Piraeus, Port of Athens
Hotel Adrian, Athens
General Observations
We don’t have to wear lanyards on this cruise, thank goodness. I am surprised that obviously wealthy passengers don’t wear stylish clothes to dinner, as they would in France or Italy, or even the UK. We all had to sign our agreement to the dress code. Although it said “understated elegance”, one woman turned up to dine in jeans, with a nice top! I think they mean no bathing suits or ghastly tights in a dining room, which I certainly agree with, but wearing jeans at dinner is going a bit far for me! I feel quite stylish here, in my carefully managed and packed evening wear: white or black trousers, with a nice top and one of the wraps we bought in Florence, but dared not wear there. I even brought three dresses, although two of them are badly crushed and need pressing. I take advantage of the free option of having my French linen dress pressed; I iron the other one that needs it myself.
It is a carefully curated crowd of passengers, most of them being wealthy white people from the US with a few wannabes like the Australian couple we met, Andy and Rose, and ourselves. The caring staff are almost all coloured people, from various countries: India, Indonesia, the Philippines. The staff are very concerned that we’re enjoying ourselves and having a good time: it reminds me of my eldest son saying, “you don’t have to be happy all the time”. Well, on this vessel, in a very Disney-like way (You’re on vacation), you do! Everyone is very polite.
I am very much enjoying aspects of this: being looked after pretty well; breakfast in our stateroom; a very comfortable bed; a well-arranged bathroom, a couch in our larger room – we have plenty of room, and the laundrette is just down the hallway. JD like to do the washing himself, although the first load of our “free” washing came back three days later beautifully folded and ironed.
When we’re dining, we’re served beautifully, and it reminds us of when we were the only breakfast guests. I think the Miramar hotel in our Hong Kong stopover in December 1973. I enjoy the large linen napkins, even at lunchtime at the buffet. Of course if JD wants a glass of Chardonnay, he has to pay for that in US dollars. Anything. you do pay for on board is very expensive.
But I was going to add that when you order dessert, you can order ice cream as well, and it comes in a separate dish. I enjoy the service, the linen serviettes (napkins?) and linen tablecloths. The dinner menu is changed every night in the GDR, but some of the food doesn’t taste great. Still and all, it’s a nice experience and unusually I don’t mind changing for it.
We are cocooned in this very American, very white environment where English is spoken and I feel a bit weird saying “grazie” or “buon Giorno”, as I have been doing since we arrived in Milan. It feels as though American passengers have been transported from their home comfort zone into this one, where money means everything, and if one knows a bit about the Classics (what?), and archaeology and classical ruins, including things one has seen in other places on other trips, one write about it, one doesn’t talk about it. I realize what a gift it is that JD and I have a shared interest in ancient classical ruins, in religion, and in Renaissance art. Not many people share this. And he looks after me far better when we’re away!
During rest times in the afternoon I try to record what’s happened. I do this by writing emails, in draft, and sending them to myself. This holds certain challenges, of course, but I’ve done it before.
Another cruise observation: it’s actually nice to unpack and store one’s clothes. There is actually plenty of cupboard and drawer and wardrobe space. It’s very nice to have one’s stateroom made up twice a day, with plenty of towels and nice cakes of soap for hand washing and showering. And did I say the tiny shower is marvellous although tiny? It doesn’t leak, and you can’t really fall over in it.
The excursions are well organized. You meet in the Nautica lounge at the appointed time, on your ticket. You hand in your excursion ticket, and are given a small numbered ticket for your bus, twenty something, to be handed to the bus driver. Then each number is called and you disembark accordingly . As you leave, you click you room key as though you were boarding an aeroplane. On the bus you’re introduced to the tour guide (and helper, perhaps), and the driver. One is supposed to tip them all afterwards, of course. Tipping comes hard to us seasoned colonials; we’re happy to tip for really good service, if we can afford it; otherwise we’re pretty reluctant. Our coach (differing levels of comfort and cleanliness here) takes us to wherever we’re going, and transports us around as necessary. There is generally a museum, an ancient site or two, and then some free time (shopping?), and a deadline to get back to our coach. This can involve quite a lot of walking, and it can be hard to find the right coach. There are usually two toilet stops along the way, of varying degrees of cost, modernity and cleanliness. Sometimes there’s no toilet seat; sometimes you mustn’t put paper in the toilet. I know to always come prepared with spare tissues, but so far I haven’t had to use them.
