Mar 17, 2012 - Day 1 - We arrive and eat 2 dinners

It's unbelievable how smooth our travels went. Plane left on time. Transferred in Munich. Arrived in Bari.  No problems with luggage or even our car rental. I kept waiting for something to go wrong but maybe that's not the kind of trip we are going to have. We seem to be on course to have a wonderful time. And it only got better. My mother is our driver and I am the guide. We got to the hotel without even fighting- kinda scary! The Palace Bari is perfect. A quaint little hotel, more than comfortable. When we check in we meet Mimma at the...

Nov 20, 2010 - Hello Italy (Again)

Brrrrr, Bari. 17 degrees? How do you expect me to cope with that? A jumper? Goodness me. Italy, for the third time, Bari for the third time. At least we knew where the supermarket was. Feels good to be back in Italy. When nowhere is home (well, for a year anyway), then somewhere you've been to three times starts to feel very familiar, and that's very welcome. I'm going to ask you a favour now. Is anyone still reading this? We're feeling a bit lonely over here so how about you guys send us a message and tell us what you're up to. Remember,...

Oct 28, 2010 - Back to Bari

[***WARNING*** There now follows an update related to the ferry crossing between Italy and Greece which some readers may find tedious and uninteresting. "But how will we tell it from your other entries, Angela?" you cry. Bog off.] Between April and October most of the companies doing the Greek crossing offer a ticket option called "Camping On Board". This means exactly what it says on the tin; if you are in a motorhome (or in your car for that matter) you get to camp on board in your vehicle, just by buying the cheapest ticket. We hit the...

Oct 13, 2010 - Goodbye Balkans

We checked in at 9pm, for the 11pm sailing. Once we started boarding, it didn’t go as quickly as expected; in fact it was the slowest boarding we’d had. It became clear as we neared the front of the line that the border guards were being extremely thorough when it came to the checks they were performing. We thought they were targeting specific nationalities when they went over the Bosnians and the Irish with a toothpick, but when they went for the guy from Liechtenstein in front of us, we knew we were for it to. However, (and if Nick’s...

Aug 22, 2010 - Bari, Italy

Sunday, August 22 - Bari, Italy - Today we are in Bari, a sweet little city with a small town feel. There is a new part to Bari and there is an old town. It’s Sunday so not much is open, but enough in the touristy areas to get a feel for it. The people are friendly and warm. This is the home of St. Nicolas, his remains housed in the beautiful Basilica di San Nicola. So if you’re feeling Christmassy, this is the place to be. OK, so it doesn’t have the snow or reindeer that you’d expect, but the Basilica di San Nicola does house the bones of...

Aug 15, 2010 - Leaving Greece, back tomorrow. Leaving Italy, back on Saturday.

August 15, Sunday - We got up early, and took a taxi to the airport. We caught our first flight to Rome without any trouble. There was not much excitement in Rome (except we almost missed our boarding time for the flight to Bari where we catch the ship). When we arrived in Bari we collected our luggage. We stood at the Taxi stand but no Taxis were to be seen. A man came walking down the sidewalk, waving his arms, and asked us if we wanted a taxi. We said yes and he said “follow me”. He lead us to the parking lot and a car that was...

Oct 14, 2009 - At sea

Time for an easy day! Seas calmed down - sun came out. Breakfast in bed - stretch class in the gym followed by aerobics - then siesta. Lunch in the restaurant with Anita from Auckland. Afternoon we diverted for a medical emergency - a young boy who had broken his arm in several places left with his family by the tender and then taken ashore to hospital. A snooze on a deck chair out on the deck. Formal dinner tonight followed bt an excellent show.

Oct 13, 2009 - Bari, Italy & our "overnight" ferry ride

We woke up and peered out the window after what we thought had been an extremely smooth, 8 hour, overnight crossing from Bari, Italy to Durres, Albania. Imagine our shock when what we thought would be our first view of little-visited Albania turned out to be same view from our cabin window as when we boarded the ship the previous night - the port of Bari. Unbeknownst to us, after we had tucked ourselves into bed for a good night's sleep, the harbourmaster closed the port because of bad weather, so we had never set sail! Not the most...

Oct 13, 2009 - Bari

Rough seas meant a delay and then stuck out in the harbour trying to get to port. At 3pm they cancelled all optional tours so didnt get to see the truffle houses. 3.30pm an emergency landing for disembarking & embarking pasengers - we got to stretch our legs on land for 1 hour. It was cold and gale force winds. Then it was back out into it. The seas calmed down a bit through the night.

Oct 5, 2009 - Far South

We were definitely in the wrong place to make a quick escape to Turkey. Airfares from Florence to Istanbul required the receipt of a mammoth fiscal stimulus in order to purchase same. I wanted to take the train via the Balkans but I could not get much info from the Italians which I wasn’t at all surprised about. So to undertake a train journey may have required hopping off in several spots and sorting out the next leg, which we are happy to normally do, but time is creeping by and Turkey is big and apparently very interesting. We...

Aug 14, 2009 - Friday 14th The No Day…

Both in terms of achievements and answers!! Drove down to Bari as planned, as we were a day ahead of schedule we wanted to get to Croatia a day early, so we got to ferry office at 2pm no probs but then found out it didn’t open until 6.30pm. So back to the van and into Bari centre. Spent the next 2 hours traipsing around Bari to try to find a MacDonald’s for an Internet connection. Finally found it, checked they had wireless, Yes they had! got our milkshakes then sat down to start uploading blogs but more importantly do the work that Michael...

Aug 7, 2009 - Croatia via Italy

Getting to Dubrovnik was always going to be a pain. I had to catch an overnight ferry from Greece, and then wait all day in a small Italian town called Bari to buy my ticket and catch another overnight ferry to Dubrovnik, Croatia. For some reason I couldn't buy the ticket from Italy to Croatia while I was in Greece, and an attempt to buy it online would have resulted in a 30 euro (approx $50) booking fee, and this for an e-ticket! I don't think so! So I decided to risk it and just head to Italy and then go straight to the ticket office....