Day 12: Istanbul to Gallipoli to Cannakale

Day 12:  Istanbul – Gallipoli – Cannakale

As promised, we were picked up at 6.30 am.  Four other Aussies were also picked up before we left Istanbul and headed for Gallipoli.  At Ercebat, the town closest to the Gallipoli Peninsula, we were ushered, first into a little coffee shop and then to a restaurant where they served us a very nice meal.

Before getting back into the minibus for the tour of Gallipoli, we spent about 20 minutes at an open air museum that was made with the help of the Turkish government in about 2006.   The whole town was cleaned up as part of the project and before/after photos are proudly displayed.  There is a massive statue honouring all players in WW1 – the soldiers from each side, a  weeping mother and others.  Then there is a huge model of the peninsular, with the various locations marked on it.   It has been very well done. In another area is a model of the trenches with Turkish soldiers in it.   The last feature of the open air display is a line of busts of prominent militiary personnel from the Turkish side.

From Ercebat, our guide, who introduced himself as ‘’Bulant – but you can call me Bill”, had us captivated the whole afternoon with his very extensive knowledge of the Gallipoli campaign.    We started at “Brighton Beach” , the beach the ANZACs were meant to land at.  Here Bill used a map to tell in great detail,  the background to the attack, from both the Turkish side and the Allies’ side.  He went on to describe the various battles, which troops were involved and what territory was gained in each.  By the time he had finished this first half hour or so, I already felt that I knew so much  more about the campaign.

We spent the rest of the afternoon in and out of the bus, going to Anzac Cove,  the site of current ANZAC Day ceremonies, Lone Pine, The Nek, some of the Aussie trenches, the main Turkish cemetery and finally, Chanuk Bair.  This is the highest point on the peninsular and the point that the Allies were ordered to capture.  Bill told us that the New Zealand troops did capture it, but only for two nights.  The Turkish forces then recaptured it and drove the Allies back.  Apart from those two nights, the ANZACs never claimed any more than 2km inland from Anzac Cove. 

Bill told us also of the Turkish commemoration of March 18^th, when they gained victory over the British by sinking six British war ships.  This is a huge day for the Turks and they hold ceremonies on that date, just as we do on April 25^th.  He also pointed out that Lone Pine is the important place of commemoration for Australians but Chanuk Bair has that importance for New Zealanders.

All in all, we were most impressed with Bill’s contribution to the day.  Roger, Robyn and Damien all enjoyed their first look at Gallipoli and I felt I gained so much from having a second day there.

Bill saw us onto the ferry to cross to Cannakale.  We found our hotel very close by.   It was the Anzac Hotel and Lonely Planet had given it a very good write up, so were were very pleased that our tour company had booked us there.  We are still not sure that the Lonely Planet reviewer hadn’t had his/her palm greased in giving this review – we found it an hotel which had rather a bit too much ‘’character’’.  However, it was a bed with clean sheets and a shower for the morning, so it was fine for one night.

Day 11: Budapest to Istanbul

Day 11:    Budpest to Istanbul

There is very little to report as it was mostly spent in transit.  No problems getting to Budapest airport by taxi and then flying out.  We were unsure if we would be seeing Robyn and Damien as planned bcause flights out of Amserdam were uncertain because of the heavy snow.

There was certainly no snow as we flew into Istanbul.   Once inside the air terminal, we bought our Visas as required and were leaning over our bags zipping them up, when we became aware of a man standing infront of us.  It crossed both our minds that we might be about to be questioned about something, but on looking up, to our delight we discovered Damien’s face at the other end of the body!!!

They had been later than they hoped getting to Istanbul, but at least they were there.  Their plane touched down at almost the same time as ours.  We were planning on getting an airport bus and then a taxi to our hotel, but Rob and Damien had used Lonely Planet’s help to work out how to get there by light rail and tram, so we happily went with their plan.  The nearest stop to our hotel was right at the Blue Mosque, so even though it was dark by then, we got a sight of it and Hagai Sofia.   According to Lonely Planet, our hotel was just a couple of streets away.  It may have been, but they were cobbled streets, narrow and windy with Istanbul’s crazy traffic zooming down them – not exactly conducive to pulling two 20kgsuitcases after us.    However, we eventually found our quaint hotel and happily booked in.