Disembarkation
Last night was the last night of our cruise. We were supposed to leave our luggage outside our stateroom by 10 pm with the labels affixed that they had provided.
This related to your chosen time of disembarking, in our case 8:45 am, although we had to vacate our state rooms by 8 am.
So after our lovely excursion to Ephesus, and a nice lunch at the terrace cafe, we had to turn our minds to packing, and what we needed in our overnight bags.
I sat out on the balcony before we set sail soon after 3 pm, but it got too hot for me! I had a shower and washed my hair before packing my main sponge bag, since that is key to fitting everything else in my little suitcase.
So I packed everything in my packing cubes except what I was going to wear to dinner that evening, my nightgown, and what I was going to wear the next day.
I did not put makeup on for dinner as I usually do, it was packed or away. We went to the Grand Dining Room for dinner. People seemed to have really dressed up for this occasion! There was a feeling of celebration before the coming – who knows? We are quite apprehensive, as the next part of our travels, making our way back to Paris, is quite ambitious, and will require a lot more effort on our part!
Actually we celebrated too. We are caponata as an appetizer (not very nice) but I had very nice cod fillet and JD a fillet steak that he was pleased with. We also ordered sauteed potatoes and green peas.
As it was our last night, I wanted to order a special coffee, French Kiss. We tried to find out what it was like beforehand, but you had to order through the sommelier who was Adrian from Romania, and not the person who usually served us if JD was ordering his glass of Chardonnay.
JD ordered an Oceania coffee, and I ordered French Kiss with Grand Marnier and cognac, they were both very good, they tasted wonderful
For dessert I ordered a blood orange sorbet, which didn’t really taste of anything; JD ordered a chocolate hazelnut hot pudding, and vanilla ice cream, and it was beautiful.
Then we searched unsuccessfully for our friends the Australian couple before we retired. When we did so, I packed away the clothes I’d been wearing to dinner, and we put two bags outside our room with labels as requested. as requested. By now there were several others out as well, and they were all far bigger than ours! Although ours were a bit heavy for us, we were so glad they weren’t any larger!
Then we put out our breakfast order, and tried to sleep. One of the advantages of ordering room service breakfast is that they ring you before it comes – it’s better than an alarm clock! Just before 6 am our tray came, and we were already at Piraeus. It did not seem particularly attractive!
So we showered, left the stateroom and duly waited in one of the lounges for our group to be called to disembark. Than we walked through and picked up our luggage before getting a taxi into Athens to Hotel Adrian.
Traffic was pretty gridlocked, but we eventually reached Hotel Adrian. And what a nice receptionist! Our room was almost ready, although it was several hours before check in time. Meanwhile he answered all our questions about climbing the Acropolis, the whereabouts of the National Archaeological Museum, time to get to the airport, and the nearest DHL branch.
We are on the second floor of this hotel: the room has a balcony with a table and two chairs, and it’s in a busy commercial area with narrow streets of shops, churches and marble. There is a fridge and tea and coffee making facilities. There is a rooftop restaurant for breakfast. There are Picasso prints on the walls, and marble stairs, as well as an elevator. There is plenty of room, although not quite the degree of luxury we have been accustomed to over the last few days! There are masses of shopsoutside – jewellery, carpets, souvenirs, leather sandals, even furs!: it’s a strange mixture of ancient and modern. It feels strangely comfortable with itself. We decide that we like Athens very much indeed.
Nga mihi nui
Classic Barbarian 