them for a sun visor and book mark.
Packing was easy, since we haven’t really bought anything other than a few tiny souvenirs. In fact, as advertised, we’ve spent almost nothing on this cruise. Our final bill included little more than the shore excursions and Internet time. Even the laundry charges were minimal.
The farewell dinner in the Compass Rose was excellent, with prime rib and Caesar salad, and accompanied by Caymus Conundrum and a good Chilean merlot.
Monday, June 19, 2006
London Rubens at the Palace Avenue Q at the Noel Coward Theatre
The Regent Seven Seas Voyager offers normal service on the morning of debarkation, so we had room service breakfast before debarkation. Getting off the ship was easy. We just waiting for our color to be called. It was star salmon. I had no idea star was even a color.
We stepped onto the coach and were on our way for the logarithmic drive to London. I say “logarithmic” because we approached Victoria Station asymptotically, seeming to go slower and slower the closer we got.
Ah, London, city of traffic, bad manners and inedible food. How you draw us back, again and again. And it’s nice to see how the Londoners have embraced the return of the traditional red phone booths. It’s solved the serious problem of what to do with all their trash. They should simply rename them “trash booths. ” Everyone has a cell phone fastened to their ear, anyway, so it make perfect sense. And you can tell when they start to get full, because you can monitor the trash level through the little windows.
It was only a few blocks from Victoria Station to our hotel, Rubens at the Palace, but we were heavily laden, and it was nice to get rid of the bags at the front door. The hotel is called “at the Palace” because it is right across the street from the slave entrance to Buckingham Palace. It’s a fairly nice hotel — for London — with fairly large rooms — for London — and is fairly quiet — for London.
After unpacking we walked down Buckingham Palace Way, looking for some edible food. Then we walked through St. James Park, looking for some edible food. Then we walked through Green Park, looking for some edible food. Then we walked down Piccadilly, looking for some edible food. We went in to Fortnum & Mason’s, a gourmet store. They also have a restaurant, but instead of selling the items they have out front, for some reason they’ve focused on boiled lamb, calf’s liver, and other, even less appetizing items.
Near Piccadilly Circus (it’s not really a circus, you know, just a semi-circle) we found a fairly dressy place called Bentley’s. It was full of business people and we decided to spend an hour with them, looking out of place. The food was surprisingly good, and they had the best mushy peas we’ve had so far this trip. The luncheon entertainment was provided by the woman next to us, who was trying to sell a Frenchman a house. Or lease him a flat. Or sell his current flat. She was certain she could do all these things in two months or less, but I wasn’t convinced.
I’ve been feeling like I’m flirting with a cold, so I started sucking zinc last night, and have continued today. Now I feel like I’m flirting with a cold and have zinc poisoning. Perhaps that accounts for the acerbic wit.
After lunch we found Dani a bargain leather jacket, because she forgot to bring anything warm and it’s going to be down in the 50’s tonight.
Then we walked back to the hotel for a little rest before the show. At 6:30pm we walked to the Hyde Park underground station and took it to Leicester Square. The Noel Coward theater has just reopened after refurbishment, and Avenue Q is still in previews. There was no sign of that in the show, though, which was very polished. It’s a sort of Muppets on steroids musical, with most of the performers carrying a Muppet and acting its part. The show doesn’t seem to have made any concessions for the UK audience, and is still set in Brooklyn. The voices and performances were great, and the set, a miniature city block, does all kinds of tricks. The audience was tremendously enthusiastic. Afterwards most of the restaurants in the West End seemed to be winding down, so we took the tube back and ordered room service before hitting the sack after our busy day.
Tuesday, June 20, 2006
London Lunch at Gordon Ramsay at Claridge’s Coriolanus at Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre
We slept late since we hadn’t gotten to bed until 1am. Then Dani wanted to have her picture taken in front of Buckingham Palace wearing her Buckingham T-Shirt from her performance in Richard III. We stopped at a place called Pronto Manger (not to be confused with the sandwich shop Pret a Manger, of which there is one in every block of London) and purchased a croissant-shaped object we managed to choke down on the way to the palace. It was very crowded in front of the palace because it turned out they were changing the guard. (Why these guys aren’t old enough to change themselves, I don’t know. ) There was a marching band in the palace courtyard which was, oddly enough, playing the theme from Star Trek.
After our photo op we headed back to the hotel to change, then down to Victoria Station to take the underground to Oxford Circus. We strolled around looking in the shop windows for a while ($$$) and then relaxed in a quiet corner of the mezzanine at Claridge’s Hotel until our 2:30pm reservation at Gordon Ramsay’s.
Our six-course lunch consisted of:
Chilled Charentais melon soup, crab vinaigrette
Ballottine of foie gras marinated in Beaumes de Venise, pickled mushrooms, toasted brioche
Roasted sea scallop, broccoli purée, poached quail egg, Port reduction
Steve: Steamed line caught sea bass, crushed Jersey royals, braised radish, asparagus velouté
Dani: Best end of new season Oxfordshire lamb with confit shoulder, spiced aubergin, asparagus, tarragon jus
Steve: French and English cheeses
Dani: Banana and coconut bavarois, passion fruit jelly
Peanut butter parfait with milk mousse, cherry sauce
Including a glass of rose Champagne, a bottle of Chablis and the 12. 5% gratuity, it came to a bit more than . . . Needless to say, we didn’t eat again that day.
I must say that the food was everything we expected, with many surprising flavor combinations, and the service was much less stiff than in most upscale restaurants.
After lunch we strolled up Oxford Street and walked through Marks and Spenser, home of the £500 shirt. After recovering from the sticker shock , we took the underground to St. Paul’s. Linda gave me a laminated pocket map of London or father’s day, and it’s sure been invaluable for navigating the city and the underground. That’s definitely the way to get around in London, rather than sitting in a cab stuck in traffic.
From St. Paul’s it was an easy walk across the Millennium bridge to Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre.
The reconstruction of the Globe was completed in 1999, and it is as accurate as they could make it, not even bowing to modern fire regulations for the most part. The largest part of the audience stands in the “yard” for the entire three-hour performance, but we had seats on the top level, in the front row. I use the term “seats” loosely. It’s a wooden bench about six inches deep, with no back. Cushion rental is another authentic touch, and one we definitely took advantage of. There’s definitely an age gradient of twenty or thirty years between the yard and the top tier!
It actually wasn’t as uncomfortable as I had expected, and the top level front low location allows you to lean on the rail and watch the performance and the people suffering in the yard. It turned cold during the show, and there were quite a few defectors during the interval (insert by Dani: Losers!).
Here’s Dani’s review of Coriolanus:
Well, let me start with my impressions of the building. WOW. We were walking into a building built right where Shakespeare preformed these plays for the very first time more than 400 years ago. How cool is that? And the fact the building looks like the original is even better. It was amazing, like stepping back into a piece of history.
For those of you who don’t know what the globe looks like let me describe “this wooden O” (Henry V Act 1 Scene 1). The building isn’t actually circular but is comprised of twenty sides and is 100 feet in diameter. The rectangular stage juts out into the yard and is graded downward towards the audience (thus leading to the expressions upstage and downstage). The stage is covered by a roof supported by two pillars. There are three levels to view from, the yard (where the plebeians stand), and the middle and upper sections (for nobles and lords). The walls are made of oak beams covered in a lime based plaster.
Coriolanus is about a roman general who fights many battles for Rome and defeats many of their enemies. After his third war they want to make him consul, which requires the support of the people. Unfortunately he is a little egotistical and fails to properly ingratiate himself to the people. When stirred up by the two tribunes, the people riot, demanding his exile. Disgraced, he leaves Rome to return to his old enemy. With their forces, he leads an army to Rome to destroy it. But at its gates, his mother and wife convince him to make peace instead. As a result, his old enemy and new ally turns on him and kills him.
It was very interesting for me to see a professional production of Coriolanus after performing in so much Shakespeare. The show was very good with one glaring exception: the Stage Combat. In Julius Caesar we had a ten minute escrema stick battle followed by three other smaller battles. In this show, they didn’t know how to hold their swords, and there was a thirty second altercation where the only exciting thing to happen was they got one spark off their swords. The rest was very forgettable. But aside from that, the production was very good. Coriolanus’ mother was a remarkable actress. Every word she said was clear and understandable (no mics) and she knew what she was saying. Coriolanus himself was very good but I lost some of what he said when he was being too quiet or yelling too loud.
It was neat to see Shakespeare cold for the first time, without being in it or having read it before. The first ten minutes were rough going, trying to understand, but then something magical happens in your brain and you adjust to the Shakespearian language.
The show was amazing and it was amazing to see it where Shakespeare actually preformed it. To look down at the stage and — even though it’s a recreation — to imagine Romeo and Juliet and Henry V and Julius Caesar, Hamlet, Macbeth being preformed there for the very first time. It’s an incredible feeling.
(Did I mention I love Shakespeare?)
Wednesday, June 21, 2006
London A Midsummer Night’s Dream at the Open Air Theatre
These blackout drapes are essential when it’s only dark a few hours on summer nights, but they have the side effect of causing you to miss the morning. But I guess that’s what vacations are all about. Dani got up at the crack of noon, and we took the tube over to Holborn, having a late lunch at Hason Raja, a recommended Indian restaurant (hey, anything to avoid English food). It started out well, but ended up being fairly mediocre. But it was Dani’s first try at this cuisine, and she enjoyed it.
Then we walked over to the British museum and strolled the galleries for a couple of hours. Dani posed in the same spot by the cat mummies that she did four years ago.
We took the tube (at rush hour!) to Baker Street (which has a new bronze of Sherlock Holmes in front of the station) and walked up into Regent’s Park, stopping to sip coffee by the tennis courts, and watch a tennis lesson. Then we made our way to the Open Air Theater in the park. The theater opens early, and there is outdoor dining and also picnicking on the grass. A cold wind was blowing some clouds in, and we wisely invested in a “picnic rug,” which kept us cozy later on. At the “Barbeque,” we unwisely invested in objects shaped like hamburgers and hotdogs, which were truly appalling.
The production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream we saw was brought back after a very popular run two years ago, and I can see why. I really enjoyed it. It was presented without amplification, except for a bit of singing. Our seats in the third row were perfect. This was a particularly interesting show for Dani, as she has a major part (Helena) in Trinity’s production, which begins rehearsals in August. Here’s her review:
I was a little surprised to walk in and find the stage completely covered in grass. The theater was really neat, it’s completely open air. The seats are arranged like an amphitheatre, but the stage has no back, just trees. It was the perfect setting for A Midsummer Night’s Dream, where much of the action takes place in a forest. It was perfect the way it kept getting darker and darker.
For obvious reasons I watched Helena, for the most part. She was brilliant! Her timing was perfect and she was crystal clear, without sounding like she was yelling. I wish I knew how to project like that. The whole cast had found so many nuances in the text to play with. It was fun watching them, knowing in a month I’ll be rehearsing it.
The acting was very good, especially Helena and Bottom, but what was truly brilliant was the direction. The director found so many spots for wonderful stage action that really accentuated the comedy of the situation. He also added many hilarious gags not evident in the text. The way he coached his actors to characterize themselves was genius. He also had an interesting concept for the fairies, equating them to Peter Pan’s Lost Boys. The show was set in mid-Victorian times for the mortals, but the fairies were unique: bald and filthy, and wearing tattered clothes and work boots. Oberon looked like Elrond from Lord of the Rings.
It was interesting to see that the types of people cast were almost identical to who is cast in Trinity’s production. Bottom is over the top theatrical (David G. ), Oberon is commanding and kingly (David VB. ), Titania is mystical (Lexi). Their casting was perfect, so ours should be to.
I can’t wait to perform this show!
Thursday, June 22, 2006
London Billy Elliot at the Victoria Palace Theatre Dinner at Le Gavroche
We finished our trip off with a highly anticipated visit to Billy Elliot, The Musical. The show, based upon a surprise hit movie, has a fantastic score by Elton John.
We had high expectations for Billy Elliot, and I was afraid the show might not live up to them, but it definitely did. I’d have to place it right up there with Wicked as one of the greatest shows I’ve seen. The story, the songs, performances and dancing were all exceptional. 12-year-old Liam Mower, as Billy Elliot, is a phenomenon. He’s one of five boys who alternate in the role, but it’s hard to imagine he’s not the very best.
