I write this blog with the Ukraine war present as a disturbing cloud on the mood of our pleasant cruise. As I mentioned in my previous blog, the cruise schedule is very busy in the upcoming weeks in the Mediterranean. In fact, we will be in port on seven consecutive days, including two days (and one night) in Venice. So my upcoming blogs will combine several ports, with as many photos as the ship’s internet will enable.
Posts by: Dallas Smith
Malaga, Spain, has been called “the Florida of Spain.” It is an ancient city (second in age only to Cadiz) founded by the Phoenicians almost three thousand years ago.
Until today’s port visit, Cadiz was just a name I had encountered sometime in the past. I didn’t know anything at all about it. Now at the end of the day, I feel enriched by learning about this city, as well as having visited an historic village named Vejer de la Frontera.
What a difference the distance of three sea days between Cape Verde and Madeira makes! The country of Madeira, like Cape Verde, also discovered and settled by the Portuguese, is the opposite of Cape Verde. The population of both countries is similar, around a quarter million inhabitants. Both countries are of volcanic origin. They both[…]
I first heard of Cape Verde Islands in the title of a jazz composition by pianist Horace Silver, The Cape Verdean Blues.
Several blog readers have requested a description of our cruise life.
Montevideo, Uruguay–Where the Tango Was Born Let me begin by saying that I knew nothing about Uruguay when the Viking Star docked in Montevideo. Unfortunately, the port of Montevideo is perhaps the least attractive that I’ve ever seen. Off to one side of the dock was a graveyard of rusting decaying ships, many of them[…]
This blog will describe Southern Chile: Puerto Montt, two impressive glaciers, Punta Arenas, and our transit around Cape Horn, the southernmost part of Tierra Del Fuego, South America.