Team Salazar

Welcome, folks, to our website.  It's been a while and Michael has just been able to post all our photos from our recent Three Continents Cruise.  We left Seattle on November 27, 2007, for Dulles Airport in Washington, D.C. and caught our flight to Rome.  The trips were easy and uneventful although I worried unnecessarily about catching the connecting flight.  We arrived on the 28th in Rome, met our Princess representative, and picked up our almost 200 lbs. of luggage -- after all we were embarking on a 24 day trip!  We were taken to the port city of Civitavecchia where we embarked the Royal Princess, a much smaller cruise ship than we're used to, which carried only about 600 passengers.  Our cabin was spacious with a balcony.  The thing we love most about cruising is that we only have to unpack once, put everything away, and not worry again about packing up until it's time to leave.  After unpacking, we always check the dining options because, although we always ask for a 2-person table when we book, there's no guarantee we're actually assigned one.  A 2-person table is an absolutely must for us.  After two attempts, we were finally assigned a lovely table right next to a very large window at the rear of the ship which we enjoyed every evening for almost the entire trip with the exception of two dinners at the specialty restaurants - Sterling Steakhouse and Sabatini's.  Both of us, by the way, were fantastic.  The food in the dining room was very good but not exceptional as it had been on other cruises.  There seemed to be an inordinate amount of lamb dishes and fish.  I don't eat lamb but Michael likes fish so I enjoyed many of the vegetarian dinners they prepared.  The desserts, of course, were fantastic.  We had a very restful routine the days when we were at sea - we love at sea days - usually having breakfast in our cabin, attending one of the lectures, going to the gym, having lunch, watching a movie in our cabin - Michael travels very well (he brought our own DVD player) - walking a couple of miles in the afternoon around the track, going to a craft class or another lecture, reading, having a lovely dinner and enjoying the evening's entertainment.  What was amusing was the fact that many of the guests were older, seasoned cruisers.  We were probably two of the youngest (at 61 and 56) .  Anyway, each morning the Cruise Director would announce the day's activities on the TV and each day he talked about DJ Mark in the lounge waiting for people to show up.  After about two weeks, we decided to go to the lounge one evening.  We arrived around 10 p.m. and the band, Legacy, was playing to an absolutely empty bar!  We were the only two in the lounge and they did a full set for us!  Apparently, it was like this every night.  Well, we decided to return at 11:45 to see if anyone came to hear the DJ.  Well, no surprise there.  Not a soul arrived!  We celebrated our anniversary on the 15th.  My sister in law ordered us the champagne breakfast which could have fed 8 people and we enjoyed a fabulous dinner at the Sterling Steakhouse, compliments of our dear friends, Sharon and Paolo.  Because we were traveling during the holidays, the ship was decorated beautifully and had Hanukkah and Christmas celebrations throughout the cruise.  Best of all, I returned home after 24 days without gaining an ounce!  Really! 

