SPRING 2013 TRIP FROM MARCH 27-MAY 28, 2013

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GENERAL OVERVIEW

This trip is very atypical for us. We will not be taking Rosie and we will be visiting many countries that we have never seen before. Some of them, like Egypt and India, are on our “bucket list” and some of them, like Oman and Sri Lanka had never appeared on the list at all. Other differences include cruises on a typical “cruise ship with a casino, nightly entertainment, miniature golf course, rock climbing, etc. and a two week long escorted bus tour.

We started planning the trip 8 months ago, making lists and checking them off as they were accomplished. For example, we needed to buy cruise clothes, especially for the equatorial countries as t-shirts and jeans just wouldn’t cut it. Another must was to get our vaccinations updated and prescriptions for malaria. We also spent a lot of time on the Internet exploring the various ports to determine which field trips we would want to go on. Of course, we wanted to see both the Valley of the Kings and the Pyramids/Sphinx in Egypt, so those were the first excursions we signed up for. Others, like Kuala Lumpur and Dubai, we determined we could see most of the sights via public transportation and didn’t need to pay for a cruise tour.

When we finished all of our planning, our spring trip will be in 5 parts: 1) a week in Singapore visiting Sharon’s son who lives there and seeing some of the sights we haven’t seen since we were there in 2007. We especially hope to go bird watching in some of the parks there; 2) 14-day cruise on RCL ship Legends of the Sea from Singapore to Dubai –see map 1; 3) a 15-day continuation cruise from Dubai to Rome–see map 2; 4) a 13-day Cosmos Grand Tour of Turkey by touring bus–see map 3 ; and 5) 11 days in Istanbul with leisurely visits to the Mosques, Topkapi museum, and other points of interests.

Today we put Rosie in storage for two months and tomorrow we begin our trip with a flight from Atlanta to Singapore via Narita, Japan. It will take about 20-22 hours to fly there and probably twice as long to get over the trip. We will try to keep you updated as we are able to connect to the Internet. We want to thank you all for following our ventures and an especial shout out goes to those who make our trips possible by staying in our home and watching after the house and yard.

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Photos

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Map 1: Singapore to Dubai

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Map 2: Dubai to Rome

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Map 3: Turkey Grand Tour