All Cruises are not created equal - this was 1998.
As I get a little older and the urge to travel finally starts to diminish, I am reminded of some of our more unusual journeys. One in particular came about as the result of an American department store travel ad while we were wintering in Arizona. A repositioning cruise according to the ad, a bargain price and a full month at sea. I read further and my head was buzzing with excitement as I saw the amazing itinerary that was presented. I could hardly wait to dash off and sign on the dotted line. Hubby looked at the ad and agreed that it sounded like a good trip. We were told that the ship was part of a Greek Line and was currently cruising for the winter in South America, but would be heading back to its summer home in Greece in March.
At the travel agent's we looked at the itinerary again, Rio de Janiereo to Athens, Greece, 30 days on the Greek Ship Odysseus, marveled at the cheap price we were getting and headed home to Edmonton to prepare for the “big trip.” This included visas to get into Brazil and yellow fever shots to get into Africa. Eventually we were on our way. We had been to Brazil before and were looking forward to the trip (on the previous trip the plane wheels stuck and we circled for an hour before the wheels came down for landing, but that's another story). Enroute, we had an overnight stop in Atlanta and arrived just in time for a terrible rain storm. It didn’t slow us down though, we went for a tour of CNN and watched some of their shows being taped. It was before the days of Anderson Cooper which would have made it more interesting.
The next morning we continued our flight south and eventually landed in Rio de Janiero which I found to be far more up to date than I had remembered.. We got a taxi and headed to the dock for our ship, but when we got there couldn’t see a cruise ship, only an old rundown boat (in car terms, think clunker) which was quite small and had obviously seen better days. We went closer and looked at the side – Odysseus was the name painted in bold letters. After the initial shock, we realized this was it so we headed through customs and up the gangplank where we were welcomed aboard. We eventually learned that this ship had been owned by a number of cruiselines and had several different names before being acquired by the Greek Line. It had a passenger capacity of 400 but because we were on a long repositioning cruise, the ship was far from full, in fact there were only 128 passengers. The cabins were spacious but one would have to be generous to consider them as good as utility grade. The kitchen was down the hall from us and all the crew were smokers so there was always the smell of smoke seeping into the room. Some of the entertainers were in the next room and they tended to stay up late. Nevertheless, it looked like an exciting adventure was about to begin and the passengers were quick to start interacting with each other.
The adventures on that journey would fill a book so I won’t even try to go into them, but after a day tour of Rio de Janiero which included visiting the very famous Corcovada, Christ the Redeemer statue, we set sail. Our first stop was Salvadore, Brazil for another day of touring, then out to sea where we began our trip across the Atlantic Ocean. When we reached the Equator there was an initiation ceremony held by Neptune and his helpers for first time crossers. Hubby had crossed before so he just sat and laughed as I had spaghetti and tomato sauce dumped on me (we were told to wear our bathing suits) and then hosed down and given a certificate as proof of participation. There was a small swimming pool on board so after a good hosing down, everyone jumped into the pool.
We had good weather for the crossing, usually around 90 F., and in the evenings we had a number of guest lecturers who gave us presentations on various topics including the history of cruise ships. There were female dancers who performed on several occasions and had doubled as Neptune's helpers during our initiation ceremony. They had also been put to work showing us how to react to an emergency drill and how to wear our life preservers. Putting one’s clock ahead by an hour each day is a challenge to getting a good sleep at night but we were usually so tired at the end of the day that we slept no matter what the time was. The ship’s crew did a good job keeping us entertained and we met many interesting people including a former ambassador.
After six days at sea, we reached the Canary Islands, then to Africa and Dakar, Senegal, a place of extreme poverty. We bought a number of souvenirs but since we had not booked a tour we were hesitant to go very far from the dock. I remember being approached and asked for soap. The next day was the Greek Easter celebration and the Captain, first officers and crew performed Greek dances for us. We continued to Lisbon, Portugal, Barcelona and Cadiz, Spain and toured a fascinating place called Alhambra. Our tour guide for Alhambra was a Spanish man who surprised us when he started talking Japanese to some other tourists. He noticed our bewilderment and exclaimed that his mother was Japanese and that was why he was fluent in Japanese as well as Spanish and English. Alhambra had amazing architecture and a strong colourful history.
The journey continued with something new every day including Messina, Sicily (where we could see Mount Etna in the distance) the Isle of Capri (where I got lost for about an hour when our tour guide took off her red coat and I couldn't find her) Rome, Monte Carlo and eventually, because we were on a small ship, we were able to go through the Corinth Canal to Greece. This was a canal that had been started by Napoleon but not completed until much later. We had a full day in a small Greek town and the next day we docked in Athens and headed to the airport for the long flight home. The ship was sold not long after that but for hubby and me, we felt we had completed an unforgettable adventure.