And, now, a few words about the different ports we visited.  We were tendered to our first port, Portofino, Italy, a lovely small town which catered to a very wealthy clientele during peak season from the looks of the high-end stores that were already closed up.  Bathrooms, however, were very difficult to find!  Monte Carlo, Monaco was bustling at the time and we were amazed to see the entire hillside covered with high rise apartments.  The harbor was busy with many restaurants which had outdoor seating and lots of shops.  Booths were being set up for the Christmas holidays which sold vegetables, pastas, decorations and toys.  Snow machines were working overtime to add to the look of the holiday season.  Barcelona, Spain was a lovely city where we took one of the cruise ship's guided tours.  I found the architecture of Antoni Gaudi very interesting and the construction of the Sagrada Familia, a Catholic Church, started in 1882 even more fascinating.  Its construction relies on donations so when there's money, they build, when there's not enough money, they stop.  I can't remember how many spires the Church was supposed to have, but I believe they've completed only half of them since 1882!  The one thing I regret not doing in Gibraltar was taking a tour to see the apes of Gibraltar.  Most of the tours centered on the cable cars and because Michael doesn't like heights, I was concerned we'd go on one of the tours and end up having to go up or down on the cable cars.  We probably should have taken a cab ride just to see the apes but didn't think they were as interesting as they turned out to be after we saw the DVD on the ship.  Although they warned people not to feed them, the apes (only about 2 feet tall) were very friendly and mischievous and seemed to enjoy all the attention they received from the tourists.  Gibraltar had dozens of jewelry shops because there's no valued added tax in Gibralatar.  Although at the very southern tip of Spain, it's English so the pound, not Euro, is the currency there.  We were supposed to go to Marrakesh, Morocco, but that was cancelled for security reasons before we left home.  Instead, we went to Tenerife, Canary Islands (named for its dogs [canaria] and not canaries, by the way) where the most interesting sight was a Santa Claus playing an accordion in the street.  There's a photo of him to the right of this blog.  My favorite port on the cruise was Dakar, Senegal.  It's an incredibly poor city (and country as well, I'm sure).  The country gained its independence from France in 1960 and it seemed as if there hadn't been any maintenance of the city since then. We did take a guided tour here because we received very stern warnings about crime in Dakar.  When we arrived in port, there would have been no where for us to go on our own from the ship.  (You'll see pictures taken from our balcony of the dock.)  Our guide, David, spoke at least six languages.  One of our stops was to a Catholic Church.  I was most impressed with the Church itself and even more impressed with the way the people dressed.  Everyone wore their finest clothes.  The women wore either Western or traditional multi-colored buba dresses, the men wore suits, white shirts and ties, the boys wore suits and the girls wore frilly little dresses.  Here, in the richest country in the world, I've seen people go to Church in shorts, t-shirts, flip flops and jeans, yet, in probably one of the poorest countries in the world, people still dress when they go the house of God.  This definitely left a lasting impression on me.  We also stopped at a shopping center.  Let me tell you, the sellers in Dakar, make the guys at the Grand Bazaar in Istanbul look like slackers!  I told our guide what I was looking for and she took us to one of the little shops, which actually looked like an up-ended cargo container, but on the way there, every other seller would grab by arm and say, "Mama, come look what I've got,"  "come, what are you looking for, Mama?"  For example, one of the items several people were selling were pictures made from butterfly wings.  Well, I couldn't even look at the pages with the pictures because the sellers were so aggressive and I didn't want to look too interested.  Outside the bus, numerous women were trying to sell us little dolls that they carried in their headdresses - the women would say, $5 each, 2 for $5, 3 for $10, etc. etc.  Two things we could not find in Dakar were postcards and kitchen magnets, which is all we buy for ourselves at this point because we don't need anything else.  When we left Dakar, we headed west across the Atlantic Ocean, then south and crossed the Equator and went to Fortaleza, Brazil.  We weren't interested in any of the guided tours offered, so Michael found one of the tour guides who spoke Spanish, who found us a cab to take us somewhere to do a little shopping.  The cab driver, who spoke only Portuguese, the native language of Brazil, waited for us while we shopped and then returned us to the ship.  We enjoyed the rest of the day on board and watched from our balcony dolphins playing in the water.  Because of weather conditions, we were unable to stop at Devil's Island, and went directly to the island of Dominica.  It was very hot and humid so we took a car into the little town.  The people were very friendly in Dominica and more than one person wished us a "good morning" as we walked along.  The vendors were very easygoing and many asked us if this was our first time in Dominica and how did we like the island.  They were not aggressive sellers and encouraged us to pick things up with no obligation to buy.  St. Barthelemy, another island, was not very interesting at all.  It, too, catered to a very exclusive crowd and we felt as if we were walking on Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills.  On the 22nd of December, we returned to Fort Lauderdale where we waited several hours to catch our flight to Charlotte and then home to Seattle.  We're not planning any cruises this year but next year, God willing, we're hoping to take a Northern Europe cruise.

On a recent trip to Denver for my new grand nephew Cameron's Baptism, my niece (Cameron's Mom), Carolyn, and I took the opportunity to "indoor skydive" at SkyVenture. I had always wanted to know what skydiving felt like but never had the opportunity when I was younger to actually do it. As I've gotten older, actual skydiving was out of the question but I heard about "indoor skydiving" in Las Vegas but I haven't been there in over ten years. When SkyVenture opened in Colorado, I knew this was the time! So, here's the proof - I'm in purple and black and Carolyn is in red and blue (in case you couldn't tell the difference.) It was lots of fun and Michael took great photos. (In case you're wondering, no, Michael wouldn't "skydive" - he doesn't like heights - heck, he doesn't like being as tall as he is!)