Trip Report Our 19-Day Mediterranean Adventure – Greece, Turkey and the Search for Free Wifi

Finally, right? It seems like I’ve been waiting forever to start this, but really we’ve only been back three weeks! And in that time I’ve lived in a hotel for two weeks and driven across the country from Washington DC to our new home in...wait for it...Las Vegas! For some reason I have chosen now, surrounded by boxes that need to be unpacked, as the time to start my trip report. Stalling maybe? :D So here it goes!

What: A massive 19 day (13 days on the cruise with 6 more including travel time and extra days in Europe) trip extravaganza. A 12 night Mediterranean cruise with a day in London beforehand and a few days in London and Barcelona afterwards. So yes. This is going to be a long stinking trip report. Oh, and I took 5239 pictures. On my camera! That doesn’t even count the Instagram/iphone photos you’ll see scattered throughout the report.

Great day in the morning.

Why: Because cruises are awesome mostly. But also because I was able to do a last-minute 11 night Med cruise back in April of 2010 with my daughter and some other family and friends, so this was a makeup cruise for my son and husband. It worked nicely as a graduation trip/present. :)

When: June 13-July 1, 2013

I booked this cruise the day it came out, back in January of 2012.

As time got closer we realized it was going to get crazy. My daughter was going to have to miss the last day of school, my son was graduating from high school the Saturday before the trip, we had a house full of family that whole weekend and a big graduation party on Sunday, he then left and was coming home one day early from his senior trip to make it on time, and we were moving across the country to Las Vegas so our household goods were all moved the day before we left. Then the kids were traveling with their youth group to Scotland 3 days after the cruise ended, so it really didn’t make sense for us to come all the way back home and we needed to stay in Europe for three more days before we dropped them off in London Heathrow. Got all that? Yes. Like I said, a little crazy.

Totally worth it though. :)

Who: Us! Here we are a few days before we left! This picture is a celebration of the whole Whiting family – but mostly Chase. The high school graduate. Also appearing in this photo are myself-Tammy, hubby-Stephen, and daughter – Ally.



My parents! My parents were on our last Med cruise, and have been in several of my trip reports. They had quite the trip in store for them. Here they are in Monaco:



My in-laws! My in-laws were also on my last Med cruise, as well as a few other cruises with us, so they may look familiar if you've ever read one of my reports. Here they are in Palo:



My brother-in-law! Scott has appeared in a few trip cruise trip reports as well. He’s the oldest of three boys with my hubby falling in the middle. Here he is in Mykonos:

 

Disneyfalcon

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
I apparently decided it was impossible to take too many pictures of brunch at palo. You’re welcome @Crush Dude! :D







I should have done a better job of taking pictures of the food signs too because I have no idea what some of this is.















 
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Disneyfalcon

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
After a delicious brunch, we went to check in on mom. Look at her sad arm!



And this, my friends, is why you buy trip insurance. This was just one visit. And there were more to come.



Can’t see the total? Here it is again. One visit.



Stephen and Chase were laying off their huge meal while we talked. This is your room this week @Crush Dude! !!

 
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Disneyfalcon

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
I found Ally in her favorite spot. On deck 4 with a book and food. Or the remains of food in this case.



Deck 4 toes!



Where are all the chairs?!





Stitch in the wild!





Belle in the wild!





And the rarest character of all – Mom!!! She came out again!

 

Disneyfalcon

Well-Known Member
Original Poster

Disneyfalcon

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Ally took my camera to entertain herself:





Dessert time!





Most of us had the Stuffoli. It was quite yummy. It would have been better warm, but you can’t really argue with deep fried goodness dusted in sugar:



Ally’s Mickey bar mysteriously photo-bombed my picture:



Tonight was the midnight premiere of Monsters University and I wanted to go, but I didn’t want to stay up so late! Ally was disgusted with me.

She said, “Disney. Up.”

Ouch!

Thankfully after dinner, we saw that we would have another chance tomorrow night so I was able to put it off! :D We did go to the adult show and did some laundry! I think we ended up staying up almost as late as the movie! Oops!

We reach Greece tomorrow! :)
 

sweetpee_1993

Well-Known Member
Loved your sunrise pictures. To die for. Maybe I'll make it for a sunrise next month. I swear, one of these days I'll see one. LOL!

