Venice. First of all we took line 2 to ride through the Grand Canal (line 1 is slower, makes more stops). If you have time, do the full circle on line 2; also take lines 42 and 52 to see other parts of the city. We had ACTV passes, and put it to good use! Of course we loved Venice, but noticed many buildings, and especially it’s visible on white and on statues, have some black soot on them – makes houses look dirty, and this is mid-May, way after the spring cleaning.

I read on the Internet that it’s not easy to find a place to sit and rest, and this is true. As we didn’t venture far from the vaporetto stops, we used the waiting area benches for this purpose. It’s interesting how they announce the stops – first in Italian, then in English as “nextT stopP,” and why is it the locals get up way before the vaporetto stops, they would definitely have enough time to walk to the exit.

The Jewish Ghetto in Venice is easy to find, the entrance is by Gam Gam restaurant, vaporetto 42 Guglie. Every Holocaust memorial is different, this one (the plaza) invites you to sit and think. On recommendation of the Internet posters we ate at Gam Gam. Sorry to disagree with everybody, the food did not leave a lasting impression. We got better food next door to our hotel. Maybe we just expected too much?

Walked the Rialto Bridge, kissed at the Bridge of Sighs, walked numerous other bridges – they all have names that escaped us, stopped for gelato at St Mark square. Out of 2 dozen tables outside 3 or 4 were occupied, my tired husband sat down at a side table while I was getting ice-cream, oh yeah, pay first, just like it was in Russia! Hazelnut and pistachio, our favorites! The moment I handed one gelato to my husband, a waiter appeared: the tables are reserved for customers who order food. We didn’t argue.

San Giorgio Maggiore – the vaporetto stop is right by the church entrance (and the ride is beautiful!). Inside, on the left side in the back is the ticket counter for the ride up to the observation tower. If you’re afraid of heights, close your eyes. The view of Venice is so worth going to this island! Just don’t be startled by the bells, they probably play every hour on the hour, and if you are at the top of the tower they are loud.

Norwegian Jade. This was our 2nd cruise with NCL, and the ship was similar to the Jewel, only it looked the workload for employees was bigger. The beds were made after noon, towel animals only twice in 7 days, and I don’t even know who was our steward as I’ve seen 3 people cleaning. On the first day the cabins were ready at 2.30, but the luggage was delivered early. We went to all evening shows, and liked them all – this is surprising as we usually find the shows to be of low quality.

I had a puzzling experience in the gift shop. The ship currency is US, so when I saw the price in both US and Euro on the receipt I asked the cashier, and was told, as we are in the EU waters, they must convert all charges to Euro. I asked again to be sure: will my charge on the credit card be in Euro or US? She said, in Euro. Great, I got caught into duplicate currency conversion charges! Turned out, she didn’t know how to explain, by law she was only required to inform how much this would be in Euro, the charge on the statement was in the US dollars.

There were many activities and lectures; of course most of them was about sales of goods and services, but some info too. For example, at the acupuncture lecture we learned how to massage the head for better memory – and if you are laughing, think about it: any massage is better than none at all! And how to massage above the eye to get rid of floaters – this I will test after getting over the jetlag.

We thought the food was very good, but the service was different – much better in the Grand Pacific compare to Azure restaurant. Lots of help was offered in the buffet, and nobody minded to share a table. Overall our impression of the ship, cabins, food, entertainment, order, employees’ help was high.

Corfu. Bus 16 takes passengers from the ship to the center of the city for 1.5 Euro, the driver has change, this would be a long uninteresting walk. I needed cash, and the bus stops in the town between two ATMs. Interesting, the locals ignored one of them in the park, everybody was getting money across the street, so we did the same. We thought it was a safety precaution.

The town is very walkable, lots of narrow streets; we loved to explore them making silly bets if this was a dead end! Our first stop in Greece, we just wanted to walk around looking at people, homes, cafes, and of course souvenir shops! We felt safe, and people were polite.

