Day 1: Travel Day & Greece
Today was the BIG day - the start of our big adventure! We were not all that excited about the L-O-N-G day of travel but honestly, we both remarked more than once after we'd arrived in Athens that as far as long travel days go, it not only went smoothly but didn't seem all that long at all. About 8:30am we got a message that our car service was arriving soon and by 8:45 we were loaded up and on our way to Miami International. We had about a twenty minute wait through security - despite having TSA - and soon were at our gate. Boarded and left for Atlanta a few minutes early and landed without any issue. Took the train from Terminal A to Terminal E for our international flight to Greece and were at the gate a good 90 minutes before take-off.
Once airborne for the international flight we settled in for the 10 1/2 hour flight. We both watched some shows/movies then had dinner and then settled in. I actually slept for several hours while Kim drifted in and out but was never fully awake, so for both of us it didn't seem long before they were coming around with a light breakfast an hour out of our final destination.
As we were eating we were approaching Greece and what I think were the best photos of the day (other than pictures of us) came when I got these shots of some of the Greek Islands.
We were off the plane in less than five minutes....the walk to customs was MUCH shorter than nearly every other international destination we've been to and there was no one in line for customs besides the about ten passengers from our plane who were ahead of us. Quickly through and met by our Viking hosts who checked us off and whisked us to the bus. Once all the luggage was loaded we set off for about an hour drive to the pier and to board the Viking Sea.
Friday morning we'd received an email from our wonderful travel agent Nancy Nelson who alerted us that we'd had our room upgraded by Viking. We had booked what was called a "Penthouse Veranda" - this is a slightly bigger room than a "Deluxe Veranda" (NOTE: ALL Viking Ocean ships have a veranda). But our upgrade was to a "Penthouse Junior Suite." Not only about 75 square feet bigger but came with several additional, nice perks. When I looked it up, had we booked the Junior Suite we'd have seen our cost increase by nearly $5,000. THANK YOU VIKING!
We went through check-in quickly, as we'd done the "Comfort Check-In" a couple of weeks ago so it was simply a matter of showing our paperwork. Got right into our room (after talking with a few couples who could not get in their rooms yet - one of our perks!). We went upstairs to the World Cafe and enjoyed lunch on the open deck with the lower 70-degree air and cool breeze gently blowing through our hair! AHHHHHH :)
As we headed back to the suite to see if our bags had arrived - and they had - I took a few photos of the upper decks on the ship :)
We headed up one deck (which is the top deck of the ship, other than the sports deck) and went to the Explorer's Lounge for a pre-dinner drink. I had my "signature" drink, a frozen mudslide. And then we went downstairs to the "specialty restaurant," Manfredi's. This not only is one of our favorite restaurants on any cruise ship .... but of any restaurant anywhere! And the cool think about Viking Ocean cruises compared to other "big ship" cruises - Viking's specialty restaurants do NOT come at an additional cost, you just need to make reservations in advance.
Tomorrow we will be up early and off the ship by 9am for a five hour excursion around Athens, highlighted by spending time on the Acropolis - a big "bucket list" item for me since my days of teaching World History.
No comments:
Post a Comment