Your pics around the Magic just totally tug at my heartstrings! We so love the Magic! She's our favorite! Ugh! Sooooo wanna go see her after the drydock. At least I'll have the next best way to get a peek... ;)

O. M. G. First of all, I am sooooo sorry for Mom having pee-moan-yuh! That stinks! But that med bill?!?! Are you kidding me?!?! Good heavens!!!! I will never ever eeeeeeeeever travel without the insurance eeeeever again. In fact, I don't have any for the girls cruise. That will change within the next hour. Holy smokes! Unbelievable!

I wish I hadn't looked at all your pics of Palo brunch. Seriously. First of all, I'm hungry now. Ugh. Second, now I want to schedule a Palo brunch next month. I want 1 of everything pictured in the dessert section!!!! Double-UGH!!!!

So, was Chase super-duper excited to be able to go to Palo??? What was his thoughts on it afterward? Did it live up to the hype for him? Chandler can't wait to eat Palo. He's so psyched because he'll be old enough to next May. He's like, "Mom, I want Palo brunch twice and dinner at least once. Or every night." LOL! He's so funny!

**edit**
Travel insurance purschased within 15 minutes. :D
 
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Tidbit

Active Member
OMG! Wow your mommy really was siiiiiiiiiccccccckkkkk!!! Forget the....as Kelly said "pee-moan-yuh" that med bill would have killed me!!

Since she had the travel insurance did she have to pay the bill or did they just use the insurance?
 

lbrad

Well-Known Member
Day 8: Sea Day

Today was another sea day today! Yay! I love the ports on a Med cruise, but it’s so nice to have some days to do nothing if we wanted.

Believe it or not though, I got up at 5:35! 5:35! Goodness gracious. There was a reason though - a sunrise photo meet up with a group from another board. I wasn’t sure I wanted to wake up, but I laid out some clothes the night before and decided to play it by ear.

I rolled over around 5:30, looked at the clock and decided – why not?

So I got up, threw on some clothes and went on upstairs.

It was cool, if not spectacular, and definitely worth getting up for.







Here it comes!





Little peek!









And wait! What is this?



Now that’s a sunrise. :)
WOW!!!
Absolutlely BREATH TAKING <3
 

lbrad

Well-Known Member
After a delicious brunch, we went to check in on mom. Look at her sad arm!



And this, my friends, is why you buy trip insurance. This was just one visit. And there were more to come.



Can’t see the total? Here it is again. One visit.



Stephen and Chase were laying off their huge meal while we talked. This is your room this week @Crush Dude! !!

PNEUMONIA ... Noooo ... DISLIKE!!!
Sure hope the meds kicked in quick!!!

Is that the "total" you pay with "trip insurance" ??? OUCH :(
 

Crush Dude!

Back from WDW!Counting down to DLP in November!
Well where do i start after all that...????

Feel so bad for your mom that is so hard! Last place anyone wants to be sick! And that bill?? Woah!! You found the one thing dearer than internet on DCL!!!

Those sunrise photos were awesome was thinking of getting up to do that myself and its a great time to get pics of the lobby before it "magic"ally disappears! Lived all the pics from around the ship, cannot wait to board (in 3 days)

Now Palo Brunch .......... :D:D:D

Those pics make me so happy that we went for it! My god it looks fantastic!
Big respect for those food pics Tammy i dont think even i will get that many taken! It is definitely going to be an awesome experience and we cannot wait!!

And hey theres MY room!!! Awesome, 3 more days until we get to it :D:D:D
 

ChuckElias

Well-Known Member
1) I just love the Magic. The pictures make me so homesick. I hope they don't screw it up with the re-design, b/c it's really almost perfect.

2) On our very first cruise, my nephew had an ear infection and the bill came to over $350 for a visit and antibiotics. So, yeah, travel insurance.

3) I love the Palo pictures, but what did you order???
 

fractal

Well-Known Member
Thanks for the Mediterranean sunset pictures - awesome! Sorry about your Mom, but at least she got treated and was able to get out and enjoy himself. :)

Palo looks amazing. Those shrimp bloody mary shots, and the King Crab. Wow!

I love when my kids take the camera and get all goofy! Can't wait for Greece!
 

Disneyfalcon

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Loved your sunrise pictures. To die for. Maybe I'll make it for a sunrise next month. I swear, one of these days I'll see one. LOL!

