We have been home for 3 weeks now. Our schedule has finally returned to normal. At least normal for the holiday season. It took me a lot longer to get back into the groove of creating this blog than I ever expected. I don’t know why, but things kept getting in my way. I am glad to have finished it. Doing so helped me to relive the experiences. That is what motivates me to do this in the first place. The blog is really my journal. One day mobility issues may force us to stop traveling. That will be a good time for me to crack open Happy Wanderers.
In the meantime, if this effort helps to keep you informed about our adventures, I hope it does it with some enjoyment.
Right after we got home Alice saw our podiatrist to assess the extent of her foot injury. What we thought was an ankle sprain turned out to be a fractured third toe. X-rays revealed that it had already started to heal, but it will take several more weeks to heal completely. Alice continues to have pain but it is getting better with the passage of time.
I was feeling left out, so started having significant pain in my right leg. I was diagnosed with a baker’s cyst behind my right knee last May. That was a secondary finding during an exam for blood clots. None of those were present. Because I did not have any pain I declined the injection that was offered. They don’t drain these cysts anymore. There is less risk in doing the injection. I was told I might develop pain eventually or the cyst might rupture and cause the feeling of water running down the inside of my leg. I decided to deal with that as events arose. Three days before the cruise ended I started having to deal with the pain. I made a doctor’s appointment the day after we got home. The earliest he could see me was two weeks later. The outcome was that I had the injection. Wow, the pain was almost gone the next day. I walked 3.3 miles on my volunteer shift at the hospital today. No pain no worries.
But I digress. My goal is to share our reaction to this journey. During the entire five weeks, we did not experience anything that we wished we had excluded.
The sights in Turkey exceeded our expectations a lot. We had not anticipated how many archeological sites there are in Turkey. The natural features also abounded. Cappadocia really caps those off well. The size of the cities and their populations make Chicago and New York seem like villages to us. Our guide and fellow travelers contributed to this positive experience. We have concluded that we are not good candidates for organized land tours. The early rising and bags out are not our thing. We will consider tours that provide independent travel in the future.
Our three days in Athen were a perfect segue to the cruise. We relaxed and limited our explorations to the neighborhoods around our charming hotel. This worked for us because we had been here before and covered the major sights then. This had us very mellow when we boarded the ship. Our first cruise through the Greek Islands was also done in a laid-back way.
So, we still had a good energy level when the second cruise started. It was good but not good enough. We ran out of gas in Alexandria with our explorations in Egypt. The pace was intense. The coach rides were long. The tour departure times were too early. But we managed. We paced ourselves through the Holy Lands and felt that we had accomplished all that we wanted to there.
We had a wonderful time. The memories linger on. Looking ahead continues to excite us. We are always asked what is next. In January we will take a seven-day Disney cruise. We are anxious to see how they cater to the various ages on their cruise. In July we will celebrate Sean’s September milestone birthday. We will take Sean and Shelly on a Norway Intensive cruise on Azamara. We are all looking forward to this. Even though it is eight months away the excitement is building. In between, we will try to do a road trip to avoid some of the winter weather here.
Thank you for your interest in our travels and for following this blog. It has been fun to share it with you.
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