From now until next Monday, we are not sure what adventures we may have.  We are booked on a six day tour that takes us to Gallipoli, Troy, Ephesus, Hierapolis, Pammukale and Cappadocia.   However we have read very mixed reviews on Trip Advisor, and so we are not at all sure how it will go. We are prepared to make our own arrangements if we need to, but all four of us being optimistic in outlook, we are hoping for good things.  The principal of the company we have booked with has visited us in our hotel tonight, mainly to collect final payment but also to give us final details, so that is so far all looking good.  We will keep our fingers crossed!

Roger's day in Salzberg

This is Roger's account of his day 6:

Set out at 9am and saw lovely knee-deep snow covered hills/alps.   But the 2 hour drive from Passau became 2 and a half hours on the bus with holdups on the freeway.  Arrived 11.30ish and the first stop for many was the WC.  Aloing the way commentary from the guide and some Mozart music kept us entertained.

Arriving in Salzberg, we saw the house where Mozart lived during his teens til 17 years old, until he left home and evetually ended up in Vienna, where he died in 1791.  A number of different touristy places were vistied including showing us where McDonalds was situated!!

 One place was the Mozart chocolate store. In memory of Mozart, they started making these delicious chocolates and then eveyone started making them.  The all called them “original Mozart chocolates”.  Now only this company can make ”originals”  and the rest have to call themselves “real” Mozart chocolates or something else of their own choosing.

During the 17^th and 18^th centuries, the baroqueness of the city was created and St Peter’s Catholic Cathedral sure was!  There were gold touches everywhere and it was almost overly ornate.  The cathedral dome was bombed during WW11 and has been retored, I would say almost to its original glory.  It the various church (choir lofts) there were five organs.  One, at the back of the church,  was immense and the other four organs were much smaller.  This was to allow for polyphonic chants and choir anthems to bounce around and criss cross the church.  Each choir with its own organ and when singing together, they would be accompanied by the main organ.   I think it would have sounded absolutely stupendous!!   Mozart was born into this atmosphere in 1756 and was baptised the next day at the font of this particular church.  Hans Gruber of Silent Night fame was also baptised here. 

After time to visit places on our own, we left at 4pm, just on dark, so the journey back to the boat was just about all in darkness. 

Of course Salzberg is also notorious for its Sound of Music fame.  We never actually saw the “hill” close up that became “alive with the sound of music”.  There was actually not much there to see, with much of it filmed in a studio in Hollywood.  The cemetery scene at the end of the film was shot in the old cemetery of St Peter’s Cathedral but there is no way that there are grave stones in it which could have been hidden behind, nor a back gate to leave from to flee into the hills!   Say no more, but if you do want more, I’ll be home in 5 weeks.

Also visited Mozart’s home where he was born.  I was a little disappointed with this, the 4^th floor of a building in the middle of town (up narrow stairs) is the designated place.  There were three rooms with wooden floors, all very bare, but with planty of pictures and information on the walls and display boards but no furniture.  One room was labelled as Mozart’s birth room and again, similar to the other two rooms.  That led to the Mozart museum and apart from a piano, believed to have used by Mozart, displayed in the middle of the room, it was similar to his birth house.  Lots of interesting information though on the walls and on the many display boards.

All in all, I had a very interesting day but sorry – I have no photos as Mimmy had the camera.

Day 10: Second day in Budapest

Day 10:  2^nd day in Budapest

We disembarked the ship at 10am, catching a taxi to our hotel which is on the Buda side of the city.  The day was much better than yesterday’s  -15 degree, foggy day, and we were both now feeling OK, so after checking in to the hotel, we set off to walk to the castle district in Buda. 

This walk, up a very steep stone staircase – about 500 steps- brought us to the top of the castle district.   I had visited it briefly yesterday in the bus tour, but today’s walk gave me a better look at it.  It reminded me of The Rocks in Sydney and Battery Point in Hobart, with narrow, winding cobbled streets, set into the hillside.  Many buildings were sad reminders of the years spent behind the iron curtain. At the top of the hill is a magnificent neo-Gothic cathedral, St Mathias.  It has a very interesting feature: part of its very steep roof is tiled with mosaic tiles – no doubt from the time the Turks conquered Hungary (about 400 years ago I think).  We didn’t delve into its history at all, but it may have been turned into a mosque at that time.   Another very interesting feature was in the square a little beyond the cathedral.  There was a bronze model of it on a raised dias with what are obviously descriptions of the cathedral written in braille – no doubt Hungarian braille.  What a wonderful way to help unsighted people enjoy the cathedral too!