Your pics around the Magic just totally tug at my heartstrings! We so love the Magic! She's our favorite! Ugh! Sooooo wanna go see her after the drydock. At least I'll have the next best way to get a peek... ;)

O. M. G. First of all, I am sooooo sorry for Mom having pee-moan-yuh! That stinks! But that med bill?!?! Are you kidding me?!?! Good heavens!!!! I will never ever eeeeeeeeever travel without the insurance eeeeever again. In fact, I don't have any for the girls cruise. That will change within the next hour. Holy smokes! Unbelievable!

I wish I hadn't looked at all your pics of Palo brunch. Seriously. First of all, I'm hungry now. Ugh. Second, now I want to schedule a Palo brunch next month. I want 1 of everything pictured in the dessert section!!!! Double-UGH!!!!

So, was Chase super-duper excited to be able to go to Palo??? What was his thoughts on it afterward? Did it live up to the hype for him? Chandler can't wait to eat Palo. He's so psyched because he'll be old enough to next May. He's like, "Mom, I want Palo brunch twice and dinner at least once. Or every night." LOL! He's so funny!

**edit**
Travel insurance purschased within 15 minutes. :D

It was not easy to convince myself to try it! But I'm glad I did! Let's do it together!
I know you love the Magic. It's going to be even better I'm sure! You know I'll be posting a gazillion pictures!
That med bill was over $5000 by the time the cruise was done. $5000!!!
Yay for insurance!
All my pictures made me want to go back immediately! Would it be wrong for us to eat Palo brunch at 10:00 on the girls cruise and then move to Remy brunch at noon? :)
He was excited! He liked it! He said he was going to skip dinner and go to dinner with Ally later that week, but he made it to dinner too!
I'm with Chandler. :)

OMG! Wow your mommy really was siiiiiiiiiccccccckkkkk!!! Forget the....as Kelly said "pee-moan-yuh" that med bill would have killed me!!

Since she had the travel insurance did she have to pay the bill or did they just use the insurance?

Really sick!! The bill was insane. They had to pay it and no have filed for insurance which should cover all of it.
 

Disneyfalcon

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
WOW!!!
Absolutlely BREATH TAKING <3

Thanks, Lisa! :)

PNEUMONIA ... Noooo ... DISLIKE!!!
Sure hope the meds kicked in quick!!!

Is that the "total" you pay with "trip insurance" ??? OUCH :(

Definitely dislike!! That's the total you must pay. Then you file with insurance who pays you back. Ouch indeed.

Well where do i start after all that...????

Feel so bad for your mom that is so hard! Last place anyone wants to be sick! And that bill?? Woah!! You found the one thing dearer than internet on DCL!!!

Those sunrise photos were awesome was thinking of getting up to do that myself and its a great time to get pics of the lobby before it "magic"ally disappears! Lived all the pics from around the ship, cannot wait to board (in 3 days)

Now Palo Brunch .......... :D:D:D

Those pics make me so happy that we went for it! My god it looks fantastic!
Big respect for those food pics Tammy i dont think even i will get that many taken! It is definitely going to be an awesome experience and we cannot wait!!

And hey theres MY room!!! Awesome, 3 more days until we get to it :D:D:D

It is the last place you want to be sick! That bill (and being quarantined) is why people avoid medical!!

Do it! Even if the sunrise isn't worth it, the empty ship is!

3 days!!

It was amazing. I can't believe how many pictures I took!
 

Disneyfalcon

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
1) I just love the Magic. The pictures make me so homesick. I hope they don't screw it up with the re-design, b/c it's really almost perfect.

2) On our very first cruise, my nephew had an ear infection and the bill came to over $350 for a visit and antibiotics. So, yeah, travel insurance.

3) I love the Palo pictures, but what did you order???

I love the Magic. I really think it will be even better though. It's time to update some things.

I believe it! Yes. Travel insurance! Mom is perfectly healthy. Total fluke.

Would you believe I took so many pictures of food and somehow forgot my plate? I ordered my favorite - chicken parmesan. Although last night when I was looking at the pancake picture I wondered why I had never had that!

Thanks for the Mediterranean sunset pictures - awesome! Sorry about your Mom, but at least she got treated and was able to get out and enjoy himself. :)

Palo looks amazing. Those shrimp bloody mary shots, and the King Crab. Wow!

I love when my kids take the camera and get all goofy! Can't wait for Greece!

The good thing about her being sick on this cruise is that it was so long she had time enjoy a few days, be sick for a week, and then enjoy the end!

I do like the silly pictures too. :)

Greece is coming!

That bill! Yikes!

That food! Amazing. I want to eat all of that right now

Yikes indeed!
It was amazing. Those pictures make me hungry. :)
 

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