Why yes I'd love to sea the Mediterranean!

A once in a lifetime splurge...honeymoons are good excuses for that right? My husband and I were so blessed to be able to go on a 12 day Mediterranean Cruise, a trip I have little to no complaints about, I will go with no complaints!

Neither of us had been on a cruise before and were slightly unsure about the experience awaiting us, but we were pleasantly surprised. We went through Princess and felt the ship and employees were fantastic.

Stops.....

This is Monaco, a place for the rich. A small sovereign city state located on the French riveria. It was beautiful and very swanky, we enjoyed the couple of hours we spent there and it was perfect for a cruise stop, but I would not recommend it as a vacation destination.

On the left is a picture of the a beautitful Chapel in Florence and to the left, I am holding up that old leaning tower of Pisa, someone had to do it. I highly reccommend visiting Florence, it is such a quaint town filled with European culture and yummy foods, I could even spend a couple days there, probably no longer. The leaning tower of Pisa was great, but it's about an hour drive South (?) of Florence and if the cost isn't crazy than I would go, but it's lofty than I think it'd be fine to skip, what you see if what you get.

Naples. We only spent a couple of hours wondering the streets, it was beautiful and fun to see, but again, good for a day trip in my humble opinion.

These are the ruins of Pompei, about a 30 minute drive from Naples and I highly recommend seeing them. I thought it was incredibly fascinating to see it all. So much of Pompei is still intact after all this time.

Rome! Glorious! I loved Rome and feel like it would be easy to spend a number of days there, the city seemed so alive. It was full of ancient beauty and yet young ambition, something about it was intriguing.

Athens and the Acropolis. I thought the Acropolis was pretty cool to see, but not worth going out of the way for. My husband and I were not impressed much with Athens, maybe it was the economy, but it just seemed grey and lonely.

Mykonos!! I am in love! This was the Greece I pictured, the greece from Mama Mia! It is a small island surrounded by gorgeous blue waters and lovely people. We heard the nightlife there is great there as well. We rented a scooter and cruised around the island, ending up on a lovely beach.

A cute little restaurant in the middle of town.

Istanbul. This was a really fun city to see. HUGE. There were shops galore, the picture above is of a large market full of bizzare items. The one below is a temple, there were a lot of these to tour. I definitely recommend this location for a 1-2 visit.

Kusadasi. Fun small town. Definitely a day trip at most.

Ephesus!!!! One of the coolest places I've ever seen.

Ephesus was an ancient Greek city and later a major Roman city. In the AD 50s Paul from Christianity lived in Ephesus. Everything was still so intact, walking around felt surreal and the history was fascinating.

Hmmm....

Venice. This was a unique view, from the deck of our ship as we entered the canal.

If you have not been to Venice I would put it at the top of your list. My husband and I had both been there before this trip and we both LOVE this place. The atmosphere is so unique and romantic, it's unlike any place I've ever seen and I have never experienced or heard anything negative about Venice.

 Favorite place to hang, the back deck. We would eat dinner while sailing away from each port, watching the sunset each night. One evening we saw some dolphins chasing the ship:)

 The Theatre, it was surprisingly large and there was some great entertainment each night.

Great experience, great cruise ship, great cruise line and great Ports, we were very impressed overall and would recommend it to anyone wanting to see a large variety of places in one trip.