Remembering November

Wednesday, November 18

These photos are not for my usual photo challenge, but one from Scott Thomas at Views Infinitum. Although November is technically still fall, it always reminds me that winter is near. The leaves are mostly on the ground experiencing the first frost of the season.
It's also the month we start searching for our hats, scarves and gloves.
A year ago today, we embarked on our first cruise and it was awesome! So for now, I will always remember November as my first cruise - on the Mediterranean. The sun setting as we left a very chilly Venice.

An almost deserted walk in sunny, but windy Santorini.
Maybe this reminiscing will inspire me to upload the rest of the cruise photos.

One Year Ago

Wednesday July 1

I can't believe it, one year ago today we were on a plane for Paris! That means we have been back for as long as we were gone - 6 months. You know how you have these big events in your life: marriage, moving, and kids. You say stuff like, "Did we do such and such before or after so and so was born.?" Or you say, "Wow we've been parents for 8 years now!" No we do that in reference to "the trip". It was such a huge and wonderful experience that we shared together.

Sometimes it seems like we were just in Spain last month and if you saw how many boxes are still in our garage you would actually believe it. I haven't even posted all the pics from our cruise back in November! Now I just want to go back everyday this summer and see where we were one year ago. Hey, this could be a blog about the trip forever. OK, I guess you would get tired of that - time to move on. I just removed the itineraries from the side bar so people wouldn't get confused. If you need to see them one last time, here you go.

The Trip
6/30 - Depart from PDX
7/01 - Paris, France
7/05 - Scotland
7/12 - Edinburgh
7/20 - Cardiff, Wales
7/22 - Bristol, England
7/25 - Oxford, England
7/27 - London, England
8/03 - Bruges, Belgium
8/06 - Amsterdam
8/09 - Prague
8/16 - Milan, Italy
8/18 - Barcelona, Spain
8/25 - Granada, Spain
12/16- Carolinas for Christmas
12/31 - Home for New Years Eve!


Cruise
Nov 20 Fly to Venice
Nov 22 Bon Voyage
Nov 23 Dubrovnik, Croatia
Nov 25 Santorini, Greece
Nov 27 Tunis, Tunisia
Nov 29 Malaga, Spain
Nov 30 Casablanca, Morocco
Dec 2 debark in Lisbon, Portugal
Dec 3 Seville, Spain
Dec 5 back to Granada

Ahhh, what a trip!

Friday Flashback: Malaga, Spain

Friday, May 8


I'm determined to finish posting the pics from our Mediterranean cruise from last November. Once again we begged the girls to go on shore with us, but when we told them we were back in Spain, they both said, "No thanks, we've already been there!" Even though we had never been there, it definitely felt familiar. Malaga is only about an hour or so from where we were living in Granada. You know it's the home town of Antonia Banderas, but I never saw him. I guess he was in Hollywood that day.
We had a warm, sunny walk up the hill to visit the Alcazaba (a military fortress built by the Moors in the 11th century) and Gibralforo Castle. Next stop was the Cathedral of course. Every Spanish town has a cathedral and a castle. Then we stopped at a bar for drinks and tapas. Finally a place we felt comfortable eating the food, not that there is any reason to eat something other than cruise food.
Click here to see the pics from Malaga.

Friday Flashback - Santorini, Greece

Friday, May 1

Friday is almost over, but we still have time for a Friday Flashback. Today totally reminded me of our visit to Santorini since it was warm, sunny and windy.

According to my cruise itinerary we visited this Greek isle on November 25, 2008. I really need to update my blog, some people might think that is an upcoming cruise, but sadly it was over five months ago. How is that possible?
The girls chose to stay on the boat and we were a little sad that they didn't get to see the beautiful views from the little town of Oia. On the other hand we had to wait for a crowded bus ride, most shops were closed since it was the very end of the tourist season and it was super windy. I didn't even know if any of my pictures turned out until we got back on the boat. We got a ride up, but walked down a bunch of switchbacks on our return to the ship. Sure wish I had found a bathroom before we started down, but I survived without any accidents!

Click here to see more Santorini pics.

I linked to this site after I had already posted so I'm adding the linky thing.

Friday Flashback: Dubrovnik, Croatia

Friday, April 9
Why have I waited almost four months to blog about the cruise we took last November? I have no good excuse, but it's not because we didn't have a great time. Cruises are the way to travel with kids! Right now I'm hanging out in a hotel near SeaTac airport. We are all headed to the Science Fiction Convention today, an annual stop for us on the way to visit the cousins in the Seattle area for Easter. Yes, I could have some very interesting pictures to post next week.

Here is what I found on the laptop regarding Dubrovnik which was written on Sunday, November 23, 2008.

Cute little town surrounded by a wall that we walked on top of. It was pretty cold and the girls begged to go back to the boat the whole time. We had lunch at a little restaurant by the water and had some yummy shrimp and seafood risotto that had a little too much seafood for me. I pretty much only like peeled shrimp and shelled crab. Luckily Kevin doesn’t mind foraging for his food and for his family too.
Click here for more pics of Dubrovnik, Croatia.