There were several lovely shops which were good for window shopping – and some funny sights, such as the display in a women’s wear shop where the models were elevated on Snickers boxes!

After lunching on a couple of Tony Ferguson shakes in our hotel room and doing a much needed wash of clothes in the bath (we wre going to send them to the hotel laundry, but when we worked out that it would cost us around $100, the scotch in us took over and we trampled them in the bath), we set off to the Pest side of Budapest by public transport.  Well what an experience that was!  We certainly got a taste of former iron curtain public service – it was non-existent!  As soon as we approached any of the people selling train tickets and said ‘Ënglish”, they just shook their heads and looked down.  This happened several times until finally,  a lady who only spoke German came to our rescue.  From the map she could see where we needed to go and she was able to make us understand what to ask for.   We finally got down the looooong escalator to the underground platform and onto the train which is a throw back from the 1960’s.  I think it is fair enough to say that updating of the rail infrastructure in Hungary is somewhat behind Melbourne’s Metro!  No sooner were we on the train than we were off – not a gradual pull out of the station but a sudden zero to one hundred in a couple of seconds!   It was as much as I could do to grab a rail just in time before the momentum whisked me off my feet. 

Once off at the other end, we wandered quite a while until we got our bearings.  In the wander we passed McDonalds and TGI Friday’s as well as several other familiar places, so we knew we would be right for tea.  We headed to the Danube, in search of a ‘sculpture”  which I had passed yesterday on the bus and wanted to spend time at.  We trudged and trudged along the snow-covered river bank and had nearly given up on it when I was able to identify its location from a photo I had taken yesterday and so that helped us to locate it.

The sculpture I am alluding to is so poignant: it is called The Iron Shoes.  All that is there is a line of pairs of shoes – several dozen of them along about 200m of the very edge of the river bank.  The shoes are of iron and they represent the Jews who were lined up by the Nazis, told to take off their shoes and were then shot into the Danube.

As we walked back to the centre of the city, the sun was setting with a beautiful reflection in the river, which is still laden with ice flows.

Before going to the Christmas market – our last – we went into a beautiful coffee house I had discovered yesterday.  It was built in 1858 and how it survived the Communist era and remains so beautiful, I’d love to know.  Beautifully decorated with brass fittings, elegant swags and tails on the rounded windows and a beautiful gilded (but not overdone) ceiling, it was like having coffee with Hercule Poirot on the Orient Express!   We  certainly treated ourselves to a wonderful cake as well in such a luxurious setting.

It was well and truly dark by the time we had finished looking at the market.  We sampled McDonalds Hungarian style (no different from at home except the fries were a lot more salty) and then successfully made our way back to the hotel.

We are excited to be meeting up with Robyn and Damien tomorrow – we hope – in Istanbul.  They are not certain that they will be able to fly out of Amsterdam as many flights are grounded because of the heavy snow.  However, the weather seems t be on the improve, so we all have our fingers crossed.  I don’t think we will have too much trouble flying out of Budapest but need to confirm in the morning.

Day 9: Budapest

Day 9:  Budapest

We were advised to leave one shoe each ouside our cabin door before we went to bed last night, in the expectation that we may find a surprise in the morning.  Sure enough, when we opened the door there was a large, chocolate, fairly grotesque figure, the meaning of which I am still not sure, but he/it brings small gifts of fruit or sweets to those who leave out a shoe.

As we awoke thismorning, we were sailing into Budapest.   The ship was breaking through iceflows several centimetres deep.  It was really a stunning sight with the ice, the fog and dare I say steam?- at least evaporation misting up the river bank.

Roger had a relapse of the tummy bug, so stayed in bed all morning while I went out on the shore excursion to see Budapest and its Christmas market.  All my disappointment with Vienna was washed away with the stunning beauty of Budapest – beauty of its architecture, its layout and geographical situation but also beauty of the spirit of its people.  The guide on my bus (there are usually 3 buses that go out each time), was a woman about my age.  Like the guide in Prague, she was so poignantly able to describe life behind the iron curtain and the difference now that they are free.   I will finish writing the blog and then maybe  I’ll  l pen a bit more poetry which is forming in my mind.

As a young child, when I was a keen stamp collector, the Mayar Posta (Hungarian) stamps seemed to be different somehow and I still can recall their design.  They all had a group of people with scarves or caps on their heads, all facing, I think to the left, but that is an unimportant detail.  Each denomination was a different colour but the design was always the same and the colours were all very washed out.  I thought of those stamps today and thought how totally oblivious I was at the time  to yet another story of pain and hardship within a beautiful city.

