Magnesia

The second archeological site we visited on our day in Turkey was a lesser-known site called Magnesia. There hasn't been as much restoration here. Nevertheless, it was quite impressive.

Ephesus

Our first stop on our tour in Turkey was the ruins of the city Ephesus.


Housing areas




View of a large part of the ruins


Mosaics


Temple of Hadrian


Celsus Library


Another view of Celsus Library


Gate of Augustus


Gate of Augustus and Celsus Library in the background


Theater

Kusadasi, Turkey

Our next stop on the cruise was Kusadasi, Turkey. Here, we took a tour of archeological sites in the Kusadasi region. We visited Ephesus, Magnesia, Miletus, and Didyma. These sites were absolutely incredible and we have lots of photos from each place, so I will be posting photos from each place we went. In the meantime, here are some of our photos from the port town of Kusadasi.

Athens

After a day at sea relaxing and reading, we arrived in Piraeus (the port for Athens).


View from the port

In Athens we went on a tour of the city. Our first stop was the Acropolis. There we visited the Parthenon and had beautiful views of Athens. As we left the Acropolis, we stopped at a limestone rock called Areoplagos where St. Paul preached to the Athenians.


Erechtheum


Another view of the Erechtheum


Parthenon


At the Parthenon


View from the Acropolis


Aeroplagos


View of the Acropolis from Aeroplagos

We then took a tour of the city and one of the sites we stopped at was the Olympic Stadium.



Finally, we spent a little time walking through the Plaka neighborhood, visited the New Acropolis Museum, and the Temple of Olympian Zeus.


Temple of Olympian Zeus

All in all, it was a great day in Athens!

Messina and Mt. Etna

Our first stop on the cruise was Messina, Sicily.


View from the port

From Messina we took an excursion to Mt. Etna. The further we went, the cloudier it became. However, it cleared up again as we got even further up the volcano. Our time there was pretty short, but we did get a chance to see and explore some old vents and lava flows and watch the clouds come up the side of the volcano.






If you look closely, Doc is in the center of the crater!

Rome, Part 1

Doc and I just got back from a week trip to the Mediterranean. We flew to Rome and spent a day site seeing there before boarding a cruise that would take us to Sicily, Athens, Kusadasi (Turkey), Crete, and then back to Rome. We had a great time site seeing, and I thoroughly enjoyed our two days at sea--just relaxing, sunbathing, and reading.

We had a full day of site seeing in Rome before we left for our cruise. Here are some of our favorite photos from the day.


The Colloseum


At the Roman Forum


The Roman Forum


Palatine Hill


The Pantheon


The dome of the Pantheon


Piazza Navona


Trevi Fountain


Spanish Steps


The Colloseum at night


The Colloseum at night

The Rhine in CH

We have had quite a bit of rain on the weekends this summer, but this last weekend was quite warm and sunny. We decided to take a short boat ride on the Rhine in northern Switzerland. We began in the town of Schaffhausen and two hours later ended in a town called Stein am Rhein.


Schaffhausen


On the boat looking back at Schaffhausen


A small bridge we passed under on our journey


The boat continuing to the Bodensee


Stein am Rhein


Taking the plunge from the bridge above into the Rhine!