Because of the subject matter — Labour vs. Conservative party, coal miner’s strike, adolescent homosexuality, and a deluge of four-letter words — it’s hard to imagine this musical ever playing in America in its current form. That’s a shame, because it really is an experience. In retrospect, I wish we had another day here in London to see it again (although it’s sold out for months).
After the theater we took the tube to Marble Arch and walked to La Gavroche. This classic French restaurant opened in 1967, and was London’s first Michelin three-star (although since it was taken over by the founder’s son it is now two.
Although expensive, our nine-course dinner (mine matched with seven wines) was no more than lunch Tuesday — an exceptional buy, given the perfect food, service and wines. In fact, I’ve never had wines close to this caliber in a food and wine pairing dinner. Perhaps the best course was the fois gras accompanied by duck pastilla with cinnamon, matched with an Alsatian Gewürztraminer. Heaven. And they also had the most extensive selection of French cheeses I’ve encountered. Even Dani enjoyed a few of them. Our three and a half hours at table seemed to fly past. Then it was back to the hotel to pack and sleep before our early morning call .
Friday, June 23, 2006
London to Orlando
Up at 6am, that’s a change! It was easier hauling the luggage the four block to Victoria Station than the other direction, due to it being slightly downhill. The Gatwick Express runs every 15 minutes, so we climbed right on and were at the airport in a half hour. We had a fairly appalling breakfast and then hung out in the terminal for several hours, Dani working on her book, and I reading Michael Connelly’s The Last Coyote (already listened to it on tape, but it’s probably his best work). Meanwhile Dani is reading an earlier novel in the same series, The Black Echo.
The Virgin flight was a nonstop to Orlando in a little over eight hours. Just enough time for both of us to finish our books. It’s a bit of a pain to clear customs in Orlando, because you have to wait for your bags, clear, and then recheck them, then wait for them again at baggage claim. The first wait was short, the second loooong, but we spent it telling Linda all about the trip.
Then it was home to our comfy beds and a shower that doesn’t require contortionism.
Dani’s final postcard tally for the trip: 44.
Nice things about the Regent Seven Seas Voyager
No tipping
Free beverages including almost all alcohol, plus bottled water for shore excursions
Free self-service laundry (use it early in the cruise)
Unbelievable service from everybody
Food presentation beautiful
Fresh flowers everywhere
24 hour espresso bar (free, of course)
Nice theater and (largely unused) lounge
Extensive DVD library
Relatively inexpensive Internet, with good wireless connectivity
Not-so-Nice things about the Regent Seven Seas Voyager
Somewhat rattle-prone cabin and a fairly rocky ride at the back if the seas are heavy
Guest chef menus were not as good as the regular ship’s menus
Small casino with no video poker (not that I cared. )
Small pool (I saw two kids in it once, so it’s not a pool kind of cruise)
No greasy pizza
Some Tips for Next Time
Transfers to and from the ship are expensive unless you get a package that includes hotel. The offered hotels in Monte Carlo and London were very expensive, but in retrospect, spending a night in Monte Carlo might have been cheaper than the transfer.
The Rubens was an excellent price. Its proximity to Victoria Station was great for the transfers, although the disadvantage of the Victoria Underground is that you must make a connection to get to most places in the city.
The Meridien in the West End might be the most convenient hotel location for London theatre.
Ron and Bev Siegel invited us to dinner and tasting at Victoria & Albert’s in Disney’s Grand Floridian. Unfortunately my Dad was in town so we couldn’t both go. Linda drew the short straw. Joining us were John and Amy from Brio and Gary and Trish.
The original plan was to do another Tasting of the Century, but neither Ron nor I could find any wines from the 1910s. So we ended up with a collection of great wines from great years. We also planned to serve the wines in pairs, but Israel kindly provided enough Riedel crystal that we always had four to six wines on the table at a time.
Chef Scott had the night off, but Chef Aimee provided us with great food, and was very generous with both the Osetra and the white truffles.
Our six hours at table sped by and V&A outdid themselves on both food and service.
The Line Up
Chef’s table (is the room listing?)
Menu
Tasting Notes
1995
Taittanger
Comtes Champagne
Youthful color, clean citrus and pear nose, nice effervescence, good match with the caviar.
93 points
1929
Chambertin
Francois Moret & cie.
Dark garnet, sour cherries all the way through, developing some sweetness after 20 minutes, also lots of mineral in the nose, with wood showing up later, iron in the mouth, leather finish
98 points
1947
Chambertin
Jaboulet
Medium brown, sweet, earthy, leather and bacon fat in the nose, medium body, a floral, woody finish
96 points
1934
Corton
Bouchard Pere et Fils.
Good color, a strong, somewhat peculiar nose redolent of iron and mushrooms, soft on the palate, with roses, vanilla, wood and pine in the finish
91 points
1959
Corton
Charles Vienot
Good color, very balanced and fruity, mint, youthful, cinnamon and vanilla in the finish
94 points
1994
Chassagne Montrachet
“Les Ruchottes”
Ramonet
Butter, vanilla, long, a perfect match for lobster and the risotto
97 points
1921
Ch. Rauzan Gassies
Margaux
Dark brown/garnet, wax, mint and intense wood nose, long, vanilla, very young and feminine, fresh sawn wood developed in the nose after 30 minutes
95 points
1929
Ch. Talbot
St. Julian
Great color, looks like a wine from the 70s. Tight nose. Youthful tasting but thin. Wood and chalk in the finish
92 points
1997
Ch. Suidiraut
Sauternes
Great color, figs and sugar in the nose, white raisins, not Yquem but nice
93 points
1959
Ch. Margaux
This was a very mysterious wine. It’s very famous, yet I’ve had it three times and never been impressed. This one was unlike any Margaux, with green wood and chalk coming though an otherwise tight nose. Flavors of green olives, with a bitter, hard-edged finish. The label was almost faded to nothing, yet the fill was superb. Was this really 59 Margaux?
89 points
1961
Calon Segur
St. Estephe
Intense Andes chocolate mint nose, dust, soft on the palate, bleu cheese and mushroom in the finish. A very interesting Bordeaux.
93 points
1968
BV Georges de Latour
Private Reserve
Cabernet Sauvignon
This was the other bizarre wine of the evening. I’ve had this wine at least 50 times, but never a bottle like this. It was from a new lot of seven purchased from K&L Wines in Ca, and looked pristine. The wine was drinking at least 20 years younger than any previous sample. Dark, ruby, wood, fruit, Rutherford dust, balanced, tannic closed. It will be interesting to try a second one from this lot and compare.
95 points
1978
La Mission Haut Brion
Very dusty nose, peppers, tight, big, chalk, gravel, typical graves, tobacco finish. A really nice Bordeaux
94 points
1905
Oloroso
Sherry
This type of sherry is made by oxidizing during fermentation (no “flor” of mold on top) and then aging like wine. It is completely dry fermented. Although it might have gone with the cheese, it was a terrible match with dessert. Clean phenolic nose, very aromatic, floral, extremely long, shocking dryness, leaving wood and a bitter aftertaste.
88 points
1998
Chateaneuf du Pape
Cuvee Marie Beurrier
Henri Bonneau
Medium to light bodied, slightly sour, cherry/kirsh flavors, gamey nose.
On the spur of the moment Ron and Bev invited me to lunch at Emeril’s, where I joined several sommeliers form around town. Present were: JP from Emeril’s, John from Brio, David from Le Coq au Vin, and Rhett from B-21.
We spent five hours(!) at table, but the time seemed to fly. The food was excellent, consisting of six courses: soft shell crab, calamari, andouille sausage, halibut, veal and pork.
I took a 47 Chambertin, a 61 Volnay-Champans, 84 Longoria Pinot Noir and a 2003 Henry’s Drive Reserve Shiraz. Most held up pretty well under the assault of Ron’s 100-point wines.
The wines:
1981 Ch. Laville Haut Brion Great bright light straw color. Candle wax, citrus, butter, chalk, charred barrel
94 pts
1994 Beringer Sbraga Chardonnay Dark amber. Oxidized, over the hill.
no rating
1959 Ruchottes-Chambertin, Domaine Thomas Muddy but fairly dark. Menthol nose. Varietal but thin. Clean.
80 pts
1964 Grands-Echezeaux, Leroy Strong mint, cedar, cherry, balanced, clean, slow to evolve, sweet finish. A great burgundy.
94 pts
1961 Volnay-Champans, Antoine Clavalier Closed nose, a bit peppery. Not much fruit left.
84 pts
1947 Chambertin, Caves du Maxim’s Inky, huge, Bordeaux-like, very big. Chocolate, bacon, cherry, long balanced, tar and coffee finish.
96 pts
1984 Longoria Pinot Noir Rick Longoria was the original winemaker at Gainey, and for three years made his own wines, too. When Gainey felt it was a conflict of interest he abandoned his own label for a decade. Now Longoria wines are some of the best that are produced in the Santa Ynez Valley. When I originally tasted this wine in the mid 80s I felt it was the only truly Burgundian Pinot Noir I’d ever had from California, and I’d saved this last bottle all these years, waiting for a chance to match it with great Burgundies. It exceeded my expectations, and now drinks like great, old Burgundy. Earthy, dried roses, coffee, leather, fading a bit in the finish. A remarkable effort.
97 pts
1982 Ch. Pichon Longueville, Comtesse de Lalande Classic Puillac, lead pencil, big but still tight, somewhat sweet, extremely chewy. Reputed winner of most 82 taste-offs. A great wine.
98 pts
1982 Ch. Cheval Blanc My usual favorite 82. Fruity, complex herbaceous mint, tar and coffee. Chewy. Aside from Haut Brion probably the best 82 right now.
99 pts
2002 Sine Qua Non “Just For the Love of It” The only wine I’ve ever had that misspelled its own name on the label (“Sine Quinine”). Huge blueberries, chocolate. Long and woody.
93 pts
2003 Henry’s Drive Reserve Shiraz Intense mint chocolate. (Did I say Intense?!) Like a box of Andes mints. But lots of other underlying complexity, too. Woody, balanced, great fruit. $45?!!
99 pts
1982 Grange Only the second Grange I’ve every encountered that was ready to drink. There’s something about the way the fruit ages that bugs me about Grange. It seems like the window of enjoyment is narrow. Woody, balanced, huge Aussie style, but fruit fading a bit.
95 pts
1995 Cuvee Madame Monbalsillac This smelled like a great Yquem. Unfortunately the acid is pretty low. Botrytis, apples, caramel, but unidimensional in the mouth. Not worth $125 a tenth I think, probably better to either go cheap or get the real thing.
92 pts
It was a really lovely afternoon, and very generous of Ron and Bev to include me in their plans.
The day mercifully didn’t start out at the crack of dawn. We had an 11:35 direct flight to New York. The flight was rescheduled to 11:20 so we were a little worried about being late, but upon arriving at the airport we learned that due to the outer bands of Hurricane Denis the flight had been delayed to 11:40 so it didn’t really matter.
Instead of flying Delta like we normally do we tried their new commuter airline Song. It was wonderful, there are touch screens in the seats to play with that offer 24 TV channels, games, movies, and a trivia game for all the passengers. Song also offers real food for lunch. Unfortunately also due to Denis there was a lot of mild turbulence so the food couldn’t be served until the end and we were in the back of the plane but C’est la vie.
Mom and Dad were playing the trivia game and losing terribly but not for lack of trying, or so I’m told. Every time they tried to hit one answer the plane would rock and they would miss the answer they had intended. Mom gave up after one round but Dad hung in there for the second half of the flight and won the game 3 seconds before we arrived at our New York terminal.
So that we wouldn’t have to mess with finding a cab we had asked the hotel to send a car for us once we arrived. The city is a little like Los Angeles only cleaner, safer and with less graffiti. The city is so TALL!!! It’s much taller than LA. As we were driving from JFK towards the city but hadn’t gone through the tunnel yet it looked a lot like I expected it to. Some twenty or thirty story buildings mixed in with some smaller ones, billboards for upcoming Broadway shows, and very dirty. But once we got onto Manhattan itself the city was beautiful. It was very clean by comparison and the buildings are so TALL!!! I think I’m in love with this city. Even though there are no patches of grass the city is much greener than I expected. A lot of the major streets have fairly large (fifteen or twenty foot) trees planted along them. It is a beautiful city.
We are staying at the Waldorf Towers, in the Presidential Suite no less. Well, that’s not exactly true. We’re staying in a “sub-Suite” of the Presidential Suite. There is a main door to the Presidential Suite but there is also another door that can be closed to make the whole wing part of the Suite. It’s a very nice room with twelve-foot ceilings and tasteful decorations. There is one king-sized bed and a rollaway that fits nicely in the corner.
