More reporting - if you have not been to Ephesus you really should go - it's amazing.

We made a second trip out to Ephesus on Sunday so we could spend more time at the Terrace Houses. It was much less crowded than last week and as mentioned above, much cooler. The terrace houses are a group of houses that are probably 2000 years old – maybe a little older. They are in between the upper and lower cities and were apparently the houses of the aristocrats and officials of the city. One of the big groups on board had a dinner in Ephesus at night and many people went to the concert so the Voyager was all but deserted – a little spooky to move about at 8PM and see no other people until you arrived in the restaurant..


Cats of Ephesus – the little kitten was having great fun attacking the other cats tails.


You walk right through the ruins – they have done a nice job of putting together pieces of the ruins so you can picture what it must have looked like.


Inside the Terrace Houses – just to give you some idea of the scale of the excavation


A view to one of the wall paintings – two thousand year old paint job!


The library of Celsus – they’ve restored the façade so you have an idea for the grandeur of the building and the city

Tuesday we were back in Rhodes – what a difference being the only cruise ship in port makes. We wandered about on our own mostly in the old town – I was fascinated by the Street of the Knights – which still follows the plan of the old medieval town. Some restoration was done by the Italians in the 1930s but these buildings are more original than most of the other buildings in Rhodes (which were destroyed by explosions and earthquakes and completely rebuilt when the Italians occupied the island). Jim and I found a nice neighborhood away from the tacky souvenir bazaar and had grilled sea bream for lunch on a shady terrace. This time we tried a bottle of white wine from Rhodes – the local wine is good.

Wednesday we had two ports: Kos in Greece in the morning and Bodrum in Turkey in the afternoon. Both were delightful. We easily could have spent more time in both. Kos is actually green unlike many of the other islands and apparently is known for its gardens and lettuce. They had a devastating earthquake in 1934 which flattened all the villages but also uncovered extensive Roman and pre-Roman ruins. The ancient agora is two blocks up from the port and you can just wander through. There is also a Roman house with frescos and mosaic floors similar to what we saw in Ephesus, but not as extensive or as elaborate. They also have Greek ruins from the 2nd century BC – they’ve unearthed a temple, a stadium, a fairly large theatre and some baths. Again, you can just wander through all of this. Kos is also known as the place where Hippocrates did much of his teaching and there are ruins of the Aesclepion where people came from all over the ancient world both to study healing and also to take various cures. There are cats all over the town – including tons of kittens. They did not seem at all frightened of people and they would come right up to be pet (knowing cats I’m pretty sure they were looking to mooch some food). They didn’t seem to be pets, but they weren’t starving and afraid either.

There was a big TexMex lunch on the pool deck while we sailed from Kos to Bodrum. Bodrum is a yachting town and a big resort for the Turkish upper classes. There is an excellent castle build by the Knights of Saint John in the 1300s and still standing – there is a museum of underwater archeology there. You have to go through the museum to get to the castle and it is fascinating – they have recovered ships from the second century BC and have interesting exhibits on life in the Aegean for the past two millennia. Bodrum was known in ancient times as Halicarnassus - there's nothing left of the famous Mausoleum as the Knights used the ruins to build their castle! If you like boats, the harbor is worth walking around – there is a whole fleet of gullets – some for tourist day trips but most seem to be privately owned and a separate marina for the modern ocean going yachts. There were a lot of dive boats so I’m guessing this is also an excellent place for diving – the water is crystal clear.

We are having a much needed sea day today - tomorrow we are in Dubrovnik and then onto Venice and then home.

I have taken over a thousand pictures so I'll have lots of editing to occupy my time on the long flight home.

Cheers for now,
Mary Ellen