Two Cruises In One, Another Day At Sea
12th June – Another “First Day” At Sea
I got up super early today because I knew the boat would be full of newbies getting their “den”, I had our spot up on deck 12 by the pool for 8am. It was lovely and quiet for about half and hour, and then suddenly it was full with women walking backwards and forward looking for the best place to sit, all with hapless husbands trailing around after them laden down with towels, books and sunbathing paraphernalia. I got a freshly squeezed orange juice and sat watching the to-ings and fro-ings of people getting settled, Paul came about an hour later, and Laura about an hour after him. Laura did not stay with us though, she went off to the kids club. Me and Paul had a splash about in the adults pool. What was really funny was there was loads of people sitting “round” the pool, but no-one actually “in” it, until I got in, then it was like the old empty dancefloor thing, once one person gets on, it soon filled up with pensioners – it was like a scene from that film “cacoon” haha!!
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Getting Lost On Crete
11th June – Crete
I decided that as we were in Crete I would have a Greek breakfast in remembrance of our first family holiday in the sun. Then we disembarked and were happily wandering into the town when we saw a sign directing us to the “Aquarium – left” so we walked and walked and walked and ended up on a motorway to Agos Nicolas. No sign of any aquarium anywhere though. Most odd. Had to turn back on ourselves and walk and walk and walk again to get back to where we had started! Eventually we got in a taxi and he took us about 1 minute in the other direction where all the action was. Typical!
What was lucky though was when we first got this taxi we asked him to take us to the Zoo, and he did not even know Crete had a zoo – then he realised what we meant and told us in no uncertain terms that we did not want to go there because there was nothing there! Walked around Crete. Saw a lovely church with a big skull covered in diamonds in it (the Holy Skull of Apostle Titus, first Bishop of Crete) Unfortunately again because of the time of day a lot of the shops and attractions were closed. We found a supermarket, got some drinks etc and decided to headed back to the boat for a siesta and come back into town later. We would be in Crete until 10pm after all. Got another taxi back into town, the taxi driver was so funny taking the mickey out of Paul for being a Man United supporter. We walked around for a bit and eventually stopped for dinner in a restaurant called Central Park. I cannot rate this place highly enough – lovely food and absolutely loads of it. We got a bit confused because before our food came we were given bottles of water and plates of crudités, but we hadn’t ordered these? We ate them anyway.
I ordered a Greek Salad but I think I was given enough to share (well, there was 3 plates to dish it out on) But I wasn’t sharing – they wouldn’t eat it anyway 
– then their burger and chips came and I’ve never seen anything so big! Had a lovely glass of ouzo… All this 3 dinners, 3 sets crudités 3 bottles water, 3 soft drinks all for 25E that’s more like it!!!!! I tipped the girl 5E which seemed to surprise her. Don’t know why. A good feed like that at that price deserves a tip.
Then we had an amazing ride of death in a taxi to get us through Heraklion’s rush hour traffic, which has to be seen to be believed!
Back on boat and up to deck 14 where they had just started a Crete night. Lots of greek music and dancing, even spit roasted pig!
And so to bed.