Driving…………………………………Great lunch at some tiny little place high in the mountains where we watched our food being cooked on the fire………………..driving……………………… Reached Mersin, Turkey (thank god) around 8pm. The entire drive was on a two lane mountainous road with lots of trucks, the Toyota was struggling thru most of the up hill climbs. Tough drive! We all shared this driving experience. [View Full Entry]

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What could be better than waking up to breakfast on the beach? We sipped our Turkish tea and planned our day while soaking up the sun and enjoying the view. We then packed up the car and drove into the town to explore Fethiye a bit before we leave. We spot some ruins carved into the mountain that bordered the back of the town. We park the car, walk up a tiny street and find some old stairs leading to right to these old structures built 6000 years ago! The view of the city and harbor below is stunning and we [View Full Entry]

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After breakfast and a walk around town we hit the road. We reached Fethiye, Turkey around 5pm. This was a surprisingly great little town. At first sight we thought there was nothing there and nearly got back on the road for the next town. Then Al spotted a sign that pointed in the direction of the waterfront. Once again, we are ahead of the tourist season by a few weeks so we had a great little hotel right on the water all to ourselves. To top it all off we found a Turkish bath on the other side of town who [View Full Entry]

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After breakfast we walked back over to the port, purchase our insurance, picked up the car and hit the road. On our way south we stopped in a small town called Ephesus to check out some ruins. This was far better than what we expected. It outshines anything we saw in Athens, Greece. We arrived in Bodrum Turkey, a very nice coastal town, around 5pm. There were many nice restaurants, hotels and shops that lined the marina. It’s about 2 or 3 weeks prior to high season so we easily found a great place to stay and nice place for dinner. [View Full Entry]

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We arrived in Chios around 4:30am. We drove off the boat and were soon informed that the next boat leaving for Turkey would not leave at 8am as scheduled but at 4pm. They told us the boat was “broken”. We made the best of it and spent the day exploring the town. We finally loaded the car around 3:30 then watched as the one other car squeezed on board this tiny little ferry. About 45min. later we arrived in Cesme Turkey. We got off the boat and were directed straight to the customs office. This, by the way, is the first [View Full Entry]

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Walked around the city one last time, and then boarded the Theofilos, the overnight ferry that will take us to the Island of Chios, Greece. This was a very different kind of boat than the one we took from Italy to Greece. There was a very strange vibe to the Theofilos. Boarding this boat is like stepping into some sort of creepy Greek funeral. We nearly jumped over the side. We decided from our last boat experience to get a cabin so we could try and sleep on the way over. When they walked us to cabin #911 we knew things [View Full Entry]

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We headed off to Acropolis (amazing) and took some photos. We also visited the Odium of Herodes, Theater of Dionysos, Hadrian’s Arch, Temple of Olympian Zeus and then finally the Ancient Agora. It’s hard to imagine how such massive structures were created so long ago. Latter in the day we walked around town, did some shopping and had a nice dinner overlooking the ruins. [View Full Entry]

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We reached port in Piraeus, Greece around 1 pm then drove to Athens. Athens is a beautiful city with lots of history but it is very smoggy and dirty. Driving here is a lot of fun if you like dodging cars, motorcycles and pedestrians that come at you from every direction. We can’t read the traffic signs but not to worry, no one seems to obey them anyway. We were lucky and found a spot for the car and a hotel with in walking distance to all the ruins. FYI- Al’s bag is STILL lost. [View Full Entry]

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Drove to Bari Italy, had lunch and Lisa got hit on by a very Italian waiter. Boarded ferry around 5pm and then watched tons of trucks BACK onto the boat. Had a great dinner in a surprising nice restaurant on board. Planned out our route to Egypt and met some other travelers on board. TRIED to sleep on a couch then the floor then a chair….. Did not matter what you did, just could not get comfortable for couple of hours of quality shut eye. Trivia- we don’t know the actual number but our guess is 9.9 out 10 Europeans smoke [View Full Entry]

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Since the statue of David’s site was closed on Monday, we decided to try to get a couple of quick shots before leaving. Big mistake. The streets were crawling with tourists and students. There were at least 4 to 5 hundred people waiting in line for David so we decided to skip it and head south. After a couple hours of driving, it started to rain hard and there was a bad accident on the freeway. We sat waiting for the involved cars to be moved off the road for about 45 minutes. Lisa decided she was going to drive to [View Full Entry]

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