Today’s guide, Maria, described how, as WW11 was drawing to a close, the people of Hungary, imprisoned and oppressed by the Nazis, just waited for the allies to come and liberate them.  However, the allies never arrived,  just the Russians- the result of the pact between Churchill,Roosevelt and Stalin.  With the coming of the Russians, there was great rejoicing, people came out of hiding and there was dancing in the streeets.  But that only lasted for about three weeks before they gradually realised that with the Russians came Socialism and a new kind of oppression.  They were dispossessed of their property and deprived of their freedom.

The city buildings had mostly been built around 1900, in a neoGothic  or neoRenaissance style.  There is a uniformity about them, with limits to the height being three storeys.  Most are  constructed of sandstone and so in their original condition are a beautiful light golden colour.  To keep their beauty as the pollution and acid rain of the industrial age enveloped them, continual maintenance is required.   However, the Communist government allowed no money to be spent on maintenance and so one by one, the buildings fell into a state of disrepair and grey ugliness.

She described the resistance movement of 1956, after the Russians left Austria and the students – again the students- of Hungaria tried to put pressure on the Communist government to get out of Hungaria.  Several students were shot and later those who took part in the rally were severely punished, but for about two weeks, the iron curtain was relaxed and hundreds of thousands of people were able to flee Hungary for USA, Australia, Britain etc.  Was this, I wonder, the period that Damien’s mother’s family left Hungary?

Then of course, came 1990, when the Communist era came to a close, the Iron Curtain came down and the Russians left the Eastern Bloc countries.  Since then, there has been a gradual cleaning up and renovation of the buildings.  As funds are raised for renovation,  the government contributes a subsidy.  So it is that, on driving down the beautiful wide streets, it is common to see a beautifully clean building right inbetween several blackened and ugly ones.

The main streets of Budapest are wonderfully wide boulevardes.  One particular one, leads to a most beautiful monument, the Heroes' Monument, which honours two particular groups of people: firstly the seven original nomadic tribes who came from the Mongolian region to settle here around 900AD.  They are honoured with a statue in the centre of an immense  paved area.   In a semi-circle surrounding this paved area, is a wall on which are statues of all the kings of Hungary over the centuries.  It is a wonderful monument, built to coincide with the 1000 years anniversary since the tribesmen first settled here.

Budapest is divided in half by the Danube, with Buda on one side and Pest on the other.   They were two separarte cities until 1872, after a bridge linking the two cities was built.  Six more bridges have been built since then.  Buda, the more picturesque and hilly side, contains  more residential areas and also the castle district on top of a hill overlooking the city.  Pest on the other hand, is flat.  This is the commercial district and now the area of government buildings.  The photo below is of the houses of parliament.  It is a magnificent building on the banks of the Danube.  We haven't yet seen the British Houses of Parliament yet of course, but I think this building surely rivals that in grandeur.   Adding to its effect is the fact that it stands more or less alone and is not crowded by other buildings.

The Christmas market here was in some ways the best of the lot.  There were no mass produced things and most of the goods were sold by the people who made them.  It has been fascinating to see the diversity of Christmas decorations and hear the diversity of Christmas traditions in what is really such a small geographical area.  We have travelled no more than six or seven hundred kilometres, and yet the food, the traditions, the decorations and the key dates very so much.  The one common link of course, is gifts, but even who brings them differs.  In Prague, it was St Nicholas, in Germany and Austria it was Kriskindle – Baby Jesus.  I have to admit that it has been refreshing to have a whole Christmas season without “Ho, ho, ho,’ from Santa!

I can’t leave the Christmas markets without mentioning all the food at them – again diverse, according to the country.  Every second stall seems to be a seller of food of some kind and the big big thing is gluwine – a hot spiced red wine.  Gluwine is probably the only thing common to every market we have gone to.   They are crazy about it and people wander the markets drinking it to keep warm.   There is even a pot of it waiting for us when we return to the ship.  To our shame, neither Rog nor I have been tempted to even try it – it just smells too spicy.   In fact, we have not eaten at the markets at all, except for a very ordinary chicken kebab on the first day in Prague.

We both relaxed in the lounge in the afternoon and then around 5 oçlock, a group of musicians and dancers entertained us.  It was wonderful – the only one of the several such groups that we have seen because other nights it has been after dinner and we have been either too tired or too sick to go.

