Back to the ship.

The Equinox is the same as the Eclipse.  It’s insane, but it’s SO the same that it doesn’t even occur to me that I’m in a different place most of the time.  So instead of insane it seems normal, but it’s not.  It’s weird.

 

So to have a place be the same is one thing, but there are things about the people here that are the same too.  Even when they’re different people.  So when I walk through security I’ll think to myself.  “Oh yeah, you’re the friendly one,” or “you’re the one who’s going to scowl at me for no reason this time.”  Less scowling here in general actually than on the Eclipse.  Celebrity seems to recruit different ethnicities for different departments too.   This is not a good thing for breaking down stereotypes.  There are many exceptions, but a lot of the time people look like what they do. 

 

But beyond all of that there are several people that I’ve seen around that replace specific other people in my mind, like, “the spiky haired chick who hangs out at the bar,” and, “the security guy who stands there just like that,” and the one security girl is also strikingly similar.  There are others, but I know that the mind is a sorting machine so the similarities are somewhat manufactured and as I get to know any of these people, the similarities will surely fade, but for now; striking.

 

Just a note here.  This particular paragraph is about a week younger than the paragraph before.  Some people’s similarities fade, in part I believe, because the new people begin to inhabit and take over the places in my memory that the Eclipse people were before, and thus I merge rather than compare.  Sort of like the cuckoo chick pushing the competition out of the nest.  BUT there are some people though that defy differentiation, stubbornly remaining so similar to someone else that they do nothing but remind me of that other person.  I won’t name any names, but when Annette, who I was with on Eclipse, comes aboard next cruise, I will have to ask her for a ruling.

 

The rest of this post will be heavy on pictures, so I can just catch up to current events and not get too bogged down.

 

1st Port.  Sicily, Italy.  City – Messina.

 

Didn’t get off the ship today.  Too much training.  Next time.  Sicily is barely an island.  You could throw a rock and hit it from the mainland.

 

 

Second Port.  Piraeus, Greece.  (near Athens)

 

Did just a bit of walking.  Ate a peach.  Good one too.

 

And this is a picture of the most exciting thing that I saw at the port that day.  If you can’t figure out why, you might ask Jon Hiskes.  And Jon, I found a copy of Brief Interviews with Hideous Men in the crew library that I’ve been reading.  And you might note that this ship is no longer branded Celebrity, but someone on the ship told me that this ship used to be Celebrity, so I’m betting that this is the one.

 

Third Port.  Kusadasi, Turkey.  (near Ephasus)

 

Well Kusadasi was awesome.  What can I say.  I got a fantastic shave and haircut from Tomas the barber.  He is clearly the best.  I kid you not, it was just like the Bugs Bunny cartoon.  Shampoo, towel, haircut, lather, shave, aftershave, wax the ear hairs, wax the upper cheek, lotion, massage face, rinse whole head, dry, powder, blow dry, massage neck and arms.  Wow.

Dylan getting the treatment.

 

Then Tomas sent us across the street for Kebabs.  Second best decision of the day.  The lamb was incredible.  The flatbread was baked to order in their wood fired oven.   It was also Wow.

Did I mention that my first two new friends’ names on the ship are Brian and Dylan?

 

Hey look Jon and Celia, Donair!

They turned our lawn into a lounge.

 

Port Four.  Rhodes, Greece.

Nice old city.  Acceptable internet.  Lousy service.  How’s that for boiling it down.

Yeah, maybe you should expand your horizons.

 

Port Five.  Santorini.  -  A Big Day.

 

I skipped training and we rented ATV’s.  Nuff Said.

Do you see the zigzag path going up the cliff?

 Yeah.  We took the tram.

Helen.

 Ian.

Ryan.

I can barely express what public nuisances we were today.  I can’t believe they put up with this.

Woah. Fish and Octopus.  Sadly we didn’t eat that.

This was our super awesome doggy friend.  I think he recognized that we were pack animals and he tried to get us to stay by nipping our ankles, and then he ran beside the ATV’s for a good mile up an incredibly steep hill in the blistering heat.  We loved him.

Go Dancers!  My friends are so talented!

The entirety of the islands around Santorini are part of the crater formed from the largest volcanic eruption the world has ever known.

There are hardworking donkeys that take people up and down the path.  The others rode.  I probably should have too, but I wanted to walk.

The path.

The end of an epic day.  Best yet.  More to come.

 

Port Six.  Mykonos, Greece.

 

We had to make a conference call to Corning today.  The venue wasn’t so bad though.

People said this beach was not the best.  It seemed pretty good to me.

Hi.  We’re calling from the beach.

 

Later on tonight there was a big birthday party for Jason from a-capella.  That was pretty amazing.  It was down in the depths of the ship in crew bar where there’s lots of loud music and dancing.  It reminded me that you hear a lot of techno on the ship, and a lot of Lady Gaga and such.  It pretty much never changes.  Good time though.

 

Port Seven.  Naples, Italy.

 

There are other stories and photos about Naples in the other post, but here’s a little throwback to how I was doing my blog on the Appalachian trail.  This was back on the ship after the port.

And that was a pretty amazing way to end the first cruise.