We were offered a tour of the Presidential Suite after our luggage arrived. It is to say the least large, not including its two sub-Suites. Some of the more famous patrons of the Suite include:
Every President of the US (Since 1931)
Queen Elizabeth II, England
King Hussein, Jordan
King Saud, Saudi Arabia
General Charles de Gaulle, France
Chairman Nikita Krushchev, Soviet Union
Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion, Israel
Prime Minister Menachem Begin, Israel
Premier Giulio Andreotti, Italy
President Valery Giscard D’Estaing, France
Emperor and Empress Hirohito, Japan
King Juan Carlos I, Spain
President Nicolae Ceausesch, Romania
King Olav V, Norway
King Faisal, Saudi Arabia
Mr. and Mrs. and Miss Alcorn, USA
Well okay, I made the last one up, but still. It’s pretty impressive.
Because we hadn’t eaten all day at 3:30 we decided to have a very late lunch. Given our disheveled appearance after 2 hours on a plane we elected to try the only restaurant in the hotel that would permit our (okay, my) blasphemous jeans to enter their premises, Oscar’s.
Big mistake. The food was okay but our waiter (his name tag actually said “bus boy”) Victor seemed to have been temporally slowed down to some degree. After sitting at our table for, oh, about half an hour he walked past and caught Dad’s meaningful glare and said with great surprise, “Oh, you’re ready to order now?”
The meal proceeded on along those lines until after 5:30. The people seated next to us, at his only other table, scarily enough, got up and left without signing their check, to our great amusement.
The thing that strikes me about New York is how expensive everything is. All I had was a hamburger and fries (the fries didn’t actually come with the hamburger, we ordered them separately). It cost 21 dollars!! After such a LATE lunch we didn’t see the point in dinner so we retired early to our room for a quiet evening.
Day 2, 7/10/05 Lion King
Dad and I ventured down to the 26th floor this morning for a continental breakfast. They had some good croissants (not La Duree, but hey) and some chocolate croissants filled with dark chocolate, good enough that a second one found its way onto my plate. We didn’t have too much time before lunch so we just went back up to the room.
Lunch was at a Parisian brasserie/bakery called Balthazar. It was a recommendation of Ron Siegel’s. Initially when we went in I was skeptical. There was not a soft surface in the place, so it echoed terribly. It was difficult to tell if it was old or just trying to look old. It had huge mirrors on all the walls that looked to be made out of a collection of old mirrors. None of them matched. I had the soup of the day, chilled carrot. It was delicious. Instantly all my skepticism evaporated. Mom had what she called “The best fois gras of my life” but I thought it was terrible. For our main course Dad and I had smoked salmon and Mom had beef stroganoff. The only weird thing about the whole meal was my coke; it tasted more like a drainage treatment solution than a fizzy beverage, but we had plenty of San Pelegrino. Dessert was a chocolate mousse that was to die for.
We had arrived early for lunch so we were done by 1:00. The Lion King tickets weren’t until 3:00 so we decided to stroll around the campus of NYU witch was only a block away. It was odd, without being told it was a campus I never would have guessed. It just seems like part of the city.
Mom had tried to find a pair of sunglasses that weren’t $65 at the hotel and failed, so she went into a grocery store at the campus. It was HOT out so Dad and I decided to check out the frozen food for a while. The only hint that we were in a college town was the fact that everything in the store was teenager sized. Mom also found some nice looking cheap sunglasses too.
After that it was time to head to the New Amsterdam Theater on Broadway to see Disney’s The Lion King. When I was nine we saw Lion King in Toronto but this was going to be my first “real” Broadway experience. I was pretty calm and collected while we waited outside the theater doors but about ten minuets before they opened the excitement bubbled to the surface. At long last the doors opened and I got my first look at a real theater. It was beautiful. We had the best seats in the house: first row, center on the mezzanine. The wide sweeping ceilings had beautiful paintings and gilt, the seats were made of green velvet. It was one of the most beautiful places I have ever been. When the lights finally dimmed and the curtain rose I think I was the happiest person on the continent.
The show was even better than I remembered. I had forgotten how good it was. The young Simba and Nala were exceptional! It was such a great show. There wasn’t an inch of the stage that didn’t do something. There were at least three trapdoors and a staircase (Pride Rock) would rise in and out of the floor. The back half of the stage would raise up to about a 25-degree angle. They had plants that would inflate out of the floor and steam jets too. It was amazing. The lighting was superb, too, and the costumes. There was one cheetah that was simply breathtaking. The way the head moved it really looked like a cheetah. It was incredible.
After the show we bough a program and a shirt that had a painting of Scar’s mask that says, “I’m surrounded by idiots”.
We had already wandered around Times Square so we just walked back to the hotel. Dad had been sick all through the last week so he was pretty tired. Instead of going out we had dinner at the Japanese place in the hotel. It was good, I had Chicken Teriyaki and a really weird dessert. It was called “White Chocolate Ice Berg Floating on Deep Blue Ocean”, no I’m not kidding. The ocean wasn’t very deep blue, it appeared to be Lime Jell-O with white chocolate mixed in. It was served in a dark blue bowl with a long curved stem that split into three. It should have been on Star Trek. The only thing normal about it was the iceberg (white chocolate mouse).
All in all it was a very good day.
Day 3, 7/11/05 Sightseeing
Again Dad and I had a continental breakfast. Today was the only day we didn’t have a play so it was our sightseeing day. We all went down to the lobby and asked the concierge to recommend a tour. We ended up booking a two-hour boat trip that did a complete circle around Manhattan Island. It didn’t leave until 1:30 so we had some time for lunch. We wandered around for a while until we came to a Houston’s. It was very good. Mom and Dad ordered half-pound burgers. I, opting for something lighter, ordered a French dip sandwich au jus. Unfortunately I didn’t realize it was covered in mayonnaise. Dad and I switched orders and he says it was the best French diphe’s ever had. I’m happy for him.
We didn’t realize how much the previous day’s activities had taken out of Dad. He ended up opting out of our planned sightseeing for a quiet day in the room. Mom and I caught a cab at the front of the hotel with plenty of time. The cab driver got to the corner of our hotel, made a right turn and was pulled over by a cop. Apparently the road we were on was a thru fare on weekdays and we had made an illegal turn. The cops wanting to thoroughly assert their authority over him made us wait, and wait and wait. After about ten minuets with no sign of the cops, Mom decided to bail on our poor cab driver. Having not even made it past our hotel we simply walked through another door, through the lobby and out the front again. A very confused looking bellman hailed us another cab. Once we got in and told him we wanted pier 78 and had to be there in 15 minutes. Nearing the corner of our hotel cab driver number two looked like he was about to make the same turn our last poor driver made. Mom quickly explained the fate of our last driver and he said “Oh yeah, I fuggot abou’ tha’. ” Surveying the traffic he asked me where the cops were. I told him they had just gotten out of their car and were walking towards our poor cab driver. He located a very large delivery truck and hid behind it while making the same illegal turn.
Now unfortunately traffic was bumper to bumper. I said that our boat left at 1:30, well, we arrived and 1:28. We ran down the pier and thrust our tickets at the man. He said, “Oh you need boarding passes to get on. ” I ran to the ticket office line where he had said to get them and encountered a man in front of me who had no idea what he wanted. As I stood in line for five minuets trying to be patient with the absolute moron in front of me I was sure that the boat was going to leave without us. Finally he left and I obtained boarding passes. As Mom and I stepped onto the boat they shoved off. Phew!
It was sort of funny: our guide’s name on the boat tour was Noah.
He was very personable and cracked a lot of jokes, he also knew a LOT about New York. He made a lot of potentially dull information very interesting.
Because it was Cole’s birthday today I used my new cell phone to call her. We suffered from a bad connection and I had to redial her SIX TIMES!!
Dad was still pretty pooped when we got back to the hotel. We decided to cancel our dinner plans and have it at the Bull and Bear downstairs. It was delicious. I had a Queen cut of Prime Rib with garlic-mashed potatoes. Mom had a strip steak and Dad had Surf and Turf with some of the best lobster I’ve ever tasted. Desert was to die for. It was a real New York Cheesecake drizzled with strawberry sauce.
Another great day.
Day 4, 7/12/05 Spamalot
Yesterday the maid had accidentally turned on our alarm, it went off at 6:30. So Dad, planning ahead laszt night, turned the alarm to 10:00 instead, because we couldn’t figure how to turn it off. Still, it woke us up.
The continental breakfast is only served until 10:00 but there wasn’t much point anyway because we had a 12:00 lunch reservation at Jean Georges. Instead of having a normal menu it has a tasting menu at lunch so you pick two or three things to try. They looked so good we decided to try three. Amazingly, the courses were only $12 each.
This was the best meal I think any of us has ever had. Every dish was an explosion of flavor. My favorite was Dad’s scallop dish. Mom and Dad liked his sea bass. The meal was too good to express with words. There was a REAL cheese tray. Mom couldn’t remember the last time she had a real one. There were about twenty different cheeses to choose from. She was in heaven. I personally thought they stunk (well they did!).
Dessert was the most amazing part for Mom and I. It was a Jean Georges’ specialty, marshmallows, coffee, mint or vanilla. They were not exactly the consistency of a normal marshmallow they were a little softer. Dad turned his nose up but we thought they were great.
We returned to the hotel for a quiet afternoon.
At 6:30 we left the hotel headed for Spamalot, the hottest ticket on Broadway right now. I wasn’t as thrilled about it as I am about Wicked or I was about Lion King because it’s based on Monty Python’s Quest for the Holy Grail. Dad is the real Monty Python fan but Mom likes it okay, too.
Spamalot was playing in the Schubert Theater. The show stars Tim Curry as King Arthur, David Hyde Pierce (Niles from Frasier) as Gallahad, and Hank Azaria (voice of Homer Simpson) as Lancelot.
We had pretty good seats as far as location goes, they were second row balcony, but the seats were so uncomfortable!!! There was no leg room. And normally when someone tells you there was no leg room it means they only had a couple of inches between their knees and the seat in front of them but in this case “no leg room” means that my shins were digging into the seat in front of me. I bruised the right one from prolonged pressure. There were literally only seven inches between the seat and the one in front of it.
It turned out that the show was GREAT. We all loved it. We were all laughing so hard!! The cast was the original Broadway cast and you could tell, they had the audience in the palms of their hands. The show was just so funny. They had their timing down to a science. It was truly amazing that a line as simple as “Well, I guess we’d better go and find some Jews” could bring the house down.
Sarah Ramirez was incredible as the Lady of the Lake. Her range was amazing; there was no style she couldn’t sing in. She also had this really funny number called “The Diva’s Lament” in the middle of the 2nd act (she doesn’t have much to do in the 2nd act). In it she asks the audience “what happened to my part?”. It ends with her yelling for someone to call her agent. After haughtily finishing and stalking off stage the action continues as though uninterrupted. Reading her bio I discovered that among one of her less prodigious roles was the cashier in “You’ve Got Mail”.
Spamalot was the funniest show we’ve seen!!!
After purchasing a “Fechez la Vache” t-shirt, a pair of coconuts, a program and a killer rabbit puppet, we crossed the street and had dinner at an after Broadway standard, Sardi’s.
It was really good. I had Shrimp Sardi’s and Chicken. Mom and Dad both had cannelloni. The walls were lined with caricatures of famous Broadway stars. It was a really neat place. We all had a really good time.
Day 5, 7/13/05 Wicked
We woke up really late today (we didn’t start dinner until 10:00 last night). We elected to cancel our lunch reservation at the trendy La Bernardin and go to a tourist standard, Tavern on the Green.
Tavern on the Green has lots and lots of dining rooms. There is a hallway covered in stained glass and mirrors that curves around and eventually leads to a conveniently placed gift shop and several of the dining rooms. The one we ate in was pretty, with a view of the garden. It looked like we were eating inside an Easter egg. The colors were all pale yellow, pink, and blue. There were at least six miss-matched chandeliers hanging from the ceiling. It was a nice meal.
Tavern on the Green is located in Central Park. We hadn’t intended to stay afterwards but there were carriage rides launching from outside the restaurant. We took a 45-minute ride around the park. We had a nice Irish driver and a horse named Jimmy. He told us all about Central Park and he drove us past the statue of Balto, the boat launching station (kayaks), and the rows of famous writer statues.
Jimmy had a very plodding gait until we were about two minutes from his stable. Then he didn’t understand why a simple red light ought to keep him from his oats. It was fun. The carriage was white with red velvet seats.
Central Park is nice, much nicer than I imagined. The trees are big, beautiful and green. It was quite a shock to see green after so much gray. I felt really safe while we were going around, and it didn’t have anything to do with the two-ton horse attached to our carriage. There are also some really scenic places in Central Park by the waterways. It was a really enjoyable afternoon.
We went back to the hotel around 4:30 to let Dad rest until Wicked. All afternoon I had been so excited I could barely sit still. After all, I have been waiting for more than 6 months to see this show. Finally at 6:30 I couldn’t take it anymore and started getting ready to go out.
It’s funny, no one seems to take Broadway seriously anymore. Everybody wants to go, but nobody wants to dress up for it. Admittedly Lion King is a kids’ show and we were going to a Sunday matinee but the dress for Spamalot was pathetic.
Well, even if no one else dresses up for Broadway, Wicked was my favorite show and I was going to look good for it. I silently kicked myself for forgetting my green blouse (get it?) but got dressed in a blue blouse, long black skirt, and black vest. The show was at 8:00 so we wanted to leave the hotel at 7:00 to allow plenty of time.
We encountered a problem downstairs. The theater was only eight blocks away but eight blocks in high heals seems like eighty, so we were going to take a cab, as were twelve other couples. At this point I started to panic, I was NOT going to miss the opening of Wicked. But luck was in our favor, a limo driver capitalizing on the lack of cabs in the vicinity offered to take us the eight blocks for $45 + tip. Okay, whatever, just get us there in time for the show.
It ended up being a good thing because, fishing for more business, he offered to pick us up from the hotel the next morning for our flight. We arrived at the theater with plenty of time to spare.
Our seats were REALLY GOOD!!! Third row, center section. OH MY GOD!!! We sat down and I was in shock. I knew we had good seats but this was unbelievable. This theater was more modern than the other theaters we’d been in. This one felt newer, the seats were wide with lots of leg room and it was a lot bigger.
The other shows’ sets somewhat extended into the theaters, but this one was just incredible. The whole proscenium was covered with gears. Some of the gears were decorative but others actually worked. There were also dead vines over everything. Elaborate sets on each side of the stage incorporated balconies and staircases. A huge tin dragon hung above the arch of the stage, animated by cables!!
Finally the show started, and WOW!! This was no longer the Broadway cast, but everyone was so good!! The lead was a look alike for Idina Menzel the original Elphaba. She sounded like her, and she looked just like her.
After listening to the music for six months I was still blown away by all the story that you can’t necessarily get from the music. It was so cool to see all of the acting that went into the songs that made them so great. All of the characters were so REAL. I have seen some great theater but if the best thing I ever saw was a 10 this was an 11. All of the talent that went into the show was just so good.
The number that really surprised me was “No Good Deed. ” On the CD it is a really good song, but live it stopped the show.
Because of where our seats were it felt like we were getting a private show for the first five rows of the audience. All of the major action of the show took place on the right side of the stage, literally ten feet in front of us. TEN FEET!! It was like they were telling this story to us. You could see all of their facial expressions and it was just so cool.
There were two wings of the stage that came out on either side of the orchestra pit and most of the major action happened on that wing right in front of us. I have never had an experience quite like this.
It was just a phenomenal show. I loved every minute of it. At the end of the show we would all have happily gone back in and watched it again.
After the show was over we loaded up on souvenirs, a Wicked shirt that says “Defy Gravity” on the back, a coffee cup, a program, a baseball hat, and a jacket.
My parents were hungry after the show so we went to the Stage Deli (recommended by Thomas) and they had sandwiches larger than their heads. I was too excited to eat.
Rome, Rome, Venice, Florence, Naples, Pisa, Athens, Ephesus, Monte Carlo, Barcelona
Tuesday, June 8, 2004
Orlando to Paris
Last month Linda sold her Mitsubishi Eclipse to a friend and is driving a rental car until the 2005 RX8s are available, so it was very convenient to drive to the airport Tuesday morning and simply abandon the car. We had a long layover in Miami, spent in the Air France lounge. Security in Miami is ludicrous. At the entrance to the escalator they check your passport and boarding pass. Then, at the top of the escalator there is a line for the metal detectors. Before you may enter the line they check your passport and boarding pass. After passing through the metal detector, you enter the terminal, but first — you guessed it — they check your passport and boarding pass. There is no way for anyone to enter or exit this process between start and finish, so what is the point. . . other than to spend your tax dollars?
Because the terminals at Miami are connected by an unsecured area, you must do this even to change flights. And since we originally were looking for the Air France lounge in the Air France terminal (silly us), we ended up having to clear security three times Tuesday. That means Linda’s purse went through the X-ray machine three times. Yet when we arrived in France and she emptied her purse, in the bottom she found a full-size Swiss Army knife! Now don’t you feel secure?
Dinner on Air France was very good: smoked duck salad, scallops and shrimp, and a nice steak. Dani and Linda slept, I listened to an audiobook of Mystic River, extremely well-read. (Has anyone ever actually been able to use those in-seat video screens, or are they perpetually being “reloaded”?)
Wednesday, June 9, 2004
Paris
Henry, Marjolaine and Nathaniel met us at Charles de Gaul airport Wednesday morning. Four of our five bags showed up. The other — Dani’s — was nowhere to be found. While Nathaniel played with the parachute toy we’d brought him I visited baggage services and was eventually directed to a different carousel where I was told the lost bag would emerge. Three seconds later the power went out in the building and the carousels all stopped. (Henry says the electrical workers are striking by cutting power periodically. That’s so French!)After about five minutes a head poked out from between the flaps at the conveyor entrance and then the missing bag was pushed through. I wish I had that on film. It took two cars to transport the six people, five bags, three carryons and one parachute toy to the Holiday Inn Paris Disneyland, about a mile from Henry’s house and Alcorn McBride sarl. The hotel is touristy, but quite nice, with spacious rooms that are an interesting cross between American and European accommodations.
We took a several-hour-long nap and then Henry picked us up for a trip to the market to buy dinner. Grocery shopping is one of my favorite activities in France. Auchon at the mall in Marne la Valee is like a giant toy store for hungry adults. Bread, wine, pate and stinky cheese — we were set. Off to Henry and Marjolaine’s for a relaxing dinner outside, overlooking the valley. The weather was in the low 80s, and the food and company were excellent. In true European style, dinner ended about 11pm.
Thursday, June 10, 2004
Paris Disneyland
We sort of missed Thursday morning. I can’t remember the last time I slept 11 hours. But we were up in time for lunch with Henry and Jean Marc (head of A/V for DLPI) at Walt’s, on Main Street in the Magic Kingdom.
We did a little theme-parking:
Pinocchio Same as Florida as far as I could tell.
Pirates The best of the three I’ve been on. The scenes are in a different order, but it’s closer to CA than FL. The dueling pirates were moving, but they are no longer making contact.
Haunted Mansion The best of the three I’ve been on. It’s audio is MUCH better than the others, there is more story line, and a whole section of western sets at the end.
Big Thunder About twice as long as the CA or FL versions. Henry spent most of the day on the phone with customers. As it happens he was in the process of answering his cell yet again as the Big Thunder cameras snapped our picture. I wonder what the customers thought of the screaming in the background?
The Dragon Few people discover this well-animated dragon that is sleeping(?) in the dungeon under the castle.
Auto Stunt Show We drove over to the second gate, a very modest implementation of Disney Studios. There are only a handful of attractions here, although we understand they are going to add Tower of Terror if they can figure out where to get the power. Henry says they may have to synchronize with Rock ‘n Roller so they don’t both launch at the same time! The stunt show was very interesting to car aficionados, and even those of us with not automotive genes were impressed by the precision driving (skidding?) ballet. Like most stunt shows it would have been better without the fake movie shoot plot.
Cinemagique This was the best show of the day. It’s a beautiful theater with great audio. During the show a guest with a cell-phone (not Henry) is chased “through” the screen and finds himself pursued through a montage of famous movies, from silent to sci-fi. The screen transitions are pretty amazing, and the use of both English and French works extremely well. This show was considered for use at Disney MGM studios, but I think it’s a bit too long for American attention spans.
We had a nice dinner at Chiny Cottage, a little house-turned-restaurant on the way to Lagny. Linda and I had been there in 1992 and it was still good, if a bit expensive for what it was.
Friday, June 11, 2004
Provins
Dani and I nibbled at a truly appalling breakfast at the hotel (sort of an American version of a German buffet?!!) and then I headed to the office for a couple of hours. At lunchtime the five of us met up and headed for the medieval city of Provins, about 30 miles southeast of Marne La Valee.
At La Fleur de Sel creperie we had some delicious jambon, gruyere, eouf and ongion crepes, followed by chocolate or caramel and butter crepes. Yum.
Then we explored the Tour Cesar, begun in 1152. It perches atop a hill in the center of the walled city. Visitors can squeeze their way through increasingly narrow stone passages, all the way to the bell tower (that part’s almost brand new, having been added in 1689).
For dinner we went into Paris to one of only 25 Michelin three-star restaurants in France, Arpège. Words cannot express the quality of this meal. Numbers cannot express the price of this meal. Well, possibly using scientific notation. Each course had layers of subtly complex flavors, particularly the vegetables, which are the chef’s specialties. We had:
A glass of 1996 Taittinger Champagne from magnum, bottled for the restaurant.
Incredible artisan bread and butter.
Amuse Bouch consisting of a small egg, served in its shell, with honey and vinegar cream.
1997 Clos de la Roche, a deep and complex Burgundy.
Various vegetables including carmelized onions au gratin and green beans with almonds. Dani had Osetra caviar, which was sufficient to serve the table.
A consume containing stuffed ravioli with spiced cumin.
(At this point in the meal I went out and quickly sold Henry’s car so that we could continue eating. )
Main courses including lobster, chicken and squid.
An incredible cheese cart, from which we selected twelve cheeses.
A variety of small pastries (to get us ready for dessert).
Various desserts including chocolate souffle, Mille Feuille and tomatoes(!) that had been basted with vanilla and a dozen other spices for most of the day.
Coffee and herbal tea.
Saturday, June 12, 2004
Chalifert
We spent a quiet day at Henry and Marjolaine’s house in Chalifert. Linda alternately read a book in the back yard and wrestled with the washing machine, which, like all French washers, is the size of a coffee grinder and similar in results. Dani, Henry and I went to the mall for a little shopping and groceries and when we got back home Marjolaine had returned from her mother’s with Zacharie, who is one year old. He is very cute and inquisitive. We made it an early night, so we could get up early to drive to Paris.
Sunday, June 13, 2004
Paris
Henry picked us up at 9am to go to our favorite breakfast spot, La Duree. After some delicious croissants and pain au chocolat we stopped on the Champs Elysee. While Henry had a short meeting about show control programming at the Renault showroom Dani, Linda and I walked up to l’Arc de Triomphe.
Then it was on to the Louvre so that Dani could visit locations mentioned in The Da Vinci Code (which she finished yesterday).
I’ll skip the explanation so there are no spoilers, but it was fun taking pictures of all the tourists taking pictures of La Jaconde (the Mona Lisa).
Not only is she smiling, she’s saying cheese.
We also visited the apartments of Napoleon III.
Why is this gargoyle wearing a German helmet?
Henry was somewhat disgruntled that we dragged him to a hot dog stand next to Notre Dame for lunch, but that was where Dani had a fondly remembered hot dog three years ago after four days in food hell (i. e. London). I’m not sure this hotdog was quite as good, but it was filling.
We made a brief stop to take a photo in front of La Tour Eiffel, and then headed back to the hotel for a couple of hours before our farewell dinner at Henry’s home.
