If you follow our IG or FB accounts you will probably already know that we’ve been on a whirlwind tour of the Mediterranean of late. It seems like the ports have been coming in one after another with few breaks in between. In addition to the rapid-fire schedule, our son Aidan is now traveling with us. So what does that all mean and why should anyone care? It just means we have not been spending much time at the computer blogging. Our priority at the moment is having awesome adventures with Aidan. This post is going to be a brief port recap and update.
So Many Ports, So Little Time to Write
Our most recent post discussed an amazing bike path we discovered in Syracuse, Sicily. That Syracuse stop occurred during this most recent stretch of voyages listed below. Here’s the rundown of ports since we stopped in Kusadasi for our outing to Ephesus.
- Piraeus, Greece
- Sea Day
- Valletta, Malta
- Syracuse, Sicily
- Katakolon, Greece
- Santorini, Greece
- Mykonos, Greece
- Piraeus, Greece
- Sea Day
- Valletta, Malta
- Syracuse, Sicily
- Katakolon, Greece
- Santorini, Greece
- Mykonos, Greece
- Piraeus, Greece
- Rhodes, Greece
- Alanya, Turkey
- Limassol, Cyprus
- Sea Day
- Santorini, Greece
- Mykonos, Greece
Valletta, Malta
Charter Cruises
For the first two weeks of the list above, the ports from Piraeus to Mykonos and Piraeus to Mykonos again, the Oosterdam hosted a private charter called the Dave Koz & Friends at Sea. Dave Koz is a jazz musician, a multiple Grammy nominated saxophonist and icon in the jazz community. The Dave Koz cruise experience was back to back cruises chock full of music lovers of jazz and soul. For two weeks there were many musicians all over the ship playing high energy live performances. It was fantastic. If you love jazz, the Dave Koz cruise experience is an amazing charter to consider. We had a fabulous time listening to so many amazing artists during that stretch.
“Tiny” Dragon Joins
Our son Aidan joined us on the Oosterdam on May 14th in Piraeus. Like his mom, Aidan is a Dragon. He’s also quite tall, so the tiny part is just ironic as he’s the furthest thing from tiny. Anyway, Aidan had never been to Europe before. He flew into Athens and spent three days there wandering the amazing historic sights on his own before joining us on the ship. Since his arrival we’ve been enjoying this unique opportunity to share new places with him in Rhodes, Alanya, Santorini, and Mykonos.
Aidan is staying onboard with us until Tiffany’s contract ends on May 26th. We are planning to spend a few days in Trieste before heading to Venice to meet up with our friends the Weslers. From Venice we’ll be flying back to the States for freaking jury duty.
Home Again
Side note to this brief port recap and update: Tiffany’s job requires her to reside on a cruise ship outside of the U.S. for 75% of the year. Despite the jury duty rules clearly specifying that you are only eligible for jury duty if you reside within the county greater than 50% of the year they insisted she fly back for jury duty stating “vacation doesn’t count”. Yeah, we sent them the contracts, evidence of employment, etc. Math is hard.
We’ve had an incredible contract and amazing adventure over the past year. Some of you we will be seeing soon for at least a few weeks. We plan to keep blogging over the upcoming weeks. Obviously we’ll have to report on our Venice adventure. We’ve got some ideas for more detailed posts on certain things, maybe a best small cruise ports type of series for different parts of the world. There also may be some changes to the website. Let us know if there is anything you would like more information on. Cheers!
Olympia, Greece
