Dear Grandkids,
You already know that Nona and I love to travel. You also know that we recently returned from a cruise to the Mediterranean Sea. (This retired gig does have some perks). While the trip is still fresh I wanted to highlight for you some of the things that we loved about the cruise. So here are my Top Ten highlights and a few pics to give you a taste of what we experienced. These are in no particular order.
1) Time together – You might think this a funny thing to mention since we live in the same house and are seemingly always together. But even in our semi-retirement, life is busy. We both have part time jobs and both have things around the house that we give attention to. So to be together 24-7 for two weeks was different. And believe it or not, we didn’t get tired of each other. (Maybe you should ask Nona if this was true for her). We have always valued shared memories and that is one of the reasons we love traveling. So even though these are in no particular order, this one is at the top of the list.
2) Time with friends – Repeating what I just said – we value shared memories. Our friends Tony and Kaylyn Fernandez joined us on the cruise. We had never traveled together but, at least in my opinion, we had a great time experiencing new places and nourishing our friendship. Now we have lots of shared stories to tell and memories to recall.
3) The footsteps of the Apostle Paul – When we picked the cruise we did it it was not with the intent of visiting a bunch of Biblical sites. But a real bonus was that it turned out that way. We visited Malta where Paul was shipwrecked and bitten by a snake (Acts 28). We visited Ephesus where Paul lived for 3 years and planted a church (Acts 19) – and where the Apostle John also lived at the end of his life. We visited Rhodes (Acts 21). We visited Corinth where Paul planted a church (Acts 18). I am currently teaching the Book of 1 Corinthians at our church so this was especially interesting to me. We visited Athens where Paul preached and engaged some of the great thinkers of the day (Acts 17).
4) Cinque Terra revisited – 10 years ago on my Sabbatical we were in Italy and stayed in Cinque Terra for 3 days. CT is a series of 5 small villages on the Italian Riviera that are stunning. We had always said that we wanted to go back but didn’t know if we would ever be able to. So to revisit it and to be able to show it off to our friends was a real treat.
5) The cruise ship – This was our 5th cruise, We sailed with Royal Caribbean to the Bahamas; Norwegian to the Western Caribbean; Norwegian to the Baltics; Princess to Alaska; and this time with Holland America. We were on a ship called the Oosterdam. It was awesome. Our state room was spacious with a balcony. The food was great. The service was great. We would definitely consider cruising with Holland America again.
6) Memorable meals on the ship – One of the fun things about cruising is that food on board in included in the price. Which means that you can order whatever you want. Pretty much every night we would EACH order several appetizers, several entrees and several desserts – just because we could!
7) Memorable meals off the ship – We had a great time exploring all the ports we visited but perhaps some of our best memories will be the extended lunches we had – just relaxing and chatting and marveling at the beauty around us as we reflected on just how blessed we were to be able to do what we were doing.
8) Memorable sunsets – These speak for themselves…
9) The weather – Spectacular.
10) New countries visited – We started in Barcelona and spent 2 days there before we boarded the ship. Then ported near Monte Carlo, the ports that served Florence and Rome, Messina (Sicily), Malta, Ephesus, Rhodes, Santorini, and finished in Athens where we spent two nights before flying home. I had never been to Spain, Malta, or Turkey so it is always fun to add more countries to my list of countries visited. I think I am up to an even 50 now.
All of this to say that we had a super duper, incredibly awesome, bodaciously fun adventure traveling this part of the world and knocking one thing off my bucket list. And we are already beginning to think about a travel adventure with all of you. We are starting to save and think about where we could all go (we might even invite your parents) to celebrate our 50th anniversary – which is just 7 years away. So help us think what a trip like that might look like.
Never forget that you are very loved,
Pop Pop