We had the company of an American couple with whom we have become quite friendly for dinner.  We swapped email addresses and found out that their surname is Hart!  We have dined with a variety of people over the week – mostly some of the 13 Australians amongst the 120+ Yanks.

At 9pm the ship started up again and we were treated to a wonderful cruise of the city.   It was wonderful and must include one of my shots of it.   I am very happy with my choice of camera, by the way.  I can zoom in on almost anything I want and almost never need my flash.   I just download each night onto this little computer and am ready to go again the next day.

Day 6 (Out of order)

I am really sorry, but have just realised that Day 6 completely missed out on being posted.   Will do so now – from Mim’s persprctive.  Roger is about to blog his day 6, which was spent in Salzburg, so we will post that – possibly after Day 10.

Day 6:  Mim on the ship, Roger to Salzburg

I awoke to feel much better, but had already decided that I would be better to stay on the ship rather than do the long day trip to Salzburg.  Roger went though, and I have spent a relaxing day sleeping, up in the lounge and now snuggled up in my bed, watching the river go by from our large window.

I have taken the opportunity to explore the ship a bit more today and to photograph various features of it.  Our tour guide Csaba, took us up to the wheelhouse – the bridge, where the captain gave us a very comprehensive description of all the computerised gadgets.  He amazed us when he showed us how they actually lower the wheelhouse if they need to for going under low bridges, and if that is still not low enough, he can lower the roof to about only 1m from the floor!   (For the Peck blog followers:  the captain, Rein Vols,  is an uncanny mix of Steve Dawson and Douglas Peck.)

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Roger returned raving about Salzberg, making me full of envy of course.  However, I had enjoyed my day on the ship and felt the benefit of it. 

He saw lots of Mozart sights and also lots of Sound of Music sights, including the church where Maria and the Baron were married.  He said it was fabulously Baroque.

I thought I would manage some dinner, but just got them to take it straight away again.  I may have managed but a lady we were sitting with told me the little custard-like dish I was eating (and rather enjoying) was goat’s cheese – that was the end of it!

Every evening on the ship, there is local entertainment and we have intended to enjoy it but so far we have been too tired or too sick to attend any of them. 

So I’ll just finish today’s blog with some shots from around this wonderful ship.  For those of you who will just have to do a similar cruise, we would thoroughly recommend APT.  It’s all that the glossy brochures say and more.  We upgraded to the middle price bracket so that we would have a full window, and are very glad that we did so.  However we really don’t think the higher price range with a ‘full balcony’is worth the extra money.  It certainly isn’t a wide enough balcony to sit on in summer.  We thought we would sit in our cabin and watch the scenery go by, but I find that I enjoy sitting in the lounge so I can see the view coming up.  So the equivalent sitting around in summer would be on the sun deck – currently very much the snow deck as the photo will show, rather than in the cabin which is really quite poky.  The food is wonderful – 5 courses a la carte for dinner each evening, breakfast has choices for every sort of taste (my favourite has become plain yoghurt with berries and dried apricots followed by eggs and bacon).   Lunch is also provided every day and the choice is to go to the dining room for a full buffet or to have a light lunch in the lounge.

Day 8: Vienna

Day 8:   Vienna

Thanks to all the blog followers for your comments and feedback on the blog and by email.  It's great to be able to share such a wonderful experience with you.

Amalyra pulled in to Vienna late in the afternoon yesterday.  By then, Roger was feeling OK to go out to the Mozart/Strauss concert.  Everyone dressed in their finery for the occasion – I had very neat casual but certainly not the glittery jackets and stiletto heels that some of the women wore.

The bus took us past the city while it was still lit up – around the Ringstrasse: the road which has been built over the original city moat.  It rings the main part of the city – what was all there was

 to the city really in the days before the city wall was taken down in the 1600s. Since then, of course, the city has greatly expanded, so that the Ringstrasse seems to form a road around the very centre of Vienna.

(I realise that I am telling many of your who read the blog stuff that you already know full well, but it is my diary of the trip and if I don’t record these details, I will forget them.)