While I was asking for directions looking for the synagogue, my husband said, come with me, I’ll show you something. There was a Holocaust memorial that we didn’t know about, on a plaza close to the fort. I didn’t see any mentioning of it anywhere on the Internet. It would probably be the easiest to find if you go from the synagogue back to the bus not taking any side streets, maybe 2 blocks away. When we stopped at the synagogue to take photos 2 people came out to invite us inside.

Santorini. This is where I chickened out being terribly afraid of the small cable cars. The wires hang on supporting poles, and going over them the cars swing; this is very visible from the pier below where the tender dropped us off. Had an unfortunate experience before, and just couldn’t make myself get on that car. So we walked around the pier, took photos of the donkeys and cable cars, and went back to the ship to get some suntan.

In the evening half of the ship was on the upper deck to photograph and film the sundown, but it was probably the wrong day – no clouds, no drama in the sky, no colors. We left. What should not be missed are the lights – the whole village on the hill is lighted up along with the cable cars. I even have a photo to show.

Mykonos. The free shuttle bus took us to the center of the very white town. Walked along the waterfront, admired the private yachts, photographed the windmills, unfortunately didn’t see any pelicans, on the way back deliberately “got lost” in those narrow streets - such a nice experience! We walked up to the windmills along the shore, and back through the narrow streets, and both were interesting, beautiful, and we didn’t want to go back on the ship! This felt like the most romantic stop.

Katakolon. Very little is said on the Internet and the guidebooks about this village except it being a stop for Olympia. There were taxis, and we saw the train to Olympia – the whole train had only 2 cars, and it left, came back later, and just stood there. Off the ship we saw horse carriage rides, and of course we got on. The driver took us along the seashore and pointed out the Olympia Mountain. We also took a “train” ride – several cars pulled by a “locomotive” – another ride, this time outside the town to the beach. Museum of ancient Greek technology (inventions) is very informative and highly recommended, signs in English and also demonstrations on how the inventions work.

I wish I could add the photos, getting a little better at taking them with the digital camera. What a great trip it was despite missing on Santorini. Our main impressions: Venice is an interesting place to visit; Greek islands are the place for a honeymoon, very romantic. For some reason, this cruise seemed too short – we were on a 7-day cruise of Caribbean, then it was just right. I wish to go back some day.

My photos are on WorldIsRound website http://www.worldisround.com/articles/365274/index.html

Loved being back in Venice through your report! Thanks for the pix too!

I like your reporting style! I laughed out loud about your husband and the 2 toilets! You made good use of your ACTV tickets in Venice, it seems. Hey, I go to sleep with the English version of "the next-ah stop-ah" ringing in my ears-ah. I love it.

Lovely report and it sounds like you had some fun adventure. Glad you are safely home and enjoyed the pics tremendously.

Sounds like your trip was fun,Faina.
look up Albert Cohen in Google-

DH and I were on Santorini in the 80s and the donkeys were the only option at that time if I remember correctly.

Nice TR, thanks!

Thank you all for your comments!

Yasronit, this is what I did at home, but at that time at the synagogue I felt a bit foolish

I believe in Venice they're called Turkish blinds.

Like in Denmark - where "Danish" pastries are called "Vienna bread".

It sounds wonderful Dayenu. My room at the Arlecchino was also very small but I would stay there again, it is a great value for Venice. And besides, you hardly spend any time in the room anyway.

Thanks for the pics and the great report.

nice report Dayenu.

would you return to Venice?

Nice pics and TR. its nice to put a face to a name and I'm glad you had a good time.

BTW here is some info on Albert Cohen
.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Cohen

AnnHig, maybe. There are so many places I want to go to for the first time! For some reason, I was awed by Greek islands, not so much by Venice.

Jacketwatch, yes, I saw that already

If anyone wondering, the removed post was a commercial from a new poster.

Bookmarking to read later.

Great report...Loved the pictures!

Thank you!

Enjoyed your dialog and pictures. We are on Royal Caribbean's Splendor of Seas for a 10 day Greek cruise Aug. 26th and spending 3 nights in Venice, 2 before and 1 after.