Monday, June 14, 2004
Paris to Rome
In the morning Dani, Henry and I had breakfast at Paul, a tea house at the mall. It’s one outlet of a bakery established in 1889. The French bread flute and coffee were delicious. After a brief stop at the office to take photos and check email we picked up Linda and headed to the airport. The brasserie lunch we shared with Henry at the airport was really quite good. Then we bid Henry goodbye and headed for Rome. Just to show you that airport security really is protecting you from terrorists (in the interest of political correctness I can’t say crazy arabs) Linda (who had repented of her mini-jihad and stowed the Swiss army knife) was unable to smuggle aboard a pair of plastic children’s scissors (airline approved) which were promptly confiscated and deposited into the receptacle for dangerous-things-confiscated-from-people-in-wheelchairs-and-short-women. By the way, when you’re paying $10 per kilogram for overweight luggage, don’t pack Diet Coke. The flight from Paris to Rome is less than two hours, so we arrived by 6pm. We had arranged for a driver to meet us at the airport with an eight-passenger van — the only thing with enough room for our luggage! Actually we don’t have that much luggage for a month-long trip, but it would overwhelm the small Mercedes they usually use. Because the airport is a ways outside the city and there are no expressways in the city it takes close to an hour to wend your way through the streets into the ancient part of town. I’m always fascinated to see the modern buildings that abut — and in some cases almost swallow — the historic structures. Nothing can be knocked down, but that doesn’t mean you can’t build all the way around it!The Empire Palace Hotel is a pretty nice hotel considering it is offered as part of the Princess Cruises land tour. We’re on our own for two days before the tour actually starts; when I booked the extra days I was surprised to find it was a member of Small Luxury Hotels of the World.
Our room is a bit odd, but not unpleasant. It’s shaped like a flag: You enter at the base of the flag pole, turn right and advance twenty feet down a two and a half foot wide hall before it opens out into the living space. The bathroom is rather small, with one of those corner showers with diagonal doors, like in a small cruise ship cabin. There is an emergency cord in the shower, but I can’t imagine what for, since it would be physically impossible to fall down. Perhaps it’s in case of claustrophobia.
Around 9pm we ventured out into the pleasant evening weather and walked a half dozen blocks down a side street until we came upon a small trattoria called Ai Tre Moschettieri, where we had a very pleasant meal. I enjoyed Tagliatelli alla Arrbbietta and Saltambuca Romano. Dani made the best choices, though, Tagliolini Bolanese and grilled shrimp (and rejected squid). When we arrived the place was full of Americans, but by the time we finished we were alone. The service was very friendly, and the owner treated us to some limoncella, that lemon liqueur from Capri. Dani stayed up late playing the new Harry Potter game on her PC.
Tuesday, June 15, 2004
Ancient Rome
I had an excellent breakfast of bread, croissants and espresso at the hotel restaurant while Dani and Linda slept in. Then we walked to London. No, seriously, we only walked halfway to London. We set out first for the Trevi Fountain. Along the way we stopped at an Internet cafe in the Piazza Barberini, where I caught up on email. The Trevi Fountain is an enormous, elaborate thing, shoe-horned into a tiny piazza and surrounded by tourist vendors. Still, there’s something pleasant about the sound of the water and all the pigeons fluttering about. Legend has it that if you throw a coin into the fountain you will return, and it seemed to work last time. This time Linda and Dani threw in Euros, so I guess they’ll be coming back to the continent. Ever thrifty, I threw in an American penny, so I guess I’m going to Illinois. We continued on in search of a Jesuit church with a fabulous tromp l’oeil ceiling, but missed it (and upon our return discovered it was closed anyway) but found ourselves at the Pantheon, our next destination.
We had a pleasant lunch of pasta and pizza in an outdoor cafe on the square there, then ventured into the enormous structure.
The Pantheon is the best preserved of ancient Rome’s buildings, probably due to the fact that in the sixth century Christians, claiming to be troubled by its demons, converted it to a church. This was better than the sixteenth century approach, when the Christians converted much of ancient Rome into a sort of Home Depot for those needing marble and limestone to build ugly churches. The Pantheon’s several hundred feet of unsupported dome is pretty impressive when you consider it’s constructed of 2000-year-old stone.
We continued our trek, heading east past the “wedding cake”, a monument to Victor Emmanuel II, the first king of united Italy. (There were only five before 1946 when, as a result of losing WWII, Italy became a democracy. ) This was Mussolini’s favorite building, so you can assume it is overblown. Behind the wedding cake lies the Roman Forum, which is currently undergoing some fairly extensive exploration by a lot of archaeology students. It’s a little difficult to picture all the great structures that were once located here, but it looks just like the jigsaw puzzles. We visited the ruins of the temple of the vestal virgins. These girls were selected at age ten to supervise the eternal flame, and it was a pretty good job except that if you forgot to keep it lit you got whipped and if you forgot to keep your virginity you got buried alive. The girls held the position for thirty years, and could then retire. No doubt that’s where we get the expression “life begins at forty. “
Beyond the forum is the Palatine Hill, where Augustus, Rome’s best — and most enduring — emperor lived. We would have explored it, but we were about five miles into our walk at this point, and it was after 3pm, and the Palatine Hill is, after all, a hill.
Turning left we encountered the Coloseum. Well, it had actually been looming over us for some time, but we decided to finally acknowledge it. We purchased a tour from a company called Romaround — which gives you an idea of their sense of humor. Everyone selling the tour was from the US and spoke perfect English, but the guy giving it was Italian. That’s actually not an accident, though, because the law requires a local guide. Anyway, he was very funny, and being on a tour lets you jump the line.
When Dani and I visited the Coloseum three years ago, we could walk across the arena, but now you can’t. Here’s a bit of trivia for you: did you know the word “arena” comes from the Italian word for sand? The floor of the Coloseum was wood, covered with three inches of sand (it’s good at absorbing blood). Under the wood floor were all the cages for the thousands of animals they slaughtered each year. Those Romans really knew how to party.
Speaking of animals, everywhere we looked in the Coloseum we saw cats. What’s up with that? Anyway, Dani enjoyed photographing them sitting on the ruins and licking their butts.
We had intended to catch a cab back to the hotel, but this seemed to be impossible, so we decided — to Dani’s disgust — to hoof it. Hey, it was only halfway across Rome, and we’d already walked about twice that far. Of course, Rome was built on seven hills. . .
On the way back we were passed by some sort of honor guard consisting of twenty horses and a very busy street sweeper. Now that’s efficient. For dinner Dani had room service and Linda and I had a simple meal of Italian cheeses and Chianti Classico by the fountain in the courtyard of the hotel.
Wednesday, June 16, 2004
At least Linda still has her nose.
Rome
Dani had a bit of a sore throat this morning and opted to spend the day reading. I had breakfast in the hotel and then walked (yes, amazingly my feet do still function, albeit painfully) down to the Piazza Barberini for some quality Internet time. My June Theme Park Engineering class starts today, so I needed to populate the discussion forums. The going was a bit slow; I thought I’d been clever to select an English keyboard layout since yesterday’s Italian layout led to many corrections. Unfortunately I discovered that even with the English layout, the key assignments were still Italian — double trouble. At lunch time Linda and I walked east, past the Baths of Diocletian and the central train terminal, stopping at at Ristaurante Al Fagianetto (I know what you’re thinking), a cafe near the Mediterraneo Hotel where Dani and I stayed three years ago. After a nice lunch of bruschetta, pasta with porcini mushrooms and pizza, we walked back to the Museo Nationale Romano. This part of the museum was in the Palazzo Massimo. It houses Rome’s largest collection of Roman artifacts, with two floors of statuary and a floor of floors — mosaic floors, that is — mounted to the walls. There were also some very nice frescoes from the house of Julia, daughter of Octavian. I can’t imagine how they move these frescoes intact. One of the most interesting things in the museum was the basement. The entire room is a vault, filled with numismatic displays. Excellent interpretive signs traced the history of coinage from lumps of bronze to the 20th century, with the emphasis on the Roman era. It turns out they were constantly devaluing the currency and reducing the precious metal content, just like modern day politicians.
In the late afternoon we headed back to the hotel for an organizational meeting with our tour director, Larry Bell, who looks just like Sean Connery. We opted out of all the optional excursions for the remaining time in Rome; after all, we’ve already walked halfway to London.
Wednesday, June 16, 2004
Rome
After breakfast I carried the laptop down to the Piazza Barberini, where the wireless connection and familiar keyboard turned an hour’s job into ten minutes of work. I was even able to transfer this journal to date over to the web server. Dani is still a bit under the weather. She finished a 591-page book yesterday and is now well into another. It’s her last chance to veg for a few days. Linda and I had lunch at an outdoor cafe, Taverna Flavia, just a block from the hotel. The smoked swordfish was delicious.
A driver and guide picked Linda and I up at the hotel at 1pm for a tour of the Vatican. Our guide, Isabella Roggero, was incredibly knowledgeable. We didn’t ask her a single question she couldn’t answer during the entire afternoon. As a result, out tour of the Vatican Museum was filled with previously unimagined insights into the significance of the various statues and paintings.
The right arm of this figure was lost. In the 16th century they “restored” it, as shown in the photograph. Then the original arm was found. Oops.
Since the popes claimed all of the objects unearthed in Rome until about a hundred years ago, all of the good stuff is in the Vatican: the only surviving gold plated bronze statue, which survived because after being struck by lighting the superstitious Romans buried it; rare dark red marble sarcophagi for the wife and daughter of Constantine, the former unaccountable engraved with pictures of warfare (Isabella said it had originally been intended for Constantine’s father, but maybe he and the wife didn’t get along); Florentine tapestries from the 14th century, clearly superior to the Italian and French ones; and a corridor of maps, once showing the Po river in its old course, far from Venice.
Isabella also provided wonderful interpretation of the Sistine Chapel. In the recent restoration they were able to determine from the plaster marks that Michelangelo worked on it 449 days over a five year period. (Frescos must be painted on wet plaster, so you must mix a fresh batch each day. ) Since Michelangelo had to learn the technique to do the job, you can clearly see the improvement in his designs in the large panels on the ceiling, which improve as you approach the altar. You can also see the tremendous difference in mood between the fanciful ceiling (painted at age 35) and the tormented Last Judgment on the wall behind the altar (painted at age 65). In St. Peter’s we admired the scale of the building (The Sun Bank building in Orlando, 24 stores tall, would easily fit inside the dome), Bernini’s outrageous monuments and canopy, and the recently beatified pope somebody or other, whose waxen smile welcomes everyone strolling past his mummified corpse. Beneath the basilica is the reputed tomb of St. Peter. But Isabella clued us in to the fact that the box everyone is taking photos of doesn’t hold his relics (that’s “bones” to you non-Catholics). It actually contains one of the Pope’s old shirts. St. Peter’s alleged bones are another level down.
Because Isabella was such a fabulous guide, we asked her to spend another hour with us. She took us to the Roman houses beneath the basilica of Ss. Giovanni e Paolo (that’s Mr. John and Paul to you non-Italians). John and Paul were a couple of fourth century Christians who lived in a house that is reputed to be the first Christian church in Rome. When Constantine died, the next emperor, Julian the Apostate, wasn’t a Christian. As a result, John and Paul lost their heads. Literally. They were buried under their house. In the fifth century the current basilica was built on top of the house. The rooms below were used for storage and wine making, and some of the pagan frescoes were painted over. The basement was listed in the Middle Ages’ equivalent of the Zagat Guide to Holy Tourist Spots and lots of pilgrims went to lower their neck chains into the hole over the reputed tombs. Then the whole thing was filled with dirt and forgotten. Later, someone built a well right down through the middle. Then, in 1887, Padre Germano, priest at the church, decided to try to find John and Paul. When he started digging he was amazed to discover the Roman house, adjacent apartment complex and shops, and even an earlier house beneath that. In fact the only thing he didn’t find was John and Paul. Visitors can follow catwalks through the many fascinating levels of the excavations far below the church. The frescoes have been uncovered, and you can walk around the shaft of the well! This is probably the single most interesting site in all of Rome. The adjacent museum holds an amazing array of artifacts from the house and apartments, including fine glassware, plates, coins, statuary and Pokemon cards (just checking if you’re awake).
For dinner we went back to the same trattoria where we had lunch, but Dani wasn’t feeling up to it, so I walked her back to the room. She felt better later, though. As it grew dark — a little past 9pm — Linda and I enjoyed drinks in the courtyard.
Friday, June 18, 2004
Umbria (Orvieto and Todi)
Today we actually joined the tour group. We met in the lobby while we waited for the bags to be collected, which took 30 Italian minutes (an hour and a half). The group is comprised of a wide range of ages, including another girl Dani’s age (13) several other teenagers and even a few middle aged folks, as well as the grandparents who are treating all the teenagers to European tours. The group is entirely Americans, except for two retired South Africans who now live in Chicago. It’s a better traveled (and therefore better behaved) tour group than any I have been with before.
While we waited we swapped stories about travels in Australia, England, France and Italy. We boarded our comfortable tour bus before 10am and driver Simone (pronounce the final ‘e’) headed us north. In less than two hours we found our bus climbing the steep road to Orvieto, a town in Umbria.
Umbria is the only one of Italy’s districts that doesn’t border an ocean or another country. It is rural, with only about 90 people per square mile. We saw corn, olives, tobacco, grapes and many vegetables along the way.
Although it took 300 years to build, the duomo isn’t still under construction. Perhaps they’re using that scaffolding to replace some of the Legos it appears to be made from.
In Orvieto we visited the duomo, a basilica constructed from 1290 to 1590 (these things take time). If you’re keeping score, this was the third church of our trip. It was riveting. Just kidding. The construction of the church was inspired by (I’m not making this up) a miracle in nearby Bolsena, when the consecrated wine actually turned to blood and spilled onto the altar cloth. I hate when that happens.
People in Orvieto must wear tall hats.
We had a very nice group lunch in the small Trattoria la Grotta: ziti, a delicate vegetable lasagna, chicken, beans, salad and a wonderful tira misu were accompanied by white wine (Orvieto, of course) and a not-too-sweet spumante (I didn’t know there was such a thing). The bread in this part of Italy is not that great, because it lacks salt. This tradition dates to the building of the Trevi fountain, when a tax was imposed on salt, and the city-states outside Rome refused to pay.
After lunch Linda and Dani pursued the traditional Renaissance activity of trying to get a stuffed toy out of the claw machine in the arcade next to the duomo. No luck.
We did a little shopping. Dani found some nice glass pen and ink sets as gifts, and Linda bought a pair of Etruscan-style earrings.
In 1527 Pope Clement VII commissioned the construction of a huge well, the Pozzo di San Patrizio, to provide Orvieto with water in case the city was attacked. (In those days Italy was comprised of many separate city states that couldn’t get along. . . a lot like today, in fact. )But this well is no ordinary well. This well is a work of art. In case you don’t know your arts from a hole in the ground, let me assure you this is one big hole. It’s 203 feet deep. And there’s no rope. But this pope was no ropeless dope. There are two intertwined staircases, each with 248 steps that spiral down the sides of the well. One for down, the other for up.
Why two staircases, you ask? It’s hard to turn a donkey around on a staircase. And they don’t swim well.
We didn’t have a donkey, so we sent Dani down to take pictures.
An hour’s drive east from Orvieto brought us to another hilltop town, Todi. The two towns are separated by rolling countryside, farms and a zigzagging River Tiber.
Our hotel, The Bramante, is nestled on a hillside below the town, and is connected to it by a nearby funicular (inclined elevator car). The Bramante was formerly a 12th century convent. What the nuns did with this swimming pool, I have no idea.
Anyway, our room is about twice the size of the one in Rome. It’s a lovely, peaceful spot. funicular funicular
In the evening we took the funicular to the top of the hill and wandered the medieval streets of Todi. It’s a charming little town of 17,000 residents and 18,000 churches. The many gift shops seem reasonably priced. todidinner todidinner Linda found a wonderful trattoria, with a floral bedecked patio overlooking the Umbrian valleys. We had a leisurely dinner as the sun set. The wine was a 2000 Sagrantino di Montefalco by Antonelli, a dark and complex red with which I was not familiar. We took the funicular back to the hotel around 10pm.
Saturday, June 19, 2004
Tuscany (Assisi, Siena and Florence)
The cool breezes wafting across the terrace at the hotel provided a lovely environment for our al fresco breakfast. Then we headed to Assisi, about an hour northeast.
I call this picture, “Can you hear me now, Monk?”
Assisi was the home of St. Francis, founder of the Franciscan order. There a local guide, Maurizio, provided a tour of the basilica (number 4 if you’re keeping count). My “Whisper” radio receiver was on the blink so I can’t comment on the commentary, but Linda and Dani(!) said it was interesting. For me it was among the more boring hours of my life.
To summarize, the church is unusual because it acknowledges not just Catholicism, but also Judaism and Islam, without invoking weapons.
Beneath the church is the crypt, with the tomb of St. Francis. There you can purchase a candle for St. Francis. You pick it up from one box and place it into another. There is a sign that says “Please do not light”. The church has discovered they last much longer this way. Yet another miracle.
Back in the main church, at the shrine of St. Duracell, you may place a coin in a slot and an electric candle will light for a while. Sort of a parking meter for blessings.
Finally we escaped from the church into the courtyard in front of the monk’s quarters, turned around and climbed the steps into — aaargh! — another church, this one the top level of the previous. That’s number 5.
As with the one downstairs, the walls and ceiling had been covered with pictures of flat people painted by perspective-challenged artists. Those by Giotto included just enough perspective to demonstrate how bad he was at it.
Slowly I inched toward the fresh air and natural light beyond the exit, and at last we were released. On the way back to the bus we visited the subbasement of the church where for fifty eurocents we paid homage to the pagan god of white porcelain.
The two-hour drive northwest to Siena gave us time to nap and appreciate the fact that we were not in a church.
Siena is a gothic (13th century) town that was once a powerful city state until it was conquered by the Medici family of Florence, an event the local residents still resent.
We had a rather long walk to the restaurant for lunch and it was hard on quite a few of those in our group. Fortunately the three of us got into training in Rome.
On the way we passed through the Piazza del Campo, an unusually large square where an annual bareback horse race is run. There are no rules, just three times around the square, the winning horse is the first to cross, with or without its rider.
Lunch was different.
Different than good, anyway: antipasti, odd pieces of thick crust pizza with strange coatings, and then a bowl of garbanzo bean soup. Fortunately there was plentiful white, red and dessert wine, perhaps an attempt to make up for the food. The dessert wine was the most interesting, a late harvest Sangiovese.
The restaurant featured 13th century architecture and acoustical treatments (brick).
The light in this weird alley looked neat.
A local guide met us after lunch and took us on a torturous tour of Siena, which exhausted many of our group. But you’ll never guess what we saw on the tour–Oh. You guessed.
Yes, we visited 183 churches.
The largest church in Siena is the duomo. (I think the Italians have all these different names so you won’t realize that all the buildings are churches. ) Unlike the duomo in Orvieto, which is white and light gray striped, this one has an important difference. It’s white and dark gray striped.
In their competition to “out stripe” the Florentines, the residents of Siena began building an addition to the church that would have converted the existing structure to a mere knave. The Plague put and end to the supply of both workers and congregation, but two walls still stand.
The best church was the one that displayed in an open box (I’m not making this up) the head of St. Catherine of Siena, who apparently didn’t need it after she died in 1380. I wish we had stuff like that at Disney World.
Dani was still hungry after watching us eat lunch. Deciding against communion wafers, she made a fast food run to Siena’s only McDonalds while the rest of us straggled back to the bus. I suspect more than a few people on the bus were jealous of that burger.
It was a very quiet hour and a half bus ride to Florence.
In retrospect, I don’t think visiting Assisi and Siena is a waste of time, but I do think the activities our tour engaged in were pointless and repetitive. I am certain everyone in our group would have preferred a couple of hours in Siena to find lunch on their own and to shop. Unlike the four hilltop towns we’ve just visited, Florence (which is really called Firenze) is located in a valley, and is divided by the Arno river. Much of the town is a typical 20th century European city, due to the beating it took in World War II. Our hotel, the Anglo American, is quite nice. Our room is cool. You enter into a small sitting area with built-in desk and cabinets, and a love seat that makes into a twin bed. There is also a fair-sized bathroom. Along one wall are open stairs — no railing — that go to a loft with two more twin beds and a large bathroom. (All of the bathrooms we’ve had have included bidets, but this is the first time I’ve encountered little bottles of “intimate cleanser”. The ingredients are identical to the shampoo. Hmmm. ) We walked along the Arno River about six blocks to Harry’s American Bar and Grill for dinner. It’s not the dark, wood-paneled, intimate space in the ad, but rather a bright, noisy place. I wouldn’t say it’s really American, but it’s not really Italian either. The service was formal, reminding me of continental restaurants from the 1950s. One of the reasons we decided to try Harry’s was that our guide Larry warned us the place was expensive, and we wanted to see what a $34 hamburger looks like.
Maybe it’s just that after Arpège nothing will ever seem expensive, but it didn’t seem all that bad. The hamburger was only 19 Euros. . . and the fries another eight. . . hmmm, let’s see. . . that makes. . . $34.
Anyway, I had smoked trout and an Entrecote that was excellent. Linda had — I’m not kidding — pasta. The wine, a 1999 “super Tuscan” by Collazzi, was superb.
Sunday, June 20, 2004
Florence
Sunday was a beautiful, blustery day, with cool breezes to offset the heat of the sun. It rained a few minutes during breakfast, then the wind pushed the clouds east.
Florence is marvelously walkable. Although the city is large, the central area is only about a half mile square.
Today was a church-free day.
We wound our way through the twisty streets to the Piazza di Signoria, stopping along the way for some shopping in an outdoor bazaar. Many shops were open even though it’s Sunday.
At the bazaar we recognized a bronze statue of a boar. There is a copy of it at the Hyatt Regency Grand Cypress in Orlando. Legend has it that if you rub its snout for good luck. . . the snout will stay shiny.
It works.
In the Piazza we admired the scaffolding that surrounds a copy of Michelangelo’s David. (This is where it originally stood, prior to being moved into a museum for safekeeping during the 1880s.) More impressive was Cellini’s bronze of Perseus Beheading Medusa, which stood opposite. What they say about the medusa must be true, because all of the figures around it were stone. There was also Giambologna’s Rape of the Sabine Women, but they hadn’t gotten to the raping yet.
We skipped the lines at the Palazzo Vecchio and Uffizi art museums (sort of Italy’s version of the Louvre) and instead focused on what Florence is really all about: shopping.
Dani bought a leather bound journal and wax seal with her initials, and a few gifts. florencepontececchio florencepontececchio The place to buy jewelry — at least the place for tourists to buy jewelry — is in the shops that line the Ponte Vecchio. This bridge, the only one to survive the German demolition teams as they retreated during WWII, used to be the location of the butchers and tanners. But the smell was so bad in the 1500s the ruling families kicked them out, and the jewelers moved in. Across the upper level of the Ponte Vecchio is a causeway the Medicis used to get from one palace to another without having to mix with the peons. Untended by the Germans during the war, it became a route for the resistance to cross the lines with plans of their artillery placements.
We had lunch at Ristorante Dei Bardi, a wine bar with a spectacular view of the river and the Ponte Vecchio. Wine, cheese, salads, fish, meats, pastas, bread, fruits and coffee — a typical two-hour Italian lunch. On our way back across the bridge Dani bought a Roman coin of Constantine I, mounted in a pendant. Linda bought a chain for Dani to hang it on, and another chain for herself. (I gave Dani her allowance and trip money on a prepaid Visa card. She has been enjoying the novelty of paying with plastic. )We assembled in the lobby at 7pm and a fleet of taxis drove our group across town to Tavernetta Della Signoria for our farewell dinner. The company was good; we enjoyed hearing everyone’s travel stories. Larry, our guide, has had an interesting life, raising a family while working for the US foreign service in Morocco and Paris, and now traveling the world hosting different tours almost every week.
After dinner I decided to walk back to the hotel by myself so I could take some photos of Florence at night. The moon was out and it was a glorious evening along the Arno, with the sky still fading to indigo at 10pm.
Monday, June 21, 2004
Florence to Venice
The Eurostar Train pulled out of Firenze Station at 8:50am for our three-hour eastward trip across Italy to Venice. This is the final leg of our land tour.
In Venice (it’s really called Venezia) we went straight to the ship, and were onboard by 12:30. Our suite is on the stern of the ship, so we have nearly a 180 degree view, guaranteeing we can see the port city no matter which side is used to dock. We can see Epcot’s — er, I mean St. Mark’s — tower from the ship.
Our cabin layout is virtually identical to that we had last year in Alaska, except mirrored. There is a sitting are with a convertible sofa, and a bedroom area with a queen bed. Both sides have built in desks and drawers so Dani and I can leave our computers set up. There is also a bar, walk-in closet and a divided bathroom.
Our cabin stewardess, Nicole, is the best we have had. She and her husband have been aboard for eight months, and this is their next to last voyage. During that time the Star Princess has been all around the world.
Nicole clued us in to a few features of the suite we weren’t suspecting: free laundry, dry cleaning and Internet access (although unfortunately no wireless access. )
We spent the afternoon exploring the ship and doing. . . well, nothing. It felt great. Then we had a pleasant dinner in one of the ship’s dining rooms and hit the sack.
Tuesday, June 22, 2004
Venice
We were up early for our morning tour of Venice. It began with a motor launch that took us through the lagoon to the Grand Canal where we went on a 40-minute gondola ride in the canals. Often people describe things as unique, but usually it isn’t really true. Venice surprised me. It really is unique. There are no cars, not motor bikes, not even any bicycles in the city. The streets are few, and they arbitrarily narrow to only a few feet wide, because there is no need to accommodate anything larger than a person. The city is actually a network of 118 islands separated by 150 canals and connected by 400 bridges. Most of the canals have no sidewalks, so it really is almost impossible to get around without using a boat. The cheapest form of transportation is a water bus, at about one Euro. The most expensive is a private water taxi, which costs 70 Euros(!) to go from one side of the city to the other, a distance of only a few kilometers. The tide seems to run only a few feet, but it appears to get dangerously close to the ground floor of most buildings. It’s a very harsh environment for construction. I was amazed at the amount of traffic on the canals: not just tourist gondolas, but launches delivering vegetables and supplies, construction and baggage handling boats, even garbage collection boats.
It was rush hour Venetian style.
Our next stop was Morano, a collection of islands a few kilometers away, where glass has been made since the 12th century. We watched a demonstration of a decorative carafe being made. It was impressive, but not the delicate ballet of four glassmakers we watched at the Hedeland Glassworks in Sweden.
The shop upstairs was ridiculously priced — a set of six goblets was 1600 Euros — but we bought a few decorative trinkets downstairs. stmarks1 stmarks1 The final stop on our tour was a church, but we escaped and caught a water bus across the lagoon to St. Marks square.
It’s a lot bigger than the Epcot version — and a lot more crowded.
We explored the side streets and canals for a while, looking for a restaurant that wasn’t a tourist trap. Finally Linda saw one that looked fairly traditional, and we went in and sat down. . .
. . . only to discover the ceiling of the room was decorated as a cave! The food was actually pretty good, and a carafe of wine was less than four Euros.
After lunch we walked back to St. Mark’s Square and had great fun feeding the zillions of pigeons.
The Star Princess left port at 6:30. We watched from our aft balcony as a tugboat wrestled against the ship’s engines, rotating it to squeeze through the lagoon and into the Adriatic.
Wednesday, June 23, 2004
At Sea
Today we did nothing. It was nice. Actually, Dani and I spent a couple of hours painting ceramic boxes. They don’t have a studio here like they did on the Coral Princess, but they do have a cart up on the pool deck, with the same selection of bisque and glazes. We’ll decorate our boxes with scenes from the trip, just like we did last year in Alaska. Then we did nothing. We discovered that having the cabin on the rear of the ship has a disadvantage: the white noise created by the wake is really quite loud. The balcony is fine for reading, but conversation is a challenge. It was formal evening, so we dressed in our best and headed for the Promenade Lounge, where Dani, Linda, Dani, Steve and Dani shared some caviar.
Sabatini’s is one of two restaurants that have a small cover charge in exchange for finer dining. We had dined at Sabatini’s on the Coral Princess, so we knew we should only have a bite of the first dozen things we were served! They weren’t exactly courses, since the waiters only replace the plate after every half dozen items or so, but we were served food 28 separate times! Even being careful, it was still impossible to do justice to the cold water lobster when the entrees finally arrived. The wine was an excellent 2000 Amarone.
Thursday, June 24, 2004
At Sea
More ceramics in the morning, then more nothing. I wish I had a dollar for every Dan Brown book on this ship. I guess Dan Brown does. While she was sick in Rome Dani read the DaVinci Code and Digital Fortress (plus three other books that didn’t earn Dan Brown and money). Linda brought Deception Point and I forgot Angels and Demons, but found it in the ship’s store. So Dani is reading that now. I must have seen a hundred other copies of those books around the ship today.
Dinner was at Tequila’s/Sterling Steak House, the other cover charge restaurant on the ship. Originally I suspect they were trying for a Mexican-themed steak house, but the only remnant of Mexico was the decor. The steaks were excellent, the service a bit clueless, and the band truly horrible. It’s difficult to say which rendition was worse, Spanish Eyes or Horse With No Name, but the fact they were both in the same set gives some suggestion of the band’s awfulness.
Friday, June 25, 2004
Kusadasi, Turkey
The ship docked at the town of Kusadasi (Coo-SHA-duh-see) while we were having breakfast on our balcony. The town has grown from a sleepy fishing village to a large resort area over the past 30 years. Before the war in Iraq there were as many as eleven cruise ships in the harbor at once. Today we were the only one. A security boat circled our ship all day, staying between us and any small boats that passed. Despite this precaution, Kusadasi seemed like a very clean and safe — if annoying — town. It’s been a long time since I was in a place where every shop keeper tried to drag me into his store full of tourist crap, but it only took me a few minutes to remember why it had been so long.
Fortunately our bus departed almost immediately for Ephesus, a Greco-Roman city about 25 minutes outside Kusadasi. By the way, did you know that Turkey is actually spelled Turkiye (with some funny little marks I can’t make) and is pronounced tur-KAY-uh?Although GWB is working hard to turn the Turks into enemies, the Muslim influence in Turkey is somewhat muted. (Istanbul was originally on this cruise but was removed in February. Just as well — they’re rioting against Americans there this week. ) A statue of Ataturk, founder of Turkey, stands on the hill above Kusadasi even though graven images are a violation of Islam.
Ephesus was founded in the fourth century BC by the Greeks. In the second city BC the Romans moved in. At its peak there were a quarter million residents. It was a very rich town because of its excellent harbor for traders and the nearby Temple of Artemis (several times larger than the Parthenon) which brought many pilgrims. The traders and pilgrims brought money. The streets of Ephesus were paved in marble. Every house had indoor plumbing. There were toilets with running water, sewers with manhole covers, even a marble bed heated by hot water pipes. The library had double insulated walls and cubbies to store 12,000 scrolls.
A small theater — still in use by performers like Elton John and Ray Charles — seats 1400. A larger stadium seated 37,000. (I suppose Elton was once popular enough to fill the larger stadium, but it’s a crumbling ruin. . . a bit like Elton, in fact. )
By the fifth century AD Ephesus was in decline. The harbor filled with silt, leaving the city two miles from the sea. The Romans, now officially Christian, no longer made pilgrimages to the temple. Earthquakes finished the job. Ephesus lay undisturbed until the late 1800s. Even today, only 10% of the site has been excavated. Our guide was extremely knowledgeable, and also funny.
We were truly impressed by what a beautiful city Ephesus once was. While not preserved like Pompeii, it was easy to glimpse its former glory.
“Magic Atmosphere”?!
Back in town we were ushered into a carpet salesroom for an almost exact replay of our carpet salesroom experience in Morocco over twenty years ago. They’re cheaper at Home Depot. The carpets are woven by girls belonging to nomadic Turks, who comprise about 8% of the population. They take about a year each to weave, and comprise the girls’ dowries. Many of the carpets contained repeating symbols of five squares, symbolizing the number of times a day that Muslims pray. (According to the salesman, good Muslims pray five times a day, bad Muslims sell rugs in Kusadasi. ) A little hot apple cider, a pita, and many carpets later we escaped with wallet intact. (It’s traditional for salespeople to give you apple drinks and food. Selling through guilt. Hmmm. . . I wonder if that would work for Alcorn McBride. . . )
I wrestled my way through the salesmen back to the ship; Linda and Dani stayed to shop. Later they returned with two rugs about the size of cat boxes. (Past experience suggests this is an apt comparison. ) They had a pleasant lunch on the pier, where the local cats were enthusiastic about the shrimp and lamb kebabs, but weren’t allowed to use the rugs.
We went up to deck 17 and watched the 360 degree view of the ship leaving Kusadasi harbor, then Linda and I snuck down to the Promenade Lounge for some caviar without Dani.
parthenon1 parthenon1
parthenon2 parthenon2 bigcolumn bigcolumn
Saturday, June 26, 2004
Athens
We docked in Piraeus, Athen’s very busy harbor, a 6:00 am, and were boarding a coach for the Acropolis a little after 7:00 am. It was worth getting up so early, because we were one of the first groups to reach the hill, and it was uncrowded and not yet hot. Both conditions would change within an hour. It’s quite a climb to the top, but we were in good shape after our training in Rome. The weather was pretty hazy, and so was our guide. Actually Angelica knew her subject, she just wasn’t very interesting. I’ll try to be more exciting.
The Parthenon was constructed by the Greeks, and is only one of a number of temples on the Acropolis. In addition to its use by the Greeks and Romans, it was also at one point converted to a Turkish mosque — complete with minaret. The reigning Turk kept his harem in a nearby temple named — I’m not making this up — the Erectheon.
The Parthenon was in fairly good shape until the Turks decided to store ammunition in it, and it was bombarded by enemy artillery until the obvious conclusion was reached. Today it has been 45% reassembled using 85% percent original parts. The rest of the original parts (all the good stuff) are in the British Museum. Like everything else in Athens, the Greeks have decided to spruce it up for the Olympics (which start in a month) by surrounding it with scaffolding.
Like everything else in Athens it won’t be ready for the Olympics. Actually, the Olympic venues we saw appeared to be ready — if you don’t think landscaping, parking and infrastructure are particularly important. The major challenge of these Olympic games will be simply getting to them. The problem is that after WWII Athens was a town of 800,000, but within 15 years the population had grown to more than 3 million. Plenty of buildings were constructed — which is why Athens looks like a modern city. (Here’s a bit of trivia: 92% of Greeks own their residence, the highest rate in Europe, perhaps anywhere. ) But no highways or other infrastructure were constructed to go along with all those buildings. As a result traffic on the twisty little streets is terrible.
Fortunately, we were in Athens on a Saturday, so we only had to contend with the weekend traffic as we left town and headed for Corinth, a little over an hour west. Along the way we stopped at a French beach resort for a buffet lunch that was quite tasty, but of no discernible nationality. (I use the term “beach” loosely. I wonder if the brochures mention it’s 100% gravel. )
Ancient Corinth was located on the isthmus that connects the Peloponnesus Peninsula to the Greek mainland. It was originally a Greek, then a Roman city. The agora — shopping and meeting area — have been excavated down to the Roman level.
We enjoyed exploring the site because unlike at Ephesus we could wander among the ruins. Dani and I climbed down into the underground tunnels that connect a distant spring to the city’s fountains and water supply. The system still works. It was 90 degrees, and the sun felt like a radiant heater, so we tried to keep to the shade. Linda and a few others even carried parasols.
On the way back we stopped at the Corinth Canal, dug by the British in the late 19th century. The 4-mile-long, 250-foot-high canal eliminated the several hundred mile trip around the Peloponnesus. Unfortunately, at only 75 feet wide and 25 feet deep it almost immediately became useless for modern commercial shipping.
Sunday, June 27, 2004
At Sea
Champagne breakfast on the balcony. Sometimes the ship’s passage brings school of small fish to the surface. They dart through the light blue wake as greedy seagulls swoop down, trying for an easy snack. Once we saw a good sized fish leap four or five feet in the air, perhaps chasing an unseen insect. Over and over he soared, until we left him far behind. At 8 pm we squeezed through the Strait of Messina, where Italy’s toe almost touches Sicily.
It was the second formal night, and we dined in Sabatini’s.
Monday, June 28, 2004
Naples (Pompeii, Sorrento, Capri)
It’s a shame that Pompeii, Sorrento and Capri are all near Naples (which is really called Napoli). It’s just too much to do in one day, particularly when it’s 95 degrees. Fortunately our tour was in the reverse order from when Dani and I visited three years ago, and we were able to see Pompeii before it got really hot. Our first stop was at a cameo factory near Herculaneum. It was a bit of a tourist trap, but soon we were on our way to Pompeii.
Our guide, Enzo, was much better than the previous one, and gave us some real insights into everyday life in Pompeii. Of all the archaeological sites, it’s definitely the best. It’s frozen at 2pm, August 24th, 79AD when Vesuvius erupted, burying 2000 of its 20,000 residents in 30 feet of ash.
Unlike our previous tour, this one wasn’t the erotic tour of Pompeii. But although we skipped the house of Vetti and the whorehouses, it was still hard to overlook the thousands of phalluses (phalli?) that sprout from almost every wall. We also found a special barstool for Linda.
Down the coast about 20 miles (and through two very long tunnels under the mountains) is Sorrento, a city that Dani and I only passed through. This time we had a nice lunch at Villa Rubinacci and did a little shopping along the Corsa Italia before climbing the steep stairs down to the jet boat dock. The Corsa Italia is the only north/south route out of Naples. It’s about 30 feet wide (enough space for two lanes of traffic or about 1500 scooters). When you consider there are 3 million people living on the slopes of Mount Vesuvius — still a very active volcano — it’s pretty scary.
In twenty minutes we were on Capri. Up until this point we had been in a group of 44 people, but we suddenly found ourselves dumped together with about 400 other people from the Star Princess, all trying to take the funicular from the harbor up to the town. We were all packed into a super-heated loading area for an interminable wait. Finally at the top of the funicular we emerged into. . . a tourist trap of a square filled with 400 Star Princess passengers. This wasn’t at all like Dani’s and my previous trip to Capri. Depressed, we wandered around for about a half hour before we found a path leading to the back side of the island, and the Garden of Augustus.
The view was fantastic. This was the idyllic Capri we remembered. In retrospect, the last time we took a wild bus ride to the very top of the island, where things are much less commercial.
After another torture session we took the funicular back down and caught the jet boat directly back to the ship. Even after showers all the way around Linda was still hot and tired, so Dani and I went to dinner on our own while she ordered room service.
Tuesday, June 29, 2004
Civitavecchia
It was strange wandering around a deserted cruise ship today, as nearly all of the passengers left early for the long trip to Rome. The girls just wanted to veg today, so I took an early shuttle down the long pier and into the port city of Civitavecchia. On the way I passed the stone fort at the harbor entrance, with still visible WWII bombardment damage. The city is a place where people — mostly maritime industry employees and their families — actually live, not a tourist trap. It took less than an hour to walk the grid of the commercial district, with its collection of clothing and appliance stores. There were many people out walking, but few tourists. At the end of an alley I spied a crowd and went to investigate. I found myself in an open-air market: more than a full city block of stalls selling fruits, vegetables, meats, clothing, and an assortment of flea market merchandise. People were rather dressed up for market day. The older women in particular wore dresses with fancy beaded necklaces or colorful scarves. They haggled over the prices, then loaded their purchases into baby strollers or pushcarts and moved on to the next stall.
My only purchase was a fairly hard-sided suitcase, for 20 Euros, to transport some of our more fragile acquisitions. Then I headed back to the ship, before the day began to heat up.
Wednesday, June 30, 2004
Livorno (Pisa)
Imagine having a guide who despised the place she’s guiding you to. That was Viola. Apparently there is a longstanding rivalry between Livorno and Pisa. We boarded our bus in the port of Livorno and were greeted by local resident Viola, who quickly admitted she hates Pisa. During the 30-minute drive she delivered a litany of everything that was wrong with the place. This was particularly remarkable, considering that Livorno — at least the industrial area where the ship docked — is slightly less appealing than the anus of a dead goat. So it was with considerable skepticism that we approached the “miracle square” of Pisa, with its duomo (yes, another church), baptistery (a church in disguise) and leaning tower (a church bell tower).
As it turned out, even Dani and I had to admit that the church was the most beautiful we’ve seen on this trip, both inside and out.
Linda listening to the echo echo
And the baptistery possesses incredible acoustics, designed for Gregorian chanting. Any sound reverberates for perhaps half a minute, as demonstrated periodically by one of the female guards, who delivered a two minute performance that was quite remarkable. Linda and Dani climbed the 243 steps sandwiched between the inner and outer domes, all the way to the top.
Linda & Dilbert’s pointy-haired boss
The tower is open to the public again, after an 11-year effort to straighten it from a 5. 5 degree tilt back to a 5 degree angle, removing about 200 years of settling. This was accomplished by carefully digging underneath the high side. Forty brave people are allowed to climb the hollow cylinder each half hour, but insurance is not included.
Obligatory tourist photo
I knew they had made some adjustments during the 100-year construction of the tower, but I never realized they had resulted in it being slightly banana shaped. If you look carefully at the photo you can see that it actually curves back toward the duomo.
Even though it was hot, it was definitely worth the trip to Pisa. Still, we were happy to return to the ship, even if it was stuck in the rear end of a goat.
Dani and I headed for the sun deck for hotdogs, iced mochaccinos and a dip in the pool while Linda took a nap. montecarlo montecarlo
Thursday, July 1, 2004
Monte Carlo, Monaco
The city of Monte Carlo is essentially the same thing as the country of Monaco, since the entire country is less than one square mile. It’s a cluster of mostly 1960s high rises pressed against the steep mountains on the coast between France and Italy.
The Star Princess is bigger than the entire harbor, so we moored off the coast and took tenders to the dock.
The city isn’t really oriented toward cruise ships. Instead the marina caters to multimillion dollar yachts. The shops along the pier are an eclectic collection of art galleries, upscale brasseries and boat maintenance businesses. The only gift shop was closed from noon to 2:30 pm, the majority of the time the ship was in port.
We had a delicious lunch at Quai Des Artistes. It was nice to find some true French cooking after two weeks of Italian and cruise ship cuisine.
After lunch Dani and I spent only a few minutes walking around before deciding to head back to the ship. Linda went on a tour of the casino made famous in many James Bond movies.
Friday, July 2, 2004
At Sea / Barcelona
It’s a long way from Monte Carlo to Barcelona, so the ship doesn’t arrive until noon. There was a 25 knot wind during the night, which made for a bit of a wild ride; I was glad I was lying down!We have sailed 2593 nautical miles since leaving Venice.
Most of the passengers left the ship for shore excursions, but since we have two more days in Barcelona we stayed aboard and had the ship to ourselves for a leisurely day, much of it spent fitting all our stuff back into the luggage.
Saturday, July 3, 2004
Barcelona
This is a monument at the location of Columbus’ return from the new world.
Barcelona is a beautiful city. Rarely have my expectations been so completely wrong. I had envisioned a sleepy, dusty old town. Instead it is a vibrant, clean metropolis. We purchased a two-day pass for the tourist buses that continuously circle the city. These double-decker busses are open on top. You can hop on and off at any stop, listen to the commentary in eight languages, or simply enjoy the sun, the wind, and the occasional tree branch in the face. Barcelona offers a dazzling mixture of modern, traditional and truly fanciful architecture. Most impressive are the many buildings by the architect Gaudi, whose organic structures fascinate the eye and impart a playfulness to the entire city.
The Guadi Cathedral is worth a close look.
His cathedral, the Temple de la Sagrada Familia, which is about halfway through a 200-year construction project, is simultaneously beautiful and creepy. Currently at 100 meters, when its twelve towers are complete it will reach 170 meters The towers are hollow parabolas, designed to enhance the sound of the bells to be hung in them. Taking the recommendation of one of the hotel receptionists, we dined at a restaurant on the Passeig de Gracia called Tapa Tapa. Not surprisingly, it was a tapas restaurant. It was also delicious. We had many, many courses, most of them only about $3. Ordering was simple because the hundred or so selections were pictured on the placemats. This was a good thing, because the descriptions were in the local language, Catalan, something across between French and Spanish that took considerable deciphering.
Catalonia is the eastern corner of Spain. With a population of 6 million, it is one of the most densely populated areas in Europe. Its major city, Barcelona, is one of the most important ports on the Mediterranean. It is a center for art, finance and commerce.
After lunch we waddled up the block to a book store where Dani added to her Harry Potter collection with editions in Spanish and Catalan.
Grand Marina Hotel
The five star Grand Marina Hotel is easily the nicest of our trip. The ultra modern building is circular, and sits on a cruise ship pier in the marina. Our room is huge, with an expansive bathroom and hi-tech shower separated by futuristic sliding glass panels. Every surface is covered in rare wood or marble.
There is a fantastic guide book in our room, even though it’s one of those hard cover advertising books you find in all hotel rooms. It’s filled with maps and useful information, arranged in order, and even lists non-advertisers. It weighs about 20 pounds and costs $85.
The book describes a night on the town: dinner followed by a night club. Night clubs open around 12:30 am and some go to 6 am. Then you can go for a stroll, and still have breakfast as late as noon. (Presumably one then sleeps. )
After a siesta we went in search of an early (for Spaniards) dinner at 10 pm. We walked to the marina and had seafood at El Chipiron Monchos. Linda and I shared a passable paella. Dani ordered spiny lobster, but her plans changed when the intended victim showed up at the table writhing indignantly.
Since evening is the central point of the day here anyway, we’re trying to get on a later schedule in preparation for our afternoon flight home on Monday. So now bedtime is 1 am.
Sunday, July 4, 2004
Barcelona
Happy 4th of July!
It was a beautiful day in Barcelona and we made good use of it. I started the morning catching up on email and uploading my journal in the hotel’s business center, which is really just a corner of the lovely piano bar on the first floor.
Sunday breakfast was popular, and the patrons spilled out of the adjacent restaurant into the hotel’s courtyard. It was close to 11 am by the time I finished uploading (while listening to piano music and leafing through a beautiful book about Dali). I hurried up to the room afraid that Linda and Dani would wonder where I’d gone, and found them. . . still asleep! Spanish time, indeed.
Eventually we made our way to the historical center of the city and strolled down the Rambla de Santa Monica, admiring the many booths of jewelry, pets (including chipmunks), postcards, and souvenirs. There were also street performers, including a horrible Mickey Mouse and two ratty Pooh Bears. And mimes. Always the damn mimes.
Soon we found ourselves on Paseig de Gracia. Since it was now lunch time — 1 pm, early for the locals, but hey — we decided to have lunch in Citrus Restaurantus, one flight above where we ate yesterday. This meal was more Mediterranean than tapas, but it was nice.
After lunch we crossed the street to admire Gaudi’s organic Casa Battlo. Truly beautiful.
We caught the tourist bus and took it past the Temple del al Sagrada Familia (no visible progress since yesterday) to Parc Guell, where we found Gaudi’s house and a lot of other wild architecture. (It was a long steep walk up to the park, but we’ve been in training. )
The central plaza of the park is supported by 84 Doric columns, the outer ones canted inward. There is also a winding portico supported by strange organic pillars covered with lava rock. Everywhere there are mosaics.
Next we caught the tourist bus and took it to a shopping area on the aptly named Avinguda Diagonal, which cuts diagonally across the entire city. We were looking for a shop Dani wanted to visit: Chocolat Factory. It lived up to its billing chocolate-wise, even if it wasn’t a factory. Nothing like 77% cocoa to bring a smile.
We rehydrated at an outdoor cafe as the sun set behind the buildings, then caught the tourist bus back to the hotel to clean up and relax before dinner.
Tired, we selected the restaurant on the first floor of the hotel, which proved to be a good choice. It was quiet, intimate and sophisticated, and since it wasn’t yet 10 pm there weren’t many other customers. We had their seven-course tasting dinner which was pretty adventurous, with giant sardines, grape soup, turbot, suckling pig, and two different desserts. The most interesting thing was the chocolates they served afterwards, which seemed to contain something like ground up Pop Rocks. Weird.
Monday, July 5, 2004
Barcelona to Orlando
The Barcelona airport is bursting with colorful shops and cafes. It was so nice we would have been happy to browse, but after a short wait in the Air France lounge we boarded our Delta flight for Atlanta, and connection to Orlando.
It was a great trip — perhaps a week too long, as (some of us) missed our pets — but full of interesting places and fun experiences, and we enjoyed each other’s company throughout.
Some Tips for Next Time
When booking a cabin, check the exterior view of the ship in that area. Our balcony was substantially blocked by a support member. The suite next to ours was not.
Avoid aft cabins. The wake is noisy.
The Star Princess and other ships in its class are not as well designed as the slightly smaller Coral Princess. The elevators don’t cooperate well with one another and dining and shopping access is all in one spot.
While most of the service on the Star Princess was excellent, the room service was, to be kind, incompetent.
Also, the attempt to emulate NCL’s “Freestyle Dining” with flexible seating in the dining room simply doesn’t work well, with long waits at popular times. The smaller and newer Coral Princess didn’t have this problem.
Don’t try to do Pompeii and Capri in the same day; select one. And don’t take the funicular in Capri, take a taxi to the very top.
The people who visited Pompeii and the farm in Sorrento really liked that tour.