The concert was held in the summer palace of the Lichenstein family. Now I don’t know if I am really dense or if something in my education has been sadly lacking, but I had always associated palaces only with royalty.  It wasn’t until coming to Vienna and learning about the many palaces that there are, or were here, that I have realised that those families who were disgustingly rich also built palaces. The two names that keep popping up in Vienna talk are Habsburg and Lichenstein.  Habsburg, we have learned were the royalty, with Marie Theresia being the Austrian equivalent of Queen Victoria.  Around a century before  Victoria, ruled here for 40 years and had something like 18 children.  She was the mother of Marie Antoinette, so obviously not all of her children died in glorious old age.  Apparently the Hapsburgs felt themselves to be so precious that they had a policy that the males should marry within the family and so maintain the wonderful Habsburg line.   Well, the obvious result of that was not only many still births but also a succession of very ugly Emperors with huge protruding jaws.  Maria Theresia who was the last of the Habsburg line, obviously escaped these terrible consequences of inbreeding (although I don’t know that she was particularly beautiful), was a very powerful ruler and is very much honoured by statues and monuments. 

Back to the concert….

As I said earlier, it was in the summer palace of the Lichenstein family – not royalty this time, but very rich and powerful.  It is they who own the country of Lichenstein and they have this palace in Vienna as their summer palace and also to house their huge collection of art:  Rubens, van Gogh and the like.  Apparently they have just paid several million euro for a cabinet which is inlaid with precious stone and that is housed at this palace.  The concerts, which I imagine are held there every night, are obviously one way of raising funds towards the upkeep of their empire.  Having said that and sounding rather too cynical, I must say that we thoroughly enjoyed the concert.  It was an orchestra of around 20 pieces, the Vienna Residence Orchestra.  Each of the members is a soloist in their own right, so you can imagine how they made their instruments sing.  I thoroughly enjoyed watching the conductor, who conducted the whole program without a note of music infront of him.  He ‘played’ the orchestra, just as if it was his instrument and was a delight to watch.   The concert was held in what must surely be a ballroom – up a magnificent marble staircase and in a richly ornate ‘room’ about the size of a house.  We were not allowed to take photos, but it was yet another example of baroque architecture, with frescoes on the ceiling and wonderful ‘marble’ columns – except I am pretty sure they are actually highly polished, coloured concrete.

It was snowing when we arrived and we had quite a way to walk from the bus to the palace entrance.  Not having our boots on, we were both a bit hesitant on the slippery surface, and we must have looked like a couple of old crocks, not casually strolling hand in hand as we often do, but tightly gripping each other’s hand like we will probably do when we are 90!

Today Roger stayed on the ship for a rest day and I joined the group going to the city for a guided tour.  It was really just a repeat of what we had seen last night, except this time in the daylight.  All the wonderful buildings were amazing of course, but I have to admit feeling a little underwhelmed by Vienna.  Could I already be getting a bit over wonderful  buildings???   We still have Istanbul, Rome, Venice, Paris, London and Amsterdam to go!!!   I think  though, that it is just that in Vienna, it’s not just a wonderful building here and there – they are everywhere, almost on top of each other.  The guide said that apart from the commercial buildings and apartments, almost every building is a concert hall of some sort.  They also have hundreds of coffee houses.  He said that if there is a building which has to be turned into something else, as was the case with the stock exchange when the computer age hit, they will most probably turn it into either a concert hall or a coffee house.  

The two Christmas  markets that I went to in Vienna were most disappointing  They were more like trash and treasure markets and didn’t have the lovely hand made things that I have found elsewhere.

We have just returned from dinner – yet another scrumptious one, but I couldn’t eat anything and Roger ate very little.  There is a new theory about the virus.  Apparently the doctor who attended one of the passengers last night told him (the patient) that there are thousands of cases in this area of Europe and he reckons there will soon be tens of thousands of cases.  Obviously someone brought it onto the ship and it spread from there.  It’s a real hoot – the topic of conversation with every group of people is who has had it, when they got it, how long they have slept for and which particular version – just vomiting or v & d. 

This being the 2^nd last night, they had a special captain’s cocktails beforehand and the captain invited several people to his table.  There were great celebrations and the atmosphere was wonderful.

Well, I’ll just add today’s photos and happily fall into bed.   We will be in Budapest when we wake up.  We will have the last of the guided shore tours and see the last of the Christmas markets.

A nice thing that happened today was that a lady selling beautiful jewellery visited the ship.  I had been given some money from one of my student’s parents to buy something for myself to remind me of their son.  I bought a most beautiful 24ct gold necklace with that money.  It is so heavy that I will have to wear it rather than put it in the suitcase for our plane trips!

Photos are of the Lichenstein palace where we went for the concert,

 one of Mozart’s various residences while he lived here,

and the Christmas market infront of the massive rathaus (Town Hall).