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Published: September 3rd 2013
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Well , the time is almost here ….. After having holidayed closer to home for the last couple of years, Ted and I will shortly be on the move once again. This forthcoming trip has been 3 years in the planning for various reasons and so, it still seems a bit surreal that our departure is now less than a couple of weeks away. What started out as a two-week trip to Turkey with friends, has grown into an epic almost “bigger than Ben Hur.” Once deciding that we would go to Turkey, I (Jan) thought that, seeing as Greece is “right next door”, why don’t we add that on too, and do some island-hopping? After all, we are going all that way – might as well make it really worthwhile and see as much as we can. Enter Greece into the equation ….. Meanwhile, husband Ted, whilst one day browsing one of the multitude of email newsletters that turn up in our inbox each day, spies an 8-day cruise along the Dalmatian coast on a small sailing ship. Thinking that that would be a neat thing to do – why don’t we find out about that as well? After all, Greece, Turkey and Croatia are all in close proximity to one another.
Having to get to Split in Croatia to get the cruise proved a bit of a challenge as, to get there from where we would be at the time, we had to fly in via another European city which, we weren’t going to be in. Leaving this aspect in the capable hands of our travel agent daughter, Jenni, to sort out, she sat opposite us tapping furiously away on her computer keyboard. At the end of our session with her, and a couple of hours and several itinerary re-writes later, she then ran through the route that we would be taking – Sydney, Dubai, Vienna …… Hang on! How did we manage to end up in Dubai and Vienna when they weren’t even on the radar?? “Because, Mum, you’ve never been to Dubai and you really should go and see it and, Vienna, because you need to go that way to be able to fly direct to Split – Vienna being the other European city.” “Sydney, Dubai Vienna is the most direct route.” Really??? “But, why Vienna??” Out of all the European cities available, why Vienna? “ I asked.
“Because I like it ….. so, you will too”, she said with a smile. Rrright ….. how do you argue with that? ….. so then Dubai and Vienna are added to the list as well. Ending our cruise in Dubrovnik, the tiny country of Montenegro is “right next door”, so Jenni says, “I think you should do this.” “Being so close, it would be a shame to miss it.” “I was really disappointed that I didn’t get to see it when I was there, but I didn’t have time.” “And …. it leaves from Dubrovnik.” So, the suggestion is made that we do the day trip into Montenegro. Another addition made to “the list” …….. By this time, it had become apparent that our original two-week holiday had somehow taken on a life of its own throughout the process and, had now stretched into a 7-week epic which, “had just grow’d like Topsy!” 😊 So, here we are. Mid-September, we will be off to Greece, Turkey and Croatia with a few days in Dubai and Vienna thrown in for good measure. Ted and I will be doing our own thing before meeting up with our Canadian and Kiwi friends once again in mid-October to tour the Turkey part of our holiday with them for, what was, the (original) couple of weeks.
Our first port of call will be Dubai (“because you’ve never been and you really should go and see it”) where we will stopover for a couple of days then on to Vienna (“because, I like it …. so, you will too” 😊 for a few days then to Split in Croatia. We shall enjoy exploring the city of Split for a couple of days then fly to Dubrovnik in the south where we will pick up an 8-day cruise of the Adriatic, touring the offshore islands along the Dalmatian Coast on a vintage sailing motorboat. Our cruise will return us to Dubrovnik where we will then do the day tour into the small country of Montenegro (“because being so close, it would be a shame to miss it”) before flying on to Athens for the Greek part of our holiday. Here we will spend the next couple of weeks touring around some of the historical sites of ancient Greece including a 4-day visit to Olympia, Delphi, Kalambaka and Meteora.
Some of the attractions we will see as we tour around will include the Beehive Tomb of Agamemnon; The Lion Gate; the archeological site of Zeus; the (original) Olympic Stadium; the Temple of Apollo and the bronze statue of The Charioteer. In Meteora, we are looking forward to seeing the ageless monasteries perched high on the monolithic rocks that this part of Greece is famous for in this UNESCO World Heritage area. If you are a James Bond fan, you may recognize some of the photos from here when you see them, as some of the scenes for the movie, “For Your Eyes Only”, were filmed here. A couple of days then to explore around Athens itself visiting, of course, the Acropolis and Parthenon; the site of the 2004 Olympic Games and other city attractions. Then, we will do a little bit of island-hopping to visit Mykonos, Santorini and the lesser known islands of Skiathos and Skopelos, (where some of the scenes for “Mama Mia, The Movie” were filmed) north of Athens. It sounds as though we are on the trail of movie locations but, no, not really, it just turned out that way. 😊
Middle of October (Happy Birthday, to Ted!) we will arrive in Istanbul, several days before our holiday in Turkey begins. It is here that we will meet up with our friends, Geoff, Marianne, Dan and Gail who will have flown in from New Zealand and Canada by this. From here, we also plan to do a 2-day trip to Gallipoli before our Turkey adventure begins. We are really looking forward to visiting this land of the ancient Ottoman Empire where, one of the highlights for us will be a hot-air balloon ride in Cappadocia, to view the mushroom-shaped “Fairy Chimneys”. Early volcanic eruptions created the surreal moonscape of this area which wind and rain have sculpted into these unique rock formations. Early Cappadocians chiseled cave-homes out of the soft rock, some of which have become today’s 5-star boutique “fairy-chimney” hotels. As Turkey will be the final destination on our holiday, we’ll head home from here via Dubai once again when our holiday concludes, arriving back in Sydney early November. Come with us ......
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kangaroojack
The Ts
Come with us !!
OK Ski Set, We are packed and ready for our trip with you, what's going on two blogs in two days, slow down, not only are we having to write and publish Kangaroojack's (tails) but we are now reading yours with comments. Great blog (Show off) hope you have a wonderful trip and happy travels to you and Mr Teddy. Love to you all. Kj