We crossed the border into Flintstone, MD where we fed the thirsty Ingrid some much needed gasoline. In the backcountry hills of Bedford, one could easily run out of gasoline if not careful. Not much to see in Flintstone but it was a relatively important town to the Imes family simply because it was nearest significant junction on the National Pike. Cumberland Fireworks We drove on to Cumberland which was readying for the Fourth of July Festivities. A quiet mountain city with great historical character and reasonable efforts at reviving the downtown, something which lacked in the smaller Bedford and yet smaller Everett. We stayed at the Bruce House Inn, located in the historical mansion quarter of the town. They put on a decent fireworks show which we got to watch after we struggled with our ... read more

Commentary on Istanbul Shopping We leave tomorrow morning very early the same way we came through Amsterdam. We had an interesting day today which ended with our stay here at the Sheraton in Atakoy which is a wealthier suburb of Istanbul near the Ataturk Airport. The hotel is nice although the staff is even greener here than they were in Santorini, more on that later. It was nice to be in a true residential neighborhood as we went to the Galleria, which is an enclosed mall next to our hotel, with a number of high end shops but also evidence of Turkey´s third world status with a shop at the entrance selling just about everything available in fake Abercrombie & Fitch. That is very popular here, in fact for a certain class of people the fake ... read more

My favorite quote from Day 1 in Istanbul, a rug merchant in the Spice Bazaar: "You see all of these old people who come here to visit, and they can barely see and are tired of walking after five minutes . . . they save up their money their whole lives and then spend it to come here when they can not really enjoy it. Here in Turkey, we live life now, why wait to see the world? Do it when you are young and can enjoy it. We don't live long in Turkey, maybe not past 75 or 76, because after that, can you really enjoy life where you are required to have others take care of you? If you do live past that here, people will take care of you, but that's not what ... read more

Visiting Meteora was to be the big question mark of the trip. Google Earth did not have a clear aerial, the hotel was not very communicative, and I had no mre information beyond the fact that it is the location of the monastery where the James Bond movie, For Your Eyes Only was filmed. Greek Trains I think we are becoming enough of an expert on the subject, having been on Serbian, Austrian, French, Chinese, Romanian, Bulgarian, and Hungarian railcars and trains. What we have experienced so far are the regional trains, these are okay, a little beat up, but still comfortable, and timely at the start of the day, but not the end. Larissa Station in Athens is quite dimunitive, but that makes it easy to navigate unlike the huge Communist Era stations we experienced ... read more

We skipped breakfast so we would not have to get up quite so early for our sailing today with Ted Stathis of Santorini Sailing. We also had our bright little yellow Fiat Panda delivered from what turned out to be a much better experience that Thrifty. Although on the last it all turned out good and the guy told me there was no issue as they had just missed it on the review. I would have to believe though that if I had merely acquiesced to their pointing out the "new" scratches, I would most likely have been charged for it, so renters beware, be thorough and be a pest about it, it will save you a lot of trouble. We pointed out so many knicks and scratches to our guy in Santorini